My Speech on Remington Steele and Scarecrow & Mrs. King
These are two of my fave shows from my youth; I've got all the episodes, I've watched them each a dozen times. And when you consider them together, the results are fascinating.
Remington Steele ran from 1982 to 1987, while Scarecrow ran from 1983 to 1987. And the two shows are these bizarre mirror images of each other - the Republican version and the Democratic version of the same story.
Interestingly, both series were conscious of their political leanings; it was built into the fabric of each show's premise. Remington Steele was about a female private detective who had to enlist a male figurehead because - no matter how competent she was - potential clients unfairly refused to trust her skills. The premise of Scarecrow & Mrs. King was that all problems could be solved by an average housewife living in suburbia, applying the skills of a typical homemaker - and, also, that all government action to protect the country was justified and that legal restrictions could be ignored or handwaved.
Each show is a buddy mystery series about a man teamed with a woman. In each show, one half of the partnership is inexperienced, while the other has years of training.
Both shows featured a number of similar storylines (which, often as not, regurgitated some classic tropes.). So, each had the "undercover at a Mary-Kay-like organization" episode, the "snarky kid" episode (played, both times, by Meeno Peluce), the "oenophile" episode, the "Chinatown" episode, the "amnesia" episode (Remington and Amanda, respectively). They also each had a series of episodes shot in Europe that showcased the glamorous scenery as much as the mystery.
The shows also shared guest stars - like Meeno Peluce - but also Nana Visitor (really!) and many of the character actors of the era.
Both shows featured Beverly Garland as the overbearing and overly domesticated mother of the heroine. (She played the same character - Lois's mother - on Lois & Clark, btw).
But they were really interesting opposites in many ways that reflected startlingly different political outlooks.
Remington Steele was about a detective agency, which meant that the leads were often at cross-purposes with government authority. In fact, Remington was a criminal, and in the course of the series was forced to dodge everyone from Interpol to the INS. The show featured an idealized heroine in the form of a quintessential career-woman. (In earlier episodes, when the feminist aspect of the show was highlighted, she often didn't carry a purse, usually wore pants, and tended to favor fedoras. She also usually drove when the two of them were in a car, and the show took great pleasure in highlighting the image of Laura driving while Remington sat passively in the passenger seat). Remington Steele also went out of its way to take a consciously blase and sophisticated attitude toward sex; not only did Remington sleep around, but early on, Laura was established as sexually experienced and willing to sleep with the right partner, though she had never married.
Scarecrow involved government actors (spies) who willy-nilly broke into homes and took people prisoner without any apparent regard for legal restrictions. The idealized heroine of the series, Amanda, was a perfect housewife and mother who had never aspired to having a career. Amanda's character was often contrasted with a supporting character, Francine - an unmarried career-woman who was portrayed as vain and mercenary. And though Lee, like Remington, also constantly dated - and slept with - glamorous women, Amanda (married and divorced, with kids) was steadfastly chaste. She was frequently depicted as almost prudish about premarital sex and, on more than one occasion, was mildly panicked at the prospect of having to share a room with Lee while the two of them were under cover.
In Remington Steele, the woman had training; the man was the novice. In Scarecrow & Mrs. King, it was the other way around. That meant that in Remington Steele, Laura was in charge of how the case was investigated (although Remington would frequently ignore her instructions); in Scarecrow, Lee was in charge, and Amanda tried to adhere to his instructions. This set-up also meant that in Remington, Laura delivered the exposition - she was the one who had to explain investigatory techniques to Remington; in Scarecrow, Lee instructed Amanda.
In Remington Steele, the woman was skilled at her job; the man had some unique skills but was mostly a bumbler who, if he solved the case at all, did so accidentally. More typically, Laura solved the case - perhaps relying on accidental insight supplied by Remington - explicitly using her detective skills and training. (That dynamic changed as the series progressed - Remington grew more skilled, and Laura became more traditionally "feminine" in costume).
In Scarecrow, the woman was a bumbler who solved the case - not by accident or naivete, but by applying some exceptionally homespun knowledge of the white, suburban middle class. So, for example, she'd sabotage the enemy's car by remembering that her son once put sugar in a gas tank; she'd find the MacGuffin by reenacting what a typical housewife would do when her hairdryer broke unexpectedly, she was able to handle going undercover as a cleaning lady while Francine fumbled comically, and so on. (Amusingly, on Scarecrow, it was pretty clear that Amanda was not a "housewife" - she was not married, and because of her work as a spy, she had a career; but she was consistently described and portrayed as a "typical housewife," because domesticity-as-superpower was the concept of the show.)
Remington, by contrast, featured only negative images of domesticity. Laura came from a broken home and was extremely distrustful of marriage; her sister was a housewife and was depicted as being slightly ridiculous because of the narrowness of her world. And Remington was even more extreme - he was an international jewel thief who had been living on the streets since he was a child; he had no memory of his parents, and had never had anything resembling an ordinary home life. Indeed, as if to underline the undesirability of traditional suburban life, Laura's pleasant house is literally blown up in the second season premiere; she subsequently moves to a funky loft in an artistic urban neighborhood.
Edit: I should add that as hard as Scarecrow tried to idealize the role of the homemaker, Amanda was, in fact, no such thing. In addition to not actually being a housewife, as I described above, she also had a full-time nanny/cleaning woman in the form of her mother. A real single mom, of course, would never be able to take a job that required her to disappear at a moment's notice for indeterminate periods of time; Amanda was able to do it because her mother was always there to take care of the kids. Though we often had touchingly domestic scenes of Amanda baking cookies with her sons or helping them with homework, the reality was that her mother probably spent more time with them than Amanda did. For all intents and purposes, then, Amanda was only able to be a superspy because she had -- well, a wife.
One final cute detail underlined the weird parallels between the shows: On Remington Steele, the male lead wore a pinky ring; on Scarecrow, the female lead wore one.
However, despite the reactionary bent of Scarecrow, I love both shows. Each had charming leads with fabulous chemistry. Moreover, both shows featured heroines with real agency - even though neither show had the kind of ongoing story arcs you see on television today, the heroines of both shows made their own choices and took lead roles in solving the cases and advancing the storylines.
Remington, btw, is now available on DVD; Scarecrow, sadly, is not.
Remington Steele ran from 1982 to 1987, while Scarecrow ran from 1983 to 1987. And the two shows are these bizarre mirror images of each other - the Republican version and the Democratic version of the same story.
Interestingly, both series were conscious of their political leanings; it was built into the fabric of each show's premise. Remington Steele was about a female private detective who had to enlist a male figurehead because - no matter how competent she was - potential clients unfairly refused to trust her skills. The premise of Scarecrow & Mrs. King was that all problems could be solved by an average housewife living in suburbia, applying the skills of a typical homemaker - and, also, that all government action to protect the country was justified and that legal restrictions could be ignored or handwaved.
Each show is a buddy mystery series about a man teamed with a woman. In each show, one half of the partnership is inexperienced, while the other has years of training.
Both shows featured a number of similar storylines (which, often as not, regurgitated some classic tropes.). So, each had the "undercover at a Mary-Kay-like organization" episode, the "snarky kid" episode (played, both times, by Meeno Peluce), the "oenophile" episode, the "Chinatown" episode, the "amnesia" episode (Remington and Amanda, respectively). They also each had a series of episodes shot in Europe that showcased the glamorous scenery as much as the mystery.
The shows also shared guest stars - like Meeno Peluce - but also Nana Visitor (really!) and many of the character actors of the era.
Both shows featured Beverly Garland as the overbearing and overly domesticated mother of the heroine. (She played the same character - Lois's mother - on Lois & Clark, btw).
But they were really interesting opposites in many ways that reflected startlingly different political outlooks.
Remington Steele was about a detective agency, which meant that the leads were often at cross-purposes with government authority. In fact, Remington was a criminal, and in the course of the series was forced to dodge everyone from Interpol to the INS. The show featured an idealized heroine in the form of a quintessential career-woman. (In earlier episodes, when the feminist aspect of the show was highlighted, she often didn't carry a purse, usually wore pants, and tended to favor fedoras. She also usually drove when the two of them were in a car, and the show took great pleasure in highlighting the image of Laura driving while Remington sat passively in the passenger seat). Remington Steele also went out of its way to take a consciously blase and sophisticated attitude toward sex; not only did Remington sleep around, but early on, Laura was established as sexually experienced and willing to sleep with the right partner, though she had never married.
Scarecrow involved government actors (spies) who willy-nilly broke into homes and took people prisoner without any apparent regard for legal restrictions. The idealized heroine of the series, Amanda, was a perfect housewife and mother who had never aspired to having a career. Amanda's character was often contrasted with a supporting character, Francine - an unmarried career-woman who was portrayed as vain and mercenary. And though Lee, like Remington, also constantly dated - and slept with - glamorous women, Amanda (married and divorced, with kids) was steadfastly chaste. She was frequently depicted as almost prudish about premarital sex and, on more than one occasion, was mildly panicked at the prospect of having to share a room with Lee while the two of them were under cover.
In Remington Steele, the woman had training; the man was the novice. In Scarecrow & Mrs. King, it was the other way around. That meant that in Remington Steele, Laura was in charge of how the case was investigated (although Remington would frequently ignore her instructions); in Scarecrow, Lee was in charge, and Amanda tried to adhere to his instructions. This set-up also meant that in Remington, Laura delivered the exposition - she was the one who had to explain investigatory techniques to Remington; in Scarecrow, Lee instructed Amanda.
In Remington Steele, the woman was skilled at her job; the man had some unique skills but was mostly a bumbler who, if he solved the case at all, did so accidentally. More typically, Laura solved the case - perhaps relying on accidental insight supplied by Remington - explicitly using her detective skills and training. (That dynamic changed as the series progressed - Remington grew more skilled, and Laura became more traditionally "feminine" in costume).
In Scarecrow, the woman was a bumbler who solved the case - not by accident or naivete, but by applying some exceptionally homespun knowledge of the white, suburban middle class. So, for example, she'd sabotage the enemy's car by remembering that her son once put sugar in a gas tank; she'd find the MacGuffin by reenacting what a typical housewife would do when her hairdryer broke unexpectedly, she was able to handle going undercover as a cleaning lady while Francine fumbled comically, and so on. (Amusingly, on Scarecrow, it was pretty clear that Amanda was not a "housewife" - she was not married, and because of her work as a spy, she had a career; but she was consistently described and portrayed as a "typical housewife," because domesticity-as-superpower was the concept of the show.)
Remington, by contrast, featured only negative images of domesticity. Laura came from a broken home and was extremely distrustful of marriage; her sister was a housewife and was depicted as being slightly ridiculous because of the narrowness of her world. And Remington was even more extreme - he was an international jewel thief who had been living on the streets since he was a child; he had no memory of his parents, and had never had anything resembling an ordinary home life. Indeed, as if to underline the undesirability of traditional suburban life, Laura's pleasant house is literally blown up in the second season premiere; she subsequently moves to a funky loft in an artistic urban neighborhood.
Edit: I should add that as hard as Scarecrow tried to idealize the role of the homemaker, Amanda was, in fact, no such thing. In addition to not actually being a housewife, as I described above, she also had a full-time nanny/cleaning woman in the form of her mother. A real single mom, of course, would never be able to take a job that required her to disappear at a moment's notice for indeterminate periods of time; Amanda was able to do it because her mother was always there to take care of the kids. Though we often had touchingly domestic scenes of Amanda baking cookies with her sons or helping them with homework, the reality was that her mother probably spent more time with them than Amanda did. For all intents and purposes, then, Amanda was only able to be a superspy because she had -- well, a wife.
One final cute detail underlined the weird parallels between the shows: On Remington Steele, the male lead wore a pinky ring; on Scarecrow, the female lead wore one.
However, despite the reactionary bent of Scarecrow, I love both shows. Each had charming leads with fabulous chemistry. Moreover, both shows featured heroines with real agency - even though neither show had the kind of ongoing story arcs you see on television today, the heroines of both shows made their own choices and took lead roles in solving the cases and advancing the storylines.
Remington, btw, is now available on DVD; Scarecrow, sadly, is not.