Coming Up TONIGHT TOMORROW at 10:00: Liveblogging "Big Love"
Yeah. We already know I’ll hate it. Still, could be fun. Drop by. Join in. Sunday night at 10P on HBO.
Bill Paxton portraying a man with three wives. One big happy family.
The Dreamer says: I thought that [polygamy] was illegal. So why have a television show about it?
Good question.
10:04 So we begin with him leaving a $100 bill under a glass on the bedside table of one of the wives. Subtle. Talk about handing it to us on a silver platter.
10:12 We have the soft-focus scenes of them all eating dinner together, one big happy family, and him greeting everyone, one wife at a time, in the kitchen — one big happy family. But then we come to his night together with Margene — she is all excited to see him after their three days apart and wants to know how much he has missed her: “Officially I miss you all the same.” Exactly why this kind of arrangement never works. Officially, and reality, of course, are two different things.
Then, things don’t go so well when they go to bed — he ends up sitting by the pool, and one of the other wives sees him, they exchange a meaningful glance, but they don’t speak. . . while Margene looks on out the window.
10:20 One of the wives spends more money than the others — her son shows up at breakfast with a new shirt from Lands’ End. And one of the other wives works while the others don’t — so she gets to redecorate while the others don’t. I never thought about the money angle, but seriously, that would be a mess.
10:22 Now he’s googing “male impotence” — turns out it’s not just the one wife.
And now he’s in bed with the first wife and she’s making a move on him — everyone assumes that would be the male fantasy to rotate through all the wives, but it’s kind of sad-funny to see that in real life, that would get tiresome.
10:28 They are headed out on the road to check on his father who is ill: first wife in the front seat, second one in the back seat. Yeah, that’s what women want, to be the Backseat Wife.
10:46 I read one reviewer who said that the show didn’t make Mormons look bad, but I don’t see how you could say that. They show them traveling back to a “compound” of sorts and the people are portrayed as backward hicks, fearful of modern medicine — and a young girl turns up who is 14 or 15, now married to “the Prophet.” A really skin-crawling scene shows her talking with the first wife about having children.
10:50 Now a scene with all three wives where the youngest one is in tears because she feels she doesn’t “measure up” and doesn’t contribute enough to the group. The first wife is trying to comfort her and it becomes clear that the other two wives are, in many ways, more children for her to care for — and, if nothing else, represent a major managerial challenge.
In real life, most of these polygamous families are dirt poor and living in trailers — way too many mouths to feed for one man to support. And the women are home caring for children and pregnant too much of the time to work themselves.