The rich also make bad TV

Verónica Castro by deissertv via
Wikimedia Commons. CC BY-SA 3.0 Unported

Tonight, in a desperate search for something, anything that would hold my interest longer than a nanosecond, I stumbled across the Mexican TV series, The House of Flowers (La Casa de las Flores) on Netflix.

Ay, Dios mío. This show will not be that thing--but I will watch a few episodes to be sure.

This is one of at least three Netflix programs made in Mexico. (There are also a couple being made in Argentina.) Believe you me, I'm glad to see some TV programs from Mexico, Argentina, and other Latin American countries, especially ones that move beyond the Cinderella storyline. You know what I mean: María meets Juan Pablo, María loses Juan Pablo, María wins Juan Pablo.

But, chavos y chavas, this just seems like bad, dumb, and dubbed (¡Que barbaridad!) Almodóvar.

A case in point--Bienvenidos al big ridiculous plot hole! The de la Mora family consists of fabulously wealthy florists. The only son Julián is screwing/in love (?) with both Lucía and Diego, but he can't come out of the closet. Meanwhile, Julián's dad Ernesto has been having a 20-year affair with Roberta, who owns a drag cabaret--and my money's on the eventual reveal that Roberta will turn out to be Roberto--that features some of the dodgiest quality female impersonators I've seen in the Mexican context (and I've seen my share). The family loves gay Diego (he's their gorgeous accountant and confidante), everyone despises Lucía, and Paulina's ex-husband is transgender. Julian is "artistic" (a design student) and does his mother's hair from time to time. AND HIS MOTHER IS PLAYED BY VERÓNICA CASTRO.

This last point makes more sense if you've been watching Mexican TV off and on since 1989, as I have. All hail the woman who starred in a telenovela called Los ricos también lloran (The Rich Also Cry, which seems like the quintessential telenovela title) and prominently featured the half-gay duo Erasure as guests on one of her mid-´90s talk shows, likely way before many did.

If you can't come out under those circumstances, Julián, then perhaps it was never meant to be.

So far the show has had its moments, such as any scene with Paulina (played by the fabulous Cecilia Suárez), a quick shot of Julián's bare butt (played by the bare butt of Dario Yazbek Bernal), interactions with the housekeeper Delia (played by Norma Angélica), the set design, the cinematography, the fact that it's always sunny in México City, and, claro, Verónica Castro.

But sometimes its plot points are puzzling--for example, why does Roberta commit suicide (not a spoiler--it happens early in the first episode)? Is there a reason why she would leave behind her daughter, son, and lover? She doesn't seem particularly unhappy or depressed, at least so far. Rather, the suicide just seems like a cheap trick upon which to begin and build the story.

And I'm not comforted by the fact that La Vero leaves at the end of season 1--and they're already filming season 3. That's a long haul of over-the-topness without la reina del over-the-topness.

Nevertheless, I will persevere, perhaps alternating between La Casa and Ingobernable, a political thriller starring alleged El Chapo amiga, Kate del Castillo.

It's this or Days of Our Lives and 7de Laan, and, híjole, I just don't have it in me at the moment for straight (so to speak) plot and limited self-aware humor. 

* * *

Update, 15 March 2019

So I watched episodes 3 and 4 last night and thought better of the show. I don't get why Julián is such a mess, but that's likely the American in me. On to episode 5, 6, 7, ....

And scene ...!

This is how I envision the TV show Roseanne will conclude now that its star and namesake has been fired for ugly, racist tweets that show an embarrassingly poor sense of timing and a shockingly limp sense of humor for someone who earns a living as a comedian.

It's a fine, unassuming spring day in Lanford, Illinois. The camera focuses on a small, comfortable, working-class home--the kind we all identify as emblematic of the Real America.^TM The camera deftly and calmly pans, slowly and surely honing in on the living room window, and then passes through to the living room itself. 

(Author's note: I haven't watched the reboot--honestly, I didn't like the original version. Too much yelling. Too much snark. Too much sniping. But I could've sworn Roseanne's family won the lottery at some point. You would think they would have upgraded their digs as a result. And no worries about educating me otherwise--once this post is complete, I will be fresh out of flying figs to give about this show and its star.)

In the living room, we find all the Conners sitting quietly in their appointed places. Each one is bound and gagged, as they are being held hostage at home by "those animals," aka notorious gang MS-33-1/3. The gang members brandish their legally obtained, generously available assault weapons. The gangbanger-in-chief comically twirls a mustache that would have been at home on the face of a Mexican revolutionary as envisioned by racist filmmaker D. W. Griffith.

The innocent members of the proletariat quake in their humble shoes, sweat through their honest George by WalMart apparel (no doubt stained with the sweat of a hard day's labor at a George Soros-sponsored Reeducation Center), and scream for their lives through the heavy-duty tape across their mouths. The Conners are panic-stricken, knowing that to die at the hands of a heavily hyped Mexican/Central American gang may be their fate, the worst fate of all (say, compared to being shot in the workplace by a sexually frustrated white guy with an AR-15, which is much more humane), and a fate that is only minutos away. ¡Ay, papi!

Roseanne, however, has managed to escape.

But instead of calling the police--too Deep State for her!--she heads toward the nearest Donald Trump rally--and as good (?) luck would have it, there's one happening next door, because His Lordshit is in the 'hood, stirring the pot, paying his disrespects to the survivors of a recent school shooting ("there were good people on both sides of that rocket launcher, both sides . . . "), and then will immediately be heading out for a $25,000 dry chicken dinner fundraiser with upper-class (or thereabouts) white gangbangers in downtown Chicago.

But I digress . . . .

Roseanne tries to corral the crowd into forming a well-regulated militia to save her family.

As bad (?) luck would have it, however, at that very moment, the crowd is watching a video about the disrespect Hollywood elites express toward Real America--a highlight being a clip of Roseanne in real life (very meta) screeching the National Anthem at a baseball game in San Diego back in the early 1990s.

The angry crowd turns on her. As they get closer and closer to attacking her, we suddenly see another (?) Roseanne waking up from an Ambien-induced haze, several spent smart (the irony!) phones strewn about her, each open to her Twitter account. Half the phones show the account as closed; the other half, open for business.

She struggles to emerge from her mental fog and rise from the couch. Once more or less upright, she begins railing at a crowd of diverse Americans, all silent while they watch her meltdown, screaming lines from notable "race" pictures of the 20th century:

"As God is my witness, as God is my witness they're not going to lick me. I'm going to live through this and when it's all over, I'll never be hungry again. No, nor any of my folk. If I have to lie, steal, cheat or kill. As God is my witness, I'll never be hungry again." (Gone With the Wind)

"Hoke, you're my best friend!" (Driving Miss Daisy)

"Mom! Dad! There's something I have to tell you! I'm Black!" (Soul Man)

"Take your stinking paws off me, you damned dirty ape!" (Charlton Heston in Planet of the Apes)⁺

"The white men were roused by a mere instinct of self-preservation, until at last there had sprung into existence a Great Ku Klux Klan!" (Birth of a Nation--this is delivered in pantomime as it's a silent film)

"I'm a Negro. I can't forget it, and I can't deny it. I can't pretend to be anything else, and I don't want to be anything else. Don't you see, Tom?" (Pinky by John Ford)

Suddenly the scene changes again--it's not a crowd of silent diverse Americans staring at her during her tirade. It's a pack of wild chihuahuas! Thousands and thousands of pissed-off wild chihuahuas!

They proceed to growl and foam at the mouth. They attack and begin to tear at Roseanne's limbs. The scene fades before things get too gruesome (it's TV after all). Lee Greenwood's "God Bless the USA"⁺⁺ swells on the soundtrack--intermixed with Roseanne's nasally shrieks and the high-pitched squeal of agitated chihuahuas--as the scene fades to black (again, irony!). "I'm proud to be an American . . . ."

Finally, before things get too dark (irony once again!), the Looney Toons/Merry Melodies theme music begins. A cartoon Roseanne pops out of the screen. "Th-th-th-th-th-th-th-that's all folks!"

And scene!

At least that's how I hope this plays out. I might actually tune in for this one.

* * *

⁺Author's note: Is this racist, ironic, or both? Despite being based on a French science fiction novel from the early 1960s, I saw this movie listed in an article on the web as being one of the most racist of all time. Given the year of release (1968) and the things going on in the US in the era (where do I begin?), I had thought of it as racist for some time. To me, it's interesting to view it as another Middle America exploitation film of the 1960s, not unlike Wild in the Streets (a camp classic!).
Nonetheless, I confess, I don't know whether this is me being ironic and camp or me being racist. I sincerely apologize if I pulled a Roseanne here. That was definitely not my intention.

⁺⁺Author's note: And is this classist against white working-class Americans? Again, I can no longer tell. I mean it is poking fun at white America's sentimental approach to God and country, and my heritage is as a white working-class American, so, yeah, I'm teasing, but I mean it, so it probably is offensive in that regard. Again, I apologize--to you and to myself.

An open letter to Pittsburgh Cable News Channel (PCNC)

Dear Advertising and Public Affairs Divisions of PCNC:

Regarding the commercial aired Tuesday, October 30, between 7:30 and 7:45 AM, to my knowledge the President of the United States is not a "baby-killer," as claimed by Jane Roe/Norma Leah McCorvey. Rather the President and the administration uphold what is currently law in the United States, the right for access to the medical procedure known as abortion.

I assume, as a commercial enterprise, you do not necessarily support every item or issue advertised on your channel. Nonetheless, as a commercial enterprise using the federally administered broadcasting spectrum, I would think you would bear some responsibility for inaccurate and inflammatory statements made and transmitted via your station. To allow a commercial in which the speaker states, "Do not vote for Barack Obama, he is a baby-killer," is not merely offensive and untrue (to my knowledge, the President has not personally performed abortions in the White House or other locales) but also dangerous. Abortion generates a great deal of emotional distress, especially among those opposed to it. Calling the President a "baby-killer" would seem to be waving the proverbial red flag in front of those highly opposed to the matter.

Thus, I would respectfully request you reconsider airing this advertisement on your channel. Surely your need for advertising revenue is not so great as to broadcast content such as this.

Thank you.