Gossip Girl recap: New York, I Love You XOXO (the finale)

So Georgina Sparks is now Blair Waldorf’s aunt. Or should that be Mrs Chuck Bass? After 121 episodes, six long series, nigh on a thousand parties and too many love triangles to count, Gossip Girl is at an end. Josh Schwartz’s series about the privileged and genetically blessed going about their fabulous business on the Upper East Side is now consigned to the dustbin of television history.

Although it never attracted as many viewers as Schwartz’s first outing into the lives of the rich and glamorous – airing as it did at the dawn of the democratisation of illegal television downloading – there’s no denying that Gossip Girl made an impact.

From its two fingers up response to groups concerned about its risqué content – including an advertising campaign based on their criticisms – to the regular tabloid appearances of its young stars, Gossip Girl was more than just a teen soap opera.

Of course, by the end, what started as an unashamedly campy drama that pushed boundaries with its scandalous storylines had become a shadow of its former self. Still, the double-bill finale sent the show – and Gossip Girl HIMself – out with a bang.

First, a few criticisms. Ok, so Serena has maintained her slutty behaviour throughout, identifying new targets as each old week melts into the next, and Nate remains the same loveable dolt, dimpled and clueless. But all the same, between the fourth and fifth series it was as if the scriptwriters decided to start with a blank canvas. Gone was Blair the conniving, tawdry mastermind, the woman for whom no scheme was too big, only to be replaced with a damsel, working at the whim of whichever male rescuer she was being saved by that episode.

Toward the end, she became a parody of her former self, portrayed as a petulant child in her campaign against Nelly Yuki. The old Blair would never have fallen for the wimpy, wearisome prince, nor made a pact with God or allowed duty and responsibility to obstruct her relationship with Chuck.

The old Blair was no shrinking wallflower; she dictated events but never let herself be dictated by them. She did not need saving, ever.

As for Dan, in the first series he was the heart of the story; the innocent, thrown without a hope into a very different world. He was sweet, boyish and sympathetic – you rooted for him to win Serena’s heart, to triumph over the bullies, to be the outsider who was never, to quote his book, seduced by the inside.

Unfortunately, Dan’s undercover adventures on the UES saw him sucked in, until he was just another selfish, vain and airheaded brat. Gossip Girl thrived on the attempts to corrupt the innocent, to sully the virtuous. But by the time his book was printed, he was tainted almost beyond the point of return.

Chuck’s trajectory, on the other hand, was better. Taking him from heartless capitalist to fighter for justice and all-round good egg was a risky move, but the reason it worked was because throughout, he maintained his smirk, his insouciance, his utter contempt for the irrelevant or unfortunate.

Despite the flaws of the final series – Sage, Sage’s dull dad, the vom-worthy Ivy and Rufus fake-romance, Bart’s Sudanese oil dealings – the finale was delicious; an homage to the fans who have stuck it out through thick and very much thin, an ode to all the ridiculous, frothy fun of the XoXo collective.

First, the big question. Who was Gossip Girl?

Unlike Lost, during which audiences were encouraged to play a guessing game from day one, the identity of the mysterious tattle-tale wasn’t oft addressed. The decision to make Kristen Bell the voice of Dan Humphrey’s delusions was frustrating – what about how GG ruined Little J’s life, or incessantly mocked his actions? – but ultimately the best option.

Dan was the ultimate outsider, ever desperate to claw his way into the lives and loves of the Upper East Siders. Only he would have had the access and the ambition to chronicle ever good, bad and downright ugly detail of the gang. Only he wouldn’t think twice about sacrificing his father, sister, romantic interests and best friends on the altar of his quest for popularity and acceptance.

The great reveal wasn’t really that, what with everyone basically just chuckling and rolling their eyes in an “aw, Daa-annn” kind of way when they found out. Never mind how he had at various points paved the way for characters to cheat, be jailed, nearly die, face social ruin and widespread embarrassment.

It was more, darn it gang, why didn’t we figure that out!

But of course, this show has never been about Gossip Girl. It’s been about the girls (and guys) gossiped about. So the finale had to wind up every loose end, with heartwarming flashbacks of Vanessa (hair still dreadful, still not permitted to return to Manhattan), Little J (inevitably, Sage’s idol) and Eric.

No return of Scott, nor stalker Juliette, Hillary – threesome with Dan and Vanessa – Duff, nor Carter. But Michael Bloomberg made a cameo, and there was plenty of Dorota (her survival secret? She’s been downing vodka this whole time). And Bell, and Rachel Bilson, appeared in a marvellous meta movie-of-Gossip-Girl-moment that had more than a little trace of the Dawson’s Creek finale about it.

As for our gang. Ivy got her comeuppance, albeit at the hands of someone only a tad less morally questionable than herself. Lily found herself a new-old husband again, after redoing Bart’s funeral (I’m shocked that she didn’t use it as an excuse to plan another fabulous society soiree!) Sage was dumped (obviously – in the 20 year reunion, Nate will still be picking up random floosies and ditching them after a month, while Chuck advises him of the joys of settling down).

In any case, Archibald has a successful media company (good to know journalism will still be going in five years time) and a possible electoral run to consider. So, in essence, he has become exactly the man his grandfather wanted to be. But with better dimples.

Blair and Chuck (it was never going to be Dan, or Nate, or anyone) found their happy ever after, with a nostalgic wedding starting at the steps of the Met, and spawned a darling mini-Chuck to love and adore (although with Dorota there for the tough parenting).

And Dan and Serena – less beauty and the beast, more arrogance and the dimwit – finally tied the know, five years after they fell back in love (although presumably with myriad splits and hiccups in the meantime).

So that’s it. No more blonde with her boobs out at funerals and other inappropriate times (S), no more smug, dastardly and ever so well-coiffed (Chuck), no more adorably clueless (Nate) and social-climber bordering on stalker (Dan), and no more bitchy, queen of mean, ne-headbanded Queen B. Unless, of course, you fancy rewatching it all from the very beginning?

Gossip Girl recap: High Infidelity

In further proof that Gossip Girl has well and truly departed the realm of the possible for the realm of 21-year-olds running major media companies and untrained socialites designing entire fashion lines, Nelly Yuki returned to Gossip Girl this, week.

Once Blair’s whipping girl, the intellectual but social inept nerd pushed around by Waldorf and her minions, two years at Yale have apparently secured her enough experience and gravitas to spar with the best of them. Supposedly now a reporter for the prestigious Women’s Wear Daily, she is assigned to cover Blair’s new clothing designs.

Only it turns out it’s part of a piece about fashionistas turned uber-designers, with Blair being put up against ponzi-scheming socialite Poppy Lifton, who helpfully reminds us that she was driven out of New York by the Constance girls.

And of course, Poppy’s designs are basically Blair’s; same fabric, same look. Cue minions – useless, comedy minions – being despatched on a mission of sabotage that comes back to haunt Blair only moments later. But at least it’s Blair, back to her old trips, and we are pleasantly free from the character lobotomy that pervaded last series.

In Serena land, the new romance with Mr man of the minute is going sour, after she and Nate spot him, gasp, with another woman, Not kissing her, nothing inappropriate. Just in the company of. It’s enough to send both Serena and Nate on a spiral of anger and heartbreak, until they discover that their respective paramours are actually father and daughter.

I eagerly anticipate the scene in which Sage – a season six version of a spiteful Little J – learns that her boy toy and her possible stepmother were shtupping not too long ago.

For Chuck, his mission to destroy Bart hits on a hiccup (something to do with Bart, an illicit weekend and a shedload of money). Yawn. I’m all for the return of Bad Bass – no dog walking and soul-searching this series – but if he’s going to go heavy on the surreptitious and underhand methods, I’d rather it be with a worthy rival. Georgina, perhaps.

Georgina, of course, is busy managing Dan’s bright future (of defamation suits and social pariah-ness, if his book is anything to go by). With a serialisation deal with Nate on the go – how handy when your best mate runs a magazine, eh) it looks like the scandalous shit is about to hit the fan.

Although what he could possibly be revealing that hasn’t already been covered by Gossip Girl, I don’t know. She is the omniscient chronicler of the madness and mayhem of the Upper East Side. Humphrey, surely, is just a pretender.

Ruby Sparks and manic pixie dream girls

Why are women on screen so hopelessly unrealistic? Not always, of course, but I’ve lost count of the number of films and television programmes purporting to show a “real” female character – that is, not  a rom com creation or a fanboy’s pneumatic fantasy – that have gone horribly wrong.

Usually, this involves the women in indie films, where the male characters have been written precisely to go beyond stereotype, yet the women are one dimensional cartoons. Case in point; Zooey Deschanel on New Girl.

As the blogosphere has labelled her, this woman, who is a foil to the agonising male, is a “manic pixie dream girl” (there is even a Wikipedia page dedicated to this). Invariably, this woman is quirky, spontaneous, emotional but adorable; intelligent yet impractical; delightful yet different to everyone else.

She wears oddly-matched clothes, has flowing wavy hair, a small nose and just enough angles on her face to not be conventionally beautiful (but she is attractive nonetheless). She is clumsy, yet endearingly so. She likes obscure music and art, and is outspoken yet accurate in her descriptions. And I’ve never met her in real life.

So it was enjoyable to watch a film that picked up on the failure of male writers to script their dream women in a convincing way. Ruby Sparks, in which a male wunderkind writer (Paul Dano) writes about his dream woman (Zoe Kazan), only for her to morph from mirage to living, breathing girlfriend, features a character that conforms to most of the above specifications.

Of course, she isn’t real; she’s just a composite of what a man thinks he wants and thinks a woman can be. And as the romantic miracle starts to go awry, this becomes clear to the writer and the audience. Written by Kazan herself, the main message of the film is about the possibility or impossibility of changing someone, but the sense that she is challenging the indie film staple – the quirky dream girl – is there too. As is said in the film: “The quirky, messy women whose problems make them appealing are not real.”

Jewish Mum of the Year: Yet another TV programme which supports stereotypes

I wrote a piece about the Channel 4 series for the Independent’s new Indy Voices site:

“I feel like we’ve been Gypsy Wedding-ed,” a friend complained on Facebook last night.

“Now I know what it’s like to come from Essex,” said another. My reaction to the first episode of Channel Four’s Jewish Mum of the Year competition? Not my community, again.

The show, essentially a contest in who can best conform to the worst stereotypes about Jewish women, comes hot on the heels of other Jewish-centric documentaries, including Paddy Wivell’s BBC Wonderland programme about the Orthodox community of Stamford Hill, A Hasidic Guide to Love, Marriage and Finding a Bride and the follow-up, Two Jews on a Cruise, and Strictly Kosher, ITV’s study of Manchester’s most colourful Jews.

Of course, other communities have also come in for scrutiny, from the “hilarious” nuptials of Irish Travellers to the activities of the youth of Essex, Liverpool and Newcastle. Life in a minority can be fertile ground for comedy writers, as the seven-series run of The Kumars at No. 42 shows.

When Channel Four advertised the second series of Gypsy Wedding with the tagline “Bigger. Fatter. Gypsier”, they came in for a fair amount of flack, and last week the Advertising Standards Authority ruled that it was irresponsible, offensive and reaffirmed negative stereotypes. The deputy chief executive of the charity that publishes the Travellers Times criticised the series for making the community “look totally feckless, not really to be taken seriously as an ethnic group”. “It just confirms prejudices,” said Jane Jackson.

In truth, I’m not sure taking a look at a minority group for entertainment is necessarily offensive, or in any way made with racist intent, but I do wonder what the point is.

Read the full version of this somment piece on the Independent website.

Review: Loserville

The geeks shall inherit the earth, or so the premise of Loserville goes. A cheery, primary-coloured musical with an array of catchy numbers and sci fi in-jokes, Elliot Davis and James Bourne’s (of Busted fame) production offered plenty of laughs and sent the audience home in good spirits.

The story, such as there is, is a simple “revenge of the nerd” type fantasy, set in 1971 at the dawn of the computer age. Michael Dork, the brainiac at the centre of the story, has to find a way to beat the evil corporation, see off the dumb jock, get the girl (a not-so-dumb blonde) and for good measure, maintain his friendship with wingman Lucas. The Star Wars and Star Trek jokes are laid on thick (even a non-fan like me managed to pick up the references) and there are plenty of knowing lines about the future and what technology will one day offer.

The poster campaign has centred around the fact that “if you like Glee” (or Grease, or the Big Bang Project), you’ll just adore Loserville. It’s true, to the extent that if you don’t like the sugary pop and overdone acting of McKinley High then you’ll probably run a mile from a stage version offering similar ingredients. But it’s not Glee, not even close.

Glee, for all its faults, is subversive – it undermines the high school tropes that Loserville is dealing in, so the cheerleader becomes the outcast, the jock doesn’t always get the girl but has a deeper side to him, and the nerdishness of the nerds becomes a winning characteristic. Loserville has a happy ending, but the geeks remain awkward hunchbacks with glasses, while the jock really doesn’t have a brain. If a comparison with a reason musical outing is necessary, Loserville owes much more to the Disney-fizz of High School Musical.

That said, the songs are catchy and fun, while the set is truly imaginative and gives an extra dimension to the relatively small stage at the Garrick. All in all, a fun and very laid back night out in the West End.

Loserville is at the Garrick until March 2013. Book tickets here.

Gossip Girl recap: Salon of the Dead

Serena Van der Woodsen is many things – sister; friend; brother-lover; walking blonde-joke punchline; advert for how not to wear appropriate attire, ever – but she’s not known for being malicious. Or at least, she never has been during Gossip Girl’s colourful history.

But there she was, this week, doing her best to torpedo new it-girl Lola’s burgeoning showbiz career, not to mention ruin a party hosted by her supposed BFF in the whole wide world.

And then she had the nerve to get mad at Lola, for outing the fact the La Fembot is actually Mommy Dearest (and Nate’s former bedroom buddy). And to ask Lola to keep shtum about her Gossiping ways, to avoid her reputation (Ha, as if Serena still has one of those) being tarnished forever.

The problem with Gossip Girl this season is that it has lost sight of who the characters are. Serena works best when she is inadvertently – but never intentionally – stupid and hurtful, when she is caught up in her emotions and blind to the idiocy of her behaviour.

I’d believe it (in the sense that one should never accept anything on Gossip Girl as remotely plausible) if any one of the other girls on this show had opted to wield the laptop of power and hold it hostage from the real Gossip Girl – but not Serena. Blair, Little J, Vanessa all have it in them – they’ve all had a taste of power and enjoyed it. Serena, not so much.

It’s not just Serena, though. The writers seem to have reinvented their characters this year, and while I’m all for the gang growing up (hello, these crazy kids have now reached the grand old milestone of being above the legal drinking age – major maturity!), it’s too much.

Gossip Girl needs to get back to its roots. Blair is a schemer – as an adult her schemes should be more complicated and intricate, and the consequences should be worse – but after months of her kowtowing to Prince not-so-Charming, it’s time for her to regain her place on the steps. So instead of feuding with Dan about Brooklyn’s merits, she should have conspired to have him turn up at the hottest party of the year, trussed up like the escort she wants him to be.

And Nate? It was never plausible to have him in a seat of power, but while it was all part of Grandpa Archibald’s plan, it sorta worked. But why is he still being portrayed as a media mogul? Nate is at his best when having inappropriate flings with older women, getting high while the world around him erupts into crisis or flashing his dimples to get him out of any awkward fix. He should be in a fraternity house right now, engaged in hi-jinks to steal the rival house’s pet hedgehog, or something, not playing Murdoch to La Hurley’s Rebekah.

As for Dan; I never thought I’d say this, but bring back Little J and Vanessa. At least they have identifiable personalities, and at least their hair has the decency to be fake. Without them as a buffer, and a reminder that life is gosh darn tough when you hail from the wrong side of the Brooklyn Bridge, Dan is just another suited and booted piece of arm candy. Let’s have him working as the ice cool undercover reporter he thinks he is and getting into scrapes with devious drug dealers and dastardly crime kingpins, not fawning over a girl who made his life miserable for years and still doesn’t feel bad about it. He’s no longer a rebel and he no longer has a cause – even house-trained Rufus has apparently worked out that that’s not OK.

In fact, the only character who keeps it interesting anymore is Chuck, who delivered one of the greatest lines in Gossip Girl history this week as he slammed his newfound mother for her general awfulness. If he can find a way to publicly humiliate her and seize control of her media empire, all the while wearing an awesome cravat or somesuch, I might forgive some of the crud that has passed for storylines this series.

Titanic: recap

The main problem with the Titanic mini-series is that at almost every turn you expect Leonardo DiCaprio to pop up. The film, made 15 years ago, is still too fresh and there’s the overwhelming sense that everyone involved in this project knows that. I imagine that were it not for the centenary, there’s no way this would have gone ahead.

That said, the series, created by Julian “Downton” Fellowes, is passably enjoyable. It’s got all the social mores, sneering contempt and ludicrous hats you would expect in a series set in 1912. The set, if not quite as majestic as James Cameron’s creation, is vast and impressive. The acting is fantastic, the characters interesting and, if not sympathetic, engaging.

But it’s not a triumph. For one, there are too many characters; maids who look alike, imperious women distinguishable only by accent. Perhaps that will resolve itself by episode two, when we meet the cast again and view events from another perspective, but it’s not a good omen for a series if the main characters aren’t instantly recognisable an hour in.

The biggest problem, though, is that we know this story and we know it won’t end well. We are all too familiar with “women and children only”, a flawed design of a ship and empty lifeboats sailing away because of social snobbery. We know that the men in steerage, and the crew, stand almost no chance of survival; likewise, it’s no surprise no see the violinists stoically playing on or the men taking the tragedy like gentlemen, with a stiff upper lip.

I probably will watch on, but this won’t be a memorable series and it won’t usurp Jack and Rose from their places at the helm. The dialogue is crisp, the relationships intriguing, but in the end, this is a story we don’t need to watch unfold on screen again – at least, not without a radically different approach. And this doesn’t give it one.

Gossip Girl’s Pacey and Joey moment

Watching this week’s installment of Gossip Girl (which was so bland that it didn’t warrant a recap), I was struck by how the Blair Dan love drama is reminiscent of another wildly popular and controversial teen soap.

I’m talking, of course, of Dawson’s Creek. Now on the face it, the exploits of the Capeside crew have little in common with those of the glamorous Upper East Siders we so dearly love to Gossip about.

The former were unfashionable, the high school pecking order’s outsiders. They were poor – not in the “I live in Brooklyn” mould of Dan and Jenni, but poor enough to have to waitress and put themselves through college.

They talked in long, luxurious sentences with the vocabulary of the Bard, and their dramas were invariably internal rather than the results of some convoluted plot or scheme.

And yet. When Dawson’s Creek began, the clear premise was that this was a love story about the boy and girl next door. The clue was in the title, this was about Dawson and Joey, about the obstacles they would face – but ultimately surmount – in their quest for happily ever after.

Yet from early on it was clear that the verbal sparring between Pacey – the intended “supporting actor” character – and Joey, was no match for her rapport with Dawson.

When they sailed off into the sunset a few series later, theirs was the romance we were rooting for.

I’m not sure if we’re yet at the cheerleading stage of Blair and Dan, but looking at it now, Dan’s relationship with Serena seems like the prologue.

Blair has always been the more engaging of the two girls, particularly in her days of scheming on the Met steps against the presumptuous Little J – but Serena’s character has barely developed from the flighty, whiny blonde we met at Grand Central. Her romances are fleeting and repetitive, whereas Blair’s are all great loves, marked by tragedy and anguish.

Perhaps that was what the Gossip Girl team was gunning for all along; the other happily ever after, the one you wouldn’t have predicted in the first place. I doubt it, just as I doubt that Pacey and Joey were anything other than a product of the writers seeing good screen chemistry that fans responded to.

But, as Gossip Girl moves to the twilight days of its fifth series (the point when Dawson’s Creek, too, was obviously doomed) it’s interesting to note just how pointless the majority of the supporting cast have become and how vapid the other plot threads are.

Where are the women in The Ides of March? (The Telegraph)

Forget the polls. Forget what the pundits think and what the ordinary Joes interviewed on the street have to say. The best barometer of how we view politics and what state politics is in surely comes from fiction, from the bumbling leaders of Yes, Minister to the spin-doctored puppets of The Thick of It.

Nowhere is that more true than with regard to American presidential politics. When Americans have faith in their commander-in-chief – or wish for a leader different to the one they have – contemporary fictional leaders have Abraham Lincoln’s ability to unite a divided nation, Dwight Eisenhower’s physical valour, Franklin Roosevelt’s ability to enact change and John F Kennedy’s glamour. Think Harrison Ford as the action-hero president in Air Force One (1997), Michael Douglas’s Andrew Shepherd striking a blow for liberty in The American President (1995) or Grant Matthews in Frank Capra’ss hope-imbued State of the Union (1948).

Likewise, times of low public faith in politics are often accompanied by films where power and the pursuit of it is shown as dirty, dank and Nixonesque. That’s no new thing; as the Great Depression got underway a film called Gabriel Over the White House (1933) was made, featuring a vacuous, do-nothing president in Herbert Hoover’s mould.

The Ides of March, George Clooney’s drama about political aspirations gone awry, reflects a profoundly dismal approach to politics at a time when Barack Obama’s popularity is at a new low. The film, set during the Democratic Party primaries (and based on a play that was itself supposedly based on Howard Dean’s shortlived run) takes a Hobbesian view of the state of politics; everyone is a dealmaker, everyone will ultimately act against their beliefs and nothing is sacred.

The subtext is that no politician – and, in this adaptation, for politician, read Barack Obama, with “Yes We Can” style posters and all – can ever be the ideal he purports to be. It’s a film about how the audacity of hope will always let you down.

But as dispiriting as that message was, also noticeable was the lack of a single credible female political figure. The sum total of female characters stood at three; the intern, the journalist, and the First-Lady-in-waiting (a Laura, not a Hillary or even a Michelle).

This was a film filled with backroom deals, high-stakes conversations and political chess games and yet the women were eternally on the periphery. Involved, yes. But not the ones leading the country, or trying to.

This comment piece was first published in the Telegraph. Read the rest of it here

We need more people to say no to Rihanna’s video

It has the making of a great comedy. A global celebrity arrives on a rural farm to film her latest music video, but her choice of attire (namely, a fancy red bra, and then apparently no bra at all) is too much for his countrified, prudish sensibilities. So he kicks her, and her glamorous associates, off his field.

In the film version, the pop star would return and convince the small-minded country folk that her modern city ways are no cause for controversy. Ultimately, he’d come round and probably even make a cameo appearance in the video.

In reality, it didn’t end that way. When Alan Graham, 61, of Clandeboye in Northern Ireland, saw just how risqué Rihanna’s video shout was, he asked her to pack up her things. Reports the Telegraph:

“If someone wants to borrow my field and things become inappropriate, then I say, ‘Enough is enough. I wish no ill will against Rihanna and her friends. Perhaps they could acquaint themselves with a greater G-d.”

Here’s the thing. Mr Graham should not be painted as the villain of this piece. He might have said no for religious reasons, but that’s beside the point.

Precisely what is it about Rihanna’s lyrics – or Beyonce’s, or Katy Perry’s or any other female pop star de jour – that requires them to be sung without clothes on?

I’m no prude – a bikini is fine on the beach or by a pool – but I’m also not of the school that this represents any kind of female empowerment. And I can’t imagine the video director or her record company are thinking “down with sexism” when they encourage her to make these videos.

When did we get to the stage that a video like this was acceptable from a mainstream artist?

Rihanna has fans all over the world, and plenty of them are young girls (and indeed young boys, being taught that this is what women should look like and how they should behave). What’s her message? That her music isn’t good enough on its own, so she needs to cavort-around half naked to make up for it?

Or that she’s so multi-talented she can sing, dance and act like a pole dancer?

Telling young girls that it’s OK – desirable, even – to sell your talent with your body? Not exactly a Suffragette hunger strike, now.

My teachers always said everything men could do, women could do too. But I don’t think they meant taking our shirts off in public.