Thinking Gillian Anderson doesn't look like Scully any more = sexism?

In My Humble Opinion
121

I don’t know, I’m an American and while I don’t think I’ve actually seen anything Anderson or Duchovny has been in post X-Files I’m aware that Anderson has appeared in movies like The Last King of Scotland, had a major role in at least one recent American network TV show (Hannibal), and has been in some of the British miniseries that wind up on PBS over here.

Off the top of my head I don’t know of anything Duchovny has done in recent years aside from Californication, a cable show I was never more than vaguely aware of. I probably wouldn’t remember the title if it wasn’t the same as a Red Hot Chili Peppers song/album, and I can’t recall anyone I know ever even mentioning Californication to me. I won’t claim that my friends and I reflect the general American public, but it’s not my impression that Duchovny’s been getting more or higher-profile work than Anderson since The X-Files.

I’m guessing you meant the bolded portion to be the other way around. :slight_smile:

While I agree that Mulder and Scully are of equal importance to The X-Files and that the actors should be paid equally, I could actually see a stronger case for paying Anderson more than Duchovny than the other way around. IMHO she’s the better actor, Wikipedia tells me she won more major awards for her performance as Scully than Duchovny did for Mulder, and she remained on The X-Files for the entire run while he sued the studio and then quit in a contract dispute. (I don’t know enough about this to say whether Duchovny was in the right, but right or wrong he was apparently a bigger headache for the studio than Anderson.)

But even playing Scully’s Advocate I wouldn’t say that Anderson deserved double Duchovny’s salary unless the new miniseries were going to be mostly about Scully and had Mulder in a relatively minor role. And if that were the case then I’d say there was no point doing the miniseries at all, because (as you say) what most viewers would want to see is Mulder and Scully as partners, not The Mulder Show OR The Scully Show.

122

I waited until I watched the episode last night to have an opinion, and in my opinion, Scully looks exactly like Scully should look, although she’s obviously lightened her hair.

As for how much she should be paid, how many people here would bitch and moan if the character of Scully had been recast or left out entirely?

123

What is sexist is that, presented with a statement: “two actors are reprising their starring roles in a TV show; but the scuttlebut is that one (the woman) is going to be earning only half the amount as the other,” your unfounded speculation used to justify it is that she doesn’t look right, so it makes sense.

So, a woman in entertainment isn’t earning the equivalent of her male counterpart, and your answer, knowing nothing about any of the actual reasons, is that it’s obviously because of her looks. That’s what’s sexist.

I’d be willing to bet that if this show had two male leads, and the same pay discrepancy, you’d probably be saying something like, “well, one is a much better actor,” or something along those lines.

124

Your OPINION that older women are not sexually attractive while older men are is not some immutable biological fact. It is, however, incredibly sexist.

125

Without the Scully/Mulder dynamic and differences between the two, six episodes is all the first season would’ve lasted.

Mulder is dedicated, easily led and sometimes stupid. How could there be any real story without Scully’s scientific approach? (Please explain to me the scientific nature of the “whammy”.) Really, a man who bases his entire career, life and ideology about an alien abduction he thinks he saw when he was 14 I have very little sympathy for. I also have less sympathy for specialty doctors like Scully to reside faith in any religion, but her research methods are within reason. I think that helps the interest of the diversity of the two.

Does she look older? Of course. Does Duchovny? As much as Gillian to me. It’s been only two years since Californication ended and he looks like he and Bruce Campbell ate at the same waffle diner for a while.

126

I think the OP is getting a little too much grief for this. Let’s unpack the various claims.

Disclaimer: I was never a huge X-Files fan, but probably saw a dozen or so episodes of the original. I didn’t know, or had forgotten, that there had been movies.

  1. In a scenario like this, actors’ work is more valuable the more they maintain a resemblance to the character: I think this is basically true. This is a nostalgia play, and being able to invoke fans’ emotional connection to the series relies on resembling the original characters in appearance and behavior.

  2. DD looks more like FM than GA looks like DS: I agree, but I don’t know if there’s an objective answer here. I think a lot of this comes from the fact that DD has a very distinctive face, where GA is more of a conventionally attractive woman. Even if they deviated from their 15-years-ago appearances by an equal amount, this effect would make today’s DD resemble 15-years-ago DD more than today’s GA’s resemblance to 15-years-ago’s GA.

  3. DD has aged ‘better’ than GA: I think this is false, though again, probably no objective truth here. However, I don’t think the OP is claiming this, nor is it relevant to the OP’s point.

  4. DS was less important to the original series that FM: Again, not a huge fan, but I think this is false.

  5. There are reasonable, objective, non-sexist criteria which justify the studio offering less to GA than to DD: Yes, I think so based on points 1 and 2. However, I consider it unlikely the studio used this logic, and more likely offered GA less based on deeply ingrained, sexist concepts of relative value in Hollywood. I think GA was right to push back and insist on equal pay, and the fact that she was successful is indicative that the studio knew they needed both actors to make this project a success.

This last point means that the Hollywood system is sexist. It does not mean that the OP is sexist. Assuming he’s faithfully representing the discussions he had on Facebook, his friends are wrong to impute this motive to him.

127

It’s ridiculous that “liberal” Hollywood has not gotten over the sexism when paying salaries of actors. Both characters were essential for an X-Files reunion and they should have been offered the same amount of money.

128

Mostly the thing that pings my “doesn’t look like Scully” sense is her hair color - if she had red hair, even with it longer she’d be immediately identifiable. Alas, if only there were some way for women to change the color of their hair…

I did a quick Wiki scan of their post-X Files careers and both have been very busy on TV and film, although Duchovny had the benefit of one long television gig in Californication and Anderson has been doing roles in smaller series and films in England (which is more common here). It may be that the difference in salary offer was due to US visibility - Duchovny will have been on Americans’ radar; Anderson less so - but I wouldn’t bet against blatant sexism either.

129

I feel the same way!

130

What seems weird to me is that the OP based his opinion on a publicity photo and not on how she might look in the show. Looking at the screen shots from the new series on IMDB I think she without a doubt still looks like Scully, just a bit older (as does Mulder) and I’ve been watching old episodes lately to get ready for the new series. To me, Mulder actually looks more different, because he looks like such a kid in the early shows. I don’t think either of them had trench coats on in the publicity photo either, and somehow I doubt they’ll be cruising around in '93 Taurus or Cutlass, either.

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/topic

132

This is what is extremely obviously false. To the point that I wonder if your disclaimer should be “I don’t watch anything nostalgic.” Or even “I don’t watch anything that brings back old characters.”

Unless the point is to have an all-new cast playing younger versions, they always try to bring back the original actors. If they don’t quite look like their old selves? This is Hollywood. **Makeup exists. **

It’s also weird to me that, even though you thought this was a possibility, you are so sure that Hollywood isn’t using this reason, and thus being sexist. But you don’t think this for the OP. What’s the difference in logic? Is it just that you are assuming good faith in the OP, but not a faceless studio?

I’m not calling the OP a bigot. I believe him 100% that he didn’t think what he was saying was bigoted. And his subsequent posts tell me that he thinks his thinking is perfectly logical and thus not affected by the biases around him. That’s going to create some blind spots.

133

And here we’ve found the real problem. Rather than work to change your opinion to fit the reality outside your head, you vehemently disagree but begrudgingly go along with it.

That’s why your “logical thought processes” are breaking down. You’re continuing with faulty premises that lead you to incorrect conclusions.

Maybe I can help, by attacking your flawed logic with “Oriental.”

Words like “Oriental” don’t become offensive because of logic. They become offensive due to historical usage. The term was used in a way that was discriminatory towards East Asian people. Sure, they point out that it’s Western-World-centric, but that alone doesn’t make it offensive. That plus treatment that made them feel like less of a person made it offensive.

One general rule is that minority groups get to pick their own names. It’s a matter of respect to call them by those names. Sometimes they pick names that are the same as what we already call them. For some reason or another, they don’t care. They don’t feel like the word was oppressive.

No amount of turning “Oriental” and “Middle Eastern” around in your head will lead you to discovering the difference. Because the difference isn’t in your head. It’s out in the real world.

This adjustment, from an internally centered view on offensiveness to an external one may help you. That way, when you encounter something, you won’t need to go around demanding that people explain how it’s wrong in your logic. Because your logic isn’t the relevant one.

The logic with why what you said was sexist is the same logic that’s been used by everyone, including your (ex?) friend. The general statement is sexist. You didn’t sufficiently override this sexism with an argument that wasn’t stupid. That stupid argument is one that is very much like a sexist argument.

Your argument is sexist whether you meant it to be or not. It’s sexist whether you actually think negatively of women. It’s sexist because it is perceived as sexist, just like “Oriental” is offensive because it is perceived as offensive.

Offense isn’t purely logical. It involves other people. For a simple approximation, what is offensive is what your audience tells you is offensive.

134

For those of you going on about Gillian Anderson’s hair, the red hair back in the day was a dye job; she’s a natural blonde. If anything, what you see is closer to her real color.
Anderson is also currently featured in A&E’s War and Peace. She plays a devious aristocrat. Her hair is blondish there too.

135

I don’t mean to play nerdier-than-thou, but I really question those who think that the X-Files would have been the same show without the Mulder-Scully dynamic (or that ‘anyone’ could have played the Scully role, and not the Mulder one). I don’t think anyone who was a fan of the show, even a casual one, could realistically come to that conclusion.

It’s also bizarre to assert that Duchovny (of whom I am a huge fan) is a more accomplished or heavily-working actor than Anderson, as has been discussed in this thread. Anderson has been doing a lot of highly-praised work (and some other less highly-praised work as well). Duchovny has been in one other long-running (though I’m not sure about how highly-rated) show and another recent, not-very-successful show. The difference, I suppose, is that Anderson’s headlining work has been in the UK mostly. I think it’s a wash on this front.

It’s blatantly obvious that was Anderson was talking about is a blatant sexist practice that is going on beyond this one circumstance. Namely, studios think they can offer women less, so they do. They assume men will laugh at the lowball offers, so they don’t bother. And some women, no doubt, do take the lowball offers because acting is a very insecure job market. Anderson is in a position where she didn’t have to, and so she didn’t, and spoke up about it.

I think it’s pretty clearly rooted in sexism, and/or total ignorance of how Hollywood/TV works, and how the X-Files worked in particular, to try to find a way to justify Anderson being lowballed – for any reason.

136

I wholeheartedly agree that Gillian Anderson DOES NOT look the same anymore. Sure, David Duchovny just looks older and more tired, but Anderson’s face looks longer and her cheekbones more pronounced. The idea that this is sexist is such BULLSH** it’s not even funny. I am currently watching the new X-Files and I’m bummed because Scully just looks TOO DIFFERENT! Why is it that through ALL previous NINE years Gillian Anderson essentially looks the same, and now, 20 years later, she looks like someone from Desperate Housewives? Sure, she’s beautiful and definitely MILFY, but I’m sorry, she looks so different. She CLAIMS she hasn’t had plastic surgery, and I’ve read comments by surgeons that say her face “doesn’t show evidence of plastic surgery…the tucks and pulls aren’t there,” and I couldn’t care less if she HAD had surgery…it’s just that she’s lost that realness and softness. Now she just LOOKS like she’s Scully’s mother: the family resemblance is there, but Scully WAS abducted!

137

This is just dumb. Scully is a fictional character who has aged. There’s no reason to believe that she would look anything other than like the actress who played her as she has actually aged. The idea that there is some standard by which to measure what Scully should look like 20 years later is plain silly.

138

Correct. They should have. It’s probably because he’s American and she’s British and they had to offer more to get DD. It’s bullsh** but sadly that’s how it is sometimes. She was right to have brought it up. Sheesh! Actors’ egos!

139

What are you going to look like in 20 years?

140

There were many years before X-Files where she didn’t look like Scully either.