Friday, Aug 29, 2008
Camryn Manheim's flawed world; I'm afraid of my anthrax shots.
May 24, 1999 |
Size matters
BY JOYCE MILLMAN
(05/17/99)
Since Camryn Manheim seems so attuned to the way women who aren't traditionally beautiful are denied sexual or romantic roles, I wonder why she had no problem when her character on "The Practice" rejected a man she had met on the Internet because in person he was slightly built and wimpy-looking -- i.e., he didn't fit the traditional concept of male attractiveness. (It now looks as if that same character, after months of hedging by the show's writers, will finally turn out to be a nutty serial killer -- furthering the stereotype that if a guy is shy and slight, there must be something wrong with him.)
If Manheim really cared about conquering Hollywood typecasting, she would look at how it affects both genders, not just her own.
-- B. Allen
Camryn Manheim is a thoroughly deluded person, and I'm surprised that Salon climbed aboard what is so obviously a PR bandwagon. Manheim is quoted as saying she wants to "live in a world with tiramisu." I have an even better idea for Manheim: How about living in a world where buying clothes isn't an overpriced, embarrassing chore? Where how you look isn't such an all-encompassing issue because you know that, at the very least, you don't look bad? Where you can run and swim and play games and dance as much as you want, without exhaustion overtaking you in five minutes? That is living, and the loss of it all is one hell of a price to pay for just another bite of tiramisu.
-- Rob Anderson
Please add to the list of easily avoidable offensive descriptions the term "good Jewish liberals," which Joyce Millman applies to Camryn Manheim's parents (it may be Manheim's own description). The phrase calls to mind a master list sorting "good Jews" from "bad Jews." Let's not go there.
-- Arthur Stock
Get Salon in your mailbox!