Abstract
It seems that Deborah Jermyn and Su Holmes set out to find essays beyond the status quo for this edited volume about women and ageing, ways in which gender and age intersect in the lives of celebrities as they work in their chosen crafts, or portrayals of these celebrities by the media. Jermyn is a Reader in Film and Television at the University of Roehampton, and Holmes is a Reader in Television at the University of East Anglia.
In the initial chapter, the authors acknowledge the obvious, “we are living in an era of a rapidly ageing population,” and argue that this is one reason ageing scholarship has become both visible and relevant. The authors also argue that scholarship in this area is gendered and, for the most part, focused on “a preoccupation with young women as their subject.” They emphasize that “celebrity culture is quite frequently concerned with pointing out those (overwhelmingly female) celebrities who are or are not ageing well,” as well as the fact that men are less likely to be criticized for ageing. Finally, this chapter brings into focus the necessity for scholarship concentrating on the response (by women) to celebrity, ageing, and sexuality.
Jermyn and Holmes also posit that ageing scholarship has been written by White women about White heterosexual women. Oddly enough, Jermyn and Holmes are both White women. Most of the essays are in fact about White women.
The two essays about non-White women attempt to decipher Whoopi Goldberg’s portrayal of Moms Mabley, and the enigmatic Jamaican-born performer, Grace Jones. The Goldberg chapter brings to light the forgotten African American star: Moms Mabley. Sadie Wearing studies Goldberg and Mabley from their positions in American comedy and how their comedic performances simultaneously reify and contradict society’s constructions about age and culture. Chapter 6, written by Nathalie Weidhase, highlights Grace Jones, her ability to remain ageless (in the media’s view), and how her 2008 album, Hurricane, fortified Jones’ skill of “disrupting identity configurations such as gender, sexuality and race.”
Other chapters feature deceased celebrities, including a chapter focusing on Elinor Glyn authored by Karen Randell and Alexis Weedon, Martin Shingler’s chapter about Bette Davis, and Hannah Hamad’s investigation of Elisabeth Sladen. Glyn and Davis did not fulfill societal expectations of ageing womanhood because each seemed proud of, and at times flaunted, her age. Glyn directly confronted her sexuality in her performances and Davis portrayed older women who defied conventionality. Hamad’s chapter’s objective is to argue that Elisabeth Sladen was “understood right up to the end of her life (and beyond) to have aged without ageing, to connote youth, vitality, and the corporeal norms of pre-menopausal femininity, and therefore to have aged successfully.”
Included in this volume as well are investigations of Jennifer Aniston’s life as the “ageing, unwed and childfree woman,” authored by Susan Berridge. Scholar Melanie Williams explores Dame Judi Dench and her representation of a woman ageing gracefully, and Rona Murray probes the life of Agnes Varda, the French filmmaker who is regularly seen as an “old woman” in her own films. Vanessa Redgrave’s voice-over work in the BBC television drama, Call the Midwife, is exposed as “a rare example of female subjectivity that is built on a continuum of ages rather than firm or oppositional divisions between young and old,” in a chapter by Ros Jennings and Eva Krainitzki.
Finally, Editor Jermyn delves into the documentary film by Sue Bourne titled Fabulous Fashionistas. In each of six women’s interviews, Bourne highlights their unconventionality and age as fashionistas, typically a place reserved much younger women. Jermyn explicates the reason these six women were selected for the film—their wardrobes. Each is older than 70 and fashion has been a much-celebrated part of their lives. In general, fashion models are rail-thin, nubile young women. However, Daphne revived her modeling career after the age of 70, demonstrating the antithesis of this practice. Jean went to work as Gap’s oldest employee after being widowed. Bridget challenges modeling agencies’ practices of hiring only young women. Gillian is married to a man 27 years younger and still working at age 90 as a choreographer. Sue left a successful career in television to become a curator and artist, and Baroness Trumpington holds a seat in the House of Lords.
Overall, Jermyn and Holmes created a volume of well-written and exceptional essays. The editors stayed true to their original mission of bringing out the uniqueness of scholarship in this area, even uncovering some previously neglected areas. This book would be an excellent graduate-level book for a course in Media Studies, Feminism, Gender Studies, or Entertainment Studies. Thanks to Jermyn and Holmes, scholars have a new volume to use as a springboard for future research or as supplemental reader.