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Regarding our last discussion about the 12 fallacies:

I think in my paper that I tried to disprove the fallacies about films killing imagination, having less psychological development, etc. Because I really tried to focus on the characters in the films. It was hard, though, not to think about the books I had read as well in choosing evidence, and in one review of the The Reader (book) on Amazon.com, someone said that it had a lot more character development than the film.

But I watched The Reader with my parents last weekend, and although, for example, my dad had questions about the character, it still got him to think about the character. So I think that this disproves the fallacy (which I don't have in front of me right now, so if I'm a little off base, I apologize!) And perhaps psychological stuff isn't as obvious, but I think it can be analyzed out of a film.

Let Us Out of Here!

I enjoyed the film version of Raisin in the Sun, especially its staginess. The external scenes added or transposed to the film version, though, didn’t quite add anything to the narrative. I felt like the most powerful and potentially political moments in the film took place within the confines of the Younger’s small apartment. There’s a claustrophobic quality to these scenes as we witness five outspoken and at times volatile characters crammed into a single room. I thought the scene that worked the best in this regard was when Walter, recently returning from the bar, is overtaken by the African music Beneatha plays. What begins as simple drumming on the table soon becomes a staging by Walter of a tribal hunt. He leaps around the room spearing imaginary prey (including his wife and other characters in the scene). But in doing so he seems trapped and imprisoned by the small cinematographic space framed by the camera. This is especially apparent when he leaps at the camera but can never cross its imaginary threshold. He must instead retreat back to the middle of the room and play the part of the hunter in the space allowed him.

A Festering Sore in the Sun

I understand there are a million things other than fidelity to consider when viewing an adaptation, but I still wish to comment that this film was very true to the text of the play. It was so close that I feel the writer Lorraine Hansberry must have had heavy involvement with the film. Most of the dialog is word for word with the text. That's totally fine, it was just an observation.

Another observation I made was the subtle censoring of some of the dialog. For example, "the most backward race of women (play)" vs. "the most backward nation of women (film)". Other racially specific lines of dialog throughout the film were also modified. Enough of it is left in the dialog, however, that I do not feel the minor censoring detracted from the dialogs impact.

Toward the end of the movie, there was an additional conversation between Walter and Mama that I do not recall reading in the screenplay. It is a conversation in which Walter asks Mama why she left the south, and equates her journey and risk with his own ambitions.

I felt George had much less of a role and his character was not explored as much in the film. Asagai on the other hand was just as much if not more involved. Asagai seemed much more a good guy in the film than he did in the book, and George seemed less a jerk. Mama's role was acted very well. I thought mama was awesome. Travis is funny. Beneatha was muchhh more annoying to me in the film.

Overall, I enjoyed the film. I feel that it was a successful adaptation in its honest and uncolored interpretation of the play, although I do not feel it added or commented on the existing text.

A Raisin in the Sun

So I want to take back what I said yesterday. It's true that when I read the play, I kind of wanted Walter to take the money at the end; maybe I have a thing for morally corrupt characters. But I think it was more because I wanted him to get back what he lost, and I knew the money would help him. I thought it would allow him to redeem himself. But watching the film and thinking about it, I realized that standing up for himself allowed him to redeem himself more than getting the money back could have. He had to show his son -- who Agatha thought was adorable; little kids tend to irritate me, but thanks to you, I didn't write him off -- what it meant to be proud. We talked about the generation gap yesterday, and how Mama thought that her children were her lineage. She says this in the movie as well, and I think Walter refusing the money really showed how the family was carrying on in the same way it had through the previous generations, even though they may not be able to understand each other on all other counts.

Women's dreams deferred

Don't worry, Agatha, this post is not going to be about any sort of crisis in masculinity, even if Walter thinks that he is having a masculine crisis. I believe that A Raisin in the Sun does show Walter in crisis and attempting to assert his masculinity, but that it points out the dangers associated with that as well as the role of women in supporting male dominance. One thing that struck me about the world of the play is the claustrophobic, feminized world it presents. Set entirely in the Youngers' cramped, Southside apartment, the play presents a family that has been built on the backs of Ruth and Mama, with both male characters frequently absent. However, this is not because Walter is busy earning the money to support the family; in fact, his earnings are so low that Ruth works full time and Mama frequently has to re-enter the workforce in order to supplement the family's income. And while Beneatha does not work, she attends a university in order to become a doctor, a healing profession that she eloquently speaks about.

Throughout the entire play, Walter demands to be listened to and complains about his female dominated home life. He wants his wife and mother to support his foolish plans and dreams, while completely ignoring their own dreams and belittling his sister's efforts to become a doctor, asking her to become a nurse instead. He asserts his dream with masculine privilege, demanding a priority and respect more from his place as “man of the house” rather than any real effort. His conversation with Ruth about the eggs totally disrespects her position as food preparer and breadwinner for the household, and blames black women for the subjugation of African Americans. However, it is clear that Mama and Ruth are holding the family together, trying their best to get a better home and working hard to provide Beneatha with an education. I think that Hansberry beautifully portrays the hard work of the plays female characters and their dreams. However, Walter consistently pushes their dreams to the back burner in an effort to advance his own. Additionally, Hansberry presents the systemic barriers that keep the Youngers from achieving their dreams, from racism and poverty to Walter's chauvinism.

In this light, I have a problem with the end of the play. In many ways, Walter throws his family's dreams under the bus in an effort to accumulate more money, but gains the respect of his wife and mother. Both women see that Walter tried to at least do something to achieve his dream and celebrate his assertion of dominance. I am still having trouble relating this to the rest of the play. The women continue to support Walter's failed dreams, deferring their own for his.

Drowning Out the Superintendent With Song

I was thinking about the form of musicals and generally how easily they can take on a lighter tone. In Pajama Game we generally feel this lighter tone amongst the musical scores and brightly designed costumes. This lends to the portrayal as the union as a good thing and a way for workers to have the ability to control the nature of business. In Bissel’s novel, we see more of a sarcastic, critical and bleak picture of this world. When reading the book I would never imagine Babe Williams parading around in a bright blue trench coat. Bissel’s world, to me, seems dull and boring and immensely more painful to live through.

I wonder then if this is because of this difference in interpretation, the transfer from literature into a lighthearted musical, or merely an attempt on the part of the screenwriters to give a more favorable view on factory life. From the pictures we saw in class today we would assume that it is the first, as many union workers seemed to enjoy the thrill of a strike. Yet, I think more importantly that we are again brought back to the question of form and interpretation. It would be difficult to translate Bissel’s critique of the working world into a romantic musical comedy like the Pajama Game simply because the form of a musical and the ever-existing need for romantics in cinema. On interpretation, it seems again the difference between a collective view of a story and the individual view.

I read Bissel’s novel much as it was his own personal beliefs on factory life. In Sid Sorokin’s bled the personality I figured was engrained in the author. His voice, although often ignorant, seemed to project the absurdity of everything happening within the functions of “Sleep Tite.” He often rejects Babe’s pleas of understanding that everything will simply work out in the end (which it does) without anyone needing to get hurt. His final act of quitting seems to represent Bissel’s overall rejection of this world as just a naturalistic force where things simply happen without regard to people.

A musical does not really have room for this personal satire. Sid Sorokin’s focus must blend in with the commune of dance and work and picnics. His voice will not be heard above the singing joy of flamboyant sewers. This also coincides with the structure of making a film or a musical. So many pieces function as important that it is impossible to retain the sort of critical analysis within the novel. While the rhythm of dancing might lend to show the true nature of the working environment, it doesn’t show its absurdity (perhaps it does), but rather a more technical detail of the life.

I think that the loss of personality here is important when considering an adaptation. It causes the meaning of them to shift in an entirely new way. If the meaning of this is lost, why is it adapted in the first place? Does the story simply serve as a vessel to give a light-hearted, romantic twist on the union? Why then do they need the story at all?
Just another thought on why considering adaptation is useless.

The Politics of Parody (And Singin' and Dancin')

I didn’t see anything overtly political about the film The Pajama Game. Any labor politics (or management politics for that matter) seemed predominantly peripheral elements of the happy-go-lucky, boy-meets-girl, “Gee Babe, you’re swell!”, 50s film narrative. But there is an implicit political critique running throughout the film in its use of parody. The film parodies labor sabotage (in the over-exaggerated movements of the workers during the “slow-down”), consumerist culture (listing the various things in song that 7 ½ more cents can by), and pulp (I’m thinking about the seedy bar the characters go to that they need a match to see in). There are also other objects of parody throughout the film that I can’t remember or just missed. Is there any scholarship on the film as a parody? And if not, what are some ways we can read the film’s politics into its use of parody?

Also, do musicals in general offer a certain amount of parody in their form, especially since nobody—at least nobody considered legally sane or normal—breaks out in song and dance in everyday life? (I could see the film parodying a sit-in strike by having a dance-in strike.) But besides being a form of parody, maybe breaking out in song and dance is a form of political resistance. I’m thinking in particular of those IWW members who when arrested, especially if a lot of them were arrested together, would spend their time in the cell singing and making noise to drive the guards and perhaps the town nuts

jammies

I felt the focus on labor throughout the film was very minimal. The film seemed to be focused much more heavily around the romance, with the labor concepts functioning more as a background device used to provide context for the relationship between Sid and Babe. All of the events in the film seem to serve or move the relationship, and the relationship is always at the foreground of the story.

As mentioned in previous blog posts, the trials of the union and the laborers are belittled in the film, taking a back seat to the relationship between Sid and Babe. Their relationship seems to suck all the seriousness out of any other events. Sid fires Babe, but there are no significant consequences. Hines' chased Sid, the superintendent, with throwing-knives and nothing more became of that. The relationship on the other hand was very serious and, at least to me, seemed to be the only high stake in the film. Not that there's anything wrong with that. It is a musical with a lot of sentiment injected into it, but that's one tried and true way to sweep people off their feet (some people). The elements of romance, as we stated in class, are a little outdated now, so this film likely does not have the same effect on me as it did on the audiences of the '50s. The concept of manhood seemed to be pretty normal, not too exaggerated in this film, keeping in mind the times. The film seemed to be smoothed out and tamed to make it more accessible.

The dancing. I liked the dancing. I'm no critic when it comes to dancing, though, because I don't see a lot of dancing, I don't know anything about the technical or theoretical aspects of dancing, and I'm a poor dancer. Sooo I don't have much context to judge this musical against, but just as an initial thoughtless reaction, I enjoyed the dancing, particularly one of the union dances: the one that sounded like a swing/big bandish song where the dancers all went ssshshhhhhh as they put their hats on. I saw a lot of moves that probably influenced Michael Jackson's dancing. Well, maybe. There were a lot of jacksonish spins and this glidey sideways walking thing that looked like the prehistoric relative of the moonwalk.

The Pajama GAME

Ok, Meaghan stole my title.

Disclaimer: this was one of my favorite movies when I was about twelve and it was one of the first movies I ever bought for myself. Having said that, I think it's pretty cool to see the movie from my 12-year old standpoint, and then again 10 years later.

I capitalized the word game in my title, because that's what I think this story/film is: a political game, with Sid and Babe as the key players. The literally do a "song and dance" around each other and the issue of the 7 1/2 cent raise. When Sid first asks Babe out, she says no, and explains that her reasoning is simple: he is the superintendent and she is the grievance committee. It can't work. Later on, in the midst of the "Small Talk" number, Babe again pleads with Sid because she is scared that the strike will come between them. She's right. I like the addition of the scene where Sid fires Babe. She took a big risk jamming the line in the factory, and as the superintendent, Sid had every right to fire her. If felt as if Babe tried to play the odds, and in that instance, failed.

I know we haven't discussed it in class, but I think it's also interesting to look at the changes from the Broadway musical to the film. Censorship is obviously an aspect of adaptation for this film. In the song, "I'm Not At All in Love," Babe's line is changed from "All you gotta do is be polite with him, and they've got you spending the night with him," to the film's version, "All you gotta do it seems is work for him, and they've gotcha going berserk for him." It seems that the original Broadway version of that line would fit better with the original novel. There are also some small changes due to language. In "Small Talk," the line "What do you think they charge for ham now? Got so a buck ain't worth a damn now," is changed to "What do you think they charge for fruit now? Got so a buck ain't worth a hoot now." One of the most interesting changes to me, however, is that Prez, the president of the Union, has a larger role in the show. He has his own storyline in which he tries to woo Gladys, Hasler's secretary. There was a slight hint of it in the film when he says something like, "Her is the most beautiful girl" to Gladys while at Hernando's Hideaway (amazing number when seen live). "Her Is" is an number in the show that is sung in the first act and reprised in the second. So I am curious if Prez's storyline was cut because he was just a secondary character, or that giving him more screen time would thus give the union more screen time.

seeing red

after reviewing the cover art of the new printing of the novel, i was constantly thinking of color in the film, and in particular, red. it's all about red in the pajama game–if you look carefully (or even not that carefully), in almost every scene there are both dominant and subtle elements of red scattered throughout. i started making a list and had to stop because there were so many, but here are a few:
• red dresses, skirts, and ribbons on the girls of the factory
• babe's red shoes and the red piping on her blue coat
• red heart buttons (part of the union?)
• red in the factory lights, exit signs, pipes, and giant spools of thread
• sid's red bowtie in the opening scene, his red striped shirt at the picnic

the most important symbol of red came during babe's reprise of "hey there," in which she sings about her inner conflict over sid. she tells herself to get over him and not to "let him make her fall apart." when she gets to the word "pride," the traffic light outside her window flashes to angry red, coloring her bedroom and her body in red light as she lies on her bed.

is that what red is about? pride? it reinforces the proud, standoffish image of babe on the cover of the novel, flashy red dress and staring in self-absorption into her compact mirror. and it makes sense that in the end, this is what she sacrifices in order to be with sid, and in order to win the "7 1/2 cents" even when they can't get retroactive pay for it ("but don't you see? we've won!").

and what do sid and babe come out in at the end of the musical? one shared pair of red pajamas.

The Pajama Party (edit at end)

OK, so I stole that from Rachael. But it's true; the end of the film kind of does turn into a big pajama party. The whole film is pretty much a pajama party. Like the story, none of the things that happen in the movie seem dire -- except for maybe Hines throwing knives. And I noticed that the film did try to create more of a conflict by having Sid fire Babe, but even that seemed to be fixed pretty quickly and easily at the end. And like Professor Newman said in class, the same thing happens at the end of the story.

Watching the film, I wondered how its creators were first inspired to turn the story into a musical. I mean, it didn't really scream song and dance numbers when I read it. But Sid does have a really heavy view of love in the story; he talks about how Babe makes everything totally fantastic, and the language he used to describe being in love was really different from his otherwise sarcastic voice. Like I said yesterday, though, I didn't really find the story that funny. But I think that the tone of the novel gave itself to the kind of raunchy humor that was displayed in the film, and Sid's view of love - yeah, when he wasn't being a pseudo-rapist - was represented in the love songs.

I also noticed that Doris Day's hair wasn't red, which was disappointing, because Sid called Babe "the redhead" in the story. But like I told Agatha, I think it's petty when people think a character's ruined just because the hair color's changed. At the same time, though, hair color has always meant a lot to me when reading about a character; it says something about their personality, about who they are. But I liked Doris Day as Babe. And to be honest, I didn't think that Sid seemed that operatic -- beyond his singing voice and that he seemed to dance with a very stiff spine.

As far as the dancing goes, I don't think it added anything political to the film. I'm not quite sure how it would. Parts of it were coyly sexual and there was that one song where Sid acted like a cowboy, which might have been a reference to his dominant attitude toward women. But the only big musicals I've seen are the most recent Hairspray and West Side Story, so I can't really say if being coyly sexual is part of most musicals or not. Rachael said that the Broadway version of The Pajama Game has much more explicit lyrics, though, that the film had to censor them.

* I just wanted to add that I may have heard that thing about musicals being coyly sexual in another class (es); I actually watched West Side Story for Juvenile Delinquency (go figure).

Dancin' in the Streets

I have to preface this blog post by saying that I really think that the musical adaptation largely trivializes and undermines labor's importance, choosing instead to focus on the seriousness of Babe and Cid's romantic relationship. In fact, it's the romance that ultimately solves the problem, due to Cid's need to reunite with Babe. Additionally, the union's claims are repeatedly reduced to silliness and the workers are mocked as lazy drunks. As an aspiring member of management, Cid is presented as a hard working hero, while Babe never really explains her motivations for believing so strongly in the union. Clearly, many of the (already minimal) labor issues wound up on the cutting room floor as the novel moved to the silver screen and attempted to reach a broad audience.

However, I do think the film at least expresses class solidarity through the dances in the film. Upper management never dances in the film, and Cid's few dance steps are solitary and usually pretty lifeless. Hasler, on the other hand, never dances at all through the film. While this probably stems from the talent of the actors in the film, I do think that the traditional musical chorus does show some unity within the union. The most animated dance scenes involve the full chorus of factory workers in brightly patterned clothes moving in unison. The union picnic and the rally at the end utilize a full cast operating to produce an impressive visual effect. The well-rehearsed tangle of bodies at the picnic illustrates unity within the labor movement, but also fails to differentiate individuals.

However, the image of a chorus can be problematic as a lens to see the working class. While all members of the management team are stoic and not very fun in the film, they have clearly distinguished characters. The chorus remains a coordinated but faceless mass of bodies on the screen, blindly moving as one unit. I think this image is strengthened by the “dancing” steamed pajama tops in the first all-cast dance. The pajama tops fill up with hot air as a part of the choreography, but underline how replaceable anyone in the cast really is. They simply stand in as bodies within the factory setting and as consumers, never fully realized as characters.

A Face in the Crowd

This was the first movie I've seen with Andy Griffith. That's surprising to me. Anyway, I liked both the short story and the movie. One thing that really stood out to me when comparing the two was the relationship between Marsha and Lonesome. In the book, they seemed much less a couple. Marsha seemed a lot more resistant in the book. The movie didn't express that in the same way. Another thing that caught my attention was the way in which Lonesome is discovered and named. It changes the status of Marsha's character because in the movie, she is the one who finds him in a jail and gives him his catchy name.
When I was reading, I was picturing in my head Ray Romano's older brother, Robert, as Lonesome. Andy Griffith doesn't look much the same, but I definitely bought the role. Andy Griffith's character redefined my mental image of Lonesome. Griffiths HAW HAW was also different from the haw haw I had imagined while reading the story, but it worked well nonetheless.
Prof. Newman mentioned this being a dark role for Griffith, and after watching the film, I would agree. I think the character of Lonesome is significantly darker in the film than in the story. The film really focuses on his will of control and his growing insanity. While those traits are definitely present in the story, they are exaggerated and magnified in the film.

Anyway, I liked it. Good reading. Good watching. Good story. Good acting. Good characters. Good plot. Good stuff. Good produce. Cool beans. String beans. 7 bean salad. Chunky soup. Thick hearty stews. Bread bowls. Abnormally large pepper shaker. Fine wines. Live Jazz. Good service. Benevolent owner. Olive Garden.

A Face in the Crowd

A Face in the Crowd raised a question about the concept of time when thinking about different forms of storytelling. The very “present” telling of A Face in the Crowd seems very contradictory to the memorandum that is The Arkansas Traveler. I think the aspect of the presentation of time is very important when considering the transfer from literature to film. With literature the audience can read it and reflect on the constant changing motions of the characters. In film the audience is swept along with the pace of the film and reflection only comes after its completion (unless you leave for a snack break.

I think this could be the main reason that so many adaptations are considered “failures.” The structure of A Face of the Crowd calls for a consistent following of Lonesome Rhodes as dynamic personality. In the short story, Rhodes’s personality is more explained as a fact rather than a developing point. Kazan uses an adaptation of time with this film to explain the rise of the man. Kazan lets us see Rhodes in his element. This agrees more with the forward moving nature of the cinema. It lets us see a man as he is, rather than what he has become.

Once more this points to how when switching forms the entire foundation of the plot must be altered if one wants to make the adaptation “faithful.” Because the form must be changed in A Face in the Crowd to sustain the interest in Lonesome Rhodes and his appeal to the masses. That appeal seems as what was made as the essence of the story. Because that was recognized Kazan was willing to restructure the entire tone of the piece in favor of this. This seems to be a important key to adapting a story. Many of the pieces we have seen thus far have just been a recreation through a visual medium. I don’t think, however, that recreation works when considering the element of time perception in the two different forms. Perhaps change is better when considering remaking a story.

Where Have All the Flower (or Socialist Folk Singers) Gone

First off, I want to comment on how much I enjoy the film Face in the Crowd. This has been my third or fourth time viewing it, and I'm surprised at how it never seems to grow stale. I'm also glad to get a chance to finally read the story from which it came. I've held a kind of ambivalent attitude towards Budd Schulberg's work. While part of me thinks it's great--What Makes Sammy Run?, On the Waterfront, A Face in the Crowd, etc.--part of me wonders if there are other factors, besides Schulberg, at work in what makes them great, especially his films: Kazan, Griffith, Brando, etc. There's also the fact that he named names to HUAC and was largely unapologetic about doing so.

One thing that makes me a little uneasy about the film is its use of a folk singer as the right wing demagogue par excellence. When I think about music associated with the right wing, folk music is not something that comes to mind. When I think of the latter, I envision Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan, and others who are usually associated with (often extreme) left wing politics. The only type of music similar enough to folk that could be considered somewhat right wing is country music. But even country musicians (at least some of them) often have political associations that could be interpreted as leftist--I'm thinking of Hank Williams Sr. song Hey Joe as a response to Mccarthyism. So I wonder if Schulberg's use of a folk singer as representative of the common man/woman is more of a fear on his part of the common masses. This is something Raymond Williams addresses in Culture and Society: a fear of allowing the masses (the unruly mob) their own means of self-determination. This is also at the heart of the debate of fictional representations of labor: do proletarian writers of whatever decade stand outside the workers as a pseudo-interested observer or are they attempting to rise with them. Perhaps the film and story, then, despite their many merits, suffer from from this potentially ungrounded fear on Schulberg's part.

one face of eve

i, like rachael, really regretted the loss of the witty, in control, female narrative from the novella version. i did also enjoy the film for itself, however–but, as usual, for telling a different story. remember that filmmaker from hutcheon who retold the story of the cuban political hero (i can't find/remember the exact reference now) because he felt that the story had been misrepresented? well even though i suppose this is fiction, the film's inversion of lonesome rhodes' guilt to marcia's guilt felt like that kind of adaptation. it wasn't just a matter of telling a different story–it was more a matter of saying "no, you've gotten this wrong; this is how it happened," this time making marcia more fully responsible for rhodes' behavior. a face in the crowd went from being a story of mutual blame back to blaming marcia as biblical eve for her 'original sin' of introducing the knowledge of fame to lonesome.

thus marcia moves from being this incredibly together, strong woman whom i'm pretty sure we all agree with when she tells lonesome to get out of her life, to this crazed, hands-clutching-her-face, edvard munch's "the scream" type of persecuted person who is suddenly supposed to be responsible for the antics of a grown man.

this theme is developed from the beginning by first portraying lonesome as an innocent, with no desire to want to tell anybody what to do about anything, and who slowly becomes power-crazed and selfish because of the role he is forced into by marcia and by the industry.

the end of the film, however, steps back from fully blaming eve for the fall of adam, in mel miller's final declamation to lonesome. he flatly remarks that audience's memories are short, and eventually someone will "give him another go" on a much cheaper venue, but that whatever he has from now on, it "won't be the same." once man has sinned, he has forever fallen…even in the entertainment industry.

as marcia and mel stand at the bottom of apartment and look up, listening to lonesome scream threats about suicide, mel again reinforces lonesome's culpability for himself by telling marcia not to listen to his rants. finally, she nods and gets into a taxi never to see him again. i was so glad that they didn't take this out of the movie.

A Face In the Crowd

So - I still have to finish the story, but I want to type this first.

I think that the film version really showed not only the rise and fall of a celebrity, but also the audience reaction - how an audience can build someone up and tear them down. Because in the end Lonesome Rhodes was really a sad character; I wish I'd seen whether or not he jumped, because then I could've judged in the end if he was sincere or not. I think - for better or for worse - that Andy Griffith really gave himself to the character. I know the laugh was a bit much, but it definitely wasn't the performance that I expected from him; it was better than I expected.

Face in the Mirror

One of the primary changes that A Face in the Crowd makes to the short story “Your Arkansas Traveler” is the insertion of an audience. The story could not include outsider reactions to the radio or television show, of course, because it was tied down to a first person narrator. Therefore, we got a cynical view of Lonesome Rhodes as a deceitful drunk. Of course, Lonesome is a deceitful drunk, but not to his adoring fans across the country, only to the less than innocent people producing his show and seeing his horrible personal life. The story does an admirable job of exposing the steamy underbelly of the entertainment industry, but in doing that it reduces the audience into an unthinking mob. Marcia admires Lonesome's charisma as much as it repulses her in the story. The film, on the other hand, provides a glimpse into the adoring crowds as they see themselves in Lonesome's “down home” charm.

The insertion of an audience reveals two elements of the world of marketing and media: the need for people to connect to personalities represented on TV and the radio, as well as the danger of that identification. The early shots of Lonesome “talking to” isolated housewives as they work in their homes. His sympathy towards and insight into domestic labor draws the isolated women into a community with Lonesome. Of course, his name connects with lonely people across the country, while his “grass roots wisdom” gives people a sense of authenticity. In the increasingly commercial culture of the 1950s, the audience seems desperate to connect with anything authentic, even if it is used to sell them something.

Even though the film does give a face to the audience searching for meaning and human connection, it still reduces Lonesome fans into a mob. Because Lonesome lacks any actual authenticity, he is able to play them like his guitar, manipulating their trust to increase sales and do his own dirty work. By seeing themselves in the television, people fall prey to the machinations of the advertising industry.

From Wyoming to Arkansas

I have to say, I really enjoyed the short story. I thought it was great to have a witty, female narrative. Unfortunately, I'm not having the same response to the film. One of the best aspects of the story is the Margy character and how she is the one person to not be bowled over by Lonesome's charm. She is a "northern intellectual" (if that's what you want to call it) and she finds his folksome nature fake. She has a sharp wit reminiscent of Rosalind Russell in "His Girl Friday." But this is completely lost in the film. The first setting is changed from Wyoming to Arkansas, which loses the north-south dynamic between the two. One of the weirdest changes to me is that she goes looking for him. That is the exact opposite of the story. What makes the story work is that he is dropped in her lap, whether she likes it not, and she has to content with what this means for her life. Changing her demeanor completely changes the dynamic. She's not supposed to sleep with him! The unconsummated love furthers that awkward relationship, but these changes really seem to ruin it.

P.S. Having said all that. I really liked the film, on its own, when not considered as an adaptation. The last scene was especially chilling and, I think, made up (some what) for the lack of tension between the two characters in the beginning of the film.

Lonesome Rhodes

After reading the short story, the mental image I have for Lonesome is Raymond's brother Robert from Everybody Loves Raymond. I'll be happier after the screening, because right now it's impossible for me to picture Lonesome as anybody but Robert, Raymond's brother.

Mahty

Just realized I forgot to post something after Tuesdays screening of Marty. My first thoughts after watching the film were that it was surprisingly faithful to the script while somehow managing a feature film length. The dialogue was very close, minus the ramblings of Marty. They filled it out a lot by taking time to set the scene. For example, the amount of time it takes for Marty to bring the dog home from the dance. That was one instance where a lot of additional dialogue was written in. The suicide dialogue was a bit of a surprise. This film was very close to the images I had in my mind, with the exception of the dog being not as doggish as I had imagined. I did notice, however, that the characters got on my nerves a little bit at times during the film, which made it harder for me to feel for them. Marty talked too much and Clara talked too little. She also had a hard-to-define quality about her that disturbed me slightly. In any case I found it harder to feel sorry for them in the film than in the screenplay.

selling out...or speaking to the audience?

maybe i'm just now obsessed with relating everything back to a gray flannel suit, but once again i felt as if, here was another fairly original, creative text which was reshaped into the same dominant middle-class narrative about trying to move up in the world, that we saw in give us this day. marty not only wants to move into an apartment, but now he wants to buy up the butcher shop, goes on a long soliloquy about how he always wanted to go to college and never got to, and finally brings in some mediocre psychology by commenting on his and clara's fear of "being on their own" and learning to move out from under the yoke of their parents.

now, i'm not necessarily judging the movie as bad (but am i right in thinking "gene kelly was married to her?") but maybe this is just part of what drew commented on earlier as the necessary adherence to the demands of the audience. and i suppose there's no saying that paddy chayefsky wasn't thrilled to be able to develop marty into a longer storyline–perhaps feeling that he could explore even more than just "latent homosexuality."

finally, i allow this: that the story is sweet. and that counts for something. i don't just mean "i liked it" because obviously that would not be a profound thing to say for a graduate student. i mean that chayefsky maintained a certain sincere warmth in marty's character and in his 'sticking to his guns,' as it were, to ask out clara again despite his friends' disapproval. his simple language, and his homeliness, and his mass on sundays with mother may be cheesy, but they're also endearing and something many audiences–both of the fifties and today–can identify with.

so i guess i'm saying i shouldn't fall into the snob category of chiding chayefsky for creating a film that is so much of the genre of fifties's middle class culture. after all, i've watched and loved virtually the same movie in about sixty different forms: twenty-seven dresses, bride wars, made of honor, the wedding date, princess diaries, etc.–and what will my kids say to me about that? exactly.

Womanly Virtue(?)

It was obvious that additional material would be necessary to make the story feature film length, but I was intrigued by what they chose to elongate. Much detail was added to the relationship between Marty and Clara in-between them meeting at the Waverly (now Stardust) ballroom and them returning to Marty's home. There was much more detail by ways of them walking down the street, and stopping for a meal at a diner. It seems to me that the most obvious reasons for such additions was the quickness of Marty meeting a girl to bringing her back to his house. When he tries to kiss her while in the kitchen, he states that he wasn't going to try anything (especially since his mother would soon be home), but what was his motivation for bringing her then?(this could also just be 21st century cynicism of male-female relationships)

In addition, while the movie may attempt to heighten Clara's virtue, the virtue of Marty's mother tasks a small assault. When waiting to go into Sunday Mass, the Mother follows much of the same dialogue as the teleplay, telling Marty that Clara doesn't look like a nice girl (mostly because she's "ugly" and not Italian). in the teleplay, when Marty excuses himself to go into church, the mother has a moment of self-reflection as she says to the audience that based on her harsh words, she is becoming as based as her sister. This moment is left out of the film. Without this one sentence, does the mother (and audience) lose this moment of regret and self-awareness? Does her womanly virtue as a mother take a hit, as she schemes against her son's desires for companionship?

Threats to the Family

I am intrigued by the conversation about motherhood and care giving within Chayefsky's Marty. Women are primarily portrayed as caring and highly put upon, while men (especially unmarried bachelors) live off the work of women. Largely, the women within the film express genuine emotions and live within a realistic—if somewhat sad—world. However, no positive female characters are shown to interact outside of the domestic or caring realm. Even Clara works as a school teacher, mentioning her students in a loving fashion and refusing to take an administrative role in order to remain with “her children.” The script ultimately reduces all real conflict to domestic drama. While Marty does experience certain ups and downs regarding his social class and job, the public world of work represents the potential for expansion and growth. Instead, real conflict originates within the world of family, and must therefore be resolved there.

Women never really escape the home. The dialogue between Marty's mother and aunt bemoaning the horrors of old age for women focuses on the loss of work. Nowhere in the script or the film do women have options to occupy their time other than caring for others. When Clara offers the idea of Marty's aunt getting a hobby, Marty's mother dismisses it as idealistic and overly academic. Men have options outside of the home, but Chayefsky portrays these options as masturbatory and expressions of “middle class latent homosexuality.” Despite the trouble and stress that comes from marriage and family, Marty sees the family as the ultimate site for happiness.

However, Chayefsky seems to see “latent homosexuality” as a major threat to the nuclear family's stability and happiness. The film adaptation certainly accented the threat that Angie (who's name is suspiciously feminine) posed to Marty's future. His attempt to hunt down and sabotage Marty and Clara's relationship almost trumps Marty's mother's disapproval. Heteronormativity is endangered by even heterosexuals, in Chayefsky's world, in a ways that makes it surprising that nuclear families ever form.

Marty and the Antagonistic Old

I’ve seen the film version of Marty before so it was interesting to read the teleplay. It will also be interesting to watch a scene from the television movie, especially since Rod Steiger plays Marty—I’ve never seen anything with Rod Steiger in which he plays a character as likable as Marty.

One thing that the teleplay, the t.v. movie (at least I’m guessing), and the film share is their somewhat negative portrayal of the older generation. This older generation, primarily comprised in the narrative of Marty’s mother and aunt, is in many ways portrayed as an antagonist to Marty’s generation. Interestingly enough, it is approximately the same generation as Geremio and Annuziata in Christ in Concrete. They are a generation that has experienced the various economic hardships the working class faced during the early decades of the twentieth century culminating in the Great Depression. But the Great Depression is something Marty’s generation faced as well. If he’s thirty-six in the play, and it is set in 1953, he would have been about twenty during the mid 1930s. So why has his generation been able to cope with and benefit from the post-war boom—and the economic, political, and cultural changes that it brought—while his parent’s generation has refused many of them? Old age? The fear of change? Economic uncertainty among an older generation that’s unable to work and must depend on their children or possibly Social Security, which was passed during the Depression? In his essay printed after the teleplay, Chayefsky seems to single Marty’s generation as its own antagonist. But he doesn’t mention the antagonistic part that the older generation plays. Maybe this is something we can talk more about during class.

Adaptation as Bricklaying

I thought Give Us This Day to be an excellent adaptation of Christ in Concrete. It attempts to address many of the same potential problems the class attached to the novel, especially the overly romanticized characterization of Geremio. Instead of portraying him as literally a Christ buried in concrete, the film offers us a more well-rounded portrayal of him: his character faults and strengths, including how they interact with a socio-economic environment that only cares for the laborer one out of every three weeks, when he's needed to lay bricks, and only pays up when he's dead. We also get a potentially more rounded characterization of Annuziata as well. She's no longer a Jesu-nut but periodically drinks wine before the sun goes down and is primarily interested in owning property.

This is not to say that I liked the film better than the novel or that I liked the film's characters better than those of the novel. Different mediums/forms offer different ways of portraying subject-matter, and not necessarily the same subject-matter either. The film is interested in the family's struggle to buy a house, whereas the book is interested in the family's struggle to survive. They also deal with different primary characters--the film with Geremio and Annuziata and the novel with Paul and to a lesser extent Annuziata. Perhaps this is what makes the film so successful as an adaptation: not trying to replicate the novel's narrative but explore unresolved aspects of it, adding its own brick to those of the novel.

Give Us This Day

Give Us This Day presented a movie based on, but very different from the book Christ in Concrete. The focus shifted entirely from a boy and his struggles to provide for the family, to the father of the household and his story before the boy ever had to take over the family business. In my opinion this lost all the sentimentality and intensity of the novel. Geremio’s struggle in the film did not nearly seem as pressurized at that of his family in the book. He only has three children, becomes foreman, and only has to worry about his promise of buying his wife a home. Geremio’s character in the film is not nearly as likeable as his own wife is rather indifferent to his death, whereas in the novel her devastation from his death is heartbreaking.

I was curious as to why they would make such dramatic distinctions between these too. The story very obviously seemed to lie with Paul, even for the film. However, I think an important thing to remember is that a film must call for an audience. In 1949, much like the Man in the Grey Flannel Suit, a large audience was the workingman and the struggle to survive in an indifferent world. Three children appeals much more to the average American workingman than eight would. Furthermore the need of a mistress and the stresses between home and working life are highlighted because these are the stresses men of the time feel.

In the novel Pietro di Donato was simply trying to relate experiences he had as a boy and the culture and hardships he had to endure. The audience was not as obvious, save for those who experienced similar tragedies during the Depression. Yet films need to relate to something. In this case they chose the working class man. In such a way, the filmmakers needed to abandon Donato’s voice and experience in favor of relation to an audience.

Mustache

This was probably my favorite movie we've watched so far. At least for me it did a terrific job conveying a really bleak mood. Although certain parts had some theaterish acting, the emotions were communicated to me very well. I felt a lot of tension, anxiety, and sympathy for both the mustache man and the salt wife. The search for "something more" was way more apparent in this movie than in the Man in the Grey Flannel Suit film. It seemed to portray the theme of the flannel man book more accurately than the flannel man film did. I felt sorry for the characters and the concrete drowning was especially gruesome. The character seemed to be arcing towards a positive ending, and then everything goes wrong. I like that because it avoids the common tendency of throwing the events of the entire story out for a clean, all-loose-ends-tied ending. I hardly recognized the mustache man when he was shown without a mustache.

A Mistress, Really?

I haven't seen the film yet, but from what Agatha told me, I don't think I will like it. Geremio has a mistress? I don't understand this alteration because it changes everything about Geremio and Annunziata. Annunziata, and through her pain, Paul dotes on the memory of Geremio, even going to visit the psychic to makes sure he isn't in any pain on the other side. Can this strong connection withhold such a schism as infidelity? I wonder if this would change Annunziata's belief in her husband and strong connection to God. Then again, this all depends on Annunziata being aware of the affair.

an italian gray flannel suit is still a flannel suit

i didn't just feel that the movie switched around elements of the novel–in doing so, and in refocusing the story on geremio's life and on his relationship with annunziata, it also sent an entirely different message. instead of paul's struggle with poverty itself, we are presented, in the first scene of the film, with geremio's breakdown over his lack of purpose, his inadequacy. it's not that poverty isn't there, but rather more that the poverty is a sign of his unfulfilled longings, the "something more" that he expected to have in his life because of his marriage and children, but which he doesn't seem to have. is this starting to sound familiar yet?

whereas the geremio of the novel is aware of the unsafe conditions of the demolition project and tries to stop it, the film suggests that where geremio really begins to go wrong is when he submits to the needs of having a job during the Depression and compromises his own workers' safety. ok, yes, it is the Depression, but are we getting warmer now?

then, the whole conflict in the film centers around geremio's struggle against moving up in the world and giving up his identity as an honest laborer in order for him to be able to afford the house he promised annunziata. hmmm where have we heard that plot before? having a house is, in fact, the ultimate representation of happiness for annunziata, which she qualifies at the end of the film by saying that geremio has "at last bought [them] a house."

when geremio dies in the novel, i believed his death was supposed to represent that of Christ–that geremio's death was a sacrifice to the building of new york city–or to capitalism, if you will (i guess that questions how worthy or holy we want to call that sacrifice). the death of geremio in the film, however, is more like that of the mortal sinner who is hoping desperately that someone else out there has already made the sacrifice so that they can save him. from what? the evil of capitalism, maybe.

Christ in Concrete

So about an hour into the movie, I was wondering if Geremio was going to die. That's probably insensitive, but I was surprised that the movie was so different from the book. It wasn't that different though; things were just compressed and moved around. Actually, the movie was pretty much backwards from the book. It kind of reminded me of I Remember Mama in that respect, just because the stories were compressed into the play and then into the movie.

Rome-ance

Gregory Peck returns to his Roman Holiday in the film adaptation of The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit, and it’s just as romantic. Despite the horrors of war, Tom manages to find a picturesque landscape full of exotic women in both versions, though. The exotic nature of Rome in both versions shows American fascination with Europe following World War Two, however the film glosses over some of the grittier facts. The novel allows Maria to express how her family dies in front of her eyes, while their death is simply mentioned in the film. Additionally, the villa in the movie is partially destroyed, but only to give a lovely view of a beautiful town; it does not show Tom breaking apart a piano and destroying the riches of the house to build a fire.

However, in both versions Rome acts as a sort of time out of time--not only an escape from the war, but an escape from life itself. Tom and Maria live totally contingently, with no social obligations. In contrast, Tom’s life with Betsy is fraught with concerns over money and children. Both versions also seem to allow Tom this period of romance outside of marriage, giving men the space to sow their wild oats without major repercussions. Tom’s experience in Rome is totally outside of his peace time life; even when he decides to “do the right thing” and help out Maria and his son he never meets or speaks to them, delegating that responsibility to Judge Bernstein instead. Rome becomes almost a mythical place in the novel and the movie. It is essential that it does not pose any actual threat to the nuclear family of the 1950s, instead it proves Tom’s virility and provides a needed respite from the horrors of war.

family matters

i am not sure about the casting choices for the film version of the man in the gray flannel suit. it seems impossible to be gregory peck and be hesitant, stressed, and fearful of economic impotence–basically everything that tom rath is in the novel, and gregory peck is not. instead, he remakes tom rath into a suave, forthright, albeit emotional man, and yet so not emotional; rather, peck's emotions are all noble and contained, like the pinnacle of what american manhood is supposed to be.

that's what the whole film felt like for me, however: an ennobling of the struggle for meaning that sloan wilson almost makes seem a bit pathetic, or at least unattainable, but the film makes into a heroic affirmation of 'real' values.

family is what ultimately comes to represent the most valuable entity in the world of the film. i think the novel eventually comes to that conclusion too, in tom and betsy's focus on creating a healthier school environment for their children. but the film really pushes this image immediately the film begins: we see the cute antics of the rath children, the tv time, the temper tantrums before bed, the dog, the fatal drama of chicken pox. sentimental music plays in the background, reinforcing the warmth and connectedness of the home and the family. and by the end of the film, instead of tom's obsessive mental harping on maria, he says to betsy that he has put maria in the past and only thinks of the welfare of his child (if we believe him). finally, the part of the novel in which hopkins invites tom to join him on the business trip in california is moved to the very end of the film, to allow tom to actively reject "success" over the time he wants to spend with his family.

hopkins also expresses more bitterness and vindictiveness at why he has chosen "success" over family, and in the staging of the scene i think we are meant to be left with the impression that he has made the wrong choice, that it has deprived him of a life he could have had. in the novel, getting to hear more of hopkins' own narrative, his upbringing and his relationships with his family, we draw basically the same conclusion, except there is a sense that even if he has made sacrifices, the person he is must always draw him to the life of business, and therefore almost seems less like the choice he made, than like the compulsion he is forced to obey.

The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit (2)

These 2 things struck me about the film:

1) The addition that Hopkins thought that Tom looked like his son. I don't think this was in the book, and I thought that it was an interesting addition. It was probably a way to forge a connection between Tom and Hopkins, and to make Hopkins seem like a better family man -- although to what end I'm not sure. Maybe the writers made him want to seem more sympathetic to the audience, based on the time period.

As far as forging a connection between Tom and Hopkins, I don't know if it was necessary, because it didn't seem like their storyline was fully realized. We talked during the movie how things were moved around and cut out. The thing with Maria came late, for example. We were surprised it came so late.

2) We talked during the movie about Gregory Peck playing the main character. I think choosing him definitely had an effect on the character. For example, we talked about how he wasn't as sarcastic, and I don't know whether this specifically was a positive or a negative change.

Any Other Color Besides Gray?

There is a lot of gray in this film from the Manhattan buildings to Gregory Peck's wardrobe, but I'd like to look at the colors that characterize the women in his life. When we were watching the film, Agatha pointed out that she hated Betsy's outfits throughout the movie. I noticed, too, that they seem quite drab, even for a 1950's housewife. In the majority of the film, Betsy wears a combination of gray, brown, beige, and orange - not the happiest of colors. I wonder if this was meant to parallel the "mundane-ness" of the life she felt she lived. Her dour and boring attire matched her dour and boring home (and life). It is only when Betsy is happy to be settled in the old mansion that she finally decides to wear pale pink, a more pleasing and happy color. In contrast, when we first see Maria in flashback form, she is wearing a bright teal dress, brimming with brightness and passion, like it's wearer. The use (or lack thereof) of color does separate the two women in my mind - and Tom's decision for a passionate affair, leaving his dull life behind him.

The Depression In the Gray Flannel Suit

One thing I noticed about The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, both in the film and novel, is that besides offering few examples of working class characters, they never, at least not that I noticed, explicitly mention the Depression. Sure, the novel and film were produced in the fifties, almost twenty years after the height of it, but it seems as if it might at least be mentioned in contrast to the boom of post-war America. The only potential reference we get of it comes from the novel: when Tom is told about his father mismanaging the family’s money (possibly a reference to the crash of the stock market and its aftermath?). I wonder if this is an attempt on Wilson and Johnson’s part to repress or even disavow the economic realities experienced during the Depression. If so, could we view elements of the Depression as attempting to make themselves known in the novel and film, a more subtle version of Tom’s war memories making themselves known in the narrative? In what scenes or moments in the film might we find them, if in fact they do exist?

The Mad Gray Flannel Suit

                The differences between Tom Rath and Donald Draper are fairly immense. One is stuck in the war in which he faced many horrors; one is embarrassed by a past that forced an identity change. While Rath struggles to find success in the corporate world, Draper views his corporate world as an escape from all else. Although, Rath and Draper’s personalities clash to an extreme degree I think the qualities in which they share are very interesting. They both have a multiple world syndrome; the war, their job and their home life. They have secrets that they feel they must keep from everyone else, and they both look at life with a sense of cynical realism.

                “You’re born alone and you die alone and this world drops things on you to make you forget it,” Draper’s depressing words reflect not only his own philosophy, but that of Rath, “Things just happen…they happen and they happen again and anybody who tries to make sense out of it goes out of his mind” (96). This sense of naturalism engrained in these characters makes them more similar than any difference can account for. But why are these qualities so important? Why is the absence of Draper’s family’s importance in Mad Men the same as the lack of the corporation in The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit? Both these characters seem to reject these ideals respectively, yet how can they still essentially represent the same character?

                I think more importantly than these particular specifics to the story, is the general mood of it. If the mood is carried through from one medium to another, can we deem it an adaptation? The two stories are different in so many ways (time period, setting, corporate life, et cetera) yet they contain so many of the same values. Does mood and memory then carry more weight than the actual story itself? Many of the problems I had with the adaptations of the “Mama” stories came from the fact that the mood changed so dramatically over the different forms. What then is mood? How can it capture so much in so different stories? What is its purpose in stories and the idea of adaptation?

I found the following passage in The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit interesting:

"In this strange, polite world high in the sky above Rockefeller Center, maybe nobody ever really got fired. Maybe all Hopkins did was to give a man nothing to do, absolutely nothing to do, until he started to go out of his mind sitting uselessly in his office all day, and resigned. Maybe that was the polite, smooth way to get rid of a man nobody wanted" (138).

In the passage we get a conflation of the heaven/hell dichotomy. What is usually thought of as the ideal place, where one gets paid to sit and do nothing, turns out to be a peculiar kind of torture to Tom, his own private hell. Perhaps this is a further sign of Tom's cynicism, but I think there's something else working in this passage beyond just characterizing his temperament. Wilson provides us in this passage with an empty space situated within the rat-race usually associated with the corporate world. There's a sort of fear inherent in this space that the moment there's no work then there's no worker. Tom might as well have disappeared in this scene, at least in his own thinking, since he momentarily serves no purpose in the community of which he has become a part. This line of thinking is interesting especially since it is usually seen to come from the top: managers worried that workers are not utilizing every moment of their time to perform pertinent work. It is also an inversion of the Marxist concept of surplus-labor in which workers labor beyond the hours they are actually paid for. I'm not quite sure what to make of the implications of the passage yet but I think it would make a good topic for classroom discussion.

The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit

So I haven't finished the book; I have to say, though, that it reminds me a lot of Revolutionary Road. I'm actually writing my paper on that; it was a book first. The plots are similar, although Revolutionary Road does not have as much emphasis on the war. So I actually wondered if that was an adaptation of -- or at least inspired by -- The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit. I can't remember for sure if I ever saw the 2 connected in the press.

I felt like, even though Mad Men actually had a similar plot to The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, it had a different tone. It didn't seem quite as depressing, and there were humorous points where we laughed. I'm not sure if that's just because it's TV or not -- the whole change of form thing we've been studying. I did think that the ambiguity about Don Draper's marriage in the 1st episode we watched was a good twist; I didn't think he was married throughout the show, but I did wonder about it. And then at the end, we find out that he was.

the "luxury" of suffering?

my first taste of mad men has led me to wonder which version of 'reality'–that of the tv show, versus that of the world of sloan wilson–is most accurate. or can they co-exist together? i guess what i mean is that the tv show addresses ideological crises that are missing from the novel, like the blatantly misogynistic attitude that men hold for women, and that women hold for themselves. or..."missing" isn't the right word. i think i'm judging man in the gray flannel suit from a modern perspective, and mad men is also "judging" the fifties from a modern perspective, so we both see things that either weren't "seen" in wilson's eyes, or else were seen but were not seen as remarkable.

in fact, in the example of misogyny that i mentioned, betsy's role actually gives her a lot more freedom and equal footing with tom, than i thought was granted to women in general in mad men, with perhaps the exception of megan (though she, of course, is able to procure this only by remaining a single woman). sloan wilson hardly addresses sexism, so from his narrative's viewpoint, it doesn't exist. rather, the injustices he expresses in the world that tom and betsy live in, are fueled by economy and politics, and equally brutalize men and women–or at least, they do for those directly involved in war (tom and maria are the only characters given some real homage for what they suffer during the war).

if betsy suffers, it doesn't seem to matter much to wilson, maybe because she refrains from the pessimism that keeps her spouse from rising above such things, or maybe because wilson doesn't feel that she's suffered. but mad men suggests that there's such a darker level of suffering pressed down beneath the surface of the smiling, well-groomed, deferential woman, and i try to imagine what my life would be like if i were betsy, the good wife, trapped just like her husband, but not allowed to show suffering. for if she did, then wilson could never give the novel a "happy ending," because tom would never be able to get over the luxury of his own suffering.

It's a great time to be female

The 2 episodes of Mad Men we watched, although very entertaining, did not seem to have much in common with flannel man book except for the setting... kind of. The main character in Mad Men and The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit was a male with a job and a family, often wore suits, and drank a lot of liquor. Other than that, it seemed like a completely different everything.

In Mad Men, the main character was already the boss and he did not seem to be desperate for a promotion. He WAS a veteran but of a different war. Characters from the book like the doctor, the lawyer, Hopkins, and the nannyish woman never made an appearance. The main character did not seem to question the meaning of everyday life, and his goals seemed to be different than the goals of the flannel man.

HAVING SAID THAT, I feel like I'm looking at it the wrong way and we weren't supposed to watch this with the mindset that it was a direct adaptation of the flannel man book. It seems more like an adaptation of a time period, lifestyle, and culture. If I look at it that way, it seems to be much more accurate. The images in the show were similar to the images I was generating while reading the book. There was a certain dissatisfaction, but each respective medium took a different view of it. Mainly, the flannel man seemed to be way more obsessed with money. The mad man seemed to be more uncertain as to what it was he wanted.

In conclusion, I feel like I missed something and I'm writing about the complete wrong thing because Mad Men and The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit do not seem related at all, or maybe just slightly vaguely coincidentally related.

Norman Rockwell(?)

Personally, I love Mad Men. I think it's a great show and I definitely see how it can relate to Gray Flannel. I think when someone mentions the 1950's/early 60's, you mind tends to go to rock-n-roll, poodle skirts, and Happy Days - the quintessential Norman Rockwell painting. Yet this two pieces speak to the discontentment of the middle-class masses.

In both examples there really is a sense of the discontented gap between one's work life and one's home life. Tom Rath wants to have that pulling desire to spend time with his family, but he is rather complacent towards them. At the end of the book, he makes a conscious decision to choose the job that will keep him closer to his family, but as I stated in class, I didn't really buy the ending to the book. I would have been happier to see him accept his unhappiness and move on.

Anyway, I think this disconnect is portrayed elegantly in the Mad Men pilot. When you first see Don Draper, he is in a bar, smoking and drinking, his only care what to pitch at the Lucky Strikes meeting. As the episode goes on, you see that all of the secretaries in the office worship him and he has a convenient "relationship" with a greeting-card designer in the village (while simultaneously flirting with a Jewish department store heiress). I assume from a male perspective, this life would be "the dream." But at the end of the episode, you see the silhouette of a man getting off the train at Ossining, driving up to a picturesque white Colonial house, and Don Draper walks through the door. He goes upstairs to kiss his beautiful wife, and checks on his two children asleep in bed. As the camera pans out, you see mother, father, and children framed in a Norman Rockwell look-alike. Does this count as the ideal model of 50's family life when we have been privy to his disconnected "city behaviors"?

(Un)Happy Endings

Reading the end of The Man in the Flannel Jacket completely changed my understanding of the novel and my loyalties to its characters. The novel attempts to resolve issues surrounding capitalism, masculine identity and labor relations, but ends without giving any genuine solutions. Tom does seem to integrate his life during war and his current existence by supporting his son, but this simply uses the post-war prosperity and relies on his well-paid labor rather than human connection. To me, the end of the novel read like a masturbatory male fantasy, where Tom got everything he wanted: a well paying position at a meaningful job, time to spend with his family, approval to use his grandmother's estate, integration with the war and even his wife's quick acceptance of his affair during the war. Although Tom sort of stands up to his boss and owns up to the past, he does it in a safe environment where there is no real fear of failure, and no real bravery in his actions. Tom is a long way from Karkow.

Another thing that did not sit well with me about the ending of the novel was the continued division of home and work life within the novel. Even when Betsy stands to speak at the town meeting regarding the new school, she is addressed as “Mrs. Rath” and joking uses her position as a woman to have the last word in the debate. Although Tom's job may move closer to his home, it never integrates with his home life, continuing the Victorian concept of separate spheres for men and women: Betsy dominates the children and the home, while Tom goes off and does whatever he does at his job. While he does have a genuine home life, unlike his boss, Tom continues to unquestioningly go to work to support his leisure time (and cocktail time) at home, while his wife does the majority of the domestic labor. Far from rebelling against the oppressive system of labor that Tom sees around him, he finds that the real solution is complaining about it to Betsy and honestly opening up about his feelings. While this is a step, it is far from the solution that I was hoping for.

Check it out.

This isn't my blog post for Wednesday, but I thought this link related to class. :)

http://wonderwall.msn.com/movies/Countdown-13-Best-Book-Franchises-9646.gallery?&photoId=37572

I Forgot Mama

Sorry this is so late

The difference between the forms of I Remember Mama (the play and movie) and Kathryn Forbes’s novel is very apparent. The need to add certain features to the film to compensate for it being a film shows the disparity between the two different mediums. The way Uncle Chris and the aunts play such a more significant comedic role suggest that the movie must make-up for the lack of continuity that presents itself in the book form. I think his makes a lot of sense in terms of audience views – people can put down a book at any time, but they do not watch a movie in several different sections. This suggests that the choppiness of her stories lends more to the television format, but who’s to say what this format needs to be. In Pulp Fiction, Tarantino tells the overlapping stories of three different characters. Why is the film world so adverse to discontinuity in their movies that they must correct adaptation to fix that? Is this why people are so concerned with fidelity? Because movies tend to try and compensate for a lack of structure in the novel they are trying to adapt? How has this structure become the standard for modern film?

Another aspect of the transformation in these forms came from a point Lipsitz brought up in his argument about the focus on the modern family. A lot of the focus in the film comes from the need of the filmmakers to present an ‘ideal home’ lifestyle. This focus shows us that the evolution of time affects the evolution of adaptation. A modern adapted piece cannot in represent the same thing as the original because the modern view will take on an entirely different perspective. We’ve discussed time before as a big part of adaptation, but I think it must be focused on much more. So important is the time period to the study of adaptation? Does adaptation not evolve simultaneously with time?

I Remember Mama

I found the TV adaptation of I Remember Mama much less substantial than the book. The issues are much much more trivial in the TV show. The focus is placed on the mother pov instead of katrins. The mother is portrayed as a more self centered individual than in the book. She's a real negative nancy in the tv show. The play seemed to be a more accurate representation of the book. The tone, characters, themes, events, and overall story were followed more closely in the play than in the tv show.

I was wondering if perhaps TV didn't have an audience for deeper, dramatic, more complicated stories and that's why the tv show seemed like such a pruned generic version of the book. Maybe the producers of the show felt it was necessary to lighten up the book so that the show would appeal to a larger audience.

Mama Could Use Some Maxwell, Please

One thing that interested me about the Mama adaptations was their depiction of an immigrant, working-class mother to what I'm guessing would be a mixture of working class and middle class audiences--since not everyone could read, had a t.v., or access to the stage theater though most people seemed to have access to the movies, at least every now and then. I wonder what effects each medium had on its particular audience. The adaptation that seemed to have clear signs of an ideological underpinning was the television version, which of all the versions was the most different. In it we have a mother, like many other viewing mothers, with one major exception from most of them: she's a first generation immigrant. But she is extremely sympathetic, at least to other housewives and mothers, in her portrayal: a mother constantly working to keep the family functioning as a family while at the same time doubting whether or not her family really appreciates her sacrifices. The other adaptations certainly show the family's dependence on "mama" as well as the continual work she must get done but not a trace of her being under-appreciated. I wonder if this was an addition intended for the typical audience of the television medium, a reminder to the family to appreciate mama or to mama that her family appreciates her. And I also wonder how advertising tapped into this particular portrayal: buy mama a radio to keep her company or an electric iron/vacuum/etc. that cuts her work in half.

What ideological effects did the other adaptations have or intend to have? Were they an attempt to normalize or get people to identify with an immigrant family? A working class family? Or to provide an example that the immigrant family could assimilate to American life? Or that the children of a working class family could rise into the middle class? Or did the adaptations attempt to provide an ideal example of what the typical American family could be in the 1940s and 50s. There are, of course, many possible sociological inquiries with which we could approach the film. I just thought I would highlight a few.

Collectivism and Mama

All of the adaptations of Mama's Bank Account seem to center on the process of idealization that goes hand in hand with memory and the past. All of the different time periods wherein the adaptations occurred were periods of strife and confusion (the depression, WWII, the 50s), and seemed to need a return to “simpler” times for a moral recentering. Mama always stands strong in the middle of her nuclear and extended family, rallying their support to get things done. This collective attitude is essential to the narrative and emotional core of the story. However, the TV show loses this collective attitude, paring the cast down to a reduced nuclear family and a few recurring aunts. This shows an impressive shift in Forbes stories, completely changing the role of family in society.

The TV show's smaller cast and small, single family home illustrate a growing sense of isolation and discontent in America as commercial culture elbowed its way into every facet of life. Without a great number of personalities to navigate and placate, Mama's episodic problems lack the frenetic energy and intelligence of the stories. Mama expresses deep seated frustrations with her life, and rages against her family's ingratitude. Of course, Mama always returns to her appreciative family and solves their problems, but that seems to be part of the unsettling nature of the TV show. Rather than rallying the collective energies in order to resolve issues and ameliorate racial and economic difficulties, problems must be solved by commercial products. In the increasingly affluent but divided post-war society, advertisers sought to replace family and friend networks with brand affinity. Instead of relying on erratic relatives, Mama relies on the comforting regularity of Maxwell House Coffee. In this way, even human warmth is seen through the lens of branded products.

I think that the most important element of this is that the TV show grafts this branding and isolation onto an idealized view of the past. By rooting it in a historical setting and showing the discontent and frustrations of a hardworking ancestor, advertisers justified their products historically. This naturalizes the consumptive, nuclear family and lonely housewife for television viewers in the 50s. Without a view of a different way of living, as offered by the collective family life of earlier representations of Mama, viewers were more likely to seek solace in Maxwell House coffee, rather than just coffee.

Mama and Race

I reviewed the readings before I saw the movie and I was drawn to the passage that states Mama soothes all of the children in the hospital ward (even the one Black child). I found that interesting as a question of ethnicity and race in "I Remember Mama." When I saw the clip in the film, the first thought that entered my mind was a question of whether or not the children would be in segregated wards (at the time - 1910, or at the time of the filming). The presence of a African-American child plays to the question of race and ethnicity that I think is not as present in the film (as in the stories and play). When Dagmar says that she would like to grow up to be a "black" Norwegian like Uncle Chris, Papa says that he wouldn't mind having one "colored" child. If I remember correctly, this line is omitted from the film, but present in the play. What does this say to the question of ethnic differences of the Norwegian immigrants and other minority groups in the US?