Here's something for your noggin. I've adapted an academic piece I wrote back in 2011. It was pretty long, so I have broken it into pieces and done a bit of re-writing so it isn't the insomnia cure it was.
The Female Entrapment Thriller: Female Stardom
One of the primary factors underlying the success of the Female Entrapment Thriller is its reliance on female stars. The Female Entrapment Thriller represents a generic structure which restricts or obstructs the essential qualities embodied by the image of the female star. The construction of the entrapped heroine, especially in terms of her qualities of innocence and docility, are based upon their representation in the figure of the female star. The way in which the female star’s established persona is represented in the Female Entrapment Thriller provides a form of extra-diegetic commentary on the qualities associated with their star persona. On the subject of stars, Richard Dyer makes the observation, “Stars are, like characters in stories, representations of people” (20). This representation is based on a real person, whose non-diegetic history acts as an extra diegetic complement to the character that the star is playing within the world of the narrative, making it “possible to believe... that as people they are more real than characters in stories” (Dyer, 20). The value of the female star in the Female Entrapment thriller lies in a remediation of the qualities of their star persona which are emphasized in their individual representations of femininity.
When discussing his 1991 horror thriller Silence of the Lambs, director Jonathan Demme once said, “Personally, I’d much rather see a strong story with a lead character as a woman than as a man because the odds are stacked higher against the women” (quoted in O’Hara, 126). Demme’s statement reinforces the relationship between perceptions of gender and conventions of genre running through discussions of female-centered genre works. Generating tension through the combination of images of femininity with the conventions of a thriller premise, the drama of this combination is based on a perceived imbalance in the power relationship between the female protagonist and the stakes of the dramatic situation she has to overcome. Such a perceived disjunction lies at the heart of the relationship between the conventions of the Female Entrapment Thriller and the female star that portrays the entrapped heroine.
The role of the entrapped heroine can be seen as a framework for addressing the characteristics and contradictions underpinning the star personae of its female stars. The four films under analysis present four different characterizations of the female star, and hence four different relationships between star-texts and diegetic heroines. The four characterizations of the star are as follows:
The Star as emancipated independent woman
The Star as innocent ingénue
The Star as royalty
The Star as the domestic goddess
The analysis in this chapter is derived from Richard Dyer’s work on the subject of stars, specifically the relationship between star personas and characters. A major point which underpins Dyer’s analysis is the notion of recognition: “Because stars are always appearing in different stories and settings, they must stay broadly the same in order to permit recognition and identification” (98; author’s emphasis). Dyer uses the term “selective use” to analyze the ways in which films utilize specific qualities associated with the star’s persona: “The film may, through its deployment of the other signs of character and the rhetoric of film, bring out certain features of the star’s image and ignore others” (127). The obvious example here is Ingrid Bergman. Gaslight foregrounds her qualities of passivity and innocence in developing the character of Paula Alquist. Dyer iterates that “from the structured polysemy of the star’s image certain meanings are selected in accord with the overriding conception of the character in the film” (127). While this ‘selective use’ approach can work, as in Bergman’s case, other films in the Female Entrapment cycle are less successful. While Bergman’s casting might be considered a “perfect fit” (to use Dyer’s phrasing), considerably more common is the “Problematic fit” (129) in which the collective signifiers and history which make up the star’s persona contradict the construction of the character to such an extent that it results in dramatic incoherence within the diegesis. In Midnight Lace, the diegesis obsesses over repressing the more sexually androgynous aspects of Doris Day’s star image (practical or even ‘butch’ costuming; capability at accomplishing tasks then associated with men; lack of sex appeal) in order to reinforce her image as a domestic goddess. This attempt at constructing a specific image of the film’s star undermines the credibility of both the character and the thriller diegesis she is a part of. As Dyer points out, the “powerfully, inescapably present, always-ready-signifying nature of star images more often than not creates problems in the construction of character” (129). In the generic framework of the Female Entrapment Thriller, the relationship between the female star and the role of the entrapped heroine highlights the tensions between the film’s construction of femininity in the image of its protagonist and the film’s construction of its protagonist in its remediation of the star’s persona.
The Star as emancipated independent woman
Sorry, Wrong Number represents a complete inversion of its star’s established persona. Anatole Litvak’s film’s representation of Barbara Stanwyck redresses the implicit relationship of the typical Gothic scenario of the sheltered woman in peril and the star persona of the film’s lead performer. In contrast to the other stars covered in this study, Stanwyck’s persona could be considered far more progressive in its image of femininity. “In many ways, Stanwyck lived out roles on the big screen that eluded ordinary women because society was not yet ready to allow women those kinds of freedoms” (Schackel, 41). More importantly, in relation to the Female Entrapment Thriller, Schackel points out that “Stanwyck is remembered for her portrayals of strong, determined women who met men on even terms or dominated them from the outset” (Schackel, 41). Stanwyck plays a tough, manipulative woman, qualities which lie at the core of most of her performances, whether as a romantic lead (The Lady Eve) or as a villainous foil (Double Indemnity). In Sorry, Wrong Number these qualities are literally consigned to the past (via the film’s flashback structure), entrapping Stanwyck in the role of an invalid.
This diminishment of her most recognizable qualities, especially her physicality and equal power relationship with the opposite sex, is emphasized throughout the diegesis, and extends to the film’s marketing: though Stanwyck’s name is first, the image clearly establishes her reduced status in the film. Sitting in bed, shrinking from her co-star Bill Lancaster, she cowers while he looms over her with a raised hand. Her character is essentially a less duplicitous version of Double Indemnity’s Phyllis Dietrichson. Her star persona acts as a shield; her arc requires the gradual loosening of this facade. The climax of the film sees the complete loss of this persona, as her ability to control the situation is finally revealed as a complete sham. Unlike her roles in either The Lady Eve or Double Indemnity, she lacks the ability to back up her threats in any meaningful way. Stanwyck was known for her “ability to carry out adventurous, demanding tasks not usually assigned to women in films prior to the 1970s,” and this included physical retribution and coercion (Schackel, 41). Sorry, Wrong Number, however, negates this physicality by keeping her stuck in bed as invalid, forced to rely on other characters as proxies to discover the mystery behind her husband’s disappearance. Though she is finally able to convince her husband to abandon his scheme, it is not enough. The murderer has already entered the room and killed her before her husband can call him off. Rather than being killed as a femme fatale, according to the film noir narrative arc to which this film is related, Leona Stephenson’s death completes the inversion of Stanwyck’s established persona as a strong, manipulative and sensual figure of identification.
The Star as ingénue
Ingrid Bergman was an icon thanks to her performances in films such as Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942). Her persona of the early Forties was based on innocence combined with beauty – the kind that men wanted to protect, which is subverted in Gaslight. Something of a victim figure, she generally played a naive woman who discovers the world is much harsher than it appears (as in Hitchcock’s Spellbound).
In reference to the work of David Smit, Gelley notes that the “uniformity of the actress’s public persona was a direct consequence of David O. Selznick’s intense personal involvement in and control over the development of Bergman’s Hollywood public image – which emphasized her natural, wholesome, and spiritual qualities” (Gelley, 30). Foreshadowing the rejection of the signifiers of Audrey Hepburn’s star status in Wait Until Dark, the key qualities of Bergman’s on- and off-screen image, of “nature and health, of niceness, of the devoted wife and mother, the hard working actress”, are repositioned as sites to be denigrated and abused within the diegesis (Gelley, 29).
Gaslight’s focus on her physical and mental degradation reinforce Gelley’s observation that the passivity Bergman’s star persona embodied had the potential to be pushed “to the point of masochism” in her roles (28). As Gelley points out, “cruelty and coldness... feature as crucial elements in the attraction that the male love interest holds for the female lead” (31-32). The relationship between Bergman’s character and Boyer’s Gregory Anton is foregrounded in the narrative, minimizing the significance of the police investigation which drives the film’s narrative. This is a major difference to the 1940 film version, which focused on the conflict between the husband and the police detective investigating him. The emphasis on the female star as the primary site of dramatic tension is a hallmark of the Female Entrapment Thriller, and Gaslight initiates yet another convention of their generic positioning: publicity.
The film’s poster establishes the key motifs of the marketing associated with the Female Entrapment thriller. Bergman is positioned in the extreme foreground while the film’s villain, Charles Boyer is positioned close behind her, staring over her shoulder. Gelley points out, the poster highlights the “sexual overtones in the sadomasochistic relationship between husband and wife,” which are both a “key feature of Gaslight’s publicity campaign” and a key aspect of the positioning of Bergman’s star persona in the film (32).
Gaslight exploits Bergman’s status as an ingénue, a perfect match of star persona to the role of entrapped heroine. Ora Gelley notes that Bergman “embodied the contradictory qualities of, on the one hand, voluptuousness, assertiveness, and sexuality, and on the other, spirituality, passivity... and ‘niceness’” (28). It is this passive aspect of Bergman’s persona which is foregrounded in the characterisation of Alice Alquist. It is her inability and unwillingness to discover the reasons behind her husband’s sudden change in personality and her own sudden mental imbalance which provide the main spectacle of the film. In Gaslight the relationship between the passivity embodied by Bergman and the psychological abuse her character endures is echoed, to varying degrees, by the stars of the films that followed.
The Star as Royalty
Audrey Hepburn’s persona was always that of the princess, the heroine of a fairy tale. As was the case with Doris Day, this persona was formed through her appearances in a series of romantic dramas and comedies. Films such as Roman Holiday (William Wyler, 1953) and Sabrina (Billy Wilder, 1954) reflected this persona of the woman who leaves her comfortable but boring existence to learn how to live in the real world. As Rachel Moseley notes, “It is this fairytale narrative of growing up and transformation in which discourses of beauty, dress and class are brought together as social mobility (while always already deserved) and a sense of self is achieved through a stylish makeover, which is at the heart of key romantic comedies of Hepburn’s career” (Moseley, 39). While Hepburn had made films outside this vein (Breakfast at Tiffany’s and The Children’s Hour), her roles remained relatively unaffected. Her character in Breakfast at Tiffany’s (Blake Edwards, 1961) is turned from a prostitute in the novel into a naive party girl; in the adaptation of The Children’s Hour (William Wyler, 1961) her character is ‘straightened out’ from a closet lesbian into her female colleague’s object of affection (Corber, 49). What defines her roles is an aversion to puncturing this persona.
Released near the end of her career (bar a few roles in the late Seventies and Eighties, she effectively retired after its release), Wait Until Dark represents more of a break in tone. The story places her in opposition to a group of antagonists who are shown breaking into her home with no difficulty (they know the door is unlocked). They have no compunction about killing (significantly their first victim is a woman). Unlike her other films in which she avoids serious dramatic turns, Wait Until Dark cripples her (she is blind), and traps her in a confined space (not only is it an apartment, it is a basement apartment in a working class tenement building) and removes the option of a male savior. However, while the obstacles and stakes are much higher, the template of her character arc remains the same: she must learn how to interact with the new scenario in which she finds herself. More importantly, she does this by her own ingenuity, and learns how to defend her home. It is telling that her character is not introduced until 20 minutes into the film, by which time the viewer has been brought up to date on the villains’ plot. In this way, our identification with her character is not based around a mutual discovery of the danger she is in, but a more distanced perspective. The viewer’s involvement in it is derived from our knowledge of the villains’ plot. Therefore the suspense of the story derives from how Hepburn will react to its various machinations.
For Moseley one of the most important signifiers in the construction of Hepburn’s characters is the manner in which her characters are introduced, and focuses on the way in which the “camera repeatedly captures Hepburn on the verge of going out or coming in... where her silhouette and the details of her dress can be viewed to the best advantage” (41). While Moseley regards these brief sequences as spectacle for the presentation of Hepburn’s fashion sense, her entrance in Wait Until Dark can be seen as an almost parodic treatment of the trope. She is not foregrounded, but in the extreme background of the shot, spied through a window. She shuffles across the frame, giving the viewer an extended preview of her less than spectacular wardrobe. Such fetishization is not the overt purpose of this shot, as the focus remains on the criminals inside the apartment desperately re-arranging the furniture to cover up their presence. Hence, a recognized visual strategy for representing a star is subordinated to the dictates of narrative, and is injected with a sense of, most obviously, suspense (will she discover the prowlers in her home?); more subtly, it up-ends the visual strategies designed to reinforce the most visually iconic aspects of her star persona.
There are a couple of different ways Hepburn’s persona is ‘attacked’ in Wait Until Dark. The most visually striking is the role itself: a blind housewife living in an unglamorous tenement in a bad neighbourhood. The realism of the art direction extends to Hepburn’s wardrobe, which consists of bland colours and materials clearly showing their age, a major discrepancy with her enduring image as a style icon. “In the key films of Hepburn’s career, while dress... is tied intimately to character and indeed to subjectivity, nevertheless it does not function silently in the mise-en-scene but rather is an attraction in its own right, pausing the flow of narrative to solicit an attentive gaze even outside the spectacular possibilities of the musical or melodrama” (author’s emphasis, Moseley, 40-41). The role of a blind housewife, combined with the setting and costuming, are major contributing factors in divesting Hepburn of the cachet she had accumulated through her career in romance and comedy films. However, while these aspects of characterization and setting are the most obvious signifiers differentiating the film from Hepburn’s past history, they are not the most representative of the film’s relationship with its star performer. Hepburn’s persona is undermined and destroyed through character interaction. The criminals who deceive and try to kill her are the most literal examples of this strategy. Their function within the narrative is to confront the Hepburn persona with something which has been missing from her previous roles: physical violence and the threat of death. These antagonists highlight the deficiencies in this aspect of her star persona in responding to this threat. The representation of the villains is the film’s most obvious probe into the weaknesses of Hepburn’s persona; her characters’ interaction with the other characters is more subtle, but no less pointed, in their critique and inversion of the qualities Hepburn embodies.
The husband who controls Hepburn’s character represents a very different angle of Hepburn’s star persona. The age gap between Hepburn and the actor playing her husband, Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., cannot help but echo the age gaps between Hepburn and her male co-stars of past films (Humphrey Bogart, Fred Astaire and Cary Grant being the most obvious examples). Zimbalist’s role as the mature husband, and his attempts to push for his wife’s independence, combines the two male characters present in Hepburn’s ‘fairy tale‘ narratives - the older love interest and the sage who gives Hepburn the knowledge to attain personal independence and romantic closure. The fact that Zimbalist’s character fails to come to her aid reveals the limitations of these archetypes as tools of dramatic resolution.
The little girl Kathy (Julie Herrod) who plays tricks on Suzy reveals a frustration and paranoia in Hepburn’s character, effectively undercutting the positive public face her character puts on with her other neighbours. Since this public ‘face’ echoes Hepburn’s past roles and off-screen persona, the implications of her confrontation with Kathy is that Hepburn’s articulate, empathetic image is a facade. All of these various interactions have the collective effect of detaching the character of Suzy Hendrix from the persona of the star portraying her, humanizing this role by treating the emotional and physical fragility associated with Hepburn’s appeal in her romance narratives as flaws within the context of the thriller narrative. Most importantly are her actions in defending and reclaiming the domestic space by herself. The fact that the heroine relies on her own ingenuity marks a major break with Hepburn’s ‘royal’ persona. Her previous films had relied upon her gaining knowledge and skills through a guide (such as Gregory Peck’s journalist in Roman Holiday, or the kindly Baron in Sabrina). In Wait Until Dark, Suzy Hendrix has no one to depend on for knowledge or support. The role of the entrapped heroine alters this aspect of her persona, dispelling this fairytale prop of traditional narrative arc. While there is an aspect of the ingénue in the naïve characters played by Stanwyck and Day, Wait Until Dark is the first film since Gaslight to feature an actress whose star persona directly incorporated the ingénue. However, unlike her predecessors, Hepburn’s Suzy is forced to transform by herself, without (male) help.
The Star as the domestic goddess
In Midnight Lace (1960) Doris Day plays a variation on her ‘domestic goddess’ persona. She is not the prickly career woman of her Rock Hudson sex comedies (the most famous being Michael Gordon’s Pillow Talk, released the year before) but a house-bound new bride completely comfortable with life as a housewife. As she says to her husband, “Every day has been a honeymoon.” This marital status sets Kit apart from Day’s previous roles, in which her femininity was balanced by more masculine expressions of appearance and agency. Films such as On Moonlight Bay (Roy Del Ruth, 1951), its sequel By the Light of the Silver Moon (David Butler, 1953) and Calamity Jane (David Butler, 1953), highlighted Day’s perceived lack of femininity through costuming and behaviour. Even in Pillow Talk, the key text in re-shaping Day’s persona, this androgyny remained a visible component of her image: “Her image as a tomboy was firmly established and existed in tension with her glamorous makeover in the film” (Corber, 155). Continuing the ‘makeover’ initiated by Pillow Talk, Midnight Lace strongly focuses on representing Day in the most traditionally feminine image possible, the housewife.
One of the key aspects of Day’s persona in this regard is the emphasis placed on the presentation of Day’s personal wardrobe. While not as immediately significant in terms of either Bergman or Stanwyck, Doris Day’s association with fashion marked an explicit shift from her roles in the Fifties. Midnight Lace is driven by the persona of its star, confronting her image as a domestic goddess with the challenges of a thriller narrative: “In Midnight Lace, ...the disjunction between the fashion display and a horror narrative that can’t begin to contain it becomes severe” (Bingham, 13). Fashion displays form an important aspect of Day’s revised persona, emphasizing a more traditional image of femininity than her previous roles. However, within the diegesis of Midnight Lace, these costumes seem to be motivated by the need to substantiate Day’s femininity rather than by the conventions of genre, plot or theme. The lack of regard toward this aspect of Day’s persona highlights Midnight Lace’s restraint in the manner in which its makers do not attempt to alter or invert the qualities associated with its star. While Barbara Stanwyck’s independence and physicality are neutralized by the limitations of the role, Day’s embodiment of these qualities is repressed by her costuming. The filmmakers’ response to the requirements of the thriller narrative is to over-compensate Day’s appearance with signifiers of traditional femininity, excluding the aspects of her star persona which do not interfere with the presentation of Day as a definably female star. This is even present in the film’s marketing - the poster’s tagline emphasizes Day’s vulnerability and sex appeal: “The woman in the midnight lace... Target for temptation... Or terror?”
By transforming her into a domestic goddess, the filmmakers turn Day into a passive presence, whose reactions to the conventions of the thriller narrative exclude the self-determination and toughness present even in her romantic comedies. This emphasis on the qualities which are most clearly not ‘masculine’ (passivity, domesticity, independent agency, costuming) within the narrative framework of the Female Entrapment thriller has the effect of undermining Day’s reproduction of the domestic goddess persona by highlighting the ways in which these qualities restrict and constrain her character’s attempts to save herself.
While Midnight Lace was produced during the transformation of Doris Day into a more traditionally feminine star, it is also situated within Day’s transition from musical to romantic comedy star, and the ways in which the characteristics of Day’s (then) recent transformation are transposed into a thriller narrative draw attention to the ways in which this narrative echoes the story structures of her romantic comedies. Midnight Lace can be seen as a re-reading of the Pillow Talk formula that characterized her romantic comedies. “In all cases, a devious predator, sometimes a competitor Day’s own age, sometimes a disapproving older man who wants to show up an upstart young woman, masquerades as a naïf, a sweet, sensitive “virgin” – whether sexually or not – who allows Day to think she’s taken him under her wing” (Dennis Bingham, 10). This deception generally involves the telephone as a medium for carrying on this masquerade, and as in Pillow Talk, the plot is based around manipulation of Day’s character over the telephone. Bingham emphasizes the fact that “Day falls in love with, and is willing to give herself sexually to, the ‘sensitive man’, the disguise” (10, author’s emphasis). This limited perception is a quality of Day’s character in Midnight Lace, but is developed in a manner that implies a critique of her perspective. She is completely oblivious to her husband’s intentions and is also completely taken in by the ‘sensitive’ Mr Younger. While her instincts as to his character are correct - he is a good man, and proves this by coming to her rescue at the climax - on the flip side, she immediately distrusts the superficially creepy Mr Ash (played by the rather emaciated Anthony Dawson), a character who turns out to have no ulterior motives toward her, but who she regards as the prime suspect solely for his appearance and manner. Bingham asserts that the message behind the Doris Day romantic comedy plot applies equally to the message of Midnight Lace and, we can say, to the Female Entrapment Thriller in general: “The joke on women – or is it men – is that the kind of man a “nice girl” goes for doesn’t exist” (10, Dennis Bingham, author’s emphasis). Without meaning to, Bingham echoes the view of gender relations shared not only between Day’s romantic comedies and Midnight Lace, but between Midnight Lace and the other films of the Female Entrapment cycle. While the other films in the cycle are able to remediate the key qualities associated with their female stars in creating their entrapped heroines, Midnight Lace highlights the struggle between remediating the image of the star to conform to the image of the character within the diegesis.
Conclusion
The entrapment of the domestic goddess in Midnight Lace transforms the diegesis into a site for critiquing the qualities Doris Day is perceived to embody in conveying this image of femininity. Of the four actresses in this study, Doris Day stands out, both for the ways in which the qualities of her star persona suit the role of entrapped heroine, and the ways in which they do not. With its emphasis upon restricted mobility and docility, Day’s image as a domestic goddess is a good fit for the Female Entrapment Thriller. However the representation of these qualities of her star persona becomes a site of conflict: while the key elements of the diegesis (such as the male antagonist and the ‘uncanny’ domestic space) attack these qualities, Day’s star image remains unaffected. Unlike the star images in other Female Entrapment Thrillers, there is no process of revision: the weaknesses of Doris Day’s image as the domestic goddess are not exploited, but ignored. The thriller narrative thus becomes merely a backdrop for the representation of Day’s image, rather than complementing it. Despite its flaws, Midnight Lace exemplifies how this relationship between the female star and the diegesis of the Female Entrapment Thriller is a recurring extra-diegetic site of tension, as the genre’s framework and conventions are remediated around the qualities and cultural baggage of a star’s image.
Sorry, Wrong Number is the most radical film of this cycle in its deconstruction of its star’s image. Its inversion of Barbara Stanwyck’s persona as an emancipated independent woman completely destroys any expectations associated with this image, depriving her of the qualities of strength which would have altered the film’s premise and narrative structure. In this respect, the film is successful in subordinating the signifiers of a star’s image to the requirements of the role of entrapped heroine.
Gaslight’s emphasis upon the dynamic of its central couple undercuts the innocence implicit in Ingrid Bergman’s role as a romantic ingénue. By focusing upon her passivity and docility in her marital role, the diegesis highlights the sexual dimension underpinning this relationship.
In a different fashion, Wait Until Dark completely destroys and re-creates the qualities and narrative expectations associated with Audrey Hepburn. The film’s brutal diegesis highlights the flaws of Hepburn’s image, re-interpreting her Cinderella-inspired persona as a lack of personal agency. The film’s narrative is based around a process of engendering a new sense of agency in Hepburn’s persona as a woman whose regal air is based upon independence and determination, rather than the associations of her past films.
Aping the narrative conventions of Doris Day’s most well-known films, Midnight Lace parodies the formula of its star’s romantic comedies. This narrative strategy highlights the dubious nature of the premise unpinning her most popular successes. However, this process also highlights a disjunction between the diegesis and the persona of its star. The film’s attempts to maintain the integrity of Day’s star image as a domestic goddess complicates the relationship with the diegesis, as it breaks down the film’s sense of verisimilitude in creating an environment that entraps its female protagonist.
The relationship between the female star and the diegesis is significant to an understanding of the inner workings of the Female Entrapment Thriller, in that the portrayal of the entrapped heroine is dependent upon the qualities embodied in the star’s persona. However, over the course of the narrative, the conventions associated with Female Entrapment become involved in a process of highlighting the weaknesses and contradictions inherent to a star’s persona.
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