Once I'm with the wizard / My whole life will change / 'Cuz once you're with the wizard / No one thinks you're strange ... and all of Oz has to love you / When by the wizard, you're acclaimed / and this gift - or this curse - I have inside / Maybe at last, I'll know why / When we are hand in hand - The wizard and I! / And one day, he'll say to me: Elphaba, a girl who is so superior / Shouldn't a girl who's so good inside / Have a matching exterior? / And since folks here to an absurd degree / Seem fixated on your verdigris / Wouldn't it be alright by you / If I de-greenify you? / And though of course / That's not important to me / "All right, why not?" I'll reply / Oh what a pair we will be / The wizard and I...
— from the musical Wicked, lyrics by Stephen Schwartz
It can be difficult, being an unattractive woman in a world obsessed with female beauty. Or being ambiguously attractive. In our mainstream culture, it's pretty much the same thing.
Once upon a time, not so very long ago, at a record store far from the mall, where I work as a retail serf, a senior manager enthusiastically stopped the CD carousel to put on Janis Ian's live album. Declaring it "the best plain-girl song," he started playing her early hit "At Seventeen." He then proceeded to discuss the lyrics with me, clearly not aware I was in practiced denial that I should have any special insight into the subject. Not into following links? The song is about a young woman's disappointment with her physical appearance. Having lost the expectation of someone else's desire, she learns to entertain herself with her imagination while the pretty girls are out on dates. I nodded as he cited his favourite lines and I allowed the subject to drop as nonchalantly as possible. Clearly someone in her (early!) thirties should already have come to terms with her plain-girl reality. He is right to expect that I would have, just as he expected that I could relate. I did, and it hurt to be reminded.
The Janis Ian incident set off a maelstrom of internalization, followed by reflection on my troubled history with the mirror. And cameras. And reflective surfaces in general. There are times, peaceful stretches of months even, when I am completely at ease with my looks. The self-consciousness drops, the envy subsides. Then there is the rest of the time. The Fugly Time. This time around, it took me weeks to regain my equilibrium. In the wake of my self-fuglellation, there is the lingering dismay that I can become so preoccupied over something so clearly superficial. Can I plead poor programming? As I entered adolescence, I was taught at home to be vigilantly preoccupied with other people's perceptions of me, most particularly regarding physical appearance. I had other teachers; besides the ever-present television, I brought some guides back home with me.
Throughout my teens, I read too many girl/women's magazines. I bought too many; I read them all. I remember one teen-oriented magazine encouraged readers to send in a photo of only their best feature, thus teaching girls in media-glutted countries around the world to itemize their beauty and compare their own features part by part. This particular approach was unusual in that it at least directed us to fixate on the features about which we felt most confident, assuming there were any. Normally, women's magazines operate from a premise that we must loathe ourselves in general. In any case, we learn to minimize the problem areas of our bodies with the products advertised by those very same glossy manuals which had first instructed us into our insecurities. By the time Naomi Wolf's The Beauty Myth passed into my hands, the damage was already done. I had become thoroughly convinced of my fugliness. Witness, my facile facial inferiority complex! (Just don't look at me.) The occasional compliment that contradicted this self-condemnation would be quickly forgotten or discredited. Worse, it became impossible to escape the freakishly beautiful magazine ladies who I willingly invited into my home before I knew better. They began to proliferate on huge billboards around the city, as well as bus shelters, subway ads and all those persistent TV commercials. (Studies show that women who watch less television feel better about themselves. Other studies claim less attractive people are less successful at getting hired and make less money when they are. Maybe it's better if they can't afford cable.)
There is also an established popular social narrative that links beauty with moral superiority and trustworthiness, while positing that outer ugliness reflects inner ugliness. As Glinda, Witch of the West, informs Dorothy, once she's done giggling, "Only bad witches are ugly." This maxim originated from the studios of MGM, circa 1939. L. Frank Baum, the author of the original The Wizard of Oz series, "portrayed the Wicked Witch of the West as a coward, in keeping with his other villains whose evil derives from weakness of character, rather than the icon of evil she appears in the film." Obviously, that and other subtleties were lost on the majority of us who only know that most famous of movie adaptations. (Also significant is that Baum and his illustrator W.W. Denslow wanted to impart the lesson that "everyone possesses the resources they need if only they had self-confidence." (I'm circling around to that, sorta...)
I was reared on many other children's fantasy movies with similar messages. They were typically populated with princesses who require a prince to rescue them, require rescue from some witchy bitch who resents their beauty and grace, and, with the divine intervention of a fairy godmother, their trials and tribulations are rewarded with inclusion or ascension in the royal ranks by virtue of marriage. Some message of personal validation. (In tandem, my mom recently urged me to find and marry a rich man, as she has times before. Love is secondary to the plot she envisions me starring in, but the leading man should look like Justin Trudeau. My mom adores Justin Trudeau. She used to send me letters telling me to send Justin letters. She doesn't know I'm not interested in men who are prettier than me. If you don't live in Canada or remember his dad Pierre, arguably one of this country's greatest past leaders, Justin is regarded by the media as the Crown Prince of Canada. As if our constitutional relationship to the British monarchy isn't lame enough.) For the purposes of this blog, I've been fast-forwarding through fewer commercials lately and I can attest that those fairytale values and desires are still being fed to us as adult women, mothers notwithstanding. We unwittingly binge and purge on a succession of trendy diet plans. Who do you think made the adult fairytale "Pretty Woman" a box-office success? Highest-grossing film among romantic comedies? Not so much the men, despite Julia Roberts' short skirts and those thigh-high, black-vinyl fuck-me boots. At sixteen, I envied Julia's character for her effervescent charm and only slightly off-kilter beauty — but simultaneously found myself disgusted at the movie's shallowly illustrated Cinderella premise.
In the aftermath of my disappointing adolescent transformation from an adorable, pretty little girl to... uhm ... I used to wish against reason that my own personal fairy godmother would show the hell up and externalize my inner princess. "Make me beautiful, and before you leave, could you perform a universal mind sweep so that everyone who ever saw me will forget what I used to look like? Please?" For extra headgaminess, and because the moral duality of fables is a given, I would wonder, "If I were offered the choice between great beauty and great intelligence, would I have the strength of virtue to make the right choice?" Today I would, but the opportunity would still give me pause and I would still secretly hope that I'd get both as reward for choosing the one correctly. Disney would let me.
Later in life, I still kinda sorta hoped that my prince would come and, if not make me beautiful by some prescribed action — the magic kiss, a dramatic declaration of love, the grand gesture, whatever — at least convince me that I was beautiful enough. For the most part, I've since come to accept that there are advantages to being physically imperfect. I once knew a girl who made the ugly-duckling-to-swan transformation and became a megalomaniac in a disastrous way; disastrous for her and the men who became the focus of her subsequent obsessions. Lawsuits followed. They do not follow me, any more than those modeling contracts most young women fantasize about. I wonder how much differently my character would have developed if things — jobs, men, prizes — came to me too easily. Another advantage is that I appear to be easily approachable, as evidenced by all the people asking me for directions on the street. I appreciate that I don't intimidate people and may even attract conversational approaches from differently-attractive men and women. By extension, other women "don't hate me because I'm beautiful." Nor do I need to worry that any man has me on his arm as a mere trophy, all shiny surfaces and empty interior. I was also thankfully never harassed by any of the closet creeps who seem to be employed at every school in the continent, except maybe that one shop teacher who was an equal-opportunity neck breather.
There are also obvious disadvantages outside of the job search stats. While beautiful women attract their share of beauty-fixated jerks, we, the less physically intimidating, are also likely to attract men with their own appearance-related neuroses. Here, I'll draw upon the more disappointing dates in my history. There's the man who resents beautiful women for all those perceived slights experienced in and outside the bar. (What a compliment that you chose me.) There's the older divorcé who prefers less attractive women in the next lower age bracket because we are presumably more grateful for the attention and — bonus! — he can play the sophisticated, mature lover. There are the self-admittedly desperate single men in their thirties who, having admitted they are desperate, wonder in acrimony why we (gently) decline their requests for a date. (Hey, backhanded compliments are not helpful. Informing us that you have a "white knight complex" may impress some and be heralded as a warning sign to others, which is helpful.) Notice the power shifts in these scenarios. Presumably, women have the control on the basis of our prerogative to reward or rebuke these advances, but the expectation of longing fulfilled remains on the male side of the equation. In this prevalent scenario, sufficiently attractive women are treated as objects of desire, rather than partner-worthy subjects. Unless, that is, the subjects are two gorgeous actors showing us how people are supposed to look during those special scenes that warrant the movie's adult rating, performed in carefully choreographed poses. Which is ridiculous, of course. As Margaret Cho says, "I like to get ugly when I fuck." The day I overheard another male manager opine that women who aren't beautiful can still be sexy — it's attitude, baby — was like a revelation. The day I realized he was giving disproportionately more shifts to a cute female coworker whom he had been having dreams, dreams about them sharing adult situations as enforced by their alien abductors... that was illuminating in other ways.
In the interest of refuting moral superiority, I admit I am occasionally stricken from the ability to form sentences when extremely attractive men patronize the store I work in. There's a reason why "stunning" is a synonym for "beauty." Yet I can counter that, for myself, I am often physically attracted to men who are not conventionally handsome — they can render my loss of vocabulary as well. What I look for is in their eyes; not the colour, but that current of thought and curiosity about the world around them. (Confidence is sexy too but easily confused with arrogance.) Can I not expect from men an equal return in desire for unconventional beauty and unique characteristics? Indeterminable, for even some of the smartest men I know still express, nay, prioritize, a preference for The Pretty. If not, they may face peer pressure to reach for the trophy. A male roommate recently told me that his friends had expressed which of his past girlfriends they liked best, and the criteria turned out to be based solely on physical appearance. If you believe biology is destiny, this might not be so surprising; supposedly men are typically attracted to female beauty as it suggests reproductive health, whereas women are typically attracted to men of certain social stature to provide greater stability and opportunity for their offspring. I think resorting entirely to the theoretical biological imperative is a cop-out, but that deserves a separate blog diatribe.
With respect to the growing ranks of self-conscious men, it is a true phenomenon and not surprising given that they are being increasingly targeted as a market for grooming products. This is not an equal comparison — yet! — because male actors who are portlier and less GQ handsome (recent example: Jack Black) now play leading parts in heavily-bankrolled movies and popular TV series. Meanwhile, the female actors who play the parts of the plain sister, friend, or any other modest supporting role — cast so as not to overshadow the lead female — are actually quite beautiful but linger ever so slightly outside the narrowest of parameters. Women widely acknowledged as exceptionally beautiful are even cast to play less comely characters by way of prosthetic noses, chins, uni-brows, and braces. America Ferrera, who plays "Ugly Betty," is vivacious and beautiful, if fuller figured than a model, but she is done up in fugly face. Two men who have acted in prosthetic noses, and who come readily to mind for playing variants of the Cyrano de Bergerac character, are more disputably attractive and yet have played leading roles in romantic comedies. Neither Steve Martin or Gerard Depardieu are exemplary examples of male beauty, but it is entirely conceivable that such humanly-visaged male actors will soon break out of the rom-com ghetto and play leading roles in more serious romantic dramas. Or, if you're Mr. Martin, you can write your own role, produce your own movie, and cast your own damn self.
There's a further beauty hypocrisy, affecting both sexes actually, whereby idiosyncrasies like extreme shyness are adorable when the character is beautiful. When she is not so physically attractive, her shyness and other neuroses make her pitiful; you can sometimes see her being saved by the beautiful lead character. Yet imagine "Amelie" played by an average looking woman rather than Audrey Tatou, who in this role closely approximates the gamine look popularized by Audrey Hepburn. In Hollywood idealism, no one less sympathetically beautiful could have played the scion of Jesus either. On the male axis, this is similar but not as pronounced as the character of Declan on Mysterious Ways, whose increased social ineptitude and occasional moments of sheer dorkiness during a short story arc that gave him a clear love interest would not have been so charming if the character weren't gorgeously portrayed by current Heroes star Adrian Pasdar. But for myself, I find the same actor so much less attractive — not even — in his new role as the clean-shaven, slick-haired and arrogant politician. Attitude strikes out!
Here, it gets more complicated. It often happens that any woman who puts herself out there in the public eye will be dismissed if she is not universally attractive. If she is intelligent, accomplished, immensely talented, or any combination thereof, it will not matter to the masses if she is not also a hottie. By that same token, all anyone has to do to dismiss her is critique her lack of beauty. Even if you are relatively attractive, the very first resort of the loudmouth louts who want to hurt you or put you in your place is to call you ugly. (Second choice is 'fat' so long as the target isn't irreproachably thin.) This also works by proxy. Think of how the women around Bill Clinton were attacked during his presidency based on their physical appearance: Monica, to great glee, for the great crime of not being Marilyn; young Chelsey, whose potential ugly-duckling transformation was loudly speculated on by the lower participants of the media who had availed themselves of photo imaging software; and, more recently, Hillary. Except now, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton has become significantly more powerful than First Lady in recent years, and thus has earned her place as a primary target. Incidentally, a "left-leaning" Fox news anchor referred to Nancy Pelosi as the Wicked Witch of the West within a day of her being appointed House Speaker. George Bush may have publicly approved of this landmark for women in U.S. government, but pay more attention to the men behind the curtain. Meanwhile, here in Canada, our female politicians are bitches, not witches. The House of Commons is a castle with a very muddy moat, only visible on one side as a deceptively clean-looking river, and there are no knights in Ottawa laying hankies down in their path. Not even the mounted ones.
Conversely, beauty is also sometimes perceived as a detrimental quality. Beautiful women are routinely attacked on the basis of their intelligence, presumably lower. (The sharks must be frustrated that their natural first resort of ugly-taunting is too hard to support.) Naomi Wolf was accused of being a hypocrite by some critics because she is, in fact, quite conventionally beautiful and probably looks wonderful in any lighting scenario. I'm sure if she were not, she'd have been equally criticized for writing her analysis of the manufactured culture and commodification of beauty out of mere bitter envy. See how it works? If you're a woman, more often than not, you will be automatically disqualified from the ranks of the respectable no matter what you look like, but precisely because of what you look like. Worse, women are conditioned to turn on each other, like many of Wolf's critics did on her, based on the above criteria. This effect is a natural by-product of the crazy and crazifying culture in which we have come of age.
Days after the Janis Ian incident, I realized what I needed was a re-screening of the sequel to Shrek. (In my DVD library, it is transitionally sandwiched between Monty Python's Quest for the Holy Grail and the Princess Bride.) Watching a 90-minute cartoon may not seem like the choice of a (semi-)rational adult woman. Just consider the possibility that the Shrek movies, which are loosely based on William Steig's storybook for children, are wonderful, cleverly-written responses to the whole pop culture fantasy we sometimes mistake for reality. They definitely provide a creative counter-potion to those ubiquitous animated fables and princess primers which had earlier insinuated unrealistic expectations in our minds before we were old enough to develop the power of reason.
In the first movie, the big-hearted but outwardly gruff ogre — Shrek! — rescues a damsel in distress — Fiona! — who turns out to be much more resourceful and strong-willed than that daft ninny Snow White. Her fairy-tale curse is that at night she transforms from a slim, beautiful woman worthy of a contract with L'Oreal into a chubby green ogress who doubts even an ogre could love her. In the end, she chooses to remain green like her one true love who accepts and loves her as she is. The second movie picks up on their honeymoon, where they enjoy all kinds of ogrely activities not mediated by the crass commercialism, pretensions to social class and demands of perfection found in Fiona's home kingdom. However, their honeymoon is quickly followed by a royal summons: Fiona must bring her new husband home to meet the parents and attend a ball in celebration of their matrimony. Fiona's curse was supposed to be 'cured' by the kiss of Prince Charming who, having come too late to rescue her, is royally pissed to find out that his betrothed is away on her honeymoon. Fiona's parents, King and Queen of Far Far Away, are also initially disappointed when their precious daughter turns up as a full-time ogress on the arm of an uncouth, green monster. Also, despite her beauty and power, Fiona's fairy godmother turns out to be a bad witch. She even arrives in a bubble like Glinda's. (I also note the Sir Justin poster in Fiona's old bedroom. Her mom probably put it there.) The rest of the movie is a fun but wise send-up of the social pressures to conformity, aspirations of fairy-tale perfection, and the manipulations we can fall prey to when we doubt our own worth. Ultimately, Fiona is presented with the choice of remaining in her previously perfect daytime body, in tow with a Shrek done spell-rendered a gorgeous human stud muffin, or returning to the forms they had before Fiona's family reunion. This palatial upgrade is a result of Shrek's resourcefulness in finding a solution, however temporary and misguided, to the problem he's been convinced he created. He does this entirely for his true love's benefit and, after a brief floundering about in hopelessness, he does this despite being made to question his own qualities and his place in a princess's life. Fiona may keep all that she was groomed to expect and desire out of life, yet she opts out. She reforms as a green ogress along with her ogre husband, content in their swamp cottage far from the graces of castle life. This is naturally the correct choice; however, she does not get the bonus reward of fairy-tale beauty. She merely gets to be herself.
Now I remember, I am waiting not for my prince, but my ogre. (Sorry Mom, the dream died last year when Sir Justin married a telegenic media princess from his own social tier. The magazines say that they are very happy together and that the charming princess has healed the fractures within the royal family.) Eventually I might even realize that I don't need anyone to show up at all in order to embrace my inner Fiona. As fellow green girl Elphaba sings, if you're flying solo at least you're flying free. Of course, that's the part in the story when the witch hunt begins.
This challenge to be green could be easier if I didn't live so close to the centre of commerce — the Estate of Here And Now — where pretty princesses are prancing about in their designer jeans while painted in expensive makeup that doesn't crease. Counterwise, living in the city means I'm a ten minute walk from several independently-owned bookstores where I can pick up a worn, used copy of Wolf's Beauty Myth for a much-needed refresher.
I haven't forgotten Janis Ian. She is a terrific lyricist, with songs that are sharp and witty. But before I walk out the door, it's the Sam Phillips song Same Changes that I play for a preemptive reality check. I sing along karaoke-like and then I feel much, much better. Whatever I look like or whatever other people see, I feel green.
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