Reading Response 1-Star Type and the Independent Women

In the Dyer reading for this week, he discusses how stars play a 'type' in their films and how that type fits into their real life persona. Stardom, according to Dyer, is a version of the American dream and the ideal image of the star is an ordinary person who has achieved wealth and success, but who still retains their ordinariness. During the period of the studio system, stars were used for specific parts in film. There was little variation in the characters they played as audiences expected specific things from specific films with their favorite stars. For example, Marilyn Monroe was expected to be the pin-up and John Wayne, the all-American, the "good Joe". Within each film, there were characters who represented all of the types of people in society.

One such type is that of the independent woman. This is a type not very common, but it did still exist in limited ways. According to Dyer, there were two types of the independent woman in films. Joan Crawford's character in Mildred Pierce would fit under the "superwoman" type. This is a character who relies on her own intelligence and free will to carve out her own path in life and be successful on her own. This is most certainly seen in the film which portrays a woman who seeks out divorce from her husband and continues to work hard in order to create a better life for her and her children. While most women in films from this era are merely passive beings who's existence is based purely on taking care of the home and looking beautiful, Crawford's Mildred is active and independent. She knows what she wants and she does what she has to do in order to achieve this.

However, a problem with this notion of the independent woman, is that even in its definition, it is still based on a woman being compared to a man. Dyer's description of this type is a female character 'adopting male characteristics'. So how is a woman truly independent if all she is going is becoming more like a man in order to get by? Women are allowed to be independent, but they are still expected to fulfill their 'womanly duties' such as keeping a home and rearing their children. This is evident in the film as Mildred, while incredibly successful, is still always under careful watch from the men in her life and still expected to fulfill certain duties. Her ex-husband is always around and her benefactor who becomes her lover is always around keeping tabs on her, making sure she is doing her job. Furthermore, Mildred's daughter Vida resents her mother for working. Vida wants a rich lifestyle, but she is ashamed that her mother is the one making that happen. Finally, as noted in the reading, Mildred is still always responsible for what happens in her home, including the death of her youngest child who became ill while under her father's care. Mildred is shown as being a wonderful mother, but she is still given the blame when bad things happen to her children. Mildred is put in a position where she is supporting her family by running her own business but she is still allowing the men around her to control her (her ex-husband always coming around to judge her parenting, Wally Fay negotiating her business deals, and Monte who takes her money and uses it to spoil her daughter) . Mildred may be an 'independent woman' but her independence comes at a cost, with her losing one daughter and losing control of the other who she has devoted her life to.

Dyer also discusses how the star's image and 'type' is constructed out of various media texts. Promotion of the star is key as that is the most direct way people learn about a star's type. In Crawford's case, she was promoted as an independent woman who is a mother willing to do anything for her kids. This of course was not only true of her character's in film, but of her personal life as well. Publicity factors into a star's image as it is the kind of information the press finds out. It is how we as audiences find out about a star's personal life, what a film studio may not necessarily want us to see as it can either reinforce or completely reverse an image of a star we already know and are quite familiar with. In Crawford's case, she maintained the image of the perfect mother, struggling to make ends meet to support her children. In reality, Crawford was the complete opposite of the type that she played. As depicted in a book written by her daughter, Crawford was quite a monster of a mother but when the press was around, she acted out her type by appearing to be a devoted mother. This is all depicted in the film Mommy Dearest (Perry, 1981) which features the infamous line, "no more wire hangers!" So while star images were carefully constucted and played out, not everything was as perfect as it seemed.

Questions for the class:
1. How might the story in Mildred Pierce be changed so that Mildred would truly be an independent woman? How would that have gone over with audiences?
2. Why must a woman take on male characteristics in order to be taken seriously? Was this merely a product of the times or is it still true today?
3. Knowing what we know now about Crawford's mothering abilities, does this change your opinion of the film? If audiences knew this at the height of her stardom playing the type of the mother, would they still have gone to see her films or would their outside opinion of her prevented her from being such a huge star?