​
Think of your favorite romantic comedy. If you don’t have one, think of just the first romcom that comes to mind. Now picture: what does the woman who serves as the female lead do for her job? I’ll venture a guess: she’s a fashion editor. Or a journalist. Or she owns a bakery. Or she’s in publishing. Or she’s a teacher. Whatever it is she does for a living, more likely than not, she behaves unethically at her job, or she works for one scene and then never again, or she ends the film in a relationship with a coworker that would horrify HR. Through this project, I want to explore why women in romcoms are confined to these limited roles, and how those tropes can actually harm the romance or the movie itself. By watching romcoms, both some of my favorites and some that were new to me, I seek to explore the relationship between a woman’s job in a romcom and how the romance plays out.
On this site, you’ll find an analysis of the work portrayed in each films, as well some of my culminating thoughts. Some things to note: I’m not interested in defining what a romcom is or making a judgement on the genre. Although it is very true that romcoms under-represent large groups of people, this site isn’t focused on that failing of the genre. This project could be a lot of things that it isn’t — what it is is one woman trying to sort out why the same things keep happening in a romcom with a woman’s job over and over again, and what it all means. You don’t have to read about every movie, or read them in any order, but my hope is that these essays will help you see romcoms the way I do.
​
​
Welcome!
Wait, there's more:
While watching romcoms and writing about them through the lens of labor may seem kind of silly, I promise there are real stakes here. Romcoms reflect culture, and the way these women talk about and interact with their careers is a window into how society views women, how the film industry views working women, and how films over time have been thinking about work/life dynamics. Do these romcoms restrain women by only letting them do like one of five jobs? Do women in these romcoms get to have both a robust personal life and career? Is it unequal to the men? In a time when women still make less than for what a man makes for the same work (even worse for women of color), this kind of stuff matters. Yes, it’s fun to groan at the cliches and tropes inherent to the romcom formula, but as 2018 and 2019 have seen a romcom resurgence, this genre deserves the some kind of critical analysis.
​
And to be honest, I’m undertaking this project because I truly, madly, deeply, love the romantic comedy. Most of my favorite movies of the past few years have been romantic comedies. I love The Proposal. I cry every time I watch Notting Hill. 10 Things I Hate About You is a perfect movie and I will fight anyone who disagrees. I know, in part, that I love them because I’ve been allowed to imagine myself in these roles — romcoms are overwhelmingly about straight, white women. Romcoms do serious work, and could do better, and I acknowledge the privilege I have to see versions of me fall in love on screen. For me, watching a romantic comedy feels like the best form of escapism — the guy gets the girl, the villains get their comeuppance, and New York always looks great in the fall.
Yet, I also consider myself to be a feminist, engaging with culture with a critical eye toward how representations of women help/harm the cause of equality. Romcoms do important cultural work, whether they are taken seriously or not. I mean, haven’t I imagined myself as a writer or an editor in New York like so many of my romcom idols are? So I’m embracing Roxane Gay’s idea of being a “bad feminist,” loving popular culture that represents women poorly, knowing it doesn’t always live up to the ideals to which I hold society. I’m not ashamed to love romcoms, and I hope you aren’t either. Yet I don’t want to look at culture with a blind eye, ignoring the ways that romcoms fail working women. So this project is me wrestling with these parts of myself that are at odds, and I hope you’ll join me. I promise not to destroy your love of your favorite romcom.