Theresa Basile

The man-child is one of my least favorite character tropes. Grown men who can’t be arsed to take control of their lives until a female cipher “character” comes by and redeems him/teaches him how to mature, thus taking the role of his mommy-wife…no, thank you. (This is why I tend to avoid most Judd Apatow projects that aren’t Freaks and Geeks.) The man-child is a character archetype that manages to be insulting to men and women, and I have no use for characters like that who aren’t Homer Simpson.

This is why I’m so fond of Modern Family’s Phil Dunphy, a character who first seems like a typical man-child, but soon shows himself to be much more complex and well-rounded – a man who has child-like interests and still handles plenty of grown-up responsibilities.

On the surface, Phil Dunphy is a combination of several tired sitcom stereotypes. He’s the childlike adult man, the whipped husband under the control of his nagging wife, the dad who tries too hard to be the “cool parent” to impress his kids. Over time, though, the writers and Ty Burrell showed us several more dimensions of the character, much more well-rounded than initially meets the eye.

One of Phil’s defining traits is an enthusiasm for life. He doesn’t do anything halfway. He tries to walk on a wire, creates elaborate presentations for his real estate business, and when he treats his father-in-law to a massage, he lights sage and incense in the room and gets deeply, spiritually in touch with his role as a masseur. The show treats Phil’s enthusiasm as something to be celebrated and emulated, as he finds joy in almost everything he does.

Another thing I like about Phil’s characterization is that he’s not shown to be a bumbling fool. There are times when he doesn’t know what he’s doing and has to be “rescued” by his more in-control wife, yes, but he’s more than competent in other areas of his life. He’s great at buying presents for people. He’s a good real estate salesman and also turns out to be a truly excellent masseur, so good that he could have turned it into a career if he hadn’t heard the siren song of real estate.

But perhaps my favorite thing about Phil Dunphy is the way he enthusiastically embraces traditionally feminine traits. He likes being the sensitive dad, he takes pride in his massage skills, and talks about his college cheerleading past with affection and pride. He bonds more easily with his son Luke than with either of his daughters, but not because of favoritism – he and Luke just have more in common. He also seems to enjoy female-centric films: when Haley, trying to get out of trouble at college, uses Elle Woods from Legally Blonde as a reference point, Phil angrily responds, “This is real life, Haley, not an excellent movie!”

I was honestly moved by the episode “Virgin Territory,” where he discovers that Haley’s had sex. He doesn’t quite know how to deal with this information, and the show presents his dilemma not as a possessive father who feels like he “owns” his daughter’s virginity, but as the dilemma of a confused parent who isn’t ready to hear that his oldest child is growing up. He also seems to realize right away that this problem is his problem, not Haley’s, and he manages to communicate (through coded language) that he trusts her to make her own choices. If only more fathers (on TV and in general) were as supportive of their daughters’ sexual choices as Phil is of Haley’s.

Phil Dunphy is a character who manages to be endearingly childlike without being a man-child, a father who enjoys being the “cool parent” and still isn’t afraid to show his kids tough love when they need it, who calls handshakes “man-shakes” and also enjoys cheerleading. He shows that adult men can have a youthful enthusiasm for life while still being a responsible grown-up (most of the time). I hope he starts a new trend of character archetypes so we can finally get a break from the less appealing man-children.

Thanksgiving, that gluttonous holiday I love despite its unsavory origins, is tomorrow. My family’s feast will begin probably at around 3 pm. For the first time, I will assist with the cooking, hoping to do enough to ease my father’s workload (and also to get out of helping with the dishes). And tonight on Thanksgiving Eve, I will partake in some of my favorite Thanksgiving-themed entertainment.

As you know, I’m a big fan of sitcoms and television in general, and there are some classic Thanksgiving TV episodes that I enjoy watching in preparation of the holiday.

How I Met Your Mother, “Slapsgiving” – Marshall and Barney’s “You Just Got Slapped” song makes me laugh, as does Orson Bean as Ted’s imagined version of Robin’s slightly older boyfriend. I also enjoy the poignancy of Ted and Robin trying to force a friendship after a breakup, only to find their friendship restored after a few military-language puns. (“General Knowledge,” “Corporal Punishment,” “Colonel Stuck In My Teeth,” and “Major Buzzkill.”) The episode also feels very Thanksgiving-y with four friends sitting on their butts and getting into drama while one person goes nearly mad doing all of the cooking – and of course, Lily gets to relax afterward as her friends do all of the dishes.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, “Pangs” – I actually have a lot of problems with this episode. It’s racist, for one thing, with native appropriation and factual inaccuracies about the Chumash people. Angel returns for a pointless cameo and continues with stalking Buffy, only to set up a crossover Angel episode that still infuriates me. I also don’t like that no one but Anya cares about Xander’s mystical syphilis. However, I do enjoy Spike tied to a chair and being a helpless, annoyed puppy without blood, and Giles calling Americans “you bloody colonials.” I also adore Anya’s description of Thanksgiving: “To commemorate a past event, you kill and eat an animal. It’s a ritual sacrifice, with pie.” Ultimately, I enjoy the attempt to put a supernatural spin on Thanksgiving.

Friends, “The One Where Ross Got High” – Let’s face it, no sitcom did Thanksgiving episodes that Friends did. The show had ten Thanksgiving episodes over its run. Two were boring, three were good, and five were great to amazing. My favorite one, even more than Chandler in a box or the Thanksgiving flashbacks, was the one where Ross got high. No Ross/Rachel breakup drama, no Fat Monica jokes, just Ross trying desperately to hide the fact that he once got high in college, Phoebe having weird sex dreams about Mr. Geller and Jacques Cousteau, Rachel accidentally making a half-English trifle and half-shepherd’s pie, the Geller siblings revealing secrets to each other, and Chandler gets a rare triumphant moment when Mrs. Geller tells him how great he is. This episode also has Joey loving Rachel’s terrible dessert, and Ross crying, “It tastes like feet!”

What about you? What are your favorite pieces of Thanksgiving entertainment?

And happy Slapsgiving!

I’m not a huge fan of menstruation humor in sitcoms. Most period jokes are centered on the “bitches be crazy, amiritie?” punchline. This was lampooned in 30 Rock in the classic episode, “TGS Hates Women,” where Jenna played a series of historical and important women who made irrational choices when they suddenly got their periods (clip here). Period humor usually shows how long-suffering men have to put up with the crazy women in their lives going even crazier when their hormones go haywire.

In fact, menstruation plots on sitcoms usually follow a very particular pattern: female character acts weepier/more irritable than usual, and the male character is more sensitive than usual because he’s afraid female character will eviscerate him if he says or does the wrong thing. The male character either says/does the wrong thing and the female character snaps at him, OR the female character realizes that the male character is being extra sensitive due to her period and then gets a) furious with him for treating her delicately, or b) overwhelmed with emotion because the male character was being sensitive for a change.

That’s why I was reluctant to watch this week’s episode of New Girl. I love FOX’s entire Tuesday night lineup, but rarely watch the episodes on the night they air, and I tend to catch up on Raising Hope, Ben and Kate, New Girl, and The Mindy Project by the time I go to bed on Thursday. I saw that the New Girl episode was called “Menzies” and felt a sense of dread – would this be another “bitches be crazy” period episode?

As it turned out, yes. And no.

Jess was definitely more irritable than usual while on her period, and she openly sobbed during a job interview when she saw a picture of a puppy sitting in a teacup, but Nick soon realized that Jess’s period was the smokescreen to hide what was really going on with her: she was still depressed over losing her job, and the depression was exacerbated because she’s been unemployed for several months now. Her period didn’t invent irritable or weepy emotions out of nowhere; they simply brought those repressed emotions to the surface.

This is the aspect of the menstruation cycle that a lot of men and male writers simply don’t get. Women don’t become completely different people when they’re on their periods, or become irritable or weepy over issues that normally wouldn’t bother us. Our emotions are often heightened, but not invented. A good friend of mine once broke down in tears after a stressful work event that didn’t go the way she wanted it to, and she blamed her period for making her cry, but she would have felt upset otherwise. The stressful work event had been on her mind for a very long time, and while she was feeling crampy and bloated, she lost her ability to swallow her emotions and hide behind a few sarcastic comments.

Such was the same for Jess: she broke down and snapped at her roommates, but probably wouldn’t have done so if she weren’t feeling depressed and lost at a critical juncture in her life.

“Menzies” was also successful because Nick wasn’t portrayed as the long-suffering, put-upon man who has to deal with his woman’s problem. He wasn’t able to help Jess until he went through his own period (pun intended) of personal journey. He teased Jess for being irrational and angry during her period, and she quickly pointed out that he’s irrational and angry all the time, and we got treated to a series of flashbacks that proved her point. Nick got through to Jess not because he was the rational man and she was the crazy-bitch-be-crazy, but because he found a way to relate to her as a friend.

Even Winston’s story had a surprise twist. He claimed he was also on his period and having “sympathy cramps” because of Jess’s cycle, but soon confessed that he didn’t want to address his post-breakup depression. (Schmidt was the only roommate who didn’t have any anger/weepy moments in the episode, and I enjoy watching Schmidt as the most emotionally stable roommate of the group, since it’s a role he rarely gets to play.) His “alpha female” theory was amusing enough, and even funnier when he admitted that he was faking everything.

For me, the latest episode of New Girl was an example of menstruation humor done well. It focused on Jess’s feelings and didn’t dismiss her as a completely irrational being just because she had a few irrational moments. Period-related humor can be very funny IF writers focus on the female character’s emotions – NOT how the female character’s emotions affect the male characters around her, but how they affect her. Because I’ll be blunt – I’m not interested in examining how men are affected by women’s times of the month. They have to deal with a few weepy moments or blunt comments? We have to deal with our uteri being twisted into knots and stomped on. Focus on the woman’s experiences, and menstruation humor can be very funny indeed.

You know what I’d like to see more of on television? Stories about women who are successful in their professional lives, but whose personal lives are a complete mess. I especially want to see more of these stories about female doctors.

Take Emily Owens, M.D., for example. Starring Mamie Gummer, Emily Owens, M.D. tells the story of a medical intern who discovers that life in a hospital is just like high school. In the first episode, she confesses to her old high school crush that she likes him only to be shot down, and realizes that her high school nemesis is interested in her high school crush, but she also diagnoses a condition and performs a life-saving procedure during her first day on the job.

Or let’s look at Mindy Kaling’s new sitcom. The Mindy Project, recently picked up for a full season, tells the story of Mindy Lahiri, a gynecologist whose dating life is a mess. In the first episode of the show, she rudely interrupts an ex-boyfriend’s wedding and drives a bicycle into a pool, but by the end of the pilot, she’s heroically delivering a baby to a patient who doesn’t have health insurance – even interrupting a date to do it.

Or let’s go back in time a few years to a show called Grey’s Anatomy, the drama that won’t die (even when most of its characters do). Ellen Pompeo plays Meredith Grey, an intern who accidentally sleeps with her boss the night before her first day. (By “accidentally sleep with,” I mean that the sex was intentional, but she did not know the man was her boss.) She struggles with a patient, but gets a sexy love interest and a guy crushing on her forlornly from the minute he meets her. She’s also the intern who makes the miraculous discovery of what’s wrong with her patient, and figures out how to help a fellow intern’s patient.

Now, pretend you’ve been living under a pop culture rock for the last few years and know nothing about these three shows or the actresses who play these characters. Based just on the descriptions, would you be able to tell which program was the satire/comedy and which two programs took the “professionally skilled, personal mess” trope seriously?

…Okay, so maybe the bicycle in the pool was the giveaway. Fair enough. The point remains that television continues to have a problem with professional women. Showrunners don’t seem to know how to write professional women characters without turning them into neurotic messes who can control nothing about their personal lives, and lately, female doctors are getting the brunt of that particular cliche.

I like comparing these female doctor characters to a character like House on House, M.D. or Dr. Perry Cox on Scrubs (who has been compared to House by other characters on Scrubs, amusingly enough). These men are professional geniuses whose personal lives are also fraught with drama, but we’d never call them neurotic. They’re curmudgeonly assholes who bark perfectly crafted sarcasm at their professional inferiors, colleagues, and bosses. Their personal lives are messes because they’re misanthropic, or because they’re masking years of built-up pain. Women doctors have messy personal lives because they overanalyze and are neurotic and always pick the wrong men.

I don’t know if showrunners write women doctors this way because they lack imagination, or because they’ve internalized sexist stereotypes, or because they don’t know how else to make a professionally competent women sympathetic to an audience. “We’ve got a woman doctor here, because women can be doctors now, but women who are TOO put-together will be a turnoff, so we’ll make her a mess outside of work! INSTANT EMPATHY!”

Fortunately, Mindy Kaling is aware of this cliche, and the episodes of The Mindy Project following the pilot have veered away from “professionally competent, personally messy” plots.Show-Mindy is often portrayed as less neurotic and more of a jerk, and Kaling is more interested in making the character funny than making her likable. Show-Mindy is several steps in the right direction, and I hope we start seeing more characters like her, soon.

But not too soon, because I want there to still be a market for my own pilot about a professionally competent, neurotic female doctor. Doctor Love tells the story of Hilarie Love, a young physician who can’t seem to get her personal life together. In the pilot episode, Hilarie goes on her first date since high school, where her prom date stood her up to go have sex with the cheerleader. Unfortunately, she winds up wearing an outfit where none of the clothes match, and gets so nervous that she throws up on her date in the middle of a restaurant, and almost accidentally kills him when she stands up and knocks the table on him. Then she gets called into work, and performs a miraculous, life-saving surgery (even though she’s not a surgeon) on a young blind boy who’s been shot, removing the bullet with her bare hands and donating her own blood to rejuvenate the child. This catches the attention of a handsome attending physician who finds her competent and pretty, and is still intrigued by Hilarie even after she throws up on him, too.

What do you think? Do we have a hit?