Respectful flick of the hair

A brief appreciation of Farrah Fawcett.

Sadly, Farrah Fawcett did not survive her battle with cancer and died today at only age 62. FF was a bit of a role model for my generation of 70's teens who were glued to Charlie's Angels in lieu of any other action women. I didn't particularly identify with FF, but rather with Kate Jackson, another 'Angel', because I considered her as the 'intelligent' one. Although, I'm not sure how much I could have identified with any one of these groomed models of womanhood as in reality I was more than merely under-lipglossed but worlds away from their glamour. However, I did have longish hair which I could style in an approximation of Farrah's famous flicks even in that hair-product challenged decade. Not being blond, my efforts were probably unnoticed by anyone else.

Feminists somewhere have likely deconstructed the whole 70's Angels phenomenon and come to interesting conclusions, but I'll tease out some of my impressions here. The main point for me is that despite Charlie giving them their instructions at the beginning of each episode, we were never exposed to him. As a teen, I was alert to his, to my ears, aged voice, so tended to dismiss him as a plot device and a character without any authority. This was important as that meant the messages I absorbed were that the women got to have all the excitement and the action while the old chap was hidden away thus not terribly interesting. And it was this which drew me to the programme, as it appeared to be aimed at promoting intelligent capable women who had terrific adventures, and this stood out against run of the mill programmes where the women were the plot device and always had to be 'saved from their own stupidity' eg successive 'companions' in Dr Who in those days. (Excuse me while I vent a little scream at the memory)!

Later I realised that Charlie was voiced by Blake Carrington (John Forsythe), who was clearly ancient to my eyes. I imagine that in another 20 years I'll think of him as a handsome bloke! I suppose I've also chosen to air-brush the creepy Bosley out of my memory of it too.

Off hand I can't think of another major long running TV series which showed women working as a team and demonstrating a competent level of resourcefulness and agency on their own behalf. So perhaps, it can be counted as relatively feminist, particularly if we choose to ignore the never a hair out of place immaculately costumed takes an entire backroom team of hair, makeup and lighting to actually look like that. Not forgetting that in the first place all the Angels were gifted with conventional good looks!

While looking for info on Charlie's Angels and FF, I noticed that in nearly all the photographs from that Angel-era the women were dressed, even shrouded, in layers of clothes in some instances. In comparison, the photographs of the later Angel's films the actors were pretty much bikini-clad and posed exclusively for the male gaze. Things are not only not getting better, they are getting worse in terms of role models for young women, but that is a rant for another time. For now, goodbye Farrah, thank you for your work.