Mrs. America (tv series)

I just finished marathoning this nine episode miniseries from 2020, which takes place in the 1970s and covers, using the fight for and against the Equal Rights Amendment during that decade as a narrative red thread, both the rise of the far right in the Republican party and Second Wave feminism in the US. It's also an incredibly female centric ensemble story with a fantastic cast - Cate Blanchett as anti feminist activist Phyllis Schlafly, Uzo Aduba whom I recalled as Suzanne in Orange is the new Black as Shirley Chisholm, the first black and the first female Democratic candidate for President, Rose Byrne as Gloria Steinem, Margo Martindale as Bella Abzug, Tracy Ullman as Betty Friedan, Elizabeth Banks as Jill Brocklehouse, Sarah Paulsen as one of the few fictional characters, Alice, Melanie Lynskey as Rosemary Thomson, and, and, and. Now googling for reviews in between episodes tells me by far the most controversial aspect of the show was to use Phyllis Schlafly as the villain protagonist throughout the show while each of the other episodes after the pilot, except for the finale, focuses on a different woman. (Hence the titles - "Gloria", "Shirley", "Betty", "Jill" etc. ) For me, that narrative decision paid off. Giving the spotlight to different women each episode emphasized not just the characters' complexity but also got across the interweaving of different agendas even within similar larger goals, and of the feminist political activism as a democratic work in progress where you have debates, where what one generation wants isn't the end game for the next anymore but they're still connected, where no one is a perfect heroine but has their own flaws and blind spots. (see, for example, Gloria Steinem utterly surprised when the sole black member of her editing team at Ms first gets shot down when talking about tokenism and then quits). Not coincidentally, the anti-ERA movement Phyllis Schlafley creates while also coming into being via grassroots organizing isn't just more and more hierarchical, with people expected to fall in line behind Phyllis, but it's not until the penultimate episode that one of Phyllis' followers gets the narrative spotliight (and it's the sole important fictional character of the show, very well played by Sarah Paulsen who until then had to convey her mixture of admiration and fear of Phyllis and the first stirring of doubts via reaction shots.

The show is also brilliant at conveying the changing political climate of the 70s. When it starts, the ERA isn't controversial, it's seen as bi partisan, even Nixon is for it. Roe versus Wade is about to become law. Being pro choice and being a female Republican working in tandem with Abzug and Steinem isn't mutually exclusive (hence Jill Brocklehurst in the National Women's Political Caucus). Life is far from idyllic for women and the patriarchy is still going strong, especially for women of colour, even if they have achieved name recognition and political success - the third episode, when Shirley keeps getting told, and not just by men, that she's done her bit for symbolism and should hand over her delegates to MacGovern already makes that viscerally clear - but nonetheless, there's such a strong momentum for progress in the air....and when the series ends, Ronald Reagan has been elected, bi-partisan is increasingly a dirty word, and the conservative backslash has barely begun. Which sounds incredibly depressing - which it is, and we're sitting in the results - and yet, this isn't a depressing series, it's too vibrant and interesting and complex for that. (And extremely well costumed. Not to mention the soundtrack.)

While the dialogue has a lot of zingers - between them, Margo Martindale and Tracey Ullmann are in a neck to neck competition in oneliner delivery - , the series also excells at the quiet moments, trusting its actresses to get across what the characters are feeling and thinkng without dialogue as well. Some that come to mind: in the first episode, Phyllis realising the reason why her husband supported her last (failed) campaign as congresswoman but doesn't want to do so now is that he didn't believe she could win last time; Margaret Sloan-Hunter's expression when the (white) rest of the MS staff is aghast at the mere suggestion tokenism could be a thing; Alice (Sarah Paulsen throughout), but especially when watching Phyllis in the finale; Bella when having to decide whether or not to include support for gay rights on the schedule for the Houston conference. And of course there are some epic confrontation scenes, and that's another way the narrative structure, with a different woman highlighted in every episode, pays off. There are two scenes in which Phyllis Schafly directly debates a feminist (both, googling tells me, historical), in one case Betty Friedan, in another Brenda Feigen (Ari Graynor). ( Spoilers for history ensue. )

Which is very satisfying to watch. (Though somewhat sobering to realise that by now, if someone did that to the Orange Menace and their ilk, their audience would no longer care.)

Could a show been made that centred around solely the feminists, or solely one of them - say, Shirley? Sure, and it would have been great as well if equally well written and cast, I'm sure. But I am glad this show exists, because stories about women disagreeing with each other on a deep set political and ideological level, not a story about some personal rivalry, are stlil very rare, as are female characters with a Walter White like arc and dimension of dastardliness who still don't come across as caricatures. It's not that the seriers lets the men off the hook - for every supportive husband, like Brenda's or Bella's, or even Gloria's boyfriends, there are plenty of guys on both sides of the aisle who are at best condescending and at worst abusive controllers like the unseen Kevin, Pamela's husband. Not to mention that two of the most gut wrenching scenes come when men who have made (political) promises to our heroines sell them out. Nonetheless, when Gloria early on dismisses Phyllis as a brainwashed tool of the patriarchy who doesn't know what she's doing, she's clearly wrong; Phyllis knows exactly what she's doing, and she wants to do it. That Republicans like Jill who is fiscally conservative and militarily hawkish but, as mentioned, pro-choice, pro-social security, pro-medcare were on their way out while Republicans like Phyills would become the standard wasn't, at this point in history, inevitable. It was a conscious choice, too. (And keeps being one.)

Lastly: for all the debates, one of the most endearing aspects of the show are the moments of connections (often against the odds) that keep being made and from which the majority of the women draws their strength. The phonecall between Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan (who usually have a rather tense relationship, though mostly tense on Betty's side) at the end of the fourth episode. Shirley and Bella in the finale. A drunk Alice stumbling across Flo Kennedy at the Houston convention and singing "This land belongs to you and me" together. These are the scenes that allow a viewer to believe that while, as Bella predicts after Reagan's election, much of the country goes fifty years backwards, not all of it does, and nothing is inevitable. The climate of progress, the momentum being with it and not against it, it can happen again.