In defense of Nora Ephron: Cool it, Sean.

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In defense of Nora Ephron: Cool it, Sean.

POSTED: Wednesday, August 5, 2009, 6:03 PM

Filed Under: Movies

Disclaimer: I saw Julie and Julia, and I agree with a lot of Sean Burns' review in Philadelphia Weekly. (Our own Cindy Fuchs brings up other relevant points, which you can read in her review tonight online and tomorrow in print). I also agree that half of the reason I want to scratch out my eyes when I go to see romantic comedies (and I see a lot of romantic comedies) is the plot structure that Nora Ephron created with treacle like Sleepless in Seattle (although, I also have to admit, I've seen When Harry Met Sally' an embarrassing amount of times).

But here's my problem with Mr. Burns:

Architect of every odious modern romantic comedy cliche, Nora Ephron initially got famous for being cheated on by Washington Post writer Carl Bernstein, and somehow parlayed her misfortune into a profitable career turning affable screen presences like Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks into annoying simps in such ubiquitous cable staples as Sleepless in Seattle and You've Got Mail.

Nora Ephron was pretty famous before she married Carl Bernstein. Yeah, sure, that made her more famous, which tends to happen when you marry a guy who took down a president. But to totally discount her career as a journalist and place her fame solely on her failed marriage is, to say, unfair. I mean, writing a column about feminism for Esquire in the early '70s couldn't have been easy.

In a excellent profile in the New Yorker, Ariel Levy writes about Ephron ' you have to be a subscriber to get the full text but here's an excerpt:

It wasn't the divorce, or even the marriage, that made her famous, or even got her into movies. Ephron, as outlined in the New Yorker piece, grew up in LA, the progeny of two screenwriters. It was the <strike>memoir</strike> novel Heartburn, about the divorce, and subsequent screenplay (made into a movie starring Meryl Streep and Jack Nicholson) that gave her the extra push. And then she wrote and received and Academy Award nom for Silkwood. And then ' and then'

As a personal anecdote, my mom, who logged quite a few hours in a newsroom herself, recounted to me how when she was a senior in college (about three years before Ephron married Bernstein), she attended the MORE Counter Culture journalism convention, where Ephron, without the help of her future husband, was a main draw. So it's not like she became famous for getting cheated on. She became more famous because she did something about it.

So Sean, I know that was a tossed-off lead sentence that was supposed to convey bigger ideas, and you eventually go on to praise Ephron, but you have to understand why, as a female myself, it's insulting that a woman's accomplishments are boiled down her husband cheating on her. I highly suggest you read Ephron's piece "A Few Words About Breasts," which is maddeningly not easily accessible online, but did make into in this Esquire piece on the 70 greatest sentences in the mag's history.

Yeah, Ephron isn't the greatest filmmaker in the world. But she's more than just some jilted housewife. And she deserves better.

UPDATE: From A.O. Scott's New York Times review of Julie and Julia: "Ms. Ephron, a literary and journalistic star before she was a filmmaker, is unequivocal in her celebration of the joys of such triumph."

phillygrrl

Posted 2009-08-05 13:24:27

So Sean, I know that was a tossed-off lead sentence that was supposed to convey bigger ideas, and you eventually go on to praise Ephron, but you have to understand why, as a female myself, itâs insulting that a womanâs accomplishments are boiled down her husband cheating on her.
I still can't believe he wrote that.

Felicia D'Ambrosio

Posted 2009-08-05 14:19:04

Nora Ephron is hilarious. Who cares who she was married to?

akaRuthie

Posted 2009-08-05 21:03:12

I only first heard about her from Sleepless in Seattle - and I'm in my late 30's. Do you really think anybody in her 20's knows or cares much about that Dustin Hoffman guy?

Posted by Molly Eichel" @ 6:03 PM Permalink | Post a comment

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