I HAVE A BONE TO PICK WITH THE DIPLOMAT

On Kate Wyler and Rebecca Solnit

(TWO NOTES: Events are at the end of the newsletter, including the latest on Writers in Conversation—and the last chance to pre-order my new poetry collection, The Sky Weeps With Us! Second: Spoilers galore, so beware if you haven’t yet finished The Diplomat!)

If you have finished it, what the hell were those writers thinking?

The Diplomat, for anyone unfamiliar with it, is a Netflix drama about Kate Wyler, who is appointed Ambassador to England with an eye to perhaps replacing the VP. Along with the political drama, the behind-the-scenes drama is, of course, about Kate’s sex life, beginning with her husband Hal, with whom she is so furious in Season One that she tries to kill him. Remember that scene where she chases him through the trees, then shoves him to the ground? He even admits he shouldn’t have done whatever it was. (Hey, it’s three seasons ago.)

In these seasons, we’ve met a strong, intelligent woman able to talk to heads of state, negotiate treaties, deal with spies, and win over her staff, even while she’s dealing with her underhanded and uncontrollable (and occasionally useful) husband. At the beginning of Season Three, she and Hal finally agree to divorce, and she has a new boyfriend, intelligence officer Callum Ellis, who doesn’t give her all the intelligence she needs to make an [intelligent] decision. She blows up at him, tells him he’s just like Hal because he holds out on her. Later, she apologizes and asks if he’s “done with” her. Seriously?

Then, Hal gets her to persuade the British PM to do something which she later discovers Hal and the President have manipulated. This, five minutes after she begged him to take her back. Begged: “You have to forgive me. You have to take me back.” (Weeping goes here.)

But why does she want him back? (And why does she want Calum back?) Earlier in the show, Hal says he’s being thoughtful when he arranges a bedroom next door to his so she can sneak her lover in. She tells him that’s inappropriate. (Yes, it is.) He calls her a bitch—and she apologizes!! How can she not recognize his passive-aggressive manipulation and bullying? How did she go from being a kick butt ambassador in Season One, who saw through her husband’s shenanigans, to a needy girl in Season Three?

I’ve been reading Rebecca Solnit with my students. She reflects in “Pandora’s Box and the Volunteer Police Force,” an essay from her collection Men Explain Things to Me, on how when anyone flexes their rights (who is not white and male), the “volunteer police force” pushes back. For example, it’s impossible to be a successful career woman if you have kids, right? Or be a successful mother if you have a career? Or be pretty if you don’t smile at men? Our Diplomat heroine is luckily childless, as it also appears, is the president in the form of Allison Janney. “Powerful women,” as one of my students wrote, “always end up destroyed or punished.”

This season’s resolution feels as if the writers got scared that a powerful woman was becoming too powerful, so they shoved her back into the box, made her a victim of her own desires and fears. However, this is new behavior. She’s always known exactly what she wanted. She didn’t return to Washington with Hal because she needed her own career. She recognized his manipulations and called him on them. I know writers on shows take some weird right turns to maintain the drama, but her character is inconsistent. The writer said she wanted Kate to reckon with her own flaws this season. Why do women’s flaws always need to be sexual? Instead, why not have her reckon with her professional flaws? And why are flaws all about Kate when so clearly Hal is more than half of this problem? We even end the show with Hal and the President whispering intimately to each other—after Hal has agreed to take Kate back. We have a chance for a female role model—flawed, sure, but still strong and cleareyed. Able to make decisions at the table with the big boys. C’mon, Diplomat writers. Don’t mess that up.

As always, thanks for reading, and I’d love to hear your thoughts!!

Events:

November 5: Norwalk Poet Laureate Katie Schneider hosts Poets and Writers Night at The Spread in South Norwalk. Information here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/norwalk-poets-writers-night-featuring-poet-shanna-t-melton-tickets-1538911829709 DM Katie if it’s full and you’re interested!

November 6: Thrown Stone’s Pop Up at Crystal Theatre, South Norwalk. Thrown Stone is a local theatre company who has just relocated to Norwalk. Register for the event (required but free!), which includes live music, poetry, theatre, flow art signature cocktails, local food and good conversation with interesting people, at https://thrownstone.org/lets-gather-nov-6/.

November 12: Writers in Conversation, with Victoria Buitron and Julie Sarkissian, who write honest and surprising poetry, fiction and memoir about the challenges of being women and mothers at the Norwalk Public Library, 6:30 PM. All are welcome!