Hey, y'all. Due to my first encounter with the MBTV Videotaping Curse, I ended up with a recording of this HBO TV movie instead of Satan's School for Girls. Sars asked me to provide my thoughts on it anyway, so I was lucky to have some. A friend and colleague at my day job, Jitterbug -- who just happens to be a lesbian -- has added some rebuttal/commentary of her own. Credits. Oh my! The film hasn't even begun before the prayers of the Religious Right are answered and God scratches His fingernails down His blackboard in Heaven to protest. My bad. As if the conservatives have that much clout! It's just Melissa Etheridge "singing." We begin with a little segment I like to call . . . “Vanessa, meet the anvil; anvil, Vanessa.” B&W footage of June Cleaver types accompanied by "Que Sera, Sera (What Will Be, Will Be)." A title reads, "1961." Movie theater. We see a clip of Shirley MacLaine emoting in The Children's Hour. She's confessing her lesbian love for this actress who's a dead ringer for Jennifer Love Hewitt (snicker). Vanessa Redgrave and her girlfriend sit in the audience, holding hands and weeping. Some teens behind them snicker so they unclasp hands guiltily. They walk out onto the street after the movie and head home to the House of Talking Walls, past a HUGE MURAL ADVERTISEMENT featuring a husband and wife with the slogan, "Kiss him goodbye in the morning." Welcome to Semiotics for Dummies. Vanessa chastises her girlfriend for over-exerting herself by lugging the trash to the curb and staying up late to add seed to her birdhouse. From their banter it's established that they're an old married couple in every way except legally. Vanessa lays out her girlfriend's pajamas while she lingers in the backyard. Seems the bird in the house is sitting on some eggs in her nest. Vanessa makes tea and puts out cookies, then tells her girlfriend to come inside and be careful on the ladder. I think we all see where this is going. Cut to the ladder falling in slow motion while a choir sings on the soundtrack. Hospital waiting room. Vanessa sits dejectedly in the corner. A woman comes in, crying and blathering about how her husband just had a heart attack. Vanessa gets up, although she's obviously worried and weary, and comforts this stranger. She gives the woman her handkerchief and holds her hand, because she's a saint. A living saint. What does Vanessa get for her trouble? The woman pooh-poohing the news that Vanessa's "friend" has had a stroke, and an inquiry about Vanessa's husband. Vanessa explains that she's never been married. The woman tells her that she's "lucky" because she'll never know "the heartbreak of losing one." Ouch. That's me taking the anvil blow for Vanessa. The woman is led away to talk to a doctor. Vanessa asks a nurse about her girlfriend, whose name is Abby. She's told that Abby's in intensive care, but only "family" can see her. Vanessa insists on staying, and wants to know about any developments in Abby's condition.
morning. Vanessa wakes up in the waiting room and asks about Abby at the nurses' station. She's told that Abby passed away around 3:45 that morning. Vanessa breaks down in tears -- why wasn't she informed when it happened? My heart is breaking for Vanessa. Wah. The nurses inform Vanessa that the body is already in the morgue, and she should contact Abby's "of kin" for funeral arrangements. Vanessa, in grief, sleeps to Abby's pajamas on their bed. Then she calls Abby's great-nephew to break the news of her death and to plan the funeral. Cut to a sob-inducing montage of Vanessa removing her clothes from the master bedroom and putting them in the spare bedroom to pretend that she was just a tenant in the house. She also packs away all of the photos and mementos of their decades-long relationship. Sniffle. Day of the funeral. Abby's great-nephew and his wife (played by Elizabeth Perkins, she of the unwise career choices since Big) and their small daughter accompany Vanessa into the house. Vanessa has already laid out a tea tray and made sandwiches for them, because she's a living saint. She shows the nephew an old photo she found of a visit he made when he was a boy and Abby taught him how to fish. This is wasted on the nephew, who barely registers any emotion. He gives Abby's binoculars to his daughter. Elizabeth asks Vanessa if the collection of bird figurines was Abby's. Vanessa says they were. The nephew looks through some papers and sees that the deed of the house is only in his great-aunt's name. Vanessa explains that she helped pay off the mortgage. The nephew agrees to compensate Vanessa after the house is sold. Vanessa explains that she and Abby had agreed that she would stay on there. Unfortunately, Abby never stated this in a will. The nephew considers letting Vanessa stay there and "pay rent." Vanessa explains again that she already paid off the mortgage. The nephew complains about the inheritance tax he'll have to pay if the house isn't sold right away. Vanessa calmly registers her eviction from her home of thirty years by this odious geek, because she's a living saint. Elizabeth, who'd left the room to boil water for tea, joins them. She covets the teapot and wonders aloud if it was Abby's. Then she blathers about doing an inventory of the entire house. Her husband looks uncomfortable and tells her that they should just leave the furniture for now, because Vanessa wants to "stay on." Elizabeth makes a beeline for those symbolic bird figurines. She patronizes Vanessa about the loss of her "good friend," and out of the kindness of her antique-grubbing heart, she offers to let Vanessa pick a figurine as a keepsake. Vanessa, refusing to lose her composure, excuses herself to go into the kitchen. Elizabeth notices the white spaces on the walls where photos used to be. When Vanessa re-enters the room, the nephew has found some savings bonds of Abby's; he'll cash them, and that will help Vanessa with the rent. Vanessa changes the subject by asking the nephew to help her out by putting away the ladder that's still lying on the ground in the backyard.
Upstairs. Elizabeth, that harridan, is measuring Vanessa and Abby's conjugal bed. The daughter finds an old photo in a drawer of Abby and Vanessa in male drag. They're perplexed. Vanessa appears. She takes the photo and tersely replies that it was taken at "a costume party." Elizabeth and daughter decide to go downstairs. Elizabeth argues with her husband about letting Vanessa stay on in the house. The little girl finds an anvil, er, a broken eggshell that's been dropped outside the birdhouse. Elizabeth sends the girl inside to go get one of the symbolic bird figurines. The daughter hesitates, because they're the "old lady's." Elizabeth tells her to go inside and loot the place anyway. Upstairs. The girl, still carrying the eggshell, hears Vanessa sobbing and wailing loudly in the master bedroom, while clutching Abby's pajamas. The girl walks into the room as if she owns the place. Like mother, like daughter. The girl shows Vanessa the eggshell. Vanessa surmises that the eggs are hatching in the birdhouse. The girl hands Vanessa a handkerchief from the dresser, and says it was "Aunt Abby's, but you can have it." Vanessa finally starts getting cross and explains, "Little girl, it is not for you to say what I can and cannot have. And it's not for your parents to tell you what you can take." The girl is sorry. Vanessa tells her that it's all right for her to keep the binoculars -- she never got to know her great-aunt. Downstairs. Elizabeth is packing up all of the symbolic bird figurines. We cut between her pillaging and Vanessa's singing of Abby's praises to the little girl. As Elizabeth swipes Abby's stuff and a rain of anvils falls from the sky, Vanessa explains how "kind" Abby was and how "she hated to see anything suffer. She kept a hospital for the birds and mice she rescued from her cat. They all survived, those fragile little creatures." The nephew wants to have "a word" with Vanessa. She fixes her hair and composes herself before joining him in the living room. She notices the empty bird figurine table but bites her tongue, because she's a saint. The nephew explains that due to "taxes and upkeep" she'll have to relocate. Just then the daughter comes back in from outside; she's found a birdling that's fallen out of the nest. Her father explains that she should just discard it, because it's "not supposed to make it." Ah, anvilicious! He sends Elizabeth and the girl out of the room while he continues his discussion with Vanessa. He'll wait to put the house on the market until he knows that Vanessa is settled elsewhere. Vanessa FINALLY gets her dander up and delivers this fine monologue which had me weeping all over again: "If you knew your aunt at all, you knew about all the marvelous things she did and how good she was . . . and funny . . . and tender . . . and brave, and smart. If you knew how hard she worked just to find a little peace in this life . . . if you knew her at all, then you'd know what she wanted. This wasn't it. No, my dear -- this certainly wasn't it."
Then Elizabeth ruins this moment by walking into the room carrying a lamp she's stealing! Witch! Vanessa and the nephew get up from their chairs. They're going to go, but he'll call in a few weeks. Elizabeth says that she was "so glad to meet" Vanessa, and gets the cold shoulder of a lifetime. Vanessa gives the nephew and wife the stink-eye as they leave, but she shakes the little girl's hand goodbye. Aw. Cut to the backyard. Just when you thought the anvil storm had let up -- Vanessa drags the ladder to the birdhouse. Using the Symbolic Handkerchief, she picks the Symbolic Birdling up off the ground and places it in the Symbolic Birdhouse. "Bye, Bye Blackbird" plays, Vanessa fades from the scene, and WE GET IT. End. Which brings us to the segment: “Come Back to the Five-And-Dime, Chloe Sevigny, Chloe Sevigny.” Clips of hippies protesting. Bell-bottom rock. Title reading, "1972." Kitchen of the House of Talking Walls. Processing session of three hippie lesbian girls: Nia Long (sporting an Afro), Natasha Lyonne, and Michelle Williams. Michelle is a brunette here, because if she remained blonde while sporting the seventies duds her resemblance to Sally Struthers circa All in the Family would have been just too disconcerting. Nia is jabbering about a girl she slept with the night before who freaked out on her the morning. ["Hands up, girls, for whoever's been here -- so far it seems the same stuff goes in the seventies as today." -- Jitterbug] Michelle changes into a loose-weave peasant blouse in front of everyone, and if we needed proof that she's going "free bird," here it is. Natasha bitches about "gay 'til graduation" chicks that treat the out lesbians like "a science experiment." Michelle wants "a real relationship." Natasha thought that Michelle wanted her freedom. Michelle wants both. Nia assures them that all will have love "after the revolution." Yeah! Kill the pigs! Acid's groovy! She kisses Michelle on the lips. The girls go out to the driveway. They make fun of their "uptight" neighbor, who's such a square because he shrinks from their loud exhortations of "Peace, man!" and blaring car stereo. Um, who can blame him? The actresses are walking together on a university campus. They're joined by a fourth, some blonde nobody who I'll call Jennifer Keaton. The girls open the door to a meeting room full of women. The lesbians get the stink-eye. The lead girl explains that the high muck-a-mucks won't let the feminist group meet on campus anymore if it's perceived as being a lesbian organization. I guess this isn't worthy of a sit-in. Michelle is nonplused. The lesbians leave. Bummer.
Cut to the house. The gang is toking on a joint. Michelle wants to "go out." She tries to convince the others to join her in checking out "the gay bar down the highway." Nia pooh-poohs it as "a dump" but Michelle wins out. Parking lot of a dive called Georgette's. The girls butcher Three Dog Night's "Joy to the World" as they walk to the door. They enter. A fifties song is crooning on the jukebox, and the bar patrons consist of femmes with dresses and big hair and butch women in suits or blue-collar apparel. The girls stand there slack-jawed in their hippie blouses while everyone in the bar stares at them and the music comes to a screeching halt. Well, I'm exaggerating about the music part, but you get the picture. Michelle leads the others to a table and insists that they stay for awhile. The blowsy bartendress shouts, "You girls sure you're in the right place?" Nia wails, "We're not GIRLS, we're WOMEN." Uch. I've been to small-town gay bars before and trust me, this is not the proper way to behave. ["Amen!" -- Jitterbug] Hello, Nia! When in Rome . . . Then Michelle shouts across the bar for a pitcher of beer. The bartrendress shouts back that there's no table service. The girls pout. Are we supposed to feel sympathy for these little snots? Hello, Michelle! It's a dive. You knew that coming in. So Nia makes a snide comment about "the women's movement being alive and kicking at this bar." Yeah, because this other woman wouldn't leave her place behind the bar to wait on these princesses hand and foot. Whatever! As Michelle gets the pitcher and some mugs, her friends make loud disparaging comments about an older woman who's looking over at the hippie divas incredulously. Guess where my sympathy lies. As Michelle walks back to the table, she gets cruised by Chloe Sevigny. Chloe's hair is slicked back and she's wearing trousers, a dress shirt, and a tie. The girls start bitching loudly about Chloe's tie. ["I thought she looked real purty." -- Jitterbug] Natasha says that she even got her father to stop wearing one. Yeah, he probably just wanted his little princess to SHUT UP. Nia adds that ties worn by women are "ten times more offensive." Because she'd know from offensive. Michelle leaves the table to go get some smokes. She walks up to the bar where Chloe is sitting and asks the bartendress for some cigs. She's told that the machine is busted. Michelle brats, "Is it busted for everyone, or JUST FOR ME?" The bartendress asks Michelle if she'd like her head busted "just for me." Actually, she doesn't, but how I wish she had. Michelle whines that "me and my friends [sic -- and way to go with the grammar, college girl] are gay too, you know!" ["Ugh!" -- Jitterbug] Chloe comments dryly, "Want a medal?" ["Thank you." -- Jitterbug] She tells Michelle that the machine really is busted, and offers her a pack of smokes. Then she asks if Michelle wants to dance. Michelle says she can't, and looks over at her friends. She walks back to the table with the graceless bow-legged gait Dawson's Creek viewers have come to know and love. Although there's half a pitcher left, the girls want to bolt. ["Okay, here's where they are clearly NOT behaving as true lesbians. I have never seen a table of lesbians leave behind a pitcher of beer." -- Jitterbug] Word! And they're college kids to boot! Michelle gives Natasha the car keys and says she wants to stay awhile. The girls give Chloe the fish-eye and depart. Chloe walks up to Michelle and asks her to dance again. She will.
Later. Outside the bar, Chloe offers Michelle a ride back to town on her motorcycle. She gives Michelle her shirt so she won't get cold. Aw. Chloe looks very James Dean-ish in her undershirt. ["Again, purrrrrrr. So cute she is." -- Jitterbug] They pull up in front of the house and banter about Chloe being "tough" and Michelle being a "tough feminist." Chloe kisses Michelle goodnight, and is invited back the day to retrieve her shirt. Campus. The girls interrogate Michelle about the night before. Michelle says she "had fun" with Chloe. Nia wails that this event "is worse than imagining you with a man." Hey! Shut up, Nia. In the car, Michelle proposes that her friends faction off from the feminist collective to form their own lesbian group. Jennifer Keaton says, "Yeah." They're all in. They pull up in front of the house. The lead feminist girl is there, and she tries to explain her position to the girls again. "Maybe year" the lesbians can be back in the organization. Just as Michelle gets her bitch on, Chloe rides up on her motorcycle. She walks up to the girls in her leather jacket, pegged blue jeans, and pompadour. Feminist leader girl gapes at her. Chloe asks for her shirt. The girls all stand there, catching flies. Natasha steps in front of Michelle protectively. Chloe reads the situation and bolts, adding, "Nice meeting you, ladies." Feminist leader girl leaves, too. Nia whines to Michelle, "How do you expect us to be accepted as feminists with your little boyfriend around?" Accept this: your coronation as Queen Asshole, Nia. ["Wouldn't be that surprising if Nia herself ended up with a man? Kind of like homophobes. Be weary of those who doth protest too much." -- Jitterbug] Cut to Michelle in her scarf-strewn, patchouli-scented (I'm guessing) room, crying on her bed because she treated Chloe so bad. Boo hoo. She's the big victim here. Not! Natasha lies to her and tries to comfort her. She asks Michelle how she can "like someone who dresses like a man? We fought so hard to break free of those roles." Michelle explains that Chloe "doesn't need other people to define who she is. She knows." Word. Michelle drives to Chloe's house. Chloe lets her in. She gets her shirt back. Awkward chatter. They fall into bed. Instead of a blow-by-blow of the sex scene, I offer these thoughts: Chloe could have equaled or surpassed Hilary Swank's performance as Brandon Teena in their film Boys Don't Cry, in my humble opinion. And Michelle is so getting wiped off the screen here. The only thing she's bringing to the set is that last refuge of bad actresses, the biting of the lower lip. I'm guessing in this context it's supposed to signal sexual ecstasy.
The morning. Michelle brushes her teeth in Chloe's bathroom. She snoops in the medicine cabinet and finds a photo of a little Chloe forced to wear a dress. This causes Michelle to bite her lip again. Um, empathy? Let's believe she's expressing that. She walks into the bedroom. Chloe praises Michelle for looking sexy. Michelle becomes uncomfortable at the prospect of joining Chloe, who's donned her male garb, in public for breakfast. Hey, you know what a good friend advised me once and I now firmly believe? If they're good enough for the bed, they're good enough for the brunch table. Or was it "good enough for the bushes, good enough for the bed"? Either way, you get my point. Grow up, Michelle. She asks Chloe if she's supposed to be the man in their relationship. Chloe explains that she dresses the way she does because she feels comfortable. She adds, "Don't you think I know what people think of me? This is me, it can't be any other way." Michelle: Ineffectual blah blah. Chloe basically tells her to pack up her hang-ups and hit the road. Breakfast is cancelled. House. Michelle is cleaning the communal living room. Natasha quips that it's like her "parents are going to visit." Nia harshes, "More like her husband!" SHUT UP, NIA. Michelle makes her friends promise to give Chloe a chance. I guess Michelle and Chloe made up off-screen. There's a knock at the door. It's Chloe, wearing a suit and carrying a bouquet for Michelle. Introductions. Michelle leads Chloe to the kitchen. Nia loudly ridicules, "Flowers for my woman!" SHUT UP, NIA. Kitchen. Chloe says she can leave early. Michelle wants her to stay. They kiss. Aw. Back to the den of vipers. Everyone eats sprouts on the floor and listens to sitar music. Natasha asks Chloe about her job. Chloe says she works in a mail room. Natasha sniffs disapprovingly. Then she makes a crack about how nice it is "to have a man around the house." SHUT UP, NATASHA. Then she criticizes Chloe for not drinking. Chloe explains that she likes to stay sober in case people try to "mess with" her. Natasha tells her that she could "dress normally" and make it easier for herself. Nia chimes in, "That tie's been hurting my eyes all night long." SHUT UP, NIA. I'll show you hurting. Nia throws a peasant blouse at Chloe. Chloe doesn't want to put it on. Michelle is doing a piss-poor job of defending her girlfriend throughout this scene. Chloe finally gives in and puts on the blouse; she looks about as comfortable as a cat in a bubble bath. The girls cluck approvingly. Michelle wants her to take it off. Natasha starts to "unstyle" Chloe's hair, because she's been "dying to." SHUT UP, NATASHA. I'll show you dying. Chloe, to her credit, pushes Natasha out of the way. She wails that Michelle must be "ashamed of her" if she let her friends treat her that way. Chloe books out of there, slamming the door. Michelle finally gets her bitch on and lets her "friends" have it: "Do you have any idea what you just did? Do you know why you don't like [Chloe]? Because you're scared of anyone who's not just like you." Word. It's a good speech; with a tad less eye-popping and jaw-thrusting ["and a real lesbian would've been cursing like a sailor here" -- Jitterbug], Michelle might have put it over. She storms out of the house, leaving Nia, Natasha, and Jennifer Keaton gaping.
Michelle drives up to Chloe's house and apologizes in front of her screen door. Chloe comes out and tells her that "clothes are only a part of who [she is]." She starts to explain about when she was a little girl, but Michelle assures Chloe that she understands. Michelle says that she was never ashamed of Chloe, but has been ashamed of herself. She wants to be "comfortable with herself" just like Chloe is. As the girlfriends reconcile, a neighbor guy takes out his trash and he lingers outside, all David E. Kelley-ish, hoping to glimpse some hot girl-on-girl action. Chloe and Michelle mack. Michelle shouts that the "lesbians are going inside to have SEX!" ["What an idiot! Sure, in an ideal world she might've been able to make that public proclamation without fearing for their safety. Michelle's clearly naïve of the Eric Rudolph types." -- Jitterbug] Neighbor guy's eyes bug. End. Two down, one to go. They saved the worse segment for last ["Hey!" -- Jitterbug] . . . “Heather Has Two Dharmas.” Footage from recent Gay Pride rallies and lesbian marriage ceremonies, accompanied by caterwauling from the Indigo Girls. ["Love the Indigo Girls, but really, do they have to always be the band that plays the lesbian anthem?" -- Jitterbug] The title says "2000." Sharon Stone is phoned the morning of the day of shooting and is pitched the role of Ellen Degeneres's love interest/lesbian life partner at the last minute. Sharon shows up with bedhead hair and pajama bottoms, thinking the filming is "come as you are" since she's a slumming big-time movie star. ["Actually, the intentionally-messed-up-hair look is the current chic for rich lesbians." -- Jitterbug] That's the only explanation I can possibly imagine for her appearance in this flick. Our story begins in the House of Talking Walls with Sharon upstairs brushing her teeth and boogying to salsa music while Ellen sits downstairs with a male gay couple. Sharon keeps brushing her teeth and checking out her belly. Ellen shares chit-chat with the guys, who are played by that dull guy who was the groom in the recent Father of the Bride flicks and Mitchell Anderson (natch), because although he's untalented, at least he's out, so he gets to do all of the gay man roles in Hollywood that Rupert Everett rejects. (Urgent plea: Please, please come out of the closet, gay men with acting ability. P.R., I'm looking in your direction.) ["K.S., I'm looking at you too." -- Jitterbug] Sharon finally comes downstairs, wearing a baby doll sailor dress with a pillow stuck in the belly. She says, "Taa daa!" and I guess we're supposed to laugh. ["I polled my friends recently, so I can assume that either you like Sharon Stone or you don't. There isn't anyone in the gray. I like her; think she's cute." -- Jitterbug] ["Girl, you can have her." -- Sars] I look over at the Walls Who Might Talk, and they're cringing at the sudden nose-dive of quality in this film. Sharon joins Ellen on the couch, and they argue with the gay men because the guys want to break their agreement to donate sperm but not have anything to do with the child Ellen and Sharon hope to raise together. The Dharmas are adamant about this "zero parenting clause" and express grief over the setback.
Cut to the Dharmas sitting on the hood of their SUV, scoping out the yard apes. They want a kid the way Carmen on Popular wants to eat food and lead cheers. Everybody up to speed? Great! Moving on. Sharon, still thinking she's got the title role in The Laurie Anderson Story, sits in her spiky chaos hair and glasses and lounging pajamas while cruising the net for sperm-for-sale sites. Ellen nixes this, because picking up the sperm is "the least she can do." (Which it really is, since Sharon will be carrying the child.) Sharon queries, "Maybe we can think about having an ethnic baby? Ethnic babies are SO beautiful!" I guess the Dharmas want the child to match all their Pier One furnishings. Whatever! But prima donna Ellen throws a fit, because she wants the baby to look just like her. Sharon apologizes for her suggestion and strokes Ellen's ego. The Dharmas declare their love for one another, as if these narcissists have the ability to feel for anyone but themselves. Sperm Bank. Wacky hijinx as the Dharmas run around the labyrinth of hallways. Ellen delivers a still-born comedy monologue about "donor profiles" reminding her of "FBI profiles" and how the baby's father might turn out to be a felon; Sharon follows her in an untucked Hawaiian shirt and sweatpants. (Note to Sharon Stone: We understand that you're not reprising your lesbian ice-pick murderess role in Basic Instinct. But does this pro bono performance mean you really have to look so unglamorous and disheveled? You just lost Camille Paglia as a fan.) The Dharmas run into a couple of guys and Ellen quips, "How's it coming?" I think we're supposed to laugh here, too. ! Cut to a waiting room. The Dharmas sit on one side while a Disapproving Heterosexual Couple sits across from them. Sharon muses aloud about her wish for "a great guy out there who's willing to donate his sperm to this great lesbian couple." The DHC grimaces as they look over at the Great Lesbian Couple. I bet we're supposed to think they're prejudiced, but I'm imagining a thought balloon over the husband that says, "What frightened her so badly that her frosted tips are standing straight up?" while his wife is thinking, "Wow, that Anne Heche looks at least twenty years older in person." ["I still like Sharon Stone, but that's very funny." -- Jitterbug] Office. A sperm broker assures the Dharmas that each donor is researched extensively and they would be getting "the cream of the crop." If that joke wasn't obvious enough for you, we cut to a close-up of Sharon squeezing creamy white moisturizer into her hand while incredulously pondering the "cream of the crop" sales spiel. If these jokes get any broader, the interior walls of the house will have to be knocked out completely. Oh wait, most of them have been already (or did some of the walls refuse to come out of their trailers after reading the script?) because we see Ellen exercising in a spacious home gym while listening to Sharon blather. The Dharmas consider adoption. Ellen cites the prejudice they'd face as a gay couple in trying to get an agency to give them a child. Hey, wait a minute, what about Ro -- ? (The MBTV lawyers won't let me finish that thought.) Ellen throws a big blue medicine ball in the air while she bemoans homophobia; the ball might as well be an anvil, because it so obviously represents the oppressive weight of the current prejudiced world. ["Fair enough, but I was thinking that exercise ball looked cool -- more fun than the treadmill at the gym. I have a short attention span, I guess." -- Jitterbug] Ellen bitches that she's not able to get Sharon pregnant. Sharon enters the room in yet another pair of baggy drawstring pants and strokes Ellen's ego by assuring her that she's through with men, and the very thought that a "part of a man" has to enter their bedroom makes her upset. Ellen complains that Sharon is "sitting on her ball." Sharon laughs, because I guess this was a joke. But wasn't the whole point of this scene Ellen's regret at not having testes? Whatever. ["Okay, wait a minute! Not all lesbians have penis envy and the frustration of wanting a baby does not merit the immediate assumption of wanting 'testes.'" -- Jitterbug] So flame me. I stand by my interpretation of the ball Ellen's holding to her crotch. !
Cut to the worst scene in the whole segment: Ellen leafs through the sperm donor candidate information and attempts a tragicomic monologue restating her belief that it's so damn unjust that the Dharmas can't reproduce without any outside assistance. You know what, Ellen? Big fat frickin' WHATEVER. So biology is just not on your side? You might as well curse the heavens for having to yield to gravity. Or go start a petition against those biased laws of physics while you're at it. So it's Nature 1, Ellen 0. Boo hoo. Get over it! ["However, the couple's dilemma has been somewhat of an untouched subject in gay film. I found it refreshing and realistic. At least none of the three segments were 'coming out stories.'" -- Jitterbug]. Sharon, wearing an ineffective headband, busily makes brownies in the background. She gently reminds Ellen that she just needs to "narrow down" the donor choices. Ellen has winnowed it down -- to the guys who look just like her. The air blooms narcissus some more. Sharon offers Ellen a tray of brownies. Ellen has refused "to get fat over this process." Once again, I'm reminded that she's too lazy to offer to carry the baby her own damn self. Then the Dharmas have sex because "there's better entertainment than what's on TV." Sharon, you just said a mouthful. Owen crosses "watching Ellen Degeneres getting some" from his list of things he hoped never to see before he died. David E. Kelley wears down the "pause" and "rewind" buttons on his VCR while Michelle Pfeiffer calls to him, wondering if he's ever going to come to bed. Bathroom. Sharon, in another set of pajamas paired with cute track-shoe mules, has completed a test that tells her she's ovulating. The Dharmas rejoice and the slapstick begins. They run downstairs. Ellen calls the sperm bank. Sharon suddenly has second thoughts about the donor. She finally chooses "the carpenter." Ellen is pleased, because Jesus was a carpenter. Holy Mary, Mother of Christ! Get over yourself, hon! Ellen is suddenly crestfallen because the sperm bank is "out of Jesus." The yuppie divas whine and regret that they didn't buy up all the Jesus when he was in stock. Ellen demands over the phone that the sperm bank get Jesus to "produce more." Ellen is told it's not possible. Sharon settles for "the professor." Ellen orders "all of it" and goes to fetch the seed. Ellen picks up a metal container of sperm the size of a milk urn. Aretha Franklin and Annie Lennox's "Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves" starts up (GET IT?), and both singers' stock plummets on Owen's celebrity trading floor. Cut to Ellen driving five miles an hour down the road with a string of cars idling behind her. A car passes, and Ellen explains that she's going so slow because she's carrying "sperm." Heh -- it's the Dharmas' Wacky World of Insemination Hijinx, and everyone else just lives in it. Cut to Sharon at home, boiling a turkey baster.
Ellen pulls up the house and lugs the urn to the door. Sharon greets her in a feather boa, black bra, and boxer shorts. The Dharmas titter about carrying "the baby" upstairs. Sharon has littered flowers all over the bedroom. She sheepishly shows Ellen the shriveled turkey baster that she over-boiled. Lucy's got some 'splainin to do! Ricky loves her anyway. We never get to find out how Sharon gets inseminated with the urn full of semen. The walls assure me that I don't want to know. Montage Alert! Sharon does a headstand to improve her fertility. Ellen lugs more sperm inside the house. The Dharmas mack and mug some more. Headstand. Lugging. Macking. Mugging. Headstand. Lugging. Macking. Mugging. Repeat ad nauseam. Examining room. Sharon's in the stirrups. Kathy Najimy is the attending physician. Sharon expositions her complaint about being "so infertile" -- the at-home inseminations never took. Ellen redundantly brings her a glass of wine. Kathy offers tertiary praise of the Dharmas for being "so amazing" during the whole impregnation process. She asks Ellen if she wants to be the one to insert the sperm. Does she ever! Sharon braces herself, all actressy, but the procedure takes less than a second. The Dharmas kiss. Kathy makes herself scarce. Owen wants to go with. That kooky Sharon does a headstand while -- guffaw! -- she's strapped in the front seat of the SUV. Ellen pulls up to the playground and Sharon takes her feet out of the sunroof. They sit on the hood of the car and scope out young'uns. Sharon wonders if their pregnancy is "selfish" because their child will be teased. Ellen: Blah blah all kids get teased yadda yadda prejudice might be wiped out in the generation yaw yaw house of love blather rinse repeat. The Dharmas talk to a woman who's leaving the park with her children. She suggests that they give motherhood a try. Tertiary praise from a complete stranger now. Whatever. ! Bathroom. Sharon shows the indicator stick of a pregnancy test to Ellen. It's positive. They smile. They double take. They gape. They wail. They hug. "This Will Be (An Everlasting Love)" begins to groove. The camera in the doorway films the Dharmas as they cavort and boogie all over their enormous bathroom. It's kind of like the scene in Bull Durham where Annie Savoy and Crash Davis dance together to "Sixty Minute Man" in her parlor, except they were likable characters in a laudable piece of entertainment. The credits roll. I heard the ratings were very good for this installment. I know the subjects that are probably being bandied about for If These Walls Could Talk 3: menopause, breast cancer, domestic violence, girls who don't follow The Rules, pads without wings. Can I suggest that it be about renovation? I covet that cavernous bathroom. End.