OUT OF THE MOUTH OF BABES

BY: Michael Arkin

‘Balance is Better’ was the theme of last week’s International Day of the Woman. The mission focused on raising awareness of gender bias in order to create a more gender-balanced world. Ironic, given just how unbalanced Hollywood is. Despite the fact that 54 percent of the moviegoing/streaming audience is female, last year only 40 films featured a woman in the leading or co-leading role. When it comes to pay, there is even greater disparity – according to Forbes, the highest paid actress, Scarlett Johansson, earned only slightly more than what the 8th highest paid male actor, Adam Sandler, earned.

While not down and completely out, women are in a way, outliers. Thinking about them that way made me think about the classic lines spoken by iconic female roles. Everyone remembers Gloria Swanson as Sunset Boulevard’s silent screen legend Norma Desmond, uttering, “I am big, it’s the pictures that got small” and Bette Davis’ classic warning from All About Eve, “Fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy night.” But only diehard fans would remember what is perhaps Ms. Davis’ most poignant moment in the film, when her character observes, “Funny business, a woman’s career, the things you drop on your way up the ladder so you can move faster, you forget you’ll need them again when you get back to being a woman.”

When considering the not-so-famous quotes from iconic female roles, certain themes appear. One is the plight of the modern woman, exemplified in Broadcast News by Holly Hunter as TV news producer, Jane Craig who laments, “I’m beginning to repel people I’m trying to seduce.”

As Carrie Bradshaw in Sex and the City, Sarah Jessica Parker comes to the realization, “I’ve spent $40,000 on shoes and I have no place to live. I will literally be the old woman who lived in her shoes.” Then there’s her on-screen BFF, Kristin Davis, who as an exasperated Charlotte York cries, “I’ve been dating since I’m fifteen. I’m exhausted. Where is he?”

Some women want a husband but as Diane Christensen in Network, Academy Award-winner Faye Dunaway admitted, “All I want out of life is a 30 share and a 20 rating.” That wasn’t the case for a young Joan Crawford in 1939’s The Women, who confides, “He almost stood me up for his wife.” And of course, there’s Awkwafina in Crazy Rich Asians assessing the problems of living up to the impossible standards set by the mothers of eligible Asian men, “Chinese sons think their moms fart Chanel No. 5.”

Self-awareness is another recurring theme. In her debut role as Celie Johnson in The Color Purple, Whoopi Goldberg characterizes herself, “I’m black, I might even be ugly, but dear God, I’m here.” On a much lighter note, in 1988’s Working Girl, Melanie Griffith’s best friend, Joan Cusack, advises her “I sing and dance in my underwear, but it doesn’t make me Madonna.” Then there’s Lily Tomlin as Violet Newstead in 9 to 5, “I’m no fool, I’ve killed the boss, you think they’re not going to fire me for that?” and Jessica Rabbit explaining, “I’m not bad, I’m just drawn that way.” As town crank, Ouiser Boudreaux in Steel Magnolias, Shirley MacLaine left audiences in stitches when she shouted, “I’m not crazy, I’ve just been a very bad mood for 40 years.”

Then there’s strong-willed women, personified by perennial Oscar-winner, Meryl Streep, who, as fashion editor Miranda Priestly in The Devil Wears Prada, deadpans, “By all means, move at a glacial pace, you know how that thrills me” and Baby Jane Hudson (Bette Davis), in psycho Kabuki makeup telling her sister, “You aren’t ever going to sell this house. You aren’t ever going to leave it, either!” Let’s not forget Cher’s Loretta Castorini in Moonstruck informing her beau, “In time, you’ll drop dead and I’ll come to your funeral in a red dress.”

There are teenage outliers among them. Take it from Lindsey Lohan in Mean Girls: “Halloween is the one night a year when girls can dress like a total slut and no other girls can say anything about it.” Or Wynona Ryder in Heathers: “Dear diary, my teenage angst bullshit now has a body count” and a young Ellen Paige in Juno: “I’m just going to go ahead and nip this thing in the bud. Cuz you know, pregnancy often leads to…an infant.”

Director Stanley Kubrick noted, “Observation is a dying art” but not for these gals: as the delicate and emotionally bruised Stella DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire, Vivien Leigh remarked, “Straight? What’s straight? A line can be straight, but the heart of a human being?”

A little less cerebral, but just as observant is, “You’re not even interesting enough to make me sick,” from Cher in The Witches of Eastwick, and Holly Golightly’s (Audrey Hepburn) “It’s useful being top banana in the shock department” in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, and “You’re what Grammy Hall would call a real Jew” from Diane Keaton as Annie Hall. But perhaps the most memorable, if not the funniest, observation comes from When Harry Met Sally when Estelle Reiner overhears Meg Ryan feigning an orgasm in the middle of Katz’s Deli and tells the waiter, “I’ll have what she’s having.”

So, while Hollywood might not be forthcoming with equal pay and parts for women, from cartoons to melodramas, comedies to musicals, leading ladies have spoken some of the most memorable sound bites in movie history. The struggle for parity goes on, but if we have learned anything about powerful women it is, as Glenn Close proclaimed in Fatal Attraction, “I won’t be ignored, Dan.”