She's the Man chapter for Ms. Chappell's class
Some students in a colleague's class are interested in citing my thesis for their essays on Twelfth Night and She's the Man. It's below the cut
“A Real Man is Difficult to Find”: Gendered Identity Construction in She's the Man
In his review for the radio station Westwood One, Bill Bregoli calls Andy Fickman's 2006 film She's the Man “Mean Girls [with] a classic twist” (Bregoli). The language of this review creates a binary opposition that privileges the contemporary teen movie archetype over its “classic” Shakespearean source; moreover, the review's language evokes comparison not to all contemporary teen films, but to a particular subgenre heralded and represented by Mark Waters' 2004 film Mean Girls. The film, based on Rosalind Wiseman's 2002 nonfiction parenting manual Queen Bees and Wannabes: Helping Your Daughter Survive Cliques, Gossip, Boyfriends, and Other Realities of Adolescence, follows former home-schooler Cady Herron's journey through her first year at North Shore High School as she works to sabotage The Plastics, the school's most popular and most envied clique. Over the course of the film, Cady eventually becomes Plastic herself and has to cope with how she has changed, ultimately learning that “Calling somebody else fat won't make you any skinnier. Calling someone stupid doesn't make you smarter. All you can do in life is try to solve the problem in front of you” (Mean Girls).
The fact that Bregoli's review comparing She's the Man to Mean Girls appears on the back of the film's DVD release implies that filmmakers wish for the film to be viewed similarly--having a positive sociopolitical message to convey to its target audience of teen girls. This categorization is not implausible, given that the film was written by Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith, authors of 10 Things I Hate About You (1999), which relocates Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew to a Seattle high school and turns Katerina, the titular shrew, into Kat Stratford, a “ball-buster” who listens to Ani DiFranco and reads Betty Friedan. 10 Things I Hate About You was widely criticized for its portrayal of teen feminism, with many critics having one or both of the following problems with the character of Kat : firstly, the fact that she listened to or read those things did not necessarily make her a feminist, and secondly, she is never actually seeing reading or listening to those things within the context of the film (Pittman 140). Her feminist reputation seems to be just that--a reputation. While critics originally touted the film as pop culture with the potential for social change, it is now typically viewed as a candy-coated presentation of political issues.
While 10 Things I Hate About You ostensibly makes it acceptable for girls to challenge the status quo of high school gender roles through an awareness of feminist politics, the positive message of She's the Man appears to be one of gender equality : “Amanda Bynes proves that girls can do anything guys can do in She's the Man,” a statement from the film's official website proclaims ( HYPERLINK "http://www.shestheman-themovie.com/" www.shestheman-themovie.com). Writers Smith and Lutz echo this sentiment in the film's DVD commentary when they explain that the original conflict of the film involved Viola playing Hamlet in a school production, but that “proving she could play on a boys' team gave it more of that female empowerment thing” (She's the Man).
Marketed as “inspired by William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night,” the film tells the story of Viola, a talented soccer player who, repulsed by her mother's desire that she become a debutante, impersonates her brother Sebastian at prestigious Illyria Academy after her school's girls' soccer program is cut in order to join Illyria's team and prove her worth as an athlete to her soccer-playing ex-boyfriend Justin. After the girls' team is cut and the coach refuses to let them try out for spots on the boys' team, Justin agrees with the coach's statement that “You're all excellent players, but girls aren't as fast as boys, or as strong, or as athletic...It's scientific fact. Girls can't beat boys. It's as simple as that” (She's the Man). When Viola reminds Justin that, just the day before, he told her she played “as good as half the guys on the team,” he feigns incredulity in front of his teammates before switching to anger and declaring, as if he is the angry parent of an unruly child,“Viola! End of discussion!” to which she responds, “Fine. End of relationship” (She's the Man). This exchange establishes the film's main conflict: it juxtaposes Viola, who represents self-assured, young femininity, with the exaggeratedly closed-minded, patronizing masculinity represented by Justin and the Cornwall coach, who seem not only to view women as inferior athletes, but to attribute this inferiority to innate biological difference. This argument recalls those employed by opponents of Title IX, first ratified by the U.S. Department of Labor as part of the Education Amendments of 1972. Section 1681 of the amendment forbids “discrimination on basis of sex under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance” (U.S. Dept. of Justice, 1972). While Cornwall Academy is a fictional private school, and therefore would not be under the jurisdiction of Title IX if it were a real educational institution, the fact that similar biologically essentialist statements are made by figures representing the values of this institution and those opposed to the amendment nonetheless serves as a notable piece of cultural commentary which seems to suggest that, though Title IX has been legally enacted and enforced, the existence of the biologically-essentialist viewpoint remains a large political problem that needs to be addressed on a deeper ideological level.
How well does the film address this problem? It's clear that the overtly biologically essentialist arguments offered by the Cornwall coach are to be taken lightly given their hamfisted, over-the top delivery. The lines are delivered with a knowing smirk to a crowd of preening male soccer players, who are clearly less intelligent than the free-thinking Viola), but even so, the use of the word “athletic”--a type of ability one can possess regardless of gender--bridges the gap between “scientific” arguments about the relative speed and strength of the sexes based on biological differences and a socially constructed sexist ideology. While some may argue that this over-the-top prejudice exists for a broader purpose within the universe of the film (in order to endear the viewer to Viola's cause), the alternative to this unfair treatment does not seem to be much of an alternative at all when examined closely. If Cornwall represents the gender constraint that Viola's mother, coach, and ex-boyfriend impose upon her, then it follows logically that Illyria should represent a newfound freedom from those constraints, in accordance with the typical function of the pastoral in Shakespearean comedy. This is not so in the film. While the Illyria coach (played by well-known footballer Vinnie Jones, formerly of Sheffield United and no doubt cast because of his star-body's relevance to the film's subject matter) states that they are “not sexist here in Illyria” when trying to convince the referee that Viola is allowed to play on the boys' team according to the official rulebook, he repeatedly and derogatorily refers to his male players as “girls” when chiding them at practice, thereby employing a less-obvious form of the biological essentialism used by the Cornwall coach. This linguistic choice makes his defense of Viola seem motivated entirely by selfishness: he is defending her not because he believes in gender equality, as he claims, but because he thinks she is a skilled enough player to get him the victory over Cornwall that he desires. An admittance of this fact instead of a reliance on a weak, supposedly political argument would better suit the empowerment argument the film claims to have.
Construction of Femininities in the Film
In addition to the cultural issue of female representation in athletics, the film also seeks to comment on viable forms of femininity in contemporary society by juxtaposing femininities that seem to be negative because their goals are centered around their appeal to other (mostly male) people (Mrs. Hastings, Monique) with those that seem to be positive (Viola, Olivia, Eunice) because they let their own choices and desires define what they want. One of the main ways the film constructs its femininities is through different styles of the clothing worn by its female characters. In the beach soccer game during the film's opening scene, Viola plays wearing a navy blue and yellow bikini and short denim shorts. Her actions show that she is physically strong and athletically capable, and her outfit, by combining dark colors and comfortable fabrics with possibly provocative cuts, connotes a certain strong sexuality.
The connection between Viola's athleticism and her awareness of her own sexuality is clear in the scene that immediately follows the soccer game. Justin lauds her athletic ability by saying she is “as good as half the guys on the team” and credits himself for teaching her to play. Viola corrects him by saying, “Probably more than half,” kisses him, then insinuates he isn't the only teacher in their relationship when she says, “You couldn't kiss at all when we first started going out, but I've taught you well” (She's the Man). Viola elevates herself above the majority of the boys in terms of athletic ability while also switching the positions in the power binary Justin has established: where he places himself in the role of teacher and her in the role of student, she makes herself the teacher and him the student. While Viola's self-confident sexuality is certainly empowering to a degree, this binary reversal makes it potentially problematic. First, by reversing the binary instead of breaking it down, Viola does nothing to improve the hierarchical social ordering principle in place; she merely privileges a different party. Secondly, her proud description of herself as Justin's sexual “teacher” aligns her with members of the contemporary, young third wave feminist movement who have been criticized for their “sex-positive” brand of feminism by both society in general and older feminists, those who think that they are not liberating themselves and owning their sexuality as they claim , but instead, that they arereinforcing the patriarchal stereotype of woman as a temptress who uses her sexuality to get what she wants.
In their book Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism, and the Future, Jennifer Baumgardner and Amy Richards seek to define Third Wave feminism and what they see as misconceptions about young feminists. In the book's lexicon, Baumgardner and Richards define “Third Wave” as:
the core mass of the current women's movement in their late teens through their thirties, roughly speaking-the ones who grew up with Judy Blume books, Free to Be...You and Me, and Sesame Street. Another way of looking at the Third Wave is as the “daughters,” both real and metaphorical, of the Second Wave, the women who read Ms. Magazine and Our Bodies,Ourselves, and lobbied for Roe v. Wade and the ERA. (Baumgardner and Richards 401-2)
Jessica Valenti, founder of the popular weblog Feministing.com, adds a more sociopolitical definition to this historical one in her book Full Frontal Feminism: A Young Woman's Guide to Why Feminism Matters, in which she claims that young women who identify as feminists today “do it [read: have sex] better” because they realize that their bodies and sexualities are not commodities, but theirs to control as they see fit, and that they are less likely to buy into “cultural myths of purity and virginity” that operate as ways for the patriarchal hegemony to control female sexuality (Valenti 28-30). Viola's consciousness of and desire to control her own sexuality as evidenced by her discussion with Justin on the beach in the beginning of the film seems to ally her with sex-positive Third-Wave feminists as defined by Valenti.
The Problem of Paul Antonio
The montage during which Viola's friend transforms her into Sebastian complicates the reading of her as representative of third wave feminism, however. As Viola and her friends Mia and Yvonne try on wigs, mustaches, and beards of comically varying lengths and colors, a cover of “Love is All Around” is performed by pop-punk band The Tea Queens. This song is most well-known as the theme to the Mary Tyler-Moore Show, and helped the show represent a new segment of society (the single, self-sufficient working woman) when it aired in the early 1970s. As such, it became a sort of popular second wave feminist anthem (Dow 32). Setting Viola's initial gender transformation to this song aligns her with what Mary Richards culturally represented: a woman on a new social frontier who is questioning the mores of her world in order to “make it after all,” as the song says. Sebastian expresses the same sentiment to Viola just before he leaves to play with his band in London. He asks, “'If you wanna chase your dreams, sometimes you gotta break the rules, right?'” (She's the Man). Is Viola really “breaking the rules”? Even if she is flouting social norms by impersonating her brother, the presence and character of the apparently gay hairdresser Paul in this scene make her position as great social rebel a dubious one.
The transformation scene is the audience's first visual introduction to Paul Antonio (we hear his voice previously as Viola pleads with him to help her, but do not see him until the actual transformation begins), who functions as Viola's fairy godmother (so to speak), as well as her guide to what it means to be “the man” of the film's title. Paul is a hairdresser at the Christophe salon--most likely a reference to the real Salon Christophe, an upscale establishment in Beverly Hills that has catered to a rich and famous clientèle “for over twenty years”--( HYPERLINK "http://www.christophe.com/" www.christophe.com). As such, it is important to note that this reference connotes style and class. Additionally, the alteration to the logo is particularly indicative of Paul's position within the universe of the film, as well as his character's position within the genre of the teen movie with a positive message. In the film, the “o” in “Christophe” is a combination of the male and female symbols. While this symbolism could easily be a comment on the questioning of gender roles/traits done by the film in general, its direct association with Paul and his role as enabler of gender change is a loaded one. While the film never has either Paul himself or one of the other characters “out” him as a gay man, he is seen holding hands with Andrew, who appears to be his date, at the ball at the end of the film HYPERLINK "" \l "sdfootnote5sym#sdfootnote5sym" 5.
Even before the ball, however, Paul is connected with a number of signifiers of a certain cultural representation of homosexuality. He is always well-dressed and groomed, much more so than any of the other male characters in the film. While this care of his appearance could possibly be attributed to his age and occupation (as a hairdresser, he would likely be expected to stay abreast of current styles and fashions, and because he has a full-time job, it can be assumed that he is at least a few years older than Viola and her peers, since they all still attend high school), when this particular sense of style is combined with his capacity as a source of wisdom on what it means to be a (presumably straight, in Sebastian's case) man, Paul seems to embody the fulfillment of the contemporary mindset, epitomized by the television show Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, that gay men possess knowledge to make straight men better somehow. The official website of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy states that its goal is to “treat each new guy as a head-to-toe project” the result of which is that “soon, the straight man is educated on everything from hair products to Prada and Feng Shui to foreign films. At the end of every fashion-packed, fun-filled lifestyle makeover, a freshly scrubbed, newly enlightened guy emerges” ( HYPERLINK "http://www.bravotv.com/Queer_Eye/about" Queer Eye for the Straight Guy Online). This attitude seems to mirror Paul's, as well as to justify his character's minimal development. Unlike Damian, the character from Mean Girls who is fleshed out and humanized beyond a mere gay stereotype because of his relationships with the other characters (even though the audience is informed upon his first appearance that he is “almost too gay to function”), Paul is introduced in the transformation scene, talks to Viola on the phone once after that , and does not appear again until the climactic soccer match, where he appears to be accessorized by Mia and Yvonne, who are wearing outfits that match his. His pairing with Andrew at the film's end is never explained, though it appears to be a result of the adaptation's depiction of the common multiple marriage at the end of Shakespearean comedies, summed up in DVD commentary by director Andy Fickman as “why everyone gets paired off at the end” (She's the Man). Thus, Paul's presence in the film seems mainly to exist to make the film seem culturally hip and forward even as it complies to Shakespearean dramatic conventions, rather than to make a serious comment about the fluidity of gender or to question social heteronormativity.
Clothing and Constructed Femininity
While the women of the film exhibit this fluidity of gender to a very limited extent because each of them only seems to embody a single identity (as opposed to Duke Orsino, who is allowed to embody multiple valid masculinities simultaneously), it is necessary to note that the primary way in which the film differentiates between these various valid and invalid femininities is through the clothing that each woman wears. It is important that the sporty bikini and shorts is the first outfit in which the film's audience sees Viola, as it serves both to establish the kind of strong, sexually aware femininity she represents and set that femininity up as the one most worthy of emulation of the ones depicted in the film, as well as to contrast that femininity with other types seen later in the film, most notably those enacted by Viola's mother, Mrs. Hastings, Sebastian's girlfriend, Monique, and Illyria Academy's resident nerd, Eunice.
If Viola represents young, sex-positive, self-confident femininity, then her mother models (and wishes for her daughter to model) a kind of femininity that is the polar opposite: stilted, passive, and above all, rigidly conforming to the norms of her upper-class social circle. Mrs. Hastings's first appearance in the film comes when Viola returns home just after learning that her team has been cut. She is dressed in a blue linen suit and pearls, clothes that simultaneously evoke both high social standing and traditional, restrained femininity. She is obviously meant to seem off-putting and over-the-top to the film's viewers from her first scene, when she enthusiastically unveils two full-skirted, copiously-ruffled gowns that she would like Viola to wear to the Stratford Junior League's Debutante Ball. This scene serves two purposes. It identifies Mrs. Hastings as a proponent of the traditional femininity represented by both the ball gowns and the event to which they are to be worn; and the fact that Mrs. Hastings seems to either be unaware of or chose to ignore her daughter's aversion to all things debutante suggests that the film's audience should view her as out of touch, a member of an older generation, one whose values are perhaps “archaic,” as Viola labels the debutante tradition (She's the Man). In addition to valuing traditional femininity, Mrs. Hastings likewise privileges traditional masculinity. She makes this clear when, after Viola mentions she “dumped” Justin, she asks, “But why? He's so handsome and rugged and chiseled and great!” (She's the Man). By using words like “rugged” and “chiseled” to identify Justin, Mrs. Hastings not only shows that she values traditional masculine stereotypes, but objectifies him in a way that makes her seem more like a teenage girl with a crush than a protective mother who wants her daughter to date the right sort of boy. While this complicates her femininity, and arguably makes her a more well-rounded character and not just a stereotype of the overprotective high-society mother, it also undeniably serves to make her type of femininity undesirable in comparison with that of Viola, who obviously does not need Justin to make her feel validated, no matter how “chiseled” he may be.
If Viola is meant to represent the struggles of the third wave feminist, what then, is the connection between that movement's “both real and metaphorical” Second Wave mothers and Mrs. Hastings's traditional, passive femininity? The comparison appears to break down here, as Mrs. Hastings certainly does not seem to embody the struggles for equality lived out by second wave feminists. In fact, her involvement with such traditionally-gendered social organizations as the Junior League as well as her apparent valuing of the association of masculinity with strength and femininity with weakness seems to negate such an association. Instead, she seems to represent someone who has profited from the achievements of the second wave, but without acknowledging, or perhaps even being aware of, those achievements. She is a wealthy divorcée with no apparent occupation, no doubt existing quite comfortably on the alimony payments afforded her because of rights won by second wave feminists. In that view, the comparison applies to a limited degree, thought it still ultimately distances the empowered, current Viola from her dated, out-of-touch mother.
While Mrs. Hastings holds Monique up as an embodiment of the sweet, passive debutante, Monique herself seems to exist in the film to allow for the Mean Girls comparison under which it was marketed. Unlike Viola, Olivia, and arguably even Eunice, she has no Shakespearean counterpart. Though Monique partly serves as the catalyst for Viola's scheme to impersonate Sebastian (upon seeing Viola from behind as she's dressed in a hooded sweatshirt and jeans, she mistakes her for Sebastian, even going so far as to remark, “You look scary alike from the back”) and is therefore necessary to further the conceit of the film, she is viewed positively only by Mrs. Hastings (the film's other representation of confined femininity). Monique seems to serve chiefly as a foil to Viola and the other two characters who enact acceptable femininities in the film, Olivia and Eunice. Like those girls, her femininity is represented most obviously by her clothing, which is almost exclusively low-cut and tight-fitting. While Viola's semi-provocative fashions seem to evoke empowerment because they are combined with self-confidence and strength, Monique's clothing and physical appearance have a less-positive connotation because of her self-important attitude. When she shows up in the cleverly-named Illyria pizzeria, Cesario's, to look for Sebastian, and Andrew Aguecheek tries to flirt with her, she angrily responds, “Girls with asses like mine do not talk to boys with faces like yours” (She's the Man). She not only bases her own self-worth entirely on her physical appearance, but applies the same standard to her choice of boyfriends. It is no wonder that, in an instance of teen movie poetic justice, Monique is escorted by Viola's pompous ex, Justin, to the debutante ball. The fact that Monique's plot is wrapped up in such a way seems to set her up as sort of cautionary tale in keeping with the film's attempt at didacticism regarding female empowerment: if young girls invest themselves fully in embodying a femininity as superficial as Monique's, then their entire lives will be just as superficial, even if they look perfect by their society's standards.
In contrast to Mrs. Hastings and Monique, who do not have Shakespearean counterparts and seem to embody negative femininities, Olivia and Eunice, who are appropriations of Twelfth Night's Olivia and Maria, respectively, seem to enact positive femininities in that they have respect for themselves and others and do not appear to gauge self-worth in terms of their involvement in a heterosexual relationship. Is there a connection between their Shakespearean source material and their positive femininity? If so, it seems to be counterproductive to the film's privileging of the teen-movie-with-a-message archetype. Regardless of whether or not such a parallel exists, it is essential to note that while Olivia and Eunice both enact positive forms of femininity, they do so in different ways and arguably, to different degrees because of the way their costumes place them within different social positions within the high school hierarchy.
In keeping with the film's construction of femininity through costuming, Olivia is marked as different from the film's other physically attractive women by her style of dress. Instead of Monique's overt sexuality or Viola's athletic one, Olivia embodies a softer, slightly more modest sexuality by wearing t-shirts and denim skirts in pastel colors. Her sexuality becomes more overt after she is made an object of the male gaze enacted by Duke Orsino, when he sees her walk into the school cafeteria and turns his head so as to look at her without her knowing. This film does not frame his viewing of her as objectification, however, as evidenced by Duke's disgusted “Don't talk about her like that!” when Viola-as-Sebastian sees him staring at her, and, desperate to pass for one of the guys, crassly remarks, “Look at the booty on that blondie!” (She's the Man). Duke's demand that Olivia be treated with respect seems to suggest both that he views her as a person rather than a sex object (as Viola-as-Sebastian seems to assume he will) and that he has feelings for her. While Duke's defense of Olivia certainly calls Viola-as-Sebastian's preconceived notions of a necessarily misogynistic masculinity into question, other aspects of the boys' characterization of her complicate the audience's view of Duke, and, in conjunction, the way his masculinity is constructed.
In Twelfth Night, Olivia is in mourning because her brother has died, as she tells Feste in Act 1, scene 5. In She's the Man, however, Andrew tells Viola-as-Sebastian the following about Olivia: “Until recently, she was dating this college guy, but he dumped her, and I hear she's a total mess right now. [Her] confidence [and] self-esteem [are] way down . Toby then interjects, “Yeah, so in man words, it's time to pounce!” (She's the Man). These statements do several things to undermine Duke's sensitive masculinity. First, it turns Olivia into a prize for which men are competing. The mention of the “college guy” not only marks her as desired by other men, but by a higher class of men than Duke and his friends, who are still high school students. Andrew and Toby also employ the language of a certain kind of competition: hunting, wherein Duke is the hunter and Olivia his prey, as in the exchange between Orsino and Curio in 1.1 of Shakespeare's play. Also, Toby says that the words he uses to describe the situation are “man words,” thereby not only constructing a exclusively masculine language, but also characterizing it as predatory. Because Duke does not create the metaphor of Olivia-as-prey, it could be argued that his friends exist as a sort of foil for him and that they intensify the effects of his caring, sensitive masculinity rather than negating it. However, Duke's contribution to the conversation follows Viola-as-Sebastian's question about the identity of Malcom,(a hanger-on turned stalker of Olivia's who seems to be a combination of Shakespeare's Festes and Malvolio) who has just entered the cafeteria and seated himself next to Olivia. Duke quickly asserts that Malcom is “not competition” and “a total geek,” and while he does not objectify Olivia as blatantly as Andrew and Toby seem to, he still places himself above Malcolm in a hierarchy of masculinities as well as employs the same language of sport. Why, then, is Duke able to embody multiple masculinities at once, when, to exhibit multiple viable femininities/feminine sexualities, the film must show multiple women?
In Twelfth Night, Olivia's attendant, Maria, is funny and sexually frank, as well as quite clever. In Act 1 scene 3, she jokes with Sir Andrew that his hand is “dry” after shaking it (1.3.55) She is, in effect, questioning his masculinity by calling him impotent, which shows that she is both knowledgeable of contemporary sexual lore and not ashamed of possessing this knowledge. She also masterminds the plot to humiliate Malvolio in front of Olivia by having him appear lovesick and insane. In contrast, Eunice (who I view as analogous to Maria due to her social rank and her eventual romantic involvement with the Toby character) is the school nerd, outfitted with the stereotypical glasses and headgear, and breathily promising Duke that she will “be the best lab partner [he] ever had” (She's the Man). While it is certainly true that Eunice herself is a sexual being, her sexuality is not seen as strong or self-assured by the film's audience as Maria's is in the play. Instead, Eunice's sex drive is played for laughs, as when, near the end of the film, she bluntly informs Toby that she “know[s] tricks,” and the next shot follows the two down to the ground, where they begin kissing in earnest (She's the Man). She is the stereotypical horny nerd, much like those made famous by Anthony Michael Hall in teen films of the 1980s (The Breakfast Club, Weird Science) and continued by Alyson Hannigan's Michelle in the American Pie trilogy of the 1990s. Though her strong sexuality is depicted humorously, unlike Viola's, I still include Eunice within the categories of positive femininity because she enacts this femininity of her own volition and to satisfy her own sex drive, not in order to conform to her perception of the sexual desires of others, as Monique and, to a certain extent, Mrs. Hastings, do. Additionally, despite her archetypal character, it could be argued that Eunice perhaps has more personal agency than Maria because of Maria's social position as Olivia's attendant. Indeed, when discussing the film's Shakespearean references in a featurette entitled “Inspired by?” director Andy Fickman mentions that Olivia's friend, who only appears in several scenes, has fewer than five lines the entire film, and is never actually referred to by name, is called Maria (pronounced “Ma-ree-uh” according to typical contemporary American pronunciation, not “Ma-rye-uh” as in Shakespeare's play) “to keep that character in there” (She's the Man). This comment seems to devalue Maria's confident sexuality (she is essentially erased and her Shakespearean name is mispronounced), which contradicts the supposed “girl power” message of the film as mentioned by the writers.
Construction of Masculinities in the Film
The film's definition of what positive masculinity entails certainly seems to be more complicated, more multidimensional than its definitions of easily-delineated negative and positive femininities. Additionally, Viola seems to let male stereotypes shade her portrayal of Sebastian, and she seems never to settle on how her/his masculinity should be performed. This is clear due to Amanda Bynes' ever-changing accent in the film, which, according to reviewers, spans the vocal spectrum from “effeminate Alabaman” (Phipps) to “like she's on the phone to the school office: 'Viola is sick today, and this is her mother speaking.'” (Ebert). This noticeable variance seems to comment that masculine stereotypes do not represent how men behave; that “a real man is difficult to find,” as Olivia complains. What then, constitutes a “real man” in the context of the film? The phrasing of Olivia's complaint is important when seeking an answer to this question. A real man is not “hard” to find, which would carry connotations of traditionally masculine sexuality due to the phrase's containing the word “hard” - a possible reference to erection. Instead, the film values masculinities that are less traditional, and seemingly more evolved or modern because they have the ability to show emotion, like Duke's fear of Malvolio, the escaped tarantula, or Paul's crying at Viola's entrance into the debutante ball. Writers Lutz and Smith confirm this goal in a segment of the DVD commentary called “The Wrap Up” in which people whose involvement was central to the film are asked to offer last words, by saying, “ We just want to promote romance and good times and shirtless, sensitive boys. We like those” (She's the Man). This blatant admittance of male objectification complicates whatever presence of “that female empowerment thing” that exists in the film by merely reversing the power binary rather than truly questioning the gender system in place. Thus, though the emphasis on empowered women and sensitive men may cause the film to appear forward-thinking in regards to socially constructed gender norms, that emphasis seems to exist not because of the film's desire to make a statement about the construction of those norms, but because of the marketability of its seemingly progressive ideologies.
Amanda Bynes’s Star-Body
Like the film's girl-power message, which seems in actuality to be more about niche marketing and a slightly underhanded reinforcement of stereotypically boy-crazy teen femininity, Bynes' star-body, while built on depicting her as strong and funny, but most importantly, as a typical teen girl, appears to have more to do with the kind of image sells to the female teen market at any given moment than a desire to positively effect the audience to whom the image is being sold HYPERLINK "" \l "sdfootnote6sym#sdfootnote6sym" 6. Billed as “ having a knack for slapstick reminiscent of Lucille Ball ” (They've All Got It), Bynes began her career at a comedy camp under the tutelage of Richard Pryor and Robin Williams. She then acted in several local Southern California theatre productions such as Annie and The Music Man before catching the attention of executives at children's television network Nickelodeon, where she was cast in the kids' sketch comedy show All That alongside future Saturday Night Live cast member Keenan Thompson in 1996. Bynes quickly became a fan favorite on All That, which resulted in her being given top billing and control of original characters on The Amanda Show, which ran on Nickelodeon from 1999-2002, and became Bynes 'gateway from bit sketch player to comedic film lead in projects like She's the Man and Sydney White (a 2007 adaptation of Snow White set in a California college sorority). Some of the original characters on The Amanda Show seem to have contributed to Bynes' “Everygirl appeal” as cited by The Boston Globe in 2006 (Tomlinson). For example, two of her most popular original characters were Judge Trudy, an obvious send-up of television's “Judge Judy” Scheindlin who always ruled in favor of children who brought their parents to her courtroom no matter the crime, and Penelope Taynt, an obsessive fan of Amanda's who would do anything to gain entrance into the star's presence while predictable hilarity ensued (Amanda Show). Both of these characters represent parts of Bynes' constructed “Everygirl” star-body. First, Judge Trudy plays into the fantasies of young children who desire to switch the parent/child power dynamic. If Amanda is playing a character who supports this, then, in the eyes of her fans, she must have the same sorts of problems with her parents as they do with theirs. Amanda is just like you, an average American kid. Penelope Taynt adds a different dimension to Bynes' star-body. Penelope functions to make light of Bynes's celebrity, while at the same time, glorifying it. While the lengths Penelope goes to to meet Amanda are absurd (disguises, fake voices, and silly gadgets galore) and she never reaches her goal (the same security guard carts Penelope off of the show's set at the end of nearly every incarnation of the sketch), and though it is sugar-coated by humor and pratfalls, the message of the sketch is abundantly clear: Amanda is a celebrity. She is not just like you, an average American kid, and don't think you can get close to her or be like her, because that is not going to happen, the sketch ultimately tells fans.
Bynes continues this contradiction of approachability and celebrity in her most recent project: a clothing line for the retail chain Steve and Barry's. The line, dear by Amanda Bynes, is composed of affordable casual wear (hoodies, skirts, pants, tanks, tees, and accessories, all on sale for less than $10 apiece) and, due to its selection and pricing, presumably geared toward Bynes' target audience of young teen girls. In a video on the line's official website, Bynes echoes Viola's sex positive femininity by saying she has helped create “clothes that let your personality breathe without hiding or covering up.” She also echoes the same shaky message of apparent girl power by exhorting her consumers to “Be quirky. Be intelligent. Be entertaining,” and then immediately instructing them to “defy labels” ( HYPERLINK "http://www.dearbyamanda.com/" www.dearbyamanda.com). The first two imperative statements of that series appear to be liberating and encouraging to their young female audience by contradicting the norms of a kind of young femininity which exists mainly to satisfy the stereoptypical fantasies of young boys. If these young girls are “quirky,” they do not conform to a feminine ideal as constructed by males, but instead, exhibit a degree of individuality in the way in which they present themselves to others. If they are “intelligent,” they do not allow themselves to merely agree with or parrot the opinions of others because they possess the reasoning skills to form opinions of their own. While those statements sound liberating at first, the ad's third statement counteracts them. By telling the girls to whom it is targeted to “be entertaining,” it commodifies them by reducing them to an act that exists entirely for the (possibly sexual?) gratification of the audience of their entertainment. The fourth and final imperative, “Defy labels,” blatantly contradicts the previous three, all of which instruct their audience in proper behavior through concise adjectives that could easily be used to “label” someone. Bynes (or possibly the writer of the ad) appears either to have been unaware or to have disregarded this contradiction due to its presence in the final product (which, it should be noted, is itself marketed under a distinctive label). While Bynes' performance of multiple identities (and her encouragement of the same within her target audience) could be viewed as a positive embrace of multiple valid femininities by some, I would argue that its commodification ultimately transforms Bynes' star-body into one that actually reinforces the female status quo it purports to negate.
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“A Real Man is Difficult to Find”: Gendered Identity Construction in She's the Man
In his review for the radio station Westwood One, Bill Bregoli calls Andy Fickman's 2006 film She's the Man “Mean Girls [with] a classic twist” (Bregoli). The language of this review creates a binary opposition that privileges the contemporary teen movie archetype over its “classic” Shakespearean source; moreover, the review's language evokes comparison not to all contemporary teen films, but to a particular subgenre heralded and represented by Mark Waters' 2004 film Mean Girls. The film, based on Rosalind Wiseman's 2002 nonfiction parenting manual Queen Bees and Wannabes: Helping Your Daughter Survive Cliques, Gossip, Boyfriends, and Other Realities of Adolescence, follows former home-schooler Cady Herron's journey through her first year at North Shore High School as she works to sabotage The Plastics, the school's most popular and most envied clique. Over the course of the film, Cady eventually becomes Plastic herself and has to cope with how she has changed, ultimately learning that “Calling somebody else fat won't make you any skinnier. Calling someone stupid doesn't make you smarter. All you can do in life is try to solve the problem in front of you” (Mean Girls).
The fact that Bregoli's review comparing She's the Man to Mean Girls appears on the back of the film's DVD release implies that filmmakers wish for the film to be viewed similarly--having a positive sociopolitical message to convey to its target audience of teen girls. This categorization is not implausible, given that the film was written by Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith, authors of 10 Things I Hate About You (1999), which relocates Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew to a Seattle high school and turns Katerina, the titular shrew, into Kat Stratford, a “ball-buster” who listens to Ani DiFranco and reads Betty Friedan. 10 Things I Hate About You was widely criticized for its portrayal of teen feminism, with many critics having one or both of the following problems with the character of Kat : firstly, the fact that she listened to or read those things did not necessarily make her a feminist, and secondly, she is never actually seeing reading or listening to those things within the context of the film (Pittman 140). Her feminist reputation seems to be just that--a reputation. While critics originally touted the film as pop culture with the potential for social change, it is now typically viewed as a candy-coated presentation of political issues.
While 10 Things I Hate About You ostensibly makes it acceptable for girls to challenge the status quo of high school gender roles through an awareness of feminist politics, the positive message of She's the Man appears to be one of gender equality : “Amanda Bynes proves that girls can do anything guys can do in She's the Man,” a statement from the film's official website proclaims ( HYPERLINK "http://www.shestheman-themovie.com/" www.shestheman-themovie.com). Writers Smith and Lutz echo this sentiment in the film's DVD commentary when they explain that the original conflict of the film involved Viola playing Hamlet in a school production, but that “proving she could play on a boys' team gave it more of that female empowerment thing” (She's the Man).
Marketed as “inspired by William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night,” the film tells the story of Viola, a talented soccer player who, repulsed by her mother's desire that she become a debutante, impersonates her brother Sebastian at prestigious Illyria Academy after her school's girls' soccer program is cut in order to join Illyria's team and prove her worth as an athlete to her soccer-playing ex-boyfriend Justin. After the girls' team is cut and the coach refuses to let them try out for spots on the boys' team, Justin agrees with the coach's statement that “You're all excellent players, but girls aren't as fast as boys, or as strong, or as athletic...It's scientific fact. Girls can't beat boys. It's as simple as that” (She's the Man). When Viola reminds Justin that, just the day before, he told her she played “as good as half the guys on the team,” he feigns incredulity in front of his teammates before switching to anger and declaring, as if he is the angry parent of an unruly child,“Viola! End of discussion!” to which she responds, “Fine. End of relationship” (She's the Man). This exchange establishes the film's main conflict: it juxtaposes Viola, who represents self-assured, young femininity, with the exaggeratedly closed-minded, patronizing masculinity represented by Justin and the Cornwall coach, who seem not only to view women as inferior athletes, but to attribute this inferiority to innate biological difference. This argument recalls those employed by opponents of Title IX, first ratified by the U.S. Department of Labor as part of the Education Amendments of 1972. Section 1681 of the amendment forbids “discrimination on basis of sex under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance” (U.S. Dept. of Justice, 1972). While Cornwall Academy is a fictional private school, and therefore would not be under the jurisdiction of Title IX if it were a real educational institution, the fact that similar biologically essentialist statements are made by figures representing the values of this institution and those opposed to the amendment nonetheless serves as a notable piece of cultural commentary which seems to suggest that, though Title IX has been legally enacted and enforced, the existence of the biologically-essentialist viewpoint remains a large political problem that needs to be addressed on a deeper ideological level.
How well does the film address this problem? It's clear that the overtly biologically essentialist arguments offered by the Cornwall coach are to be taken lightly given their hamfisted, over-the top delivery. The lines are delivered with a knowing smirk to a crowd of preening male soccer players, who are clearly less intelligent than the free-thinking Viola), but even so, the use of the word “athletic”--a type of ability one can possess regardless of gender--bridges the gap between “scientific” arguments about the relative speed and strength of the sexes based on biological differences and a socially constructed sexist ideology. While some may argue that this over-the-top prejudice exists for a broader purpose within the universe of the film (in order to endear the viewer to Viola's cause), the alternative to this unfair treatment does not seem to be much of an alternative at all when examined closely. If Cornwall represents the gender constraint that Viola's mother, coach, and ex-boyfriend impose upon her, then it follows logically that Illyria should represent a newfound freedom from those constraints, in accordance with the typical function of the pastoral in Shakespearean comedy. This is not so in the film. While the Illyria coach (played by well-known footballer Vinnie Jones, formerly of Sheffield United and no doubt cast because of his star-body's relevance to the film's subject matter) states that they are “not sexist here in Illyria” when trying to convince the referee that Viola is allowed to play on the boys' team according to the official rulebook, he repeatedly and derogatorily refers to his male players as “girls” when chiding them at practice, thereby employing a less-obvious form of the biological essentialism used by the Cornwall coach. This linguistic choice makes his defense of Viola seem motivated entirely by selfishness: he is defending her not because he believes in gender equality, as he claims, but because he thinks she is a skilled enough player to get him the victory over Cornwall that he desires. An admittance of this fact instead of a reliance on a weak, supposedly political argument would better suit the empowerment argument the film claims to have.
Construction of Femininities in the Film
In addition to the cultural issue of female representation in athletics, the film also seeks to comment on viable forms of femininity in contemporary society by juxtaposing femininities that seem to be negative because their goals are centered around their appeal to other (mostly male) people (Mrs. Hastings, Monique) with those that seem to be positive (Viola, Olivia, Eunice) because they let their own choices and desires define what they want. One of the main ways the film constructs its femininities is through different styles of the clothing worn by its female characters. In the beach soccer game during the film's opening scene, Viola plays wearing a navy blue and yellow bikini and short denim shorts. Her actions show that she is physically strong and athletically capable, and her outfit, by combining dark colors and comfortable fabrics with possibly provocative cuts, connotes a certain strong sexuality.
The connection between Viola's athleticism and her awareness of her own sexuality is clear in the scene that immediately follows the soccer game. Justin lauds her athletic ability by saying she is “as good as half the guys on the team” and credits himself for teaching her to play. Viola corrects him by saying, “Probably more than half,” kisses him, then insinuates he isn't the only teacher in their relationship when she says, “You couldn't kiss at all when we first started going out, but I've taught you well” (She's the Man). Viola elevates herself above the majority of the boys in terms of athletic ability while also switching the positions in the power binary Justin has established: where he places himself in the role of teacher and her in the role of student, she makes herself the teacher and him the student. While Viola's self-confident sexuality is certainly empowering to a degree, this binary reversal makes it potentially problematic. First, by reversing the binary instead of breaking it down, Viola does nothing to improve the hierarchical social ordering principle in place; she merely privileges a different party. Secondly, her proud description of herself as Justin's sexual “teacher” aligns her with members of the contemporary, young third wave feminist movement who have been criticized for their “sex-positive” brand of feminism by both society in general and older feminists, those who think that they are not liberating themselves and owning their sexuality as they claim , but instead, that they arereinforcing the patriarchal stereotype of woman as a temptress who uses her sexuality to get what she wants.
In their book Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism, and the Future, Jennifer Baumgardner and Amy Richards seek to define Third Wave feminism and what they see as misconceptions about young feminists. In the book's lexicon, Baumgardner and Richards define “Third Wave” as:
the core mass of the current women's movement in their late teens through their thirties, roughly speaking-the ones who grew up with Judy Blume books, Free to Be...You and Me, and Sesame Street. Another way of looking at the Third Wave is as the “daughters,” both real and metaphorical, of the Second Wave, the women who read Ms. Magazine and Our Bodies,Ourselves, and lobbied for Roe v. Wade and the ERA. (Baumgardner and Richards 401-2)
Jessica Valenti, founder of the popular weblog Feministing.com, adds a more sociopolitical definition to this historical one in her book Full Frontal Feminism: A Young Woman's Guide to Why Feminism Matters, in which she claims that young women who identify as feminists today “do it [read: have sex] better” because they realize that their bodies and sexualities are not commodities, but theirs to control as they see fit, and that they are less likely to buy into “cultural myths of purity and virginity” that operate as ways for the patriarchal hegemony to control female sexuality (Valenti 28-30). Viola's consciousness of and desire to control her own sexuality as evidenced by her discussion with Justin on the beach in the beginning of the film seems to ally her with sex-positive Third-Wave feminists as defined by Valenti.
The Problem of Paul Antonio
The montage during which Viola's friend transforms her into Sebastian complicates the reading of her as representative of third wave feminism, however. As Viola and her friends Mia and Yvonne try on wigs, mustaches, and beards of comically varying lengths and colors, a cover of “Love is All Around” is performed by pop-punk band The Tea Queens. This song is most well-known as the theme to the Mary Tyler-Moore Show, and helped the show represent a new segment of society (the single, self-sufficient working woman) when it aired in the early 1970s. As such, it became a sort of popular second wave feminist anthem (Dow 32). Setting Viola's initial gender transformation to this song aligns her with what Mary Richards culturally represented: a woman on a new social frontier who is questioning the mores of her world in order to “make it after all,” as the song says. Sebastian expresses the same sentiment to Viola just before he leaves to play with his band in London. He asks, “'If you wanna chase your dreams, sometimes you gotta break the rules, right?'” (She's the Man). Is Viola really “breaking the rules”? Even if she is flouting social norms by impersonating her brother, the presence and character of the apparently gay hairdresser Paul in this scene make her position as great social rebel a dubious one.
The transformation scene is the audience's first visual introduction to Paul Antonio (we hear his voice previously as Viola pleads with him to help her, but do not see him until the actual transformation begins), who functions as Viola's fairy godmother (so to speak), as well as her guide to what it means to be “the man” of the film's title. Paul is a hairdresser at the Christophe salon--most likely a reference to the real Salon Christophe, an upscale establishment in Beverly Hills that has catered to a rich and famous clientèle “for over twenty years”--( HYPERLINK "http://www.christophe.com/" www.christophe.com). As such, it is important to note that this reference connotes style and class. Additionally, the alteration to the logo is particularly indicative of Paul's position within the universe of the film, as well as his character's position within the genre of the teen movie with a positive message. In the film, the “o” in “Christophe” is a combination of the male and female symbols. While this symbolism could easily be a comment on the questioning of gender roles/traits done by the film in general, its direct association with Paul and his role as enabler of gender change is a loaded one. While the film never has either Paul himself or one of the other characters “out” him as a gay man, he is seen holding hands with Andrew, who appears to be his date, at the ball at the end of the film HYPERLINK "" \l "sdfootnote5sym#sdfootnote5sym" 5.
Even before the ball, however, Paul is connected with a number of signifiers of a certain cultural representation of homosexuality. He is always well-dressed and groomed, much more so than any of the other male characters in the film. While this care of his appearance could possibly be attributed to his age and occupation (as a hairdresser, he would likely be expected to stay abreast of current styles and fashions, and because he has a full-time job, it can be assumed that he is at least a few years older than Viola and her peers, since they all still attend high school), when this particular sense of style is combined with his capacity as a source of wisdom on what it means to be a (presumably straight, in Sebastian's case) man, Paul seems to embody the fulfillment of the contemporary mindset, epitomized by the television show Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, that gay men possess knowledge to make straight men better somehow. The official website of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy states that its goal is to “treat each new guy as a head-to-toe project” the result of which is that “soon, the straight man is educated on everything from hair products to Prada and Feng Shui to foreign films. At the end of every fashion-packed, fun-filled lifestyle makeover, a freshly scrubbed, newly enlightened guy emerges” ( HYPERLINK "http://www.bravotv.com/Queer_Eye/about" Queer Eye for the Straight Guy Online). This attitude seems to mirror Paul's, as well as to justify his character's minimal development. Unlike Damian, the character from Mean Girls who is fleshed out and humanized beyond a mere gay stereotype because of his relationships with the other characters (even though the audience is informed upon his first appearance that he is “almost too gay to function”), Paul is introduced in the transformation scene, talks to Viola on the phone once after that , and does not appear again until the climactic soccer match, where he appears to be accessorized by Mia and Yvonne, who are wearing outfits that match his. His pairing with Andrew at the film's end is never explained, though it appears to be a result of the adaptation's depiction of the common multiple marriage at the end of Shakespearean comedies, summed up in DVD commentary by director Andy Fickman as “why everyone gets paired off at the end” (She's the Man). Thus, Paul's presence in the film seems mainly to exist to make the film seem culturally hip and forward even as it complies to Shakespearean dramatic conventions, rather than to make a serious comment about the fluidity of gender or to question social heteronormativity.
Clothing and Constructed Femininity
While the women of the film exhibit this fluidity of gender to a very limited extent because each of them only seems to embody a single identity (as opposed to Duke Orsino, who is allowed to embody multiple valid masculinities simultaneously), it is necessary to note that the primary way in which the film differentiates between these various valid and invalid femininities is through the clothing that each woman wears. It is important that the sporty bikini and shorts is the first outfit in which the film's audience sees Viola, as it serves both to establish the kind of strong, sexually aware femininity she represents and set that femininity up as the one most worthy of emulation of the ones depicted in the film, as well as to contrast that femininity with other types seen later in the film, most notably those enacted by Viola's mother, Mrs. Hastings, Sebastian's girlfriend, Monique, and Illyria Academy's resident nerd, Eunice.
If Viola represents young, sex-positive, self-confident femininity, then her mother models (and wishes for her daughter to model) a kind of femininity that is the polar opposite: stilted, passive, and above all, rigidly conforming to the norms of her upper-class social circle. Mrs. Hastings's first appearance in the film comes when Viola returns home just after learning that her team has been cut. She is dressed in a blue linen suit and pearls, clothes that simultaneously evoke both high social standing and traditional, restrained femininity. She is obviously meant to seem off-putting and over-the-top to the film's viewers from her first scene, when she enthusiastically unveils two full-skirted, copiously-ruffled gowns that she would like Viola to wear to the Stratford Junior League's Debutante Ball. This scene serves two purposes. It identifies Mrs. Hastings as a proponent of the traditional femininity represented by both the ball gowns and the event to which they are to be worn; and the fact that Mrs. Hastings seems to either be unaware of or chose to ignore her daughter's aversion to all things debutante suggests that the film's audience should view her as out of touch, a member of an older generation, one whose values are perhaps “archaic,” as Viola labels the debutante tradition (She's the Man). In addition to valuing traditional femininity, Mrs. Hastings likewise privileges traditional masculinity. She makes this clear when, after Viola mentions she “dumped” Justin, she asks, “But why? He's so handsome and rugged and chiseled and great!” (She's the Man). By using words like “rugged” and “chiseled” to identify Justin, Mrs. Hastings not only shows that she values traditional masculine stereotypes, but objectifies him in a way that makes her seem more like a teenage girl with a crush than a protective mother who wants her daughter to date the right sort of boy. While this complicates her femininity, and arguably makes her a more well-rounded character and not just a stereotype of the overprotective high-society mother, it also undeniably serves to make her type of femininity undesirable in comparison with that of Viola, who obviously does not need Justin to make her feel validated, no matter how “chiseled” he may be.
If Viola is meant to represent the struggles of the third wave feminist, what then, is the connection between that movement's “both real and metaphorical” Second Wave mothers and Mrs. Hastings's traditional, passive femininity? The comparison appears to break down here, as Mrs. Hastings certainly does not seem to embody the struggles for equality lived out by second wave feminists. In fact, her involvement with such traditionally-gendered social organizations as the Junior League as well as her apparent valuing of the association of masculinity with strength and femininity with weakness seems to negate such an association. Instead, she seems to represent someone who has profited from the achievements of the second wave, but without acknowledging, or perhaps even being aware of, those achievements. She is a wealthy divorcée with no apparent occupation, no doubt existing quite comfortably on the alimony payments afforded her because of rights won by second wave feminists. In that view, the comparison applies to a limited degree, thought it still ultimately distances the empowered, current Viola from her dated, out-of-touch mother.
While Mrs. Hastings holds Monique up as an embodiment of the sweet, passive debutante, Monique herself seems to exist in the film to allow for the Mean Girls comparison under which it was marketed. Unlike Viola, Olivia, and arguably even Eunice, she has no Shakespearean counterpart. Though Monique partly serves as the catalyst for Viola's scheme to impersonate Sebastian (upon seeing Viola from behind as she's dressed in a hooded sweatshirt and jeans, she mistakes her for Sebastian, even going so far as to remark, “You look scary alike from the back”) and is therefore necessary to further the conceit of the film, she is viewed positively only by Mrs. Hastings (the film's other representation of confined femininity). Monique seems to serve chiefly as a foil to Viola and the other two characters who enact acceptable femininities in the film, Olivia and Eunice. Like those girls, her femininity is represented most obviously by her clothing, which is almost exclusively low-cut and tight-fitting. While Viola's semi-provocative fashions seem to evoke empowerment because they are combined with self-confidence and strength, Monique's clothing and physical appearance have a less-positive connotation because of her self-important attitude. When she shows up in the cleverly-named Illyria pizzeria, Cesario's, to look for Sebastian, and Andrew Aguecheek tries to flirt with her, she angrily responds, “Girls with asses like mine do not talk to boys with faces like yours” (She's the Man). She not only bases her own self-worth entirely on her physical appearance, but applies the same standard to her choice of boyfriends. It is no wonder that, in an instance of teen movie poetic justice, Monique is escorted by Viola's pompous ex, Justin, to the debutante ball. The fact that Monique's plot is wrapped up in such a way seems to set her up as sort of cautionary tale in keeping with the film's attempt at didacticism regarding female empowerment: if young girls invest themselves fully in embodying a femininity as superficial as Monique's, then their entire lives will be just as superficial, even if they look perfect by their society's standards.
In contrast to Mrs. Hastings and Monique, who do not have Shakespearean counterparts and seem to embody negative femininities, Olivia and Eunice, who are appropriations of Twelfth Night's Olivia and Maria, respectively, seem to enact positive femininities in that they have respect for themselves and others and do not appear to gauge self-worth in terms of their involvement in a heterosexual relationship. Is there a connection between their Shakespearean source material and their positive femininity? If so, it seems to be counterproductive to the film's privileging of the teen-movie-with-a-message archetype. Regardless of whether or not such a parallel exists, it is essential to note that while Olivia and Eunice both enact positive forms of femininity, they do so in different ways and arguably, to different degrees because of the way their costumes place them within different social positions within the high school hierarchy.
In keeping with the film's construction of femininity through costuming, Olivia is marked as different from the film's other physically attractive women by her style of dress. Instead of Monique's overt sexuality or Viola's athletic one, Olivia embodies a softer, slightly more modest sexuality by wearing t-shirts and denim skirts in pastel colors. Her sexuality becomes more overt after she is made an object of the male gaze enacted by Duke Orsino, when he sees her walk into the school cafeteria and turns his head so as to look at her without her knowing. This film does not frame his viewing of her as objectification, however, as evidenced by Duke's disgusted “Don't talk about her like that!” when Viola-as-Sebastian sees him staring at her, and, desperate to pass for one of the guys, crassly remarks, “Look at the booty on that blondie!” (She's the Man). Duke's demand that Olivia be treated with respect seems to suggest both that he views her as a person rather than a sex object (as Viola-as-Sebastian seems to assume he will) and that he has feelings for her. While Duke's defense of Olivia certainly calls Viola-as-Sebastian's preconceived notions of a necessarily misogynistic masculinity into question, other aspects of the boys' characterization of her complicate the audience's view of Duke, and, in conjunction, the way his masculinity is constructed.
In Twelfth Night, Olivia is in mourning because her brother has died, as she tells Feste in Act 1, scene 5. In She's the Man, however, Andrew tells Viola-as-Sebastian the following about Olivia: “Until recently, she was dating this college guy, but he dumped her, and I hear she's a total mess right now. [Her] confidence [and] self-esteem [are] way down . Toby then interjects, “Yeah, so in man words, it's time to pounce!” (She's the Man). These statements do several things to undermine Duke's sensitive masculinity. First, it turns Olivia into a prize for which men are competing. The mention of the “college guy” not only marks her as desired by other men, but by a higher class of men than Duke and his friends, who are still high school students. Andrew and Toby also employ the language of a certain kind of competition: hunting, wherein Duke is the hunter and Olivia his prey, as in the exchange between Orsino and Curio in 1.1 of Shakespeare's play. Also, Toby says that the words he uses to describe the situation are “man words,” thereby not only constructing a exclusively masculine language, but also characterizing it as predatory. Because Duke does not create the metaphor of Olivia-as-prey, it could be argued that his friends exist as a sort of foil for him and that they intensify the effects of his caring, sensitive masculinity rather than negating it. However, Duke's contribution to the conversation follows Viola-as-Sebastian's question about the identity of Malcom,(a hanger-on turned stalker of Olivia's who seems to be a combination of Shakespeare's Festes and Malvolio) who has just entered the cafeteria and seated himself next to Olivia. Duke quickly asserts that Malcom is “not competition” and “a total geek,” and while he does not objectify Olivia as blatantly as Andrew and Toby seem to, he still places himself above Malcolm in a hierarchy of masculinities as well as employs the same language of sport. Why, then, is Duke able to embody multiple masculinities at once, when, to exhibit multiple viable femininities/feminine sexualities, the film must show multiple women?
In Twelfth Night, Olivia's attendant, Maria, is funny and sexually frank, as well as quite clever. In Act 1 scene 3, she jokes with Sir Andrew that his hand is “dry” after shaking it (1.3.55) She is, in effect, questioning his masculinity by calling him impotent, which shows that she is both knowledgeable of contemporary sexual lore and not ashamed of possessing this knowledge. She also masterminds the plot to humiliate Malvolio in front of Olivia by having him appear lovesick and insane. In contrast, Eunice (who I view as analogous to Maria due to her social rank and her eventual romantic involvement with the Toby character) is the school nerd, outfitted with the stereotypical glasses and headgear, and breathily promising Duke that she will “be the best lab partner [he] ever had” (She's the Man). While it is certainly true that Eunice herself is a sexual being, her sexuality is not seen as strong or self-assured by the film's audience as Maria's is in the play. Instead, Eunice's sex drive is played for laughs, as when, near the end of the film, she bluntly informs Toby that she “know[s] tricks,” and the next shot follows the two down to the ground, where they begin kissing in earnest (She's the Man). She is the stereotypical horny nerd, much like those made famous by Anthony Michael Hall in teen films of the 1980s (The Breakfast Club, Weird Science) and continued by Alyson Hannigan's Michelle in the American Pie trilogy of the 1990s. Though her strong sexuality is depicted humorously, unlike Viola's, I still include Eunice within the categories of positive femininity because she enacts this femininity of her own volition and to satisfy her own sex drive, not in order to conform to her perception of the sexual desires of others, as Monique and, to a certain extent, Mrs. Hastings, do. Additionally, despite her archetypal character, it could be argued that Eunice perhaps has more personal agency than Maria because of Maria's social position as Olivia's attendant. Indeed, when discussing the film's Shakespearean references in a featurette entitled “Inspired by?” director Andy Fickman mentions that Olivia's friend, who only appears in several scenes, has fewer than five lines the entire film, and is never actually referred to by name, is called Maria (pronounced “Ma-ree-uh” according to typical contemporary American pronunciation, not “Ma-rye-uh” as in Shakespeare's play) “to keep that character in there” (She's the Man). This comment seems to devalue Maria's confident sexuality (she is essentially erased and her Shakespearean name is mispronounced), which contradicts the supposed “girl power” message of the film as mentioned by the writers.
Construction of Masculinities in the Film
The film's definition of what positive masculinity entails certainly seems to be more complicated, more multidimensional than its definitions of easily-delineated negative and positive femininities. Additionally, Viola seems to let male stereotypes shade her portrayal of Sebastian, and she seems never to settle on how her/his masculinity should be performed. This is clear due to Amanda Bynes' ever-changing accent in the film, which, according to reviewers, spans the vocal spectrum from “effeminate Alabaman” (Phipps) to “like she's on the phone to the school office: 'Viola is sick today, and this is her mother speaking.'” (Ebert). This noticeable variance seems to comment that masculine stereotypes do not represent how men behave; that “a real man is difficult to find,” as Olivia complains. What then, constitutes a “real man” in the context of the film? The phrasing of Olivia's complaint is important when seeking an answer to this question. A real man is not “hard” to find, which would carry connotations of traditionally masculine sexuality due to the phrase's containing the word “hard” - a possible reference to erection. Instead, the film values masculinities that are less traditional, and seemingly more evolved or modern because they have the ability to show emotion, like Duke's fear of Malvolio, the escaped tarantula, or Paul's crying at Viola's entrance into the debutante ball. Writers Lutz and Smith confirm this goal in a segment of the DVD commentary called “The Wrap Up” in which people whose involvement was central to the film are asked to offer last words, by saying, “ We just want to promote romance and good times and shirtless, sensitive boys. We like those” (She's the Man). This blatant admittance of male objectification complicates whatever presence of “that female empowerment thing” that exists in the film by merely reversing the power binary rather than truly questioning the gender system in place. Thus, though the emphasis on empowered women and sensitive men may cause the film to appear forward-thinking in regards to socially constructed gender norms, that emphasis seems to exist not because of the film's desire to make a statement about the construction of those norms, but because of the marketability of its seemingly progressive ideologies.
Amanda Bynes’s Star-Body
Like the film's girl-power message, which seems in actuality to be more about niche marketing and a slightly underhanded reinforcement of stereotypically boy-crazy teen femininity, Bynes' star-body, while built on depicting her as strong and funny, but most importantly, as a typical teen girl, appears to have more to do with the kind of image sells to the female teen market at any given moment than a desire to positively effect the audience to whom the image is being sold HYPERLINK "" \l "sdfootnote6sym#sdfootnote6sym" 6. Billed as “ having a knack for slapstick reminiscent of Lucille Ball ” (They've All Got It), Bynes began her career at a comedy camp under the tutelage of Richard Pryor and Robin Williams. She then acted in several local Southern California theatre productions such as Annie and The Music Man before catching the attention of executives at children's television network Nickelodeon, where she was cast in the kids' sketch comedy show All That alongside future Saturday Night Live cast member Keenan Thompson in 1996. Bynes quickly became a fan favorite on All That, which resulted in her being given top billing and control of original characters on The Amanda Show, which ran on Nickelodeon from 1999-2002, and became Bynes 'gateway from bit sketch player to comedic film lead in projects like She's the Man and Sydney White (a 2007 adaptation of Snow White set in a California college sorority). Some of the original characters on The Amanda Show seem to have contributed to Bynes' “Everygirl appeal” as cited by The Boston Globe in 2006 (Tomlinson). For example, two of her most popular original characters were Judge Trudy, an obvious send-up of television's “Judge Judy” Scheindlin who always ruled in favor of children who brought their parents to her courtroom no matter the crime, and Penelope Taynt, an obsessive fan of Amanda's who would do anything to gain entrance into the star's presence while predictable hilarity ensued (Amanda Show). Both of these characters represent parts of Bynes' constructed “Everygirl” star-body. First, Judge Trudy plays into the fantasies of young children who desire to switch the parent/child power dynamic. If Amanda is playing a character who supports this, then, in the eyes of her fans, she must have the same sorts of problems with her parents as they do with theirs. Amanda is just like you, an average American kid. Penelope Taynt adds a different dimension to Bynes' star-body. Penelope functions to make light of Bynes's celebrity, while at the same time, glorifying it. While the lengths Penelope goes to to meet Amanda are absurd (disguises, fake voices, and silly gadgets galore) and she never reaches her goal (the same security guard carts Penelope off of the show's set at the end of nearly every incarnation of the sketch), and though it is sugar-coated by humor and pratfalls, the message of the sketch is abundantly clear: Amanda is a celebrity. She is not just like you, an average American kid, and don't think you can get close to her or be like her, because that is not going to happen, the sketch ultimately tells fans.
Bynes continues this contradiction of approachability and celebrity in her most recent project: a clothing line for the retail chain Steve and Barry's. The line, dear by Amanda Bynes, is composed of affordable casual wear (hoodies, skirts, pants, tanks, tees, and accessories, all on sale for less than $10 apiece) and, due to its selection and pricing, presumably geared toward Bynes' target audience of young teen girls. In a video on the line's official website, Bynes echoes Viola's sex positive femininity by saying she has helped create “clothes that let your personality breathe without hiding or covering up.” She also echoes the same shaky message of apparent girl power by exhorting her consumers to “Be quirky. Be intelligent. Be entertaining,” and then immediately instructing them to “defy labels” ( HYPERLINK "http://www.dearbyamanda.com/" www.dearbyamanda.com). The first two imperative statements of that series appear to be liberating and encouraging to their young female audience by contradicting the norms of a kind of young femininity which exists mainly to satisfy the stereoptypical fantasies of young boys. If these young girls are “quirky,” they do not conform to a feminine ideal as constructed by males, but instead, exhibit a degree of individuality in the way in which they present themselves to others. If they are “intelligent,” they do not allow themselves to merely agree with or parrot the opinions of others because they possess the reasoning skills to form opinions of their own. While those statements sound liberating at first, the ad's third statement counteracts them. By telling the girls to whom it is targeted to “be entertaining,” it commodifies them by reducing them to an act that exists entirely for the (possibly sexual?) gratification of the audience of their entertainment. The fourth and final imperative, “Defy labels,” blatantly contradicts the previous three, all of which instruct their audience in proper behavior through concise adjectives that could easily be used to “label” someone. Bynes (or possibly the writer of the ad) appears either to have been unaware or to have disregarded this contradiction due to its presence in the final product (which, it should be noted, is itself marketed under a distinctive label). While Bynes' performance of multiple identities (and her encouragement of the same within her target audience) could be viewed as a positive embrace of multiple valid femininities by some, I would argue that its commodification ultimately transforms Bynes' star-body into one that actually reinforces the female status quo it purports to negate.
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