If you re a woman of a certain age, you re supposed to be feeling emboldened right now by a swarm of successful golden girls.
Hillary Clinton wants to be president. Nancy Pelosi is speaker of the House. And in case you didn t notice, an assortment of senators, governors, CEOs and media power brokers are wielding their clout in St. John knits.
Obligingly, the Oscars have bolstered the trend by delivering a best actress nominee list that s dominated by three very grand women: two real English dames, Helen Mirren, 61, and Judi Dench, 72, and America s closest version, Meryl Streep, 57. For once, vast experience is being valued, and wisdom and wrinkles are having their moment in the sun.
But don t break out a vintage wine to celebrate just yet. Look closely at the films that have earned nods for this trio of veteran actresses. Each movie contains a great role for an older woman. And each has a storyline that s linked inextricably to a woman of Hollywood s desirable age, definitely shy of 40.
In The Devil Wears Prada, Streep is terrifyingly good as the intimidating editor of a fashion magazine. The audience, however, is meant to identify with her harried assistant (Anne Hathaway, who s in practically every scene). Streep s towering achievement is turning a one-dimensional monster into a woman of such flesh-and-blood flaws that we care about her more than the actual heroine.
Notes on a Scandal is a creepily seductive duet between Dench s calculating spinster teacher and her novice colleague, played by Cate Blanchett. As a married mother with a weakness for a teenage boy and an inability to explain her behavior, Blanchett is superb, as messily appealing as Dench is sparsely prim. Blanchett is nominated as a best supporting actress in part because studios play strategic games with such categories (does anyone honestly think another supporting nominee, Jennifer Hudson, isn t the true star of Dreamgirls ?).
As for Mirren, her awesome transformation in The Queen has already won a bouquet of awards. Yet she, too, shares screen time with a younger woman – the ghost of Princess Diana. In the delicate twists of a finely tuned screenplay, Diana s presence is always there, daring her mother-in-law to ignore the grief of the millions who mourn her passing.
Given the outcome of the movies, it s possible to argue the older women are in a losing battle with their younger counterparts. Without going into plot-spoiling specifics, let s just say that Streep s character and Dench s end up much as they began, locked inside the confines of the lives they ve inhabited for so many years.
As for Mirren s monarch, you already know how that controversy ended. Queen Elizabeth was forced to bend to the emotions stirred by Princess Diana s death and make choices not in keeping with a lifetime of stiff-upper-lip royal training.
Would a movie have gotten made about an aging magazine editor without a cute protege? Or a lovelorn teacher with no beautiful object of obsession? Or a queen who didn t have a world-famous daughter-in-law? Probably. But it s easier when there s a fresh face in the cast.
Entertainment Weekly recently offered the shocking reminder that nobody older than 39 has taken home the best actress statuette for a decade. If the pattern holds, the Oscar will go to Penelope Cruz for Volver or Kate Winslet for Little Children. But that s unlikely.
The smart money is on Mirren, and critics also are swooning over Dench and Streep.
If there s an underlying message in the nominations, it s less about changing perceptions of age and more about women hanging in there.
Actresses the stature of Mirren, Dench and Streep understand that surviving is half the battle, whether in show business or in life.
They stay in the game. They seek substance instead of glamour. They work with fresher faces and show them how it s done.
One of the great advantages of getting older is that you can walk into a world which is more truthful and less to do with other people s fantasies, Mirren told Entertainment Weekly magazine.
The truth is, if you play it smart, you can sneak around Hollywood s fascination with youth. Leave it to an old broad to figure that one out.
