Big Little Lies - Discussion

[em666]

3 Relationship Counselors On What Big Little Lies Tells Us About Domestic Violence
By Anna Silman
HBO’s Big Little Lies tells a story of domestic abuse that sneaks up on the audience. Celeste (Nicole Kidman), an elegant former attorney and envy of the school drop-off line, and Perry Wright (Alexander Skarsgård), her younger businessman husband, are rich, successful, and madly in love — the picture-perfect California couple. Their passionate chemistry is the talk of the neighborhood. And yet, unbeknownst to the neighbors in their sleek glass houses, Perry is abusing Celeste, covering her body with bruises when he isn’t professing his undying love to her and showering her with lavish gifts.

Big Little subverts the familiar onscreen picture of domestic violence in a number of ways: There’s an abuser who admits he has a problem. A victim who fights back. A genuine sexual chemistry that blurs the lines between consent and coercion. And yet the show does an impressive job of exploring the complex dynamics of abuse, according to three mental-health professionals who have seen the first four episodes. Dr. Tammy Nelson, Dr. Tamar Springer, and Dr. Rachel Sussman are all relationship counselors who have worked with couples experiencing domestic violence. While each counselor takes her own approach to working with patients — and the insights they provide are based partly on personal experience — they all felt that Big Little Lies’ story was a compelling depiction of one couple’s toxic partnership, even if they quibbled with certain aspects of the show’s portrayal. And challenging one-size-fits-all depictions of domestic violence is an important project, given that 1 in 3 women will experience some form of intimate-partner violence in her lifetime, and it doesn’t always look the same (men too, though most domestic-abuse victims are women).

On Sunday’s episode, we watched Celeste’s therapist (Robin Weigert) try to get her client to admit that Perry makes her fear for her life, while Celeste protested that she was equally to blame for the violence at home. Yet according to Nelson, a nontraditional and “sex-forward” couples therapist who wrote The New Monogamy: Redefining Your Relationship After Infidelity, Celeste’s tendency to seek conflict isn’t surprising. She points to a scene in episode four, where Celeste goads an angry Perry by asking, “Are you going to hit me now?” and he responds, “Do you want me to hit you, Celeste?”
“It’s a very common dynamic to have that cycle of abuse in abusive relationships, where [the victim] would very likely trigger some sort of argument or conflict to bring on the abuse, because you know its coming and it gives you a sense of control,” says Nelson. In her view, when Celeste seems to spark conflict with Perry, her actions serve as an attempt to gain some feeling of control (however illusory) over her situation. Sussman, though, said that she hadn’t tended to see that kind of response from women she’s worked with: “These women have a hard time finding their voice.”

Perhaps the most unsettling aspect of Perry and Celeste’s relationship is the way their sex life and their abusive dynamic seem to intertwine. The couple share an intense erotic chemistry, and many of their scenes together, particularly early in the show, are shot in such a way that the audience isn’t sure whether to be frightened or titillated (or both) — it’s unclear whether we are watching scenes of consensual sex or marital rape. Sussman said she also didn’t find this side of the relationship convincing: In her experience, women in abusive relationships tend to lose the desire for sex as the abuse worsens, and often find their self-esteem so depleted that they don’t have the strength to fight back. “I think what a lot of women who are being abused tell me is that as the abuse gets worse, and their self-esteem gets worse, their desire to have sex gets lower, they lose their libido, and then they get shamed for that,” she told me. But Nelson and Springer both said that this dynamic — while certainly not applicable to all abusive relationships — seemed psychologically plausible for these characters. “I don’t know that it would be super common, but what it looks like is their relationship is very sexual and they’re very interested in each other that way. And some people are turned on by aggression, either rough sex or aggressive sex or sex resulting from feelings of aggression that may fuel this type of highly charged sexual encounter,” says Springer.

“A lot of people like rough sex and it can be totally separated out of an abusive relationship. But when it’s integrated with domestic violence, then it’s a whole different dynamic,” added Nelson. She pointed to 50 Shades of Grey as a key source of cultural confusion. Despite its marketing as the ultimate high-end BDSM fantasy, the relationship depicted in the popular novels and films isn’t actually a healthy BDSM dynamic — Christian is manipulating Anastasia as a way of working through his own childhood trauma. In Nelson’s view, Celeste seems to be “kind of into being submissive to him, that’s what kind of turns her on” — but, “at the same time, how much is her saying, ‘if I don’t have sex with him I know where this is going to go’?”

Big Little Lies works to make Perry feel human, to lay bare the psychological issues that might cause somebody to hurt the person they love. “Oftentimes you’ll see the abuser is a very insecure person that wants to kind of encapsulate their partner in their life in their home. They’re always afraid on some level that the partner is better than them or might leave them. So they’re trying to chip away and make their partner’s life smaller and smaller and smaller,” said Sussman. All three therapists agree that Perry possesses many of the traits one would expect to see in an abuser: jealous and controlling, resistant to Celeste’s independence, crippled by fear that she’ll leave him. Likewise, as Celeste defends Perry to her therapist, we see the many complex reasons a victim might choose not to leave her abuser — both the genuine love she feels for her husband and the shared history and family life that binds them together, as well the complicated mix of denial, guilt, and shame that many victims feel after having their self-esteem decimated by an ongoing cycle of abuse. “A lot of these men are very very disturbed, and they take the position that their wife or their girlfriend is the source of the problem 100 percent,” adds Sussman. “That’s why these are difficult couples to work with. Sometimes the women are so wrapped up in this also and they’ve lost their own reality that they even blame themselves. When I get down on the husband sometimes I’ve seen the women jump in to rescue the men.”

The show has yet to address the way violence can reverberate through generations — but the therapists I spoke to thought it was something the show might easily spotlight in upcoming episodes. While it remains to be seen how all the threads will come together, Springer predicts that, if the show is striving for psychological realism, we might learn that Perry and Celeste’s twins are the ones responsible for hurting Renata’s [Laura Dern’s] daughter Amabella at school. “[Witnessing violence] is very damaging to kids emotionally and psychologically, even if they are not hit or touched,” Springer explains. “It’s definitely a generational thing, because things are learned by observation, by environment, and if there’s genetic personality factors that lead to poor emotion regulation or anger management that certainly can be passed down. You could expect these types of kids may turn around and be violent in school. Who knows, maybe one of them may be the one who grabbed [Amabella’s] neck. I wouldn’t be surprised if it comes out that they’re the ones [doing it].”
nymag.com/thecut/2017/03/couples-counselors-on-domestic-violence-and-big-little-lies.html

[em666]

03/21/2017 11:38 am ET
‘Big Little Lies’ Offers A Rare, Nuanced Portrayal Of An Abusive Relationship
Victims (and abusers) don’t always behave like one would expect.
By Melissa Jeltsen
HBO’s miniseries “Big Little Lies” is a story about the complex inner lives of privileged women, wrapped up in a murder mystery set in a wealthy seaside town. Amidst the stunning vistas and unraveling whodunit plot line, viewers are witnessing something rarely seen on screen: A thoughtful portrait of an abusive relationship. (Note: Spoilers ahead.).

It’s no coincidence that the show got it so right: HBO worked with Safe Horizon, a domestic violence victim assistance organization, to ensure “Big Little Lies” was accurate in its portrayal of abuse. They also prepared a plan for what to do if viewers had a personal reaction and needed support.

The show’s abuse plot line centers around Celeste, played by Nicole Kidman, a lawyer who gave up her career to raise twin boys. To the outside observer, her life appears picture-perfect: She has a stunning home, healthy children, and a gorgeous husband whose adoration for her is obvious to all. But as the show progresses, the facade crumbles. Celeste is deeply worried about her marriage. She uses the word “volatile” to describe it, but the more accurate label is abusive.

While her charismatic husband Perry, played by Alexander Skarsgård, can sometimes treat her “like a goddess,” he is more often possessive and controlling. He is quick to physical aggression, choking, slapping and throwing her against the wall. Celeste hits back at least once in an act of self-preservation, bucking the traditional role of passive victim.

Their fights typically conclude with rough sex scenes, which are ambiguously consensual. It’s unclear to the viewer (and perhaps to Celeste herself) if she is engaging in sex because she desires Perry, or because she feels she has no choice. Afterwards, he offers apologies and gifts, at one point anointing her bruised body with a sparkling necklace.

In the most recent three episodes of “Big Little Lies,” (episodes 3, 4 and 5), the couple goes to marriage counseling. The resulting scenes offer a profoundly nuanced look inside an abusive relationship and the complicated landscape a couple in a similar situation might navigate.

In the couple’s first therapy session, Celeste, looking extremely uncomfortable, talks about their issues in the plural, constantly glancing at Perry for approval. “I just think things can get a bit volatile,” she explains. “We fight a lot, we yell, we scream. We just have a lot of anger that we need some help controlling.”

Of course, it is not really her anger that needs controlling, it is his. At its core, domestic violence is about maintaining power and control over another person. It is clear that Perry’s need to dominate Celeste is at the root of their problems.

Later, she sees the therapist alone. When she is asked directly about the abuse, she continues to insist she is equally at fault. “We both become violent sometimes, I take my share of the blame,” she says. “I’m not a victim here.”

It is a startling moment. As she asserts her autonomy, Celeste unabashedly rejects the label of victim. It’s debatable if she does this because she has internalized negative stereotypes about the type of people who end up in abusive relationships ― weak, damaged women, not independent, accomplished ones like herself ― or if she truly does not see herself as abused.
Marium Durrani, public policy attorney at The National Network to End Domestic Violence, said it could be a mixture of the two, noting that it’s common for victims to take time to process their situation before accepting it.

“A victim might wonder, ‘Doesn’t everyone fight?’” she said. “It’s hard to know what’s normal in intimate relationships.”

They also need to be emotionally ready to deal with the consequences, she added. Once they recognize they are in danger, the next logical question is, what are they going to do about it? Celeste might not be ready to tackle that yet, she said.

Celeste may also be repeating what Perry has long told her: That she is the cause of the violence. Like many abusive partners, Perry is a master of projection, blaming Celeste for anything that goes wrong.

In episode 3, the couple is drinking wine in front of a fire, a portrait of domestic bliss, when Perry finds out that Celeste and the kids are going to Disney on Ice without him. He accuses her of purposely excluding him, and grabs her roughly by the neck.

When she protests that he is hurting her, he flips the statement around. “Oh, I’m hurting you? he scoffs. “Can we talk about how much you hurt me?”

It is her fault, he means. She hurt him first. He is the true victim.
Perry later tells the therapist that his rage stems from his fear that he will lose Celeste. “I always had the sense that the day would come where she would just not love me anymore,” he says. “I think I’m constantly looking for evidence.”

He admits that he is insecure, and that is driving his controlling behavior. But while his confession appears sincere, it’s subtly manipulative. He implicitly blames her ― it is because Celeste is unhappy that he is acting out. The underlying message: If you loved me more and showed me better, I wouldn’t have to hurt you.

The show takes pains to not flatten Perry’s character. Some of the actions he takes are surprising: It is he who discloses the abuse to the therapist, not Celeste, who tries to protect him. As he puts it, “there’s a line between passion and rage, and sometimes, maybe, we cross that.”

In a particularly resonant scene, the family is having dinner. He starts joking around, and pretends to be a monster, lurching around the table. The kids, who are delighted, giggle and run away.

As viewers, we know that to Celeste, Perry can be an actual monster, but here he is being a fun and engaged father. That symbolism and duality reveals a frightening truth: Abusers are not shadowy monsters devoid of feeling or compassion ― they can be fathers and lovers and husbands; beautiful men living in beautiful neighborhoods with beautiful wives.

We don’t ever really know what domestic violence looks like from the outside. Marium Durrani, The National Network to End Domestic Violence

Celeste wordlessly answers the question, “why don’t you just leave,” in almost every scene. We see her fear as a constant undercurrent to her interactions with her husband, as she weighs what to say and calculates how to defuse tense situations. We also see her hope and desire to keep her family intact.

In one scene, the couple dances to Neil Young’s Harvest Moon. Perry, staring in her eyes, whispers, “don’t give up on me baby.” Celeste glances at some drawings done by their children and it is clear where her priorities lie.

When the therapist asks her why she doesn’t want to leave, she talks about focusing on what is profoundly right in the relationship instead of what’s wrong.

“I think about what we have, and we have a lot,” she says. “We are bound by everything we have been through.”

Brian Pacheco, director of public relations at Safe Horizon, said that reaction is common.

“Domestic violence is complicated and many survivors are conflicted by the good times―and there are good times,” he said. “Often survivors may just want the abuse to stop, not necessarily to end the relationship.”

Durrani applauded the show for opening up a much-needed dialogue, and challenging stereotypes about who experiences abusive relationships.

“I think one of the lessons to learn is that we don’t ever really know what domestic violence looks like from the outside,” she said. “People don’t think that someone rich and beautiful in a seemingly idyllic life would be facing something like this. There’s a really dark cloud over her that isn’t visible.”

______
www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/big-little-lies-offers-a-rare-nuanced-portrayal-of-an-abusive-relationship_us_58d01a59e4b00705db518a0d

[em666]

Big Little Lies Actress Robin Weigert on Therapy, Working With Nicole Kidman, and Celeste’s Plight
By Maria Elena Fernandez
The houses are spectacular, the people are gorgeous, and the views are splendid. But when it comes to the show’s therapy scenes, Big Little Lies couldn’t be any more discomforting. Born from the imagination of series creator David E. Kelley — and not the Liane Moriarty book he adapted for HBO — the marriage-counseling sessions between Dr. Amanda Reisman (Robin Weigert) and Celeste and Perry Wright (Nicole Kidman and Alexander Skarsgård) are so realistic they’re draining. In last night’s pivotal episode, Dr. Reisman gets Celeste to admit she’s afraid she might die because of her husband’s violent abuse. Vulture spoke to Weigert about what it was like to film those intimate scenes, Jean-Marc Vallée’s unique directorial style, and working with Kidman and Skarsgård.

Why did you want to play this part? Had you read the book?
I read the book after I got the part and I loved the book. The therapist is not as much a figure in the book; she’s very much a figure in the mind of Celeste. The fully elaborated character is more in the script by David Kelly, so it’s very interesting to see what he made of her. They’re very believable therapy sessions to me — I thought she was very well-conceived. I have an interesting relationship to the profession of psychotherapy just because I come from a line of therapists. My father was one and my grandmother was one too, so it was super-interesting to step into those shoes.

What kind of sense did you get about Dr. Reisman that gave you the instinct as to how to play her?
Well, because the scenes were so well-written, I could feel that she was present in a “feeling-ful” way, not just in an intellectual way. She isn’t one of those tabula rasa kinds of therapists who just sits as if on a safe perch and observes, you know? She’s not just an agent of an emotional experience for the patient — she’s also risking being emotionally engaged herself. That’s part of what made me fall in love with the part.

Did you research therapists or did you rely more on your family experience?
It’s not based on research, but I say in all humility that I feel like I have a lot of experience of this because of the whole milieu that I grew up in. In fact, I have a wonderful therapist who I used to see quite a lot and now I just check in with every so often. Not that I’m cured! I would love to give a shout-out to Florence Falk because she was quite instrumental in my own kind of growing. My grandmother has one published book of essays, which are a little bit of a dry read — they’re in translation from German — but the content is very profound. It’s called The Courage to Love, and it’s very much about what I’m talking to you about.

How did you find working with Jean-Marc and his unique directorial style? He doesn’t rehearse and he shoots with handheld cameras.
He’s much the way that I’m describing this therapist: somewhat untraditional in terms of allowing herself to be vulnerable and be present. I would say he is that way as a director. He’s very feeling-ful. It’s not uncommon that, after a take, he’ll come toward us with tears in his eyes because something has really caught him in that place. He’s present in a very animal sense, and you can feel it by the way he moves about the room.

The other actors I’ve talked to say they like working with him because there’s no waiting around — you arrive, you’re in character, and you go.
He’s in pursuit of something very organic, and I think you see that in the final product. There isn’t allowed that kind of time that can sterilize the moment by making everything so self-conscious. It’s a little bit like, “Let’s tumble in and see what we find.” There’s a therapy scene we did where there’s a scene, a cutaway, and then we’re back in. It’s fully expected that you would shoot that as two scenes. But he just let it roll. Without even a cue in advance that we’d be pulling in the second half of that therapy session, we just continued. The surprise of it all is great, because that degree of uncertainty actually helps cut off a certain part of your brain that isn’t necessarily helpful to you as an actor — where you’re trying to make something overwrought by overthinking it.

What was the most challenging part for you? It’s a tough role. A lot of it is in facial expressions and gestures.
Well, I’m not thinking about facial expressions or I’d be in trouble! That would be really quite bad to look at. I realize that my face is a pretty expressive one, but that’s not because I’m sitting there making facial expressions. That’s what I was sort of born with, so that’s just what I got. In this situation, the real acting challenge was to be open and available to whatever might be happening and to not be afraid to be affected by it, even though my character is there in a professional capacity.

She just sits there and listens and maintains eye contact. She doesn’t even scribble in a notepad.
The props department was wonderful in providing every single thing that a therapist might use. Pretty early on, Jean-Marc was like, “Yeah, I don’t think you take notes.” And I wasn’t inclined to do it, either.

Let’s talk about the scenes more specifically. The first time we see Dr. Reisman is in the third episode, when Celeste and Perry go to therapy together. Celeste tries to protect him, but he ends up confessing to the violence in the relationship, which was surprising.
Yes, I thought so too. Alex [Skarsgård] is really, really great there.

What was filming that scene like? You want to think he’s a jerk, but then you kind of feel for him. You realize he’s tortured.
It was very moving, but I have to say often villains are tortured. I can think of a few that we know about right now who are probably pretty tortured also. But I’m not going to get into that! [Laughs.]

Funny! But you know what I mean. Are you saying he played us?
He is an incredibly convincing actor, and I mean Perry. Also Alex, but I am talking about Perry. His sociopathy is partly evident in how well he can perform the role he knows she wants him to play. There’s something about the way he bestows these lavish gifts of flowers and necklaces and stuff, and adorns her bruised body with these trinkets. What woman wouldn’t want to hear every single one of the things that he’s able to say, especially one who feels like, Oh, gosh, I have this younger man who adores the ground I walk on and, actually, the root of all of this is that he’s afraid of losing me? He’s giving her exactly what she would most want to hear. While Dr. Reisman is moved by that to a degree, I think she’s also canny enough to perceive that there might be something manipulative in it.

How long did it take to shoot that scene?
We did all the therapy scenes in two days. They were scheduled to go on much longer, but that’s the way we were working. We were working in a highly intuitive, highly efficient way. We did everything in order. Nothing was out of sequence, which is also very helpful. We were really just right in there, you know?

What was it like working on such a deep and personal scene with Nicole Kidman and Alex Skarsgård?
It was just a very good experience. When you work with a certain caliber of actor, there’s this gift, because you don’t have to do a lot to create that suspension of disbelief. It’s just the truth and it’s so palpable. It’s like your own truth is bestowed upon you by the fact that the other in the scene feels so absolutely present. I felt that when I acted with Philip Seymour Hoffman. It’s a very rare quality. It’s hard to put a finger on exactly what that is — when somebody’s truth takes over, and you’re not thinking about much else besides relating to what’s in the room.

In the next three episodes, Celeste returns to therapy by herself. The first time, she asks for advice on how to tell Perry she wants to work again. What do you remember about filming that scene?
It’s a very delicate dance, because you don’t want to go so far that the patient becomes defensive and loses trust in you or suspects that you have an agenda. It has to be handled with great care, even if you begin to sense that there’s something lurking under there that needs prying out. I was experiencing it very much as if I was a therapist; I remember feeling that I had to exercise a great deal of care, even as I was bringing certain things to her or raising certain questions for her. She had to be handled somewhat gently so she wouldn’t pull away.

When Celeste returns to therapy in tonight’s episode, it goes much further. Dr. Reisman gets her to admit she does fear for her life.
The therapy session in episode five is the one where she finally breaks through Celeste’s defenses. Both patient and doctor are super-intelligent women — one with an agenda to bury the truth, the other with an agenda to unearth it. A lot of the beats of the scene could almost be read as if the two of them are in a contest of wits. The “gotcha” beats in the scene, as we played them, began to feel like waves on the ocean, and underneath them was just this tremendous, still reservoir of empathy.

Have you ever seen the story of domestic violence told this way before in TV or film? The show gets into it in such a different way.
These are members of an extremely rarified class. They’re very privileged, very wealthy people, living lives that, from the outside, look so enviable. I think that, most often, depictions of abuse go to situations that are rough-and-tumble and treat the abuse as if it’s just endemic to that way of life — like, that guy hits his wife because he never had anything. So right from the get-go, the idea that this level of abuse could exist within such a totally bucolic setting — that’s novel in terms of depictions I’ve seen.

The way Nicole is playing the character, just when she’s out in public, there’s this sort of veil of sadness or mystery that other people might read as part of her mystique. You don’t realize what pain is there. The idea that somebody can be so visible and so the object of envy and harbor secrets like this, is also important. It gives us a way to recognize the potential for this to be anywhere. In a world where appearances seem to be everything, the dirtiest part of the secret for her is her addiction to it, her pleasure in it, her inability to get rid of her desire to be desired in that way. Even rescuing her children would come at the cost of this almost idolatrous love that Perry showers her with when he’s apologizing. All those things are so addictive. The shame in not being able to break free is partly because she’s so hooked on it herself.

www.vulture.com/2017/03/big-little-lies-robin-weigert-therapy.html

[christine73]

Such great articles Em. Thanks for sharing them here. This show is fascinating as it really does show a whole side of abuse I think we often want to think doesn't exist. Abuse doesn't happen among higher income, higher educated people. People with perfect lives. When in fact it can and does. It shows how very real abuse can be, and how difficult it can be to leave an abusive relationship and how lines can be crossed and blurred till you don't know if you are coming or going. And even in the best situations and options that are available, how hard it can be to leave. Alex and Nicole have done such an amazing job with this show, and the show as a whole has done a phenomenal job at showcasing abusive relationships and the damage they do to all. Perry is a complex character, he has moments he is charming and fun and you forget the darkness and abusiveness that lies at the surface. The BAM in a split second the switch is flipped and he is truly frightening...then like all abusers the I'm so sorry, It won't happen again bullcrap. When its just a matter of time the cycle repeats.

[davischristinem]

My thoughts on episode 5, 'Once Bitten'

Each episode is better than the previous one, it seems.  The adults are trying to do their best I suppose, but the children are underestimated and a few of them have matured beyond their years.

A question...Why will Amabella not speak up to either of her parents?  I can understand being put on the spot by a teacher or school administrator, but mommy and daddy?

No sense in my sharing observations about destructive, violent behavior between people that should in all reality truly love and treasure each other when we have had so many good articles by licensed professionals who are educated & experienced daily on these things.  It's been a lot of interesting reading. What can be said about people running full throttle toward disaster, anyway?

The performances by the cast are all strong and admirable.  This has been a frighteningly realistic story brought to screen.  Hopefully it will strike a chord in many viewers who recognize their own destructive natures in the narrative...and they seek out help.  Most of our primary characters could use a skilled therapist...not just Celeste and Perry, or poor little Ziggy.  (though I'm not sure who gave Jane the advice that holding onto and keeping a loaded firearm in a home with a young child was that great an idea & therapeutic to boot!  Bad, bad idea!)

Alex's portrayal of Perry just continues to blow my mind. 

[em666]

Mar 22, 2017 11:31:37 GMT -5 davischristinem said:

My thoughts on episode 5, 'Once Bitten'

Each episode is better than the previous one, it seems.  The adults are trying to do their best I suppose, but the children are underestimated and a few of them have matured beyond their years.

A question...Why will Amabella not speak up to either of her parents?  I can understand being put on the spot by a teacher or school administrator, but mommy and daddy?

No sense in my sharing observations about destructive, violent behavior between people that should in all reality truly love and treasure each other when we have had so many good articles by licensed professionals who are educated & experienced daily on these things.  It's been a lot of interesting reading. What can be said about people running full throttle toward disaster, anyway?

The performances by the cast are all strong and admirable.  This has been a frighteningly realistic story brought to screen.  Hopefully it will strike a chord in many viewers who recognize their own destructive natures in the narrative...and they seek out help.  Most of our primary characters could use a skilled therapist...not just Celeste and Perry, or poor little Ziggy.  (though I'm not sure who gave Jane the advice that holding onto and keeping a loaded firearm in a home with a young child was that great an idea & therapeutic to boot!  Bad, bad idea!)

Alex's portrayal of Perry just continues to blow my mind. 

I think it's the guns that have made it very clear this is an American adaptation. I don't know if that was a deliberate move on the part of the producers/writer or just a natural thing.

[ohva]

I was a bit confused in the last episode about Madeline's affair with the play producer. I read the book a year ago and only remembered references to a flirtation, but not a full-fledged affair. I wasn't sure.

This week I read an article that said this was the one departure from the books. Reese said her character didn't have anything deep wrong with her life and she wanted something too.

I'll respectfully disagree with Reese here. I recall that the book was more sarcastic and funny than the show. I thought one point in the book was the contrast of Madeline to the other two women. Madeline was the blessed 'many of us', whose problems at worst were daily modern life hassles (kids, house, family, career vs. non-career). Yet to her in her fortunate life, they were HUGE. I remember her always going on about her 'problems' to her friends while being oblivious to the very serious issues that her two friends were going through.

But I can see from a Reese standpoint as the star. The stories of the other two characters are much more involving.

[ohva]

Found the article:

www.bustle.com/p/madelines-affair-in-big-little-lies-is-different-from-the-book-for-a-good-reason-45192

Madeline's Affair In 'Big Little Lies' Is Different From The Book For A Good Reason

Aside from a change in location, Big Little Lies has mostly stayed faithful to the book it's based on — with one major exception. Madeline's extramarital relationship with Joseph came as a surprise to readers who thought we'd be able to predict every twist and turn this season, and the plotline was placed front and center in the March 19 episode "Once Bitten" after the pair got in a car accident while arguing about their future. As we approach the deadly Trivia Night, I'm even starting to wonder if showrunners tweaked the ending in some way. Could someone find out about Madeline's affair on Big Little Lies, and will it impact what happens when all the parents arrive at Otter Bay School for the fundraiser?

Thanks to the Greek Chorus, viewers know that a lot of people in Monterey were gossiping about why Madeline and Joseph were in his car together — and both Ed and Joseph's wife seem suspicious as well. Although Madeline told Celeste that she recently kissed Joseph, her best friend doesn't know about the affair, which apparently happened around a year ago. Up until this point, Madeline was the only character in her friend group who didn't have a major secret — but is this a big enough bombshell to change the outcome of Trivia Night?

The Joseph plotline definitely adds another layer to Madeline's character, but I doubt it will change the identity of the victim or the killer. In an interview with Variety prior to the premiere, Witherspoon (who is Big Little Lies' executive producer, along with Nicole Kidman) emphasized that staying true to the book was important to her — so it seems highly unlikely that she'd make a request to shake up the entire ending. Rather, it seems like Madeline's affair with Joseph was added in order to make the character a little less sunny and perfect. Witherspoon told Variety that she asked for one major change to her character's arc and explained why:

“Because I didn’t have anything to play but perfection, and I just think those people who are perfect [are] all full of sh*t. It mainly came out of me not having anything to really put my teeth into. I think there’s something fascinating about a person who projects perfection or is very judgmental of others who is clearly just swimming in their own discontent.”

The arc certainly lets viewers see Madeline in a new light — her marriage has consistently been depicted as somewhat passionless, but her infidelity still comes as a surprise because she's so fiercely loyal in every other area of her life. When she visits Joseph in the hospital, it's clear that she still has strong feelings for him and admits as much. Madeline tells him the reason she needs to walk away is because she has a terrible feeling that word will get out and destroy her family, but it's obviously painful for her to do so.

She'll probably eventually confide in Jane and Celeste, but this is one situation where I think Madeline will be happy to not be the center of Monterey's attention. Infidelity is definitely a pretty big secret, but it still pales in comparison to the ever-present violence (in flashbacks and present day) in the lives of Jane and Celeste — and there are only two episodes left in the series. So, I think the fallout from the affair is something Madeline will grapple with in private and it won't come into play on Trivia Night. But at this point, it's really anyone's guess — after all, everyone's secrets are fair game in Monterey.

[em666]

I understand why the Madeline subplot was added, but am not sure it really added anything.

"I recall that the book was more sarcastic and funny than the show."

Has the satire and humour of Big Little Lies been lost in translation?

The Australian novel has been adapted for US screens, leaving behind both Sydney’s northern beaches and the nuance.


www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2017/mar/23/has-the-satire-and-humour-of-big-little-lies-been-lost-in-translation

[em666]

How Schoolyard Drama and Domestic Violence Converge on ‘Big Little Lies’
The schoolyard drama tracks a parallel course with the adults’ storylines, which reinforces a through line of the series — the way we teach children to see threatening behavior as a prank, a joke, all in good fun.
Television | By Lara Zarum | March 23, 2017

The immediate pleasure of HBO’s Big Little Lies came from its chorus of catty helicopter parents: It’s easy to laugh at Renata’s overreaction to every perceived slight, played to the hilt by a razor-sharp Laura Dern, just as it’s easy to see Big Little Lies as a glossy soap opera elevated by its indie-film director, Jean-Marc Vallée. I’ve heard viewers question why the show even needs its murder-mystery undercurrent, a storyline that remains murky right up until the final episode. But as the series progresses — the penultimate episode, the last one I’ve seen, airs this Sunday — it becomes clear that the murder mystery isn’t incidental to Big Little Lies, which was adapted from Liane Moriarty’s 2014 novel. At its core, the series isn’t about gossipy housewives; it’s about the complex interplay between violence and desire.

The battle lines between the feuding parents are drawn in the first episode: When Renata’s young daughter, Amabella (Ivy George), accuses a classmate, Ziggy (Iain Armitage), of hurting her, Renata demands an apology from the boy, who insists he didn’t do anything wrong. Ziggy’s mom, Jane (Shailene Woodley), stands by her son, and Madeline (Reese Witherspoon) eagerly comes to her new friend’s defense. In retaliation, Renata executes a campaign to cancel the community production of Avenue Q, which Madeline is helping to produce. When Renata fails to invite Ziggy to Amabella’s birthday party, Madeline spies an opportunity for revenge and plans a trip to Disney on Ice on the same day. Confronting her at a tony wine bar, Renata seethes, “Do not fuck with my daughter’s birthday.”

The schoolyard drama tracks a parallel course with the adults’ storylines, which reinforces a through line of the series — the way we teach children to see threatening behavior as a prank, a joke, all in good fun. Kids and parents are constantly sneaking up on and startling each other; the series is full of seemingly innocuous scenes of playful family tousles that are hard to dismiss in light of the violence that swirls around them, just out of sight.

There’s a particularly incisive scene from last week’s episode, in which Celeste (Nicole Kidman) and her husband, Perry (Alexander Skarsgård) — whose seemingly perfect relationship masks the serious physical abuse Perry wages on his wife, usually before they have sex — are having dinner with their two adorable twin boys. They don’t listen when their mother tells them to put their toys down and eat their food, but when Perry does the same, they snap to attention and pick up their forks. He lets out a big belch that makes the twins giggle and makes Celeste sigh and shake her head. Then his voice deepens: “Here comes the monster!” he cries, curving his hands into claws and rising from the table like a grotesque creature emerging from the sea. The boys shriek as he chases them around the dining room; in retaliation, they grab toy guns and start shooting. When Celeste cries, “No!” and jumps out of her chair, Perry yells, “Get her!” She runs into his arms as he pledges, “I’ll save you!” But instead, he holds onto her and instructs, “Fire at will, boys!”
The scene takes on a sinister resonance set against the backdrop of Celeste and Perry’s disturbing relationship, as does the plot involving Ziggy and Amabella. When their teacher passes around a stuffed animal named Harry for every child to hug, Amabella asks, “Does Harry want to be hugged?” Renata’s growing frustration with Amabella, who insists that Ziggy is no longer hurting her even as new bruises and bite marks appear on her body, mirrors the audience’s frustration with Celeste, who is constantly applying makeup to the bruises she sustains from her husband and yet keeps the abuse a secret from even her closest friends. When she discloses to Madeline that she and Perry often have sex after they fight, Madeline says that’s fucked up — but also kind of hot. Compared to Madeline’s lackluster marriage with her nice-guy husband, Ed (Adam Scott), Celeste’s sex life is enviably passionate. But Madeline doesn’t know the truth.

Like Amabella, Celeste refuses to talk about the abuse with anyone, until she finally discloses it to a therapist — who advises her to tell a friend so that she’ll have a witness to Perry’s abuse in the event of a custody battle. By juxtaposing Amabella’s situation with Celeste’s, Big Little Lies suggests how innocuous violent behavior can seem when you treat it like it’s normal.

For Celeste, the scariest thing is admitting that it’s not, because that would expose the lie on which she’s based her supposedly perfect life. To the Greek chorus of parents giving their testimony to detectives investigating the as-yet-unknown murder, Celeste and Perry have an obnoxiously perfect relationship, and Madeline is an insufferable busybody. But the viewer sees a fuller picture of Madeline: She may not be as demure and polished as Celeste, but Madeline doesn’t take shit from anyone; she may be combative, but she’s genuinely funny, and she’s a good friend — loyal, supportive, and willing to fight for what she wants and what she thinks her friends deserve.

But the Greek chorus doesn’t want to see the nuanced, complex truth about their neighbors. They crave high drama, and they reduce every person to a caricature. Both the moms and dads see women in conflict and call, “Catfight!” One mom tells the detectives that she was there that night at the wine bar when Renata confronted Madeline, and she swears she saw Madeline eyeing a steak knife. They smell blood, and yet they overlook the actual violence taking place right under their noses because it doesn’t fit their clichéd ideas about what it should look like.

By casting these people not just as adults but as (very involved) parents, Big Little Lies reveals the subtle ways in which we teach young people to romanticize violence and to weaponized romance — and how they learn that one usually follows the other. Ever her mother’s daughter, Chloe (Darby Camp) tries to get Amabella and Ziggy to make up by putting on one of her favorite songs and forcing them together. “Big hug, kiss, bang — everything’s better again,” she explains to her mother after her plan fails. After all, she says, that’s how mommy and daddy make up after a fight. And anyway, how could anyone stay mad when Leon Bridges is singing “River”?

Director Jean-Marc Vallée hammers home this idea when he puts that same song over the final scene of that episode, “Serious Mothering,” while Celeste and Perry have Skype sex. Earlier in the episode, Celeste bats off Perry’s cyber sex request after glimpsing a bruise in the mirror; but by the end, safely ensconced in her low-lit bedroom overlooking the ocean, her husband miles away on a work trip, she happily writhes on the bed in front of a laptop while Perry watches. Put a sweet, sexy song over a troubling scene, and bang — everything’s better again. I can’t remember a show or film that more effectively demonstrates the way women protect the men they love even when those men turn violent, or more effectively illustrates the biggest little lie of all: This is ok because he loves me.
flavorwire.com/602060/how-schoolyard-drama-and-domestic-violence-converge-on-big-little-lies

[em666]

How Nicole Kidman, David E. Kelley, and Others Prepared for Big Little Lies’ Domestic Violence Story Line
By Maria Elena Fernandez
Nicole Kidman is having a hard time shaking her Big Little Lies character. Nine months after production ended, the Oscar winner and first-time TV star’s voice quavers when discussing the filming of Celeste’s violent and highly sexual marriage to Perry (Alexander Skarsgård). “I feel weird talking about it,” she says over the phone from the Philadelphia set of Untouchable. “I’m not comfortable because I feel like I want the work to speak for itself, and I don’t like dissecting it too much. It’s one of the hardest roles I’ve had to talk about because I’m still very raw about it. It’s weird.”

Not when you consider the intensity of Celeste and Perry’s story line. From controlling Celeste’s schedule to pushing her around, grabbing her forcefully, and beating her, Perry is a classic abuser. And yet Celeste is, on some level, addicted to her husband’s rage and the sexual energy it unleashes between them, adding gray areas to an alarming domestic situation not usually examined in this way on television.

“The intention was to see how complex it is: to show how people lie about it, what it feels to go through it, and how painful it can be for the woman, who is the victim in this case,” Big Little Lies director Jean-Marc Vallée said. “But [writer David E. Kelley] and I and all of our partners thought, Well, what if we try to care for this guy too? He is the perpetrator of the violence, but he is aware of it and sincerely wants to get rid of his demons. That’s why I think you wonder and go, My God, I see. I see. There’s a little spark of hope here and there. I wanted to try to touch people’s hearts.”
In this past Sunday night’s episode, “Once Bitten,” Perry attacks Celeste after he sees their kids’ toys strewn around their apartment. He beats her, almost suffocates her, then has sex with her, most of which the viewer learns as Celeste remembers it. “After we shot some of the really, really violent scenes, I was in a lot of pain myself. My body was,” recalls Kidman, who’s also an executive producer on the series. Except for one scene in the finale, which airs April 2, where a body double was used to help choreograph a fight, Kidman and Skarsgård filmed all of the violence themselves. “It was very strange. It wasn’t a good feeling,” she says. “But women go through this so I wanted to tap into the truth of it, and I wanted it to be as real as it could be. Afterwards I would just be quiet. I would go home and be quiet.”

Vallée purposefully let the violent scenes linger. “I wanted it to feel like, whoa, you don’t belong there,” he said. “You’re witnessing something that is hurting you and is tough. We rarely cut because I want to show what’s great about the storytelling and the acting.”

Celeste and Perry’s explosive marriage originated in Liane Moriarty’s best seller of the same name. Kelley, who adapted the novel for HBO, said he can relate to Kidman’s discomfort because he found it equally difficult to write those scenes. “My process is that I go into that world, so I’m in that room when things are going on in my mind,” he said. “Jean-Marc and I did a lot of research, as did Nicole. We knew this was delicate material, and we wanted to treat it with the seriousness and the responsibility that it merited. But there’s no question, when you’re in that place, mentally, disturbing is the operative word.”

Exploring domestic violence through the lens of a gorgeous, upper-class couple was also an atypical way of approaching the story. “Most often, depictions of abuse go to situations that are rough-and-tumble and treat the abuse as if it’s just endemic to that way of life — like, that guy hits his wife because he never had anything,” says Robin Weigert, who plays therapist Dr. Amanda Reisman. “So right from the get-go, the idea that this level of abuse could exist within such a totally bucolic setting — that’s novel in terms of depictions I’ve seen. The way Nicole is playing the character, when she’s out in public, there’s this veil of sadness or mystery that other people might read as part of her mystique. You don’t realize what pain is there. The idea that somebody can be so visible, and so the object of envy and harbor secrets like this, is important. It gives us a way to recognize the potential for this to be anywhere.”

Kelley gave the couple’s narrative an added dimension by expanding the role of Dr. Reisman. At first, the couple goes together, but Celeste continues the meetings in secret by herself. In “Once Bitten,” Dr. Reisman finally cuts through Celeste’s denial with three syllables: “He hurts you.” Later in the session, she pushes further and coaxes Celeste to admit she is sometimes afraid for her life, which Kidman acknowledges wordlessly.

“Those scenes were long on the page, and people weren’t moving,” Kelley says. “It was so internal — I remember seeing the dailies and I was so stunned by Nicole’s work in those scenes. I know I had written the words on the page, and a lot of them are in the book, but when I watched the dailies, I was holding my breath: What’s going to happen now? The fear, the ambiguity, the clinging to hope, that was all on her face.”

Kidman and Reese Witherspoon, who have separately spearheaded female-driven projects through their respective production companies, had been looking to work together when mutual friend Bruna Papandrea, an executive producer on the series, brought up optioning Big Little Lies. They loved the idea, and soon Kidman was meeting with Moriarty in Australia. It was the author who asked that Witherspoon play Madeline and Kidman take on Celeste.

“I suppose Celeste was the most natural fit for me,” Kidman says. “She has that particular way of being which is very quiet and watchful, and she’s more of a voyeur when she’s out in public. She can’t really have deep intimacy with anybody because of what’s going on at home, and she knows it. But one thing that was very important to Liane is that Celeste fights back. It’s a very important part of her nature, and it’s a huge part of her guilt.”

When it came to casting for Perry, Kidman said Skarsgård was her first choice. “I wanted him badly!” she laughs. “I was like come on please, HBO, please! They had a relationship with him already [working on True Blood]. He has the ability to hold you and pull you in, but he also breaks down. He has that fragility as well as the dominance.” Besides, Kidman added, Skarsgård had something else that made him more appealing than other actors. “He is obviously very tall which is really, really helpful for me,” she explains. “It’s not often that I look small. So physically he’s very dominating as well, which is frightening, but I take him on.”

In Sunday’s episode, “Burning Love,” viewers will see just what Kidman means. “It’s very sad, but it’s so great that amidst all of the entertainment value of this show, you can still tap into some topical things that are hopefully really truthful because it’s not gratuitous or exploitative,” she says. “It’s a very real part of this relationship, and the many that it mirrors in the world, that Celeste feels she needs to protect him.”
www.vulture.com/2017/03/big-little-liess-domestic-violence-storyline-explained.html

[ohva]

thank you for posting this!!! great article.

I expect Alex to be doing interviews after the series. It had to be rough on him too.

[davischristinem]

AV Club on Sunday Night's Ep. from 'Big Little Lies'

Found at:  skarsjoy.tumblr.com/


skarsjoy

A.V. Club: Excellent review of #BigLittleLies 06 “Burning Love”

The beautiful homes on display in Big Little Lies aren’t there by accident: Their perfect facades bely the varying levels of tempestuousness that reside in each. This week, as BLL deftly maneuvers all of its pieces in place for next week’s finale, the facades finally begin to crack, as Madeline, Celeste, and Renata all decide to let go of the destructive elements they’ve been holding onto for far too long.

Nicole Kidman’s Celeste has become the character we most root for, and most worry about, so much so that she elicits a silent cheer when she whacks her abusive husband with a tennis racket, even as we’re terrified as to what that will mean for her. She finds out when Perry tells her, “You’re lucky I didn’t kill you.” Many abusive relationships spend a lot of time in a maddening cycle; the exemplary behavior that Perry exhibits after an attack, as Celeste describes to the therapist, is intended to win the abused over again, to lull her into a place of false security until the next attack happens, and they escalate each time. Then, for many women (using “women” here because we know that the majority of these types of relationship are male-female dyads), they finally have a moment of reckoning: This person who says that they love them might actually kill them. And in far too many instances, that’s exactly what happens.

As has been emblematic of Nicole Kidman’s quiet, commanding performance here, we see the change on her face the moment it happens. That shock of realization: She has to get out to save her life. To save her kids from being raised by only a monster (and it’s interesting that the “play” persona Perry now takes on most often is just that, an intrusive monster). Her therapist may be unconventional (“Call the Better Business Bureau” elicited one of the few chuckles this episode) but her methods are sound: She’s doing what she needs to do to get Celeste out of danger. Just having a safe place, away from Perry, now means the world to Celeste.

(An aside: That conversation, though, did highlight how relatively easy an escape was for Celeste to set up, because she has means, and how near-impossible it would be for so many who lack her financial situation. To come up with rent, a security deposit, money for utilities, as well as a whole new fleet of furniture and groceries, adds up to thousands of dollars. And many of these women may have partners who are in complete control of their finances, if they even have that kind of disposable income available.)

So Celeste finally fights back, and after weeks of seeing her brutalized, we cheer her for it. But it’s also interesting that she only took one-half of her therapist’s advice. It was easier for Celeste to set up an entire new apartment than to actually open up to Madeline about her abuse. She points that self-awareness out to the therapist, that so much of her own self-worth comes from how other people see her. Even her closest friend thinks her life is “north of perfect,” when the actual reality is far from that. Could Celeste be afraid of losing Madeline’s love and admiration by revealing that her “perfect life” is a fraud? Or is she just terrified overall by what might happen when the whole facade comes tumbling down?

Madeline may be projecting a perfect life onto Celeste because she feels so adrift in her own. She knows that nothing will never be right between her and Ed until she tells him the truth about Joseph, but she fails to so so, even with a variety of opportunities this episode. Interestingly, like Celeste opening up to her therapist, Madeline reveals her secret to a different person: Abby, instead of Ed. Like Celeste, Madeline is sick of her daughter thinking she’s perfect, just like Celeste is fed-up with Madeline’s too-rosy view of her life.

It’s a staunch reminder that everyone is dealing with something, It brings to mind this line from Alan Alda’s movie The Four Seasons, which was apparently improvised by Carol Burnett, after her movie husband (Alda) calls her perfect: “How dare you call me perfect? When I’m perfect, I cease to exist!” Which is true: No one is perfect. We all know those couples in our circles who host the ideal veneer, then suddenly break up , and all the imperfections they’ve been hiding tumble out.

Madeline and Ed ‘s conversation about marriage is revealing as well: He says a lot of what makes a successful marriage is pretending. Madeline and Ed go along like the marriage is fine, when the lack of passion obviously bothers them both. But that’s a problem they can easily work on together, once Madeline reveals her infidelity and they both move on from there, morphing their marriage into something that’s a little less perfect, and a little more real. Celeste’s reality, though, can’t include Perry in it for her to be able to survive.

For Renata, the main thing she’s struggled with is control, so it’s a relief to see her let some of that drop away as well. I know I rave about Laura Dern a lot, but she adds so many layers to this role that could have been just straight-up villainous. Jane, for once, does the absolute right thing by coming to Renata’s house and opening up about her fears and feelings of helplessness about Ziggy. As with Kidman, Dern silently lets us know Renata’s change in attitude, even behind a huge eye patch. All the tension releases from her neck and her shoulders, and she can finally relate to Jane, mom to mom. Their conversation has an honesty that’s not present in any of the spouses’ talks: Jane took a chance and actually revealed herself, to say that she’s not perfect, and doesn’t know what she’s doing, Renata latches onto that because it’s a feeling she’s been hiding away in herself for too long.

The most telling scene this episode is Ziggy and Chloe’s playdate. Yes, it’s idyllic, but I think it’s carefully positioned into the center of this episode for a reason. Ziggy and Chloe have no preconceived notions about each other, because they’re 6. They are merely communicating with each other on a friendship, affection-based level: to laugh, play music, run around. Imagine if we all just communicated with each other that honestly, without all the posing and posturing that gets in the way.
Stray observations

Best mom outfit: Madeline had some nice outfits this week: I really liked the sweetheart neckline of her pink dress she wore to the premiere, and the black background of that floral dress as the disaster dinner saved it from being too frilly.
Does Bonnie ever do anything but (rightfully) eyeroll at Nathan? Do you think she regrets her decision to tie her life to a man who is so petty and vindictive, which seems very far away from what she is? She seems like the type who should marry another yoga teacher or a musician or something.
That’s Robin Weigert, Deadwood’s Calamity Jane, doing such a riveting job as Celeste’s therapist.
I remember being equally horrified by Abby’s horrible personal project while reading the book. Poor Madeline.
Next week: The Big Little Lies finale. I will be so sad to see this series go; I am enjoying it so much, and am really enjoying your comments. I was very moved last week by so many of you who opened up about your own relationships and therapy sessions. That’s the best part of our comments section for me: The reminder that we’re a community. Thanks so much for reading and commenting, and even after next week, I will still be on the lookout for all of your names on other comment boards after BLL is gone.

Source:  AV Club

                                                                                         

[davischristinem]

Gifs from Episode 6

Found at:  alexskarsgardnet.tumblr.com/






maggiesview

But he still has control over the potato chips.👍

Source: sikanapanele

                                                

[davischristinem]

Perry and Celeste Wright

Found at:  sikanapanele.tumblr.com/





Source: sikanapanele