Profound. Fiercely honest. “If I was going to be a woman, I would want to be as beautiful as possible.” Through acting, he really does enter into the female experience. He gets it. I remember him talking about this at the time Tootsie came out, that he was horrified at how unattractive he was as the character, and how it brought up shame in him over how he had overlooked women due to the fact that they did not conform to what he thought he deserved as a man. And all of that is in the performance.
Categories
Archives
-
Recent Posts
- “I have already been accused of trying to drown a boatload of wild Irishmen on Aran!” — Robert Flaherty
- X Marks the Spot
- Valentine’s Day Story #2: The Spitball Valentine
- Valentine’s Day Story #1: An Eyeball and a Dozen Roses
- “I looked like a bad girl. But I wasn’t a bad girl, really. I was a very nice little girl, until I found out what life was.”– Harriet Andersson
- Happy Birthday, Burt Reynolds: “My love is unironic.”
- “Listen, I never meant to make money. I never wanted it. I’m a singer, man.” — Gene Vincent
- “Each of us have a gift, you see, given us freely by the universe. And each of us with every breath gives something back” — Kim Stanley
- “The audience will always forgive you for being wrong and exciting, but never for being right and dull.” — Burt Reynolds
- Josh White, singer of “the fighting blues”
Recent Comments
- Tony Acardo on “These kids only want to talk about acting method and motivation. in my day all we talked about was screwing and overtime.” — Robert Mitchum
- Jeff on Valentine’s Day Story #1: An Eyeball and a Dozen Roses
- Clary on “Listen, I never meant to make money. I never wanted it. I’m a singer, man.” — Gene Vincent
- Gemstone on How it’s going
- Mike Molloy on “All my work is about uncovering, especially uncovering of voices that speak without governance, or that speak without being heard.” — Seamus Deane
- Tom on How it’s going
- Melissa Sutherland on “Since we do float on an unknown sea I think we should examine the other floating things that come our way very carefully.” — poet Elizabeth Bishop
- Mike Molloy on “If it was raining soup, the Irish would go out with forks.” – Happy Birthday, Brendan Behan
- sheila on “The only people who ever called me a rebel were people who wanted me to do what they wanted.” — Nick Nolte
- Roger O Green on February 3, 1959: The Day the Music Died
- Maddy on “The only people who ever called me a rebel were people who wanted me to do what they wanted.” — Nick Nolte
- sheila on December 2024 Viewing Diary
- Todd Restler on December 2024 Viewing Diary
- sheila on February 3, 1959: The Day the Music Died
- sheila on December 2024 Viewing Diary
- sheila on January 2025 Viewing Diary
- Kelly C Sedinger on February 3, 1959: The Day the Music Died
- Bill on All That Jazz: Remembering and Loving Erzebet Foldi
- Johnny on December 2024 Viewing Diary
- Todd Restler on January 2025 Viewing Diary
-
OMG, Sheila, this is so moving. Also, to me, it reflects back to his early career, when he was not considered “attractive,” was he? This must have been painful for him. But, even when I try to be as unjudgemental as possible, I’ve been known to remark how much more attractive he’s become with age. Compare THE GRADUATE to that more recent movie with Emma Thompson (having a senior moment about the title). I know I said that to somebody, probably more than one somebody. He really moved me in this clip. Thanks for posting it.
Yeah, it takes real self-knowledge and bravery to take that leap. “I wouldn’t ask me out because I don’t find me attractive. And who have I missed out on by dismissing women like that?” Really powerful stuff!! Glad you liked!
I guess that it is nice he had that epiphany, that through his life he didn’t engage with women who weren’t attractive enough to him. I guess it is just interesting to me, because I have never found him attractive at all, and that he had that criteria for women-says a lot to me about how men see themselves.
It says a lot about how he sees himself. The rest of us men are as individual as the rest of you women.
Mutecypher – Women are de-valued on a widespread cultural level if they are deemed unattractive and therefore not worthy of consideration – not just to date, but as someone to be dealt with equally, with respect. And forget about the drop in value when you pass the childbearing age.
Men have a wide circle in which to operate where they are not ONLY valued as how attractive/date-able/fuck-able they are. Women have a much narrower circle. Look at what just happened with the chick who just won Wimbledon. The vicious misogynistic commentary, as though an athlete is somehow required to provide the same fantasy as a supermodel. If you do not “fit” into that narrow mode, then watch how you are vilified. Even if you’re NOT presenting yourself as “Look at how sexy I am.”
This is why we see schlubs like Seth Rogen pair up with Katherine Heigl – or the King of Queens pairing, and many many more. We rarely see the opposite – Roseanne Barr paired with George Clooney, or whatever. That’s the whole topic of Shallow Hal. :)
And of course this is how Dustin Hoffman sees himself. He’s not talking for everybody, he’s speaking about his own personal experience. He happened to light upon a universal, however – which is something the film was was attempting to tackle.
I agree that what was said about the young woman who won Wimbledon was vile, and then the “apology” was also awful. For me, shockingly so. Sounds like it was not as shocking a thing for you. And I don’t doubt what you describe as the most common experience for women and the most common set of attitudes for men. It’s clear and obvious.
Seems like it was understood (but not by me) that the discussion was at that “common experience” level and not at the “men are ALL and ALWAYS…” level. That’s what I was commenting upon, perhaps over-applying some of my own recent experience on the receiving end of such crud.
Of course! Generalizations are not always helpful or true and they can alienate those who may already be sympathetic. That’s not a good thing!
Yeah, that Wimbledon thing wasn’t shocking to me at all. It’s par for the course. It’s horrible and much worse now than when I was growing up. Who do we blame? Joe Francis? :)
Also, if there was no Internet then morons would just think those things to themselves, or say it to their friends around some brewskis – but now it becomes national news because of Twitter, etc. That’s the way it goes with technology, I realize. But it does highlight that attitude that has always been there.
A friend of mine was on SNL and made the mistake of looking on message boards after her first couple of episodes to see what people were saying. Every single comment had to do with how “ugly” she was. Her point was: my idols are Gilda Radner and Carol Burnett. I’m not trying to be a sex symbol, I’m a comic, what the hell does my “ugliness” have to do with anything? It was like people were affronted by the fact she was on television at all – AND felt that “she is ugly” is a valid thing to say. It’s not. It’s not with men either. But women are dominated by this kind of commentary far more often than men are. Men can be “ugly” and not be totally dismissed.
She made some statements about it recently – and said, “I didn’t realize that my job on the show was to produce boners. I thought I was there to be funny.” (She said it in a funny and sarcastic way.)
Women who are not even porn stars are expected to “produce boners” in the populace and if you don’t, then you are scorned, vilified, whatever. Supreme Court justices. It’s outrageous. People should be ashamed of themselves. But they clearly aren’t.
This is why women can be a little bit insane about our looks, our weight, etc. Because the culture itself is insane.
I saw some pic on FB of a group of film critics sitting around a table at some festival. One of the comments just tore apart the looks of every female critic at the table. Not the men. Just the women.
It creates such a hostile sexualized environment where it is not appropriate. This is common common practice.
I’m sure that all of the folks who were effortfully unpleasant enough to post unflattering comments about your SNL friend were men, but unfortunately it isn’t just men who inappropriately comment on looks.
It’s break time now and I’m at a teacher training event. The state of Hawaii is adopting a new teaching framework and so we’re learning about it. The framework is named after its developer, a woman. Clearly she must be a recognized expert in her field to have an entire state adopt her work. Just prior to clicking the start button on a video where the developer spoke about her work, our trainer ( a woman) remarked, “yes, she’s quite attractive” with an eye roll.
There is an extra degree of crap that women have to put up with that’s completely unrelated to the quality of their work.
Ha – what a great dovetail to our conversation with that video you just saw! Yup, it’s everywhere. :)
I am not sure if they were all men commenting on my friend’s ugliness (meanwhile: UGLY? who refers to other human beings like that??) – I’m sure it was a mix of men and women – although men have a tendency to get really nasty sexually in these situations – sometimes even threatening (see the Tweets about Wimbledon). I’ve experienced that on my own site. the scariest person who ever got fixated on me was a woman – two comments and I banned her for life, and she has still been harassing me for YEARS – but mean comments from guys tend to go after my sexuality, my woman-hood, my non-fuckability, or they cut right to the chase as one guy memorably did by calling me a “stupid cunt” in the comments section of a post I wrote about one of my boyfriends. This is what women have to deal with online. I rarely mention it, because, whatever, nobody can stop me from writing.
But certainly there’s a “mean girl” aspect to this kind of commentary – for example with my SNL friend- slagging on someone’s looks, especially someone who gets to be on television and “who does she think she is, let me take her down a peg” – that kind of attitude certainly crosses gender lines.
But in terms of placing VALUE on women based on how pleasing they are to the eye/how fuck-able they are/how they do or do not conform to a fantasy ideal – that’s pretty much male territory.
Not ALL men. But it’s endemic enough and common enough that I certainly feel perfectly safe in generalizing in this case.
Maureen – Yeah, it’s rare to find a man who will come out and admit it. As he says, there is a “brainwashing” element at work. I hate to keep bringing up Shallow Hal – or, hell, no, I love it! – because that’s really the underlying topic of that film. Hal needs to de-program himself, basically.
I found this link on some feminist site which said, “He figures out what women have known all along.” Ha. Yes, there is some truth to that – but I think also that that was the underlying journey/question of Tootsie itself. Sidney Pollack, in another interview, said he had no interest in or aptitude for a classical farce – he didn’t want to treat the material farcically. The questions they are examining are pretty important ones – for both sexes, of course, if we want to meet in the middle and get along with one another.
Also, of course, the whole “what does it mean to be a friend” thing – which Tootsie tackles. He gets to be a “friend” to a woman for the first time in his life. But only when he’s dressed as a woman. But what would it be like if he could be that receptive/open/gentle to a woman, as a man? Listening to her, removing sex from the equation (even if he was interested in her), being able to be there for her – in the way that women seem to be able to do with one another behind closed doors – he gets a glimpse of the intimacy that friendship provides for women, and that is revelatory to him!
Anyway, interesting stuff!
Hi can you tell me the name of the feminist site you found that comment on (He figures out what women have known all along). I was reading it the other day and wanted to go back to it as it had a series of good links/clips and now I can’t find it. Much appreciated. Thanks
Jezebel, maybe?
Maureen, sorry for the undeserved scold.
Really interesting followup commentary. I just never took it there. Not sure why.