Ever since HBO’s original seriesSex and the Cityhit television screens during the late ’90s (1998 to be exact), pop culture has transformed drastically. Still airing today globally in syndication and on select streaming platforms (HBO and Hulu)Sex and the Cityis an empire of sorts—the original six-season series, two feature films (Sex and the Cityfrom 2008 andSex and the City 2two years later), as well as two spin-off television series (CW’sThe Carrie Diariesand Michael Patrick King’s new HBO adaptationAnd Just Like That); allhone in on the everyday life from the perspective of a variety of female characters.
Sex and the Cityiscentralized around Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker), a newspaper columnist living in theheart of New York Cityalongside with her best friends. Samantha Jones (Kim Cattrall) a sexually promiscuous woman who is successful in spearheading her business through the public-relations sector; she is strong, confident, and unapologetically herself. Charlotte York (Kristin Davis) is the quintessential hopeless romantic with a more refined personality, and Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon) is an ambitious lawyer with a fiery, direct, and sometimes distrustful vibe when it comes to the men in her life.
As the four best friends eagerly explore the Manhattan dating scene, the series accurately displays the complexities of dating which many New Yorkers find themselves in (if you’re a New Yorker, by the way, never travel outside the bubble of New York City to meet a companion,just stay single). In almost every case, the result is either excessive drama, heartbreak, laughable awkwardness, sex, and more sex, with the women getting together very often to all share and compare their experiences.
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The show has generally been well-received after its first year, due to its representation of accomplished adult women, unashamed in living their best lives and being sexually liberated in a ’90s era whenwomen’s history had led to liberationbecoming mainstream; the show was also praised for detailing sexuality in a new and risky way for television in the ’90s. However, select groups have highlighted the problematic stereotypes embedded in the franchise’s premises. IsSex and the Citya feminist classic, or is it bad for women?
There’s a dynamic and complicated history, as it pertains to the feminist movement withinSex and the City’s original series. Groundbreaking for it’s time, the show is successful for partly mirroring the everyday reality of what it’s like to be single, in your thirties, and female. The myriad sexual escapades, the pursuit of snagging high-end Blahnik’s for a significant deal, and the celebration around being a well established, career-orientated woman, while also pursuing a pool of men, resonated with many women, or at least their ideal selves. As many people navigate their twenties, experiencing excessive breakups, heartaches, career set-backs and achievements, they can then understand why these four tight-knit friends rely on each other for sources of familiarity and support.
Season one of the series was actually met with a barrage of mixed reviews. Many critics frowned upon the idea that these four women all owned their sexuality and weren’t ashamed to be significantly blunt through their dialogue. Looking back, it’s surprising just how chauvinistic and body-shaming many of theSex and the Cityseason one reviewswere. For instance, the actual Washington Post wrote:
Sarah Jessica Parker has an in-your-face face. In her new HBO comedy series,Sex and the City, she always seems to be thrusting it forward. She’s in love with the camera. Unfortunately, it’s unrequited […] Parker, with her scraggly hair and jutty jaw, is certainly not the worst thing about this smirky-jerky sexcom, but she usually seems so light and funny that it’s dismaying to see her in bad form, looking like a walking flea market and coming across about as subtly as a tsunami.
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1998 may not seem like a long time ago, butthe reviewsindicate a time period where women were instructed to shut up and look pretty. For instance, USA Today wrote that the series was, “Enough to make you re-evaluate the virtues of celibacy […] Here’s a thought: Perhaps these whiners can’t find great guys because they’re not so great themselves.“Sex and the Cityinstead challenged the notion that females could be flirty, witty, successful, outspoken, and sexually liberated simultaneously, both onscreen and offscreen.
Stereotypes
The stereotypes androm-com clichésofSex and the Cityare prevalent, though, especially in the non-existent elements of diversity. The show heavily represents this idea of women empowerment, while refraining to incorporate women of color into the girl’s inner circle. Yes, viewers are able to see four accomplished white women, thriving in the who’s who of inner circles, but do the girls not have any Black female friends who move throughout the same circles?
Thenewest installment,And Just Like That,adds Lisa Todd Wexley (Nicole Ari Parker Kodjoe) to the group of friends (Carrie, Miranda and Charlotte, to be exact), through her new-found friendship with Charlotte. However, it would have been great as well to have seen this addition of women, throughout all ethnicities, reflected in the original ’90s HBO series, further breaking societal barriers. While the topic of privilege is still hot, how in the world does Carrie manage to feed her fashion addiction and live off a writer’s salary with her extravagant lifestyle. No, it’s not realistic, but since she’s classified as a woman of privilege, viewers are supposed to not question this. Along with their privilege comes the ability to afford pampered clothing and make-up; the show thus reinforces standard beauty stereotypes.
Also, the supposedly empoweringSexand the Citytends to attach a lot of worth to the pursuit of (almost always heterosexual) men. How many episodes actually don’t include one of the characters desperately trying to get a man or frantically talking about a man? As Alice Wignall writes forThe Guardian:
For a show about women, it displays a singular obsession with men. As Miranda, the character most likely to consider herself a feminist, points out in one episode: “How does it happen that four such smart women have nothing to talk about but boyfriends?”
Their endless pursuit of men, along with the fantasy idea that these men can make them whole in some way, weakens the stronger elements of feminism in the series and sends a dangerous message to younger girls. As Janet McCabe and Kim Akass write in theirbookReading Sex and the City:
The women are still caught in fairytale narratives. The ‘right’ couple were signaled in the first episode [in which Carrie first meets her on-off lover known only as Mr Big] and in some ways the entire show has just been about them getting together - which, of course, has to be endlessly delayed or you don’t have the driving force behind the story.
To sum everything up, theSex and the Cityfranchise does promote both feminism and stereotypes. The original series, more specifically, advances this new wave of thinking in relation to the modern day alpha woman (which is amazing and awe-inspiring). However,Sex and the Citydoes contain fairytale ‘princess’ narratives, and pushes away from including diversity, not only because writers failed to hone in onwomen of color who were also successful, but throughout the men they dated and the heteronormative scope of the series. Except forSamantha, can anyone remember any of the other main characters who dated a diverse group of men?
