Post by Flamingo on Jul 24, 2003 8:39:44 GMT
Where men are men, and women are cardboard cut-outs
By Caroline Baum
July 24 2003
Everything else about Aaron Sorkin's brilliant series The West Wing is realistic and almost spookily believable, but there is something wrong with the women who walk his corridors of power. Why are they all so one-dimensional? And why is it that, while the male characters seem to bond, popping in and out of the Oval Office for cosy chats and private confidences, the women remain isolated?
West Wing men are complex and multifaceted. Their inner lives are explored through their battles with alcoholism, divorce, the anxiety of impending fatherhood or the scandal of a relationship with a call girl. Witness Toby Ziegler (Richard Schiff), the rumpled communications director, estranged from his father for years owing to his dad's unsavoury past and separated from his politically ambitious ex-wife, with whom he is now expecting twins, no less - now there's an interesting, evolving situation! Meanwhile, the women's roles stagnate rather than develop and can be summed up like this...
First Lady Abigail Bartlet (Stockard Channing): a bad-tempered, ball-breaking bitch. Clearly adores her husband, yet is always telling him off.
Press secretary C.J. Cregg (Allison Janney): carries the can for the men whenever they cock up. Her sassy comebacks at the press briefings are gifts of dialogue worthy of great Hollywood dames like Rosalind Russell and Bette Davis, but she's the shield protecting the men.
Donna (Janel Moloney): official series martyr and assistant to the insufferably immature Josh (Bradley Whitford), deputy chief of staff.
The sexual tension between them used to be funny and fizzy, but his sadism towards her, and her pouting acceptance of it, have become tedious and demeaning to both of them; he refuses to grow up and she indulges him.
Amy (Mary-Louise Parker): feminist minx whom Josh is smitten with. Another bitch and a half: wheeling and dealing, playing with Josh's affections, she speaks through a jaw so clenched there'd be no danger of her ever servicing anyone under a desk. She's ghastly, though not as dreadful as...
Ainsley (Emily Procter): blonde ventriloquist's doll briefly dangled on a string before the deputy communications director, Sam Seaborn (Rob Lowe, who has now left the show). Ainsley speaks even faster than he does, making her virtually unintelligible, and is a Republican, which is supposed to engender some feisty repartee between them - kind of like Tracy and Hepburn on crack. But it can't happen because her voice is so squeakily high we can neither take her seriously nor laugh at her witty ripostes - Sorkin undermines her, making her a target for teasing and ridicule by colleagues and viewers alike.
Sorkin refuses to invest any of his women with true clout despite plenty of real-life examples all around him. He could turn to fascinating women like Hillary Clinton, Madeleine Albright and Condoleezza Rice for inspiration: powerful women who have navigated the perils of intense public scrutiny, discovering everything from unfaithful husbands to previously unexplored cultural roots (Albright), battling sexism and racism (Rice) along the way. This makes them irresistible, archetypal figures for us to watch in reality, so why should we settle for caricatures in Sorkin's fiction?
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm
By Caroline Baum
July 24 2003
Everything else about Aaron Sorkin's brilliant series The West Wing is realistic and almost spookily believable, but there is something wrong with the women who walk his corridors of power. Why are they all so one-dimensional? And why is it that, while the male characters seem to bond, popping in and out of the Oval Office for cosy chats and private confidences, the women remain isolated?
West Wing men are complex and multifaceted. Their inner lives are explored through their battles with alcoholism, divorce, the anxiety of impending fatherhood or the scandal of a relationship with a call girl. Witness Toby Ziegler (Richard Schiff), the rumpled communications director, estranged from his father for years owing to his dad's unsavoury past and separated from his politically ambitious ex-wife, with whom he is now expecting twins, no less - now there's an interesting, evolving situation! Meanwhile, the women's roles stagnate rather than develop and can be summed up like this...
First Lady Abigail Bartlet (Stockard Channing): a bad-tempered, ball-breaking bitch. Clearly adores her husband, yet is always telling him off.
Press secretary C.J. Cregg (Allison Janney): carries the can for the men whenever they cock up. Her sassy comebacks at the press briefings are gifts of dialogue worthy of great Hollywood dames like Rosalind Russell and Bette Davis, but she's the shield protecting the men.
Donna (Janel Moloney): official series martyr and assistant to the insufferably immature Josh (Bradley Whitford), deputy chief of staff.
The sexual tension between them used to be funny and fizzy, but his sadism towards her, and her pouting acceptance of it, have become tedious and demeaning to both of them; he refuses to grow up and she indulges him.
Amy (Mary-Louise Parker): feminist minx whom Josh is smitten with. Another bitch and a half: wheeling and dealing, playing with Josh's affections, she speaks through a jaw so clenched there'd be no danger of her ever servicing anyone under a desk. She's ghastly, though not as dreadful as...
Ainsley (Emily Procter): blonde ventriloquist's doll briefly dangled on a string before the deputy communications director, Sam Seaborn (Rob Lowe, who has now left the show). Ainsley speaks even faster than he does, making her virtually unintelligible, and is a Republican, which is supposed to engender some feisty repartee between them - kind of like Tracy and Hepburn on crack. But it can't happen because her voice is so squeakily high we can neither take her seriously nor laugh at her witty ripostes - Sorkin undermines her, making her a target for teasing and ridicule by colleagues and viewers alike.
Sorkin refuses to invest any of his women with true clout despite plenty of real-life examples all around him. He could turn to fascinating women like Hillary Clinton, Madeleine Albright and Condoleezza Rice for inspiration: powerful women who have navigated the perils of intense public scrutiny, discovering everything from unfaithful husbands to previously unexplored cultural roots (Albright), battling sexism and racism (Rice) along the way. This makes them irresistible, archetypal figures for us to watch in reality, so why should we settle for caricatures in Sorkin's fiction?
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm
