S01.E02: Gloria

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Quote

While Phyllis mobilizes grassroots support in her fight against the ERA, Gloria Steinem fends off Bella Abzug's attempts to drag her further into the political game. Written by Dahvi Waller; directed by Anna Boden & Ryan Fleck.

Original air date: 4/15/20

[tennisgurl]

Gloria has such strong sunglasses game, time to dig mine out from the back of my closet! 

I guess a way to a mans heart really is through his stomach. Or through a political grudge that has nothing to do with it more like. Looks like Phyllis's sister in law is still salty about all that "they're all just bitter losers with no husbands or children, because anyone without those is a pathetic dried out husk!" cracks from the last episode. 

[MadLove]

Who thought that god awful wig Rose Byrne is wearing was a good idea? 🙄

[Penman61]

The more I watch and mull, the more I think most of the leads are fatally miscast (to the extent we care about accuracy):

Shirley Chisholm: IRL was all angles and rectitude and rhetorical precision, whereas Udo Azuba's essence is overflowing, supra-verbal, outside-the-lines excess.

Phyllis Schlafly: IRL cultivated a pinched, delicate, grandmotherly/auntly persona, whereas Cate Blanchett's essence is languidly, richly otherworld and sensual.

Gloria Steinem: IRL her voice was low-pitched, surprisingly quiet (as her reputation preceded her), authoritative, and her body language was still; Rose Byrne is playing her as...something other than that. I blame the wig.

YMMV.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Pros for this episode: less Phyllis and more Gloria/Bella/anyone who isn't Phyllis

Cons: still too much Phyllis (I kid mostly - I know they have to show what she's up to so we understand what the other side is up against but that doesn't make it any more pleasant to watch her)

I loved when she was questioned by both Donahue and one of the ERA women about the "facts" she stated on the show. Of course those weren't facts. Phyllis felt so justified in her goal that she was just making shit up that would support her arguments. I remember I hated when we studied all the different kinds of fallacies used in argumentative papers but obviously it's important for people to understand how writers/speakers use them to distract from the absolute lack of FACTS and DATA they are presenting in their arguments.

I would love to see more about the early days of Ms. It can be easy for people like Gloria to get caught up in the details of running a new magazine so that moment with the woman on the street was a good reminder as to why what she was doing was important. 

[Commando Cody]

I found the Gloria characterization to be kind of ridiculous.  I actually thought a secondary character in the pilot looked more like Gloria = I thought she was going to be Gloria - than whoever is playing her.  The hair and sunglasses looks really stupid.  Just my opinion, obviously, but the way they have written her is underwhelming and it is giving me the impression that Gloria Steinem was entirely over rated.  The actress is not giving a good performance.  

[IndyMischa]

11 hours ago, Commando Cody said:

I found the Gloria characterization to be kind of ridiculous.  I actually thought a secondary character in the pilot looked more like Gloria = I thought she was going to be Gloria - than whoever is playing her.  The hair and sunglasses looks really stupid.  Just my opinion, obviously, but the way they have written her is underwhelming and it is giving me the impression that Gloria Steinem was entirely over rated.  The actress is not giving a good performance.  

I'm not into the ironed hair w/aviators look either, but it's accurate. This is a Google image search on just her name, with no qualifiers... 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

She's a Dynamo

 

[marinw]

I liked how even Schlafly's posse was forced to admit that Hair had some great music.

[Snewtsie]

On 4/20/2020 at 2:44 AM, MadLove said:

Who thought that god awful wig Rose Byrne is wearing was a good idea? 🙄

I find that wig very distracting, and what a shame- right? I am enjoying this series so much, but then comes Rose/Gloria wearing that damn wig and it takes me out of the moment.  I really wish they perfected that better.

[AllyB]

This feels very unfair to Rose Byrne but my biggest issue with her isn't her wig. It's her accent. Under other circumstances it would be absolutely fine but it's a bit of a problem for me because when she talks, an awful lot of the time, I'm hearing Serena Waterford. I wonder if she has the same dialect coach as Yvonne Strahovski or if it's just something similar in the speech patterns of an Australian woman doing an American accent. Whatever it is, it's a bit jarring because she's literally playing a woman on the opposite side of the debate as the real life Serena Joy.