ilruggitodelmandrillo

[debbiewilder]

the meaning of “real actress” for Ruth

y’all ever think about how Ruth wants to become a “real actress” and get “real parts” because she can't communicate anything “real” in her life :/

I also just think how the word “real” is used in relation to Ruth throughout the series is interesting.

The first time it’s used, the word is used to diminish Ruth. The casting director Mallory says: “Every director says, “Bring me someone I don’t know. Someone I haven’t seen. I want a girl who’s real.” So I bring you in so they can see that they don't actually want the thing they think they want.”

So, basically she’s told that her “realness” makes her unfit for the escapist version of real. In a way, that’s what Ruth does with the word real too. She calls herself a real actress but self destructs when given any real opportunity to act. Just in the pilot, she’s given an audition. She reads the wrong part. Sure, that’s badass in ways and really shows who she is but it’s also…incredibly self destructive, disrespectful, and isn’t going to help her move up from smaller roles to get the “real” roles she desires. Her idealism gets in the way of her achieving her goals. Her obsession with being a real actress inhibits her ability to act at all. Later in the episode, she ruins her chances at GLOW by being obsessed with showing off that she’s a real actress. She doesn’t follow a simple direction and has to impose the real actress thing on this audition (she then uses this term “real actress” as the only way to defend why she should stay in GLOW versus keeping Carmen; Sam chooses Carmen). 

In retrospect, there are a lot of layers to the way the pilot is structured. We go from Ruth talking about wanting “real parts.” And the very next scene shows Ruth and Debbie together. This juxtaposition is meaningful in my opinion because Ruth can’t communicate in any real way to Debbie. She’s already slept with Mark. In the scene, Ruth hands Debbie her windbreaker thingy and yes it’s out of kindness maybe but as I’ve said before I think it’s also because she doesn't want to face how deep that betrayal is (she didn’t just have sex with her friend’s husband, it’s her friend who has a baby and is still lactating that she’s betrayed…really really really bad). So, Ruth talks about “real” parts in acting but fails to communicate honestly with Debbie in 1x01. And of course the betrayal itself comes out of a lack of coping in a healthy way with her own insecurities and a lack of honest communication with Debbie. 

In addition, these two scene are visually connected by mirrors. Mirrors are used throughout the series, often in relation to Debbie but they occasionally occur for Ruth as well. Of course, mirrors often suggest truth, honesty, etc. I think it’s interesting that Ruth never looks at her own reflection in that scene with the casting director Mallory. She looks at Mallory in the mirror and watches her the whole time as she speaks of real parts, even when Mallory leaves she’s still facing Mallory’s direction rather than looking inward at all or towards her own reflection. She’s so focused on her own goals and “real parts” that she can’t seem to see herself. 

This next two scenes (Ruth and Debbie in the exercise class, then in the locker room) feature mirrors prominently with characters even looking at their own reflections but not even seeming to really see themselves. The mirrors seem to suggest in subtext: Ruth can’t face her own truth (casting director scene), Debbie can’t face her own truth (exercise class scene), they can’t face each other honestly (locker room scene).

There are actually a lot of other scenes in the pilot that feature a mirror with Ruth including the next scene but I have nothing I really want to say about those so moving on. I want to delve into Ruth’s obsession with the term “real actress” and how it negatively impacts her life.

As I’ve said, the term “real actress” leads Ruth to destruct the real opportunities to act that she gets in 1x01. She’s so focused on this term she can’t see the opportunities in front of her. She also still can’t deal with the shame of not getting roles in a healthy way in 3x09. She has to blame Sam, get disgusted by Sam, because her thinking about acting is so all or nothing that she can’t cope with the shame of not getting this small role (if she can't get this role, it means she’s not a real actress and her whole identity is crushed; if she can blame Sam, she can still salvage that identity as real actress because it’s not on her, it’s on someone else). Look at how many times she blames Sam in this one line: “That’s when you’d feel like an asshole? You called me in. You knew how much this would mean to me! You made me feel like I finally had a chance to do something real.” The number of times the word “you” is said. And, again, it’s about wanting to do something real in fiction while she ruins anything that could be real with Sam. It’s about pushing away her shame onto someone else. A bit later in the scene, she says “I’ll pour out my heart to you about what a fucking failure I am, and you’ll pretend to listen, and then you’ll try to get in my pants.” Again, she’s labeling herself, here as a failure (it’s either fucking failure or a real actress, there’s clearly no in between in her head) and it makes it so she can’t see the audition for what it was and can’t see Sam for who he is and it makes it so that she can’t show up for Sheila later. 

Ruth totally ruins her scene with Sheila. She says Sheila’s a better actress than her. And I don't even think that’s necessarily true. Ruth was, from what I remember, basically cold reading the freaking scene when she met up with Sheila yet still felt so much insecurity that Sheila could even clearly see it and pointed it out. She didn’t study the scene yet. Of course she wouldn’t be as good. But she’s so all or nothing and then just doesn't show up to the performance, it’s just…”Sheila’s a better actress.” Like...girl, maybe study a bit more? 

She carries the specter of Katharine Hepburn around with her in the form of that huge portrait, reminding her of the dissonance of who she is versus who she wants to be, that it’s “real actress” or failure. It looms in the background as Ruth calls her parents and asks for more money in 1x01 (as do mirrors), as Ruth talks to Sheila about Sheila’s costume that’s not a costume in 1x04. I think these two characters are foils in ways, real actress isn’t a costume just like the she-wolf isn't a costume. It’s a protection, it’s something to build their identities around. Sheila’s able to let go of that she-wolf identity because she recognizes how it was getting in her way and it isn’t about throwing away who she is but about becoming even more of herself by letting go of that element. Of course Sheila is with Ruth for these huge moments of clarity, the two are connected with that aspect of their identity that they need to shed, that isn’t serving them. But, Ruth clings on even harder while Sheila is willing to grow and risk and “gamble.” (Ruth’s line to Sam in 3x02: “I don’t understand why anyone gambles” has layers. She doesn’t take gambles in life. She wants to be real actress and when she fears she might fail, she just doesn’t show up or blames others or compares herself or reads the wrong role etc etc. She doesn’t gamble with her love life. She just kind of knows Russell is wrong for her and doesn't let him go because that’s a risk, she only goes after Sam after he says that he’s in love with her and that she’s in love with him (she gets to follow his script so there’s safety in that) but as soon as she gets beyond the “I love you” with Sam, she just self destructs because she doesn't want to take a risk and would rather ruin it in the beginning because there’s control in that (I mean, she’s already pre-ruined it in ways since she’s telling him she’s in love with him while still dating Russell ffs), when Debbie offers her a different vision of the future Ruth doesn’t take it because she can’t let go of that “real actress” identity and can’t take a gamble etc etc)

Yes, she takes GLOW because she’s desperate and all of that. But the core identity thing is that she views herself as a real actress and that inhibits her from doing what she loves. She easily could’ve shown up to that performance with Sheila, we’re told that when Ruth says she can have a drink with Sam that she could still make the performance. The point is, her shame over failing that term “real actress” when she didn’t get a role in Justine’s film stopped her from appearing with Sheila in case she risked failing again. She’d rather fail by not showing up than risk humiliation and see she’s not good enough. She says she wants real roles but when she gets them with Sheila, it’s not right because Sheila’s better, because this or that...in truth, the real actress shit is all self destructive bullshit. In truth, it’s stopping her in art and in life.

Ruth likes control and she’s very all or nothing (Debbie is too but in a different way). Ruth is all or nothing about her ideals. She’s so ashamed of her own inability to live up to this “real actress” identity she’s constructed for herself, inability to live up to that large portrait she carries everywhere, that she does nothing as an actress. She can’t. The dissonance between reality and her imagined ideal is too great, grows greater by the day. She’s not in that scene study with Sheila and Tammé etc I think it’s not necessarily that she doesn’t care about acting and shouldn’t do it at all, it’s that her view of acting is messed up and needs to change.

Ruth sees other people around her moving on and taking gambles at life and gaining so much success while she just…stays the same. That moment facing the mirror in the changing room is powerful because of all of this subtext. And yet she still sublimates all of her real into that term “real actress” and fails to find a way to cultivate anything real in her life. She’s desperate to be a real actress but in her real life clings onto Russell when she knows he’s not right. She’s desperate to be a real actress but can’t be a real friend in 1x01. She’s desperate to be a real actress but can't deal with real feelings/humiliation in 3x09, she’s desperate to be a real actress so rejects risking anything with Sam. She’s not sure why she had sex with Mark and so much about herself. She’s not sure how she feels about Russell or Sam. She’s told how they feel about her and kind of takes it from there rather than instigating or sorting out much of anything on her own. She just kind of lets people tell her what to do and how to feel and who to be. It’s like she thinks some role is going to save her and give her all that she needs instead of finding agency and power in her own life.

She pushes all of her closest relationships away because of this obsession—Sam in 3x09, Debbie in 1x01 and in 3x10 (not that I think she was wrong to speak up in 3x10 in ways because I think Debbie’s offer could’ve been phrased better but Ruth’s words came out of this real actress obsession, and she could’ve spoken up without pushing Debbie’s offer totally away in that scene), Russell (her relationship is a mess and she can’t face breaking up with him or how she really feels about him) etc. 

I think she lets herself be pushed around by all these people in her life because she thinks it somehow doesn't matter as long as she’s escaping into “real parts.” That’s where she gets to feel powerful and strong. It’s interesting because actress = someone who acts = active person. And, Ruth can’t seem to act or actively pursue much that matters to her let alone in a healthy way. She needs to honestly uncover what she wants from her career, from acting, from others in her life, and from herself and go after it without that perfectionist shit, without that escapism, she needs to not only express to but uncover how she actually feels about the people in her life—Sam, Russell, Debbie, etc. Because until she can express and actually let herself feel and face herself honestly, she’s never going to be happy in a real way. Not even if she’s cast in a huge, "real” role tomorrow. It’s not going to save her. In fact, I’d argue she can’t even be a real actress and express truth in art until she’s capable of facing truth in her own life.

She can’t even face her own shame or wants because she just says this phrase again and again. I think her arc, if GLOW is given a season 4, will be about letting go of the phrase “real actress” and finding out what she really wants. She could still want acting, but she can't want it the way she’s been pursuing/not pursuing it. She could want directing. She could want to go back to Nebraska and teach. Probably not but who knows. But she can’t just keep repeating the same unhealthy patterns. Ruth stays the same, these audition rooms stay the same in 1x01 and 3x09, while the people around her in GLOW grow and change. 

So, this is the foundation of Ruth’s arc. She wants to be a real actress but really needs to find the strength to be a real person. Or something.