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Water into Wine by Lisa Mladinich

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Right in the Kisser: What the Media Says About Older Women

Right in the Kisser: What the Media Says About Older Women

Last updated on: March 29, 2015 at 3:18 pm by Lisa Mladinich

Right in the Kisser: What the Media Says About Older Women 2015-03-29T15:18:11-04:00 Lisa Mladinich

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Last night I watched Candice Bergen get punched in the face. She was playing a typical role for older actresses–the powerful, rich woman who also happens to be mean and hard and wrong about everything.

In Sweet Home Alabama, Bergen’s New York City mayor is smooth as silk and hell on wheels. And in the end, she gets what’s coming to her. Reese Witherspoon’s saucy southern character hauls off and punches Madam Mayor smack in the kisser and gloats as she collapses in a humiliating heap–surrounded by a howling crowd of triumphant rednecks.

Just another powerful woman put in her place–and another ordinary day in Hollywood.

Sweet Home Alabama “punch” scene:

(To see the clip, go to the one-hour-and-sixteen-minute mark)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieuZINwFEbk 1:16

I was born in 1959. During my formative years, the few older women who appeared on television and in films were a mixed bag of stereotypical exaggerations for comic effect. Servants of the sexual politics of the 1960s, 70s, 80s, and 90s, the more famous ones seemed to be attempts at shocking audiences with updated versions of worn out feminine stereotypes: the doormat, the harpy, and the dirty old woman.

For instance, All in the Family’s Jean Stapleton enjoyed critical and commercial success from 1971-1979 with her doormat-idiot-savant, Edith Bunker, whose shrill, childlike simplicity and occasional moments of insight were the perfect foil for her bigoted, working-class brute of a husband.

Some of you will remember a huge phenomenon popular during the 1980’s: comedian Dana Carvey rocketed to stardom on NBC’s Saturday Night Live through a grey-haired harpy he called “the church lady.” Prissy and judgmental, Carvey’s tight-lipped and histrionic creation spotted Satan’s fingerprints on the scandals of all her charming and attractive celebrity guests, raising her fixation with sin to the level of a fetish. Meanwhile, every punch-line placed devout, older Christian women in the cross-hairs for supposedly being fiendishly judgmental.

Few of my generation can forget Dame Edna, the sly contrivance of Australian actor, Barry Humphries. In the 1950s, the Aussie comedian donned a purple wig and gaudy cat-eye glasses and toured the world to great success as the termagant-queen of bawdy humor and scalding insults, until his retirement in 2013. The targets of most of the Dame’s witticisms were Australians, whom she accused of being unsophisticated, but her flirtatious and sometimes lascivious observations slam-dunked her into the category of “dirty old woman.”

In much the same way, Betty White’s “Sue Ann Nivens” (The Mary Tyler Moore Show, 1970-77) and Rue McLanahan’s “Blanch Devereaux” (Golden Girls, 1985-1992) were modern man-eaters who aroused both sympathy and repugnance in their audiences and enjoyed long, award-winning runs on television. To this day, the roles available for older actresses are invariably pathetic, sleazy, or repellent in some way. More often than not, they are also presented as dangerous.

It’s no wonder we get down on ourselves. In a pretty pervasive way, older women are shamed or ignored, treated with suspicion, or mocked to great effect by some of the world’s most talented comedians. Please don’t misunderstand me. I laughed at some of these characters, myself. But there were very few alternatives in the media to these portrayals of older women as the butts of society’s merciless jokes and judgments. Satire as successful as these examples can unconsciously impact the way we see ourselves, over time.

Allowing ourselves to be misled by society into thinking of our aging selves as less beautiful and less valuable supposes that the first half of our lives was worth living–the second half, not so much. In a creepy ploy for our “beauty dollars,” we are taught to look down on our own faces and bodies, as we compare ourselves to air-brushed, dramatically re-configured photos of very young girls and women. Degradation is profitable, so we can expect this toxic campaign to continue.

My beautiful grandmother (left) and her sisters: Irene, Vivian, and Estelle

I was very blessed, growing up. I had a bevy of beautiful, elderly aunts and a magnificent grandmother, so my thoughts on aging are more positive. But many women have been so shamed about the aging process that they have either given up on themselves or become obsessed about recapturing their youth. Just look at photos of women like Nancy Pelosi and the late Joan Rivers for stunning examples of the havoc facial surgeries can wreak on a woman’s natural beauty.

Add to our own self-doubts the media’s loathsome characterizations of older women. In recent years, Candice Bergen, Jody Foster, Meryl Streep, Jane Fonda, Jessica Lange, Susan Sarandon, Barbara Hershey, Ellen Barkin, Shelley Long, and many other former leading ladies have been consigned to playing stylish old witches–some figuratively, some literally. The message seems to be that even these beauties have worn out their welcome and may only appear on screen as villains and fools.

When are these privileged, connected women going to put their talented heads together and produce something worth watching?

I say, ENOUGH of giving in to being marginalized for the unforgiveable sin of aging. Let’s start a movement of mature women being held up as icons of wisdom, strength, and beauty. No more dirty jokes, insults, or getting punched in the face.

Now THAT would be a kick in the pants.

A very blessed Holy Week to you all!

violence against women

women and aging

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