Not Helping Feminism?/Submitting to Misogyny

A couple years ago many of my Arizona comedy pals had a mass exodus of our improv group. It was time for me to go too. I knew my final year of grad school should be spent focusing on my thesis, and the group was getting younger anyway. The director put together a final send-off show on a Sunday night. It was pretty packed, and it was a great night for all of us. We bowed, and I felt a bittersweet twinge for these four other guys who were moving on. And then something "organic" happened. The director took the mic and thanked the huge crowd for coming out. But then he went on to say how much the group meant to him. Hm. And then he rambled about the legacy of the group. (At this point the audience started squirming a little. They just watched an hour plus of improv and were kinda ready to scoot.) Then the director starting giving personal shout-outs to guys who had been in the group when he was just starting. Then he gave little speeches about each of the guys leaving on stage. He said something like, "These guys are the funniest people and my best friends, and the ladies are lovely as well." It was pretty embarrassing. I was hurt too--I considered this person my friend. Oh well, it was almost over. NOPE, PSYCH. He handed the mic to someone else onstage. The audience let out a collective discomforted sigh and waited while three other dudes gave basically the same speech calling out the same dudes from previous generations. Not a single guy recognized the female director who had cast most of them initially. Not a single one called out any of the women who had been on teams with them. My female teammate took the mic and gave gratitude this is how she met her boyfriend, an ex-cast member. The whole goo-fest was probably fifteen minutes strong when I got the mic last. I, again, was feeling bad for the audience who was listening to this pretty self-referential sludge, so gave a polite shake of my head and the night was over. I had been thinking about what the group meant to me though. I just chose to appropriately tell the important people I met in-person, not assuming a crowd of strangers wanted to hear about it.

Some of those important people (specifically three other girls I formed an independent group with) were in the audience that night. I hugged them and told them why they meant so much to me. "But you didn't say it onstage!" Kale said. It was such a trap, I realized. I wasn't egotistical enough to sing my own squad's praises, and therefore, they went unsung. I didn't mean to submit to misogyny. I didn't mean to quiet the very few and underrepped female voices in comedy. I acted rationally as a person regardless of gender, but.

Shellz and I writing sketch comedy years ago.

Adventures in Gym Class: Part II

I. Last Wednesday Boot Scoot was canceled, so I had to try something new. Grind. I took a fitness class called Grind. I know about Grind because sometimes when the song is changing in BS, I can hear "Candy Shop" through the gym walls.

Grind is a "hip-hop" "dance" class that makes you "feel like you're at the club." I have never shaken my butt more in an hour period, that is true. But my butt also isn't really built to shake, or shimmy, or anything, so I mostly stiffly rotated it around kind of and was grateful not to be wearing glasses so I could only half-way see the embarrassing mess I had become.

Three things:

1. It was a 20 person class. I am pretty sure only 2 of the people present would actually make a night of being at a club. The other 18 were mainly doofy looking women of all sizes in various hodgepodge workout tees trying their best not to look completely idiodic "getting low." There's something about moving like you're in a club with a body and demeanor that say, "Club as in the cracker, or?"
2. There was a dance where we did a push-up after twerking. I'd like to see someone do that in a club sometime. Maybe that should be me. Maybe I should just start doing push-ups in the club.
3. The tunes were, obvs, club beats. Having to focus on the music to get rhythms down made me hyper aware of the lyrics. Wow. Did these songs all objectify women. My Chick Bad. The Luda bit in "Yeah." And I'd prefer to not hear "Damn, that white girl got some ass" any time in my day, let alone several dozen times repeated over and over, LET ALONE while I was jumping around attempting to jiggle my butt.

"What are we doing here?" I kept thinking. Like, what. Is. Happening? Why? It's usually assumed that when people are working out, they're trying to look better. And it's usually assumed that when women are trying to look better, it's for men. This isn't always true, obviously. I love to work-out. Sometimes it makes me look better and sometimes it just feels good. If I do look better, I'm kinda happy to be more physically appealing to men, but more immediately, I feel better. Still, society blah blah blah there was a little part of us in there for that purpose.

And there were no men with us. Besides the ones yelling over the loudspeaker to bend over and lemme see you work. And we did. We did.

II. Alternatively, I completed one of my grad school goals by closing out an all-female workshop production today.

Lady director, lady playwright, five lady actors.

Please Do Not See The Wolf of Wall Street

People will tell you this movie is the best of the year, and there are merits, sure. Their names are Leo, and Jonah Hill. Also there are def some solid comedic scenes/lines, it's an overall entertaining movie, and it's well-made. The soundtrack is baller, it clips along, some of it is very pretty. BUT ALSO:

1. GD MISOGYNY.

Yeah, I get it. If you indulge in hotties and refuse to make serious emotional connections, you're unahppy. But do we need to keep seeing this played out over and over--meanwhile sexualizing women for 98% of films and then adding a little escape hatch of "but it's bad"? OVER IT.

2. IT AIN'T NEW.

What do most audiences think about Wall Street? That stoke brokers suck. That capitalism allows for some real self-indulgent dingbats. That they get away with everything. Well, thanks for a movie that affirms everything we thought when we entered the theater.

3. JORDAN BELFORT IS AN EFFING JERK.

The whole movie is about how much of a toolbox JB is, and what a swindler, and he totally does not get served as much justice as he should be. Because he's the worst. But guess what? He is now synonymous with only the most lovable and respected movie star in America. So no matter how despicable he truly was, we still kind of think he's awesome. PLUS, HE IS MAKING MORE MONEY OFF THE MOVIE. Not just indirectly is it screwed up that this terrible human continues to make millions in speaking events and book sales, which will only blow up more as a result of the film...I LITERALLY JUST GAVE HIM MY MONEY BY SEEING THIS MOVIE. Rage puke.

Spoilery: That final shot. Bisque said it redeemed the movie a little because it shows "Whoa, look at this d-bag, and how money didn't make him happy, and, yet, hundreds of people still want his get-rich-quickness." And then I was like, omg, it's a mirror image of the theater. All these people just staring at a monster, totally engrossed.

The Heat! (Some Spoilers, But, Like, Stuff You Coulda Guessed)

Welp. I loved The Heat.

Granted, I had an extremely generous mindset going into the theater--I wanted to love this movie. Oh, boy, did I want to love this movie. FIRST FEMALE BUDDY COPS, FEMALE SCREENWRITER, MIDDLE-AGE HEROINES, MELISSA MCCARTHY'S UNCONVENTIONAL BEAUTY! My gender equality dreamz exploding into unicorns.

Look, it's not GD American Beauty, but it's way way way better than, like, eighty percent of Will Ferrell's summer movies. I have way too much to think and say about this film, but this is my crummy blog, and I don't get paid for it, so I am just going to give some bullet points.

-It was just as exciting to see women run around with guns and narrowly dodging explosives as it would be watching men. Truth. Of course the amount of violence is problematic, but that's not what I'm focusing on right now.

-Witty, gritty women. Some of the banter and one-liners. #SupesSmartDialogue #SupesSmartDialogueInLadyMouths

-I was worried at first when the women were so horribly opposed, but I had to recognize that they were not just competitive women (cough, Bridesmaids), they were just two opposing protagonists. It's a buddy cop movie. That's how it goes.

-Perhaps women can be a little more emotional, but they don't have to be. The women become friends/learn from each other, but they maintain a playful hate/love relationship until the end. Like, women (especially women in the FBI maybe?) can be affectionate jerks.

-No sexualization besides minor comedic club dancing. More awkward than body-focused. In buddy cop comedies, we don't need to actually get into a dude's six-pack. Same goes got Sandra's bangin' bod.

-THAT said, the women talk about each other's appearances more than average cop duos might.  (Although, it does happen. Opening scene in 48 Hours.) But, let's be real...that's part of being a woman. That stuff matters more. It's natural, they would make it matter more in their conversation. It was never drippy. It was punchy and often entertaining.

-Men also commented a lot on their appearances/ages/hygiene. I think this may have been overblown. (The villain always commenting on the relative "hottness" of the pair.) But, possible (sad). It was done comedically like, "Oh, great! This silly guy not being attracted to Melissa LOL." In seriousness, I'm sure true male villains do use appearance as a wedge to make their female victims feel uncomfortable. But, that would be a different genre.

-Lack of romantic focus. Each woman had a little backstory (I'm wondering if to prove they weren't gay?) but not even a B plot worth. Not even a C plot worth.

-The supposedly touching friendship moment was actually touching for me. I wonder if it was just written well or if I could connect more as a lady. Is this what I have been missing out on bromance movies all this time!? Seriously felt slightly choked up. During The Heat.

-There was a big ol' lack of other women. One one hand, this was probably accurate. Female cops in high places? Meh? It helped show a subtle feminist message: woman against everyone else. But, I thought that may have been too strong. Of course Sandra wants a promotion that her male boss can't see she deserves. What if it had been a woman? Maybe, I'm reading too much into it.

-These humans were supremely unlikable at the outset and didn't get much better (although they grew on me). Perhaps showing some negative women blown up? I think no. I think that's just what comedy is. They were whole humans. That's the important thing. I mean, we can't complain about lack of women in film if we expect them all to be perfect. Perfect is boring.

-The plot skeleton was pretty intriguing. The cops are on the trail of a huge drug bust. Kinda one of the less important rings of investigation? (According to me, who, you know, doesn't know anything about the worst impacts of coke economy.) I guess it's comedy, so murders aren't the best bet. But, still...something about the women succeeding at a pyseduo-fruitless mission...Hm.

-For a female-centric movie, there were still a lot of dick jokes. But, part of standing up as a woman is making aiming some guns at guy crotches.

-No one ever made fun of Melissa's weight or even alluded to it. #SoFreakingHappy

-Mainly, SO COOL THAT THE WORD "MISOGYNY" IS JUST CHILLIN' IN A SUMMER BLOCKBUSTER!

Things are happening, and I feel really excited for the future.