Tinker Belles and Evil Queens: The Walt Disney Company From the Inside Out (34 page)

(i.e., straight) viewer has become increasingly aware of the

“lesbian/gay subtext”—until, as in the case of
Ellen,
it overrides the heterosexual spectator position as the dominant reading strategy.

Rightly, Disney’s increased manifest representation of homosexuality should be regarded as a momentous event for both the company and 178

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lesbian/gay culture. As Dan Rather points out in his analysis of
Beauty
and the Beast,
the millions of people who saw the film not only sympathized with a character who seemed to symbolize a PWA but
identified
with him. Millions of people have also now come to know a lesbian through the character of Ellen Morgan and to see a lesbian as a rounded, complex character instead of a collection of simple stereotypes. While Disney has come under increasing fire from conservative groups battling against the growing acceptance of homosexuality, the company has not backed down from its decisions (although sometimes
making
these decisions takes a while, as LEAGUE’s attempts to get domestic-partner benefits and the season-long behind-the-scenes discussion about what to do with Ellen Morgan shows).

The Walt Disney Company should be lauded for these develop-

ments, but there are some problems that face lesbian and gay culture as a result of this increased visibility within the company’s product—

problems that became more apparent when
Ellen
entered its fifth season. In the fall of 1997, DeGeneres told
TV Guide
that “she has returned reluctantly for what she hopes will be the show’s last season.”86 While the article did not venture to say this attitude would affect the content of the series, critics and audiences quickly noticed a major shift in the outlook of the show. While ABC entertainment president Jamie Tarses initially downplayed the series’ gay themes (“It won’t be the lesbian dating show. We’re taking baby steps”),
TV Guide
reported that “DeGeneres was proceeding full steam ahead with her own agenda.”87

Most of the cast regulars moved to the margins of the show as Ellen Morgan explored lesbian/gay culture and found a steady girlfriend.

Only a few weeks into the season, ABC began posting a warning at the front of many of
Ellen
’s episodes that “some viewers may find certain scenes objectionable.” The first of these warnings accompanied Ellen’s first on-screen kiss with another woman. Further warnings introduced episodes in which Ellen had to overcome her worries about public displays of affection with her girlfriend, when the two had their first sexual encounter, and a fantasy episode in which Ellen’s straight cousin dreams he is a minority in a predominantly homosexual society.

These opening disclaimers and scuttlebutt in the industry indicated that ABC executives were a bit bothered by the direction DeGeneres had taken the series. Referring to Tarses’ summer comments, DeGeneres herself said, “When I hear ‘baby steps,’ . . . it’s like they’re saying, ‘OK, you’re gay, and we’re tolerating this, but don’t show us how

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you really would be, don’t kiss a girl on the lips.’”88 As DeGeneres pushed the limits of network tolerance by focusing consistently on Morgan’s coming to grips with her sexuality, the show’s ratings slowly began to slip, further exacerbating ABC’s worries. Analysts seemed to think that the show’s insistence on addressing lesbian/gay issues was turning off many viewers. Interviews with DeGeneres as the season continued showed a revision of her earlier attitude: now, she wanted the series to be renewed for yet another season. Faced with both low ratings and worrisome content, though, it was not much of a surprise when ABC announced in April that the show would not be renewed. It seemed that Ellen’s coming out was an economic asset, but Ellen’s
stay-ing
out was a financial liability.

Possibly the final nail in the series’ coffin came from reports that even lesbian and gay viewers were critical of
Ellen
’s new focus. In March of 1998, Glenn Lovell wrote in
Variety,
“It’s one thing for the critical establishment to carp about ‘Ellen’s’ rigid gay-ness, but when a well-known lesbian activist does it—well, that’s news.” Lovell had interviewed Chastity Bono, entertainment media director of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD):

If
Ellen
is going to be picked up for a sixth season by ABC, the creators need to slow down—“take smaller steps” and cart a more moderate path, advises [Bono]. . . . “[
Ellen
] is so gay it’s excluding a large part of our society. . . . A lot of the stuff on it is somewhat of an inside joke. It’s one thing to have a gay lead character, but it’s another when every episode deals with pretty specific gay issues. . . . Originally, she said this wasn’t going to be the ‘gay Ellen show,’ that every episode wasn’t going to deal with gay issues. But it pretty much has. And this is something ABC hasn’t been happy about.”89

Word of these statements seemed to fly through the entertainment industry and the southern California homosexual community like wild-fire: even a lesbian media advocate was complaining that
Ellen
was too out! GLAAD, which used the series’ coming-out episode as a major fundraiser the previous spring, snapped into action to address the article and announced that Bono was not expressing her own attitude towards the show, but was merely repeating theories others had made as to the show’s low ratings. The statement continued, “What the article fails to mention is that Ms. Bono and GLAAD strongly believe that the 180

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program contains themes that transcend issues of sexual orientation, and are entertaining and appealing to audiences gay and straight.”90

While the actual quotes by Bono
do
seem to support GLAAD’s statement, the furor over Lovell’s article may have indicated an awareness that there were indeed many lesbians and gay men who didn’t like the new
Ellen.
In a number of different contexts and environments, I encountered lesbians and gay men who had complaints about the show during the 1997–98 season. Some agreed with the opinion that the show had become “too political” and ceased to be funny because of its stri-dence. These viewers preferred to relax in front of the show; to them, serious discussion belonged somewhere other than on a situation comedy. Yet, others were bothered by Ellen Morgan’s openness specifically because understanding her as lesbian was no longer an oppositional reading. They preferred remaining “outlaws,” wanting to remain outside of and challenging to the status quo by keeping
Ellen
’s “lesbian sensibility” to themselves.91

The latter attitude points to an overarching issue regarding the

“more obvious” homosexual readings of Disney discussed in this chapter: if reading from a “lesbian/gay sensibility” is no longer so “underground,” it becomes harder and harder to argue that such a subject position is radical or subversive. If the Walt Disney Company is not only aware of the “gay subtext,” but—as in the case of
Ellen
or
Tombstone,
for example—actively putting it into the text, a “gay sensibility” is not resisting the work but coming closer to the “ideal subject position.” As mainstream society becomes increasingly aware of lesbian and gay culture, there is the attendant danger of this subculture becoming colonized and commodified by mass culture.92 ABC’s desires to keep
Ellen
from becoming the “lesbian dating show” are a perfect expression of corporate interests attempting to control and manage sexual discourse; before Ellen came out, discourse around the series had a freer and wider potential. With no official sanction by the show, certain viewers could interpret Ellen Morgan in a number of ways: as lesbian, as bisexual, as asexual—i.e., as a queer figure.

The previous wealth of possibilities for Ellen Morgan, and the differences in criticism of the series by various homosexual individuals, also points out that “the homosexual community” is not an easily defined and isolated group. The deconstruction of a mythologized unified homosexual community is what has led to the use of the previously derogatory word “queer” in academic and some political circles, thus

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reinvesting in the term “queer” an inclusiveness of gay men, lesbians, bisexuals, the transgendered—in short, the wide variety of sexualities (and, hopefully, the diverse racial/ethnic and class identities) which are created by the matrices of social discourse. The use of the word “queer”

by both theorists and activists tries to keep identity fluid and uncon-tainable by larger hegemonic concerns.

Increased visibility of overt homosexuals in Disney’s employee ranks and in its texts recognizes the existence of homosexuality yet ironically works against the amorphousness of being “queer.” With this in mind, one must acknowledge that not all “queer” individuals enjoy Disneyana. In Gregg Araki’s
Totally Fucked Up
(1993), which deals with gay, lesbian and bisexual teens, one young man states plainly that he
cannot stand
Bette Midler and is annoyed for feeling that he
has
to like her since he’s gay. As was mentioned at the beginning of the discussion of
The Golden Girls
and
Ellen,
Disney lends itself more readily to gay men than to lesbians. And, as reception to the final season of
Ellen
unwittingly pointed out, some “queer” individuals want to retain control of their conceptions of sexuality by remaining out of the hegemonic limelight.

In September of 1997, Ellen DeGeneres won an Emmy for Best

Comedy Writing with “The Puppy Episode.” In accepting the award, she said, “On behalf of the people—and the teenagers especially—out there who think there is something wrong with them because they’re gay: There’s nothing wrong with you, and don’t let anyone make you ashamed of who you are.”93 As this chapter describes, it became easier to read Disney in the Eisner-Wells-Katzenberg era as saying that there was “nothing wrong” with being homosexual. But it seems increasingly obvious with the cancellation of
Ellen
that the company was actually saying there was “nothing wrong” being a
certain kind
of homosexual—

one that served Disney’s best interests.

5

You’ve Never Had a Friend Like Me

Target Marketing Disney to a Gay Community

I N S E P T E M B E R O F 1996, when rumors about the lesbian storyline developing on
Ellen
were first reported in the mainstream press, they were met with a certain cynicism by some industry insiders. Some seemed to think that the revelation of these discussions going on at Touchstone Television were purposefully leaked as a means of assessing the public reaction from both audiences and advertisers. “You can’t help but think that they’re testing the waters, waiting to see if advertisers will balk,”

an unnamed rival studio executive told
TV Guide.
“The timing is ideal.

If the public supports this, they can move ahead with the storyline. If not, they can just shelve their plans and say it was all a rumor.”1 Certainly, divulging that the show’s producers were considering having Ellen Morgan come out created instant and widespread publicity for the series, making it one of the most talked about shows of the year.

Countless newspaper and magazine articles and columns devoted themselves to the topic, providing publicity that Disney did not have to pay a cent for. Furthermore, only a month before the rumors were reported, Touchstone Television had sold the syndication rights to the Lifetime cable network, and such an enormous awareness of the series had the potential to increase its profitability. While some have theorized that having a signed contract created more security to tackle this volatile subject, it is also quite possible to see how such rumors could provide incentive for viewers to tune in to reruns to find all the “clues”

that they might have missed from previous seasons.2 After all, DeGeneres’ manager, Arthur Imparato, told reporters during the period that “If you look hard at the whole series, there are a lot of elements over the years that could be laying the groundwork for that storyline.”3 Consequently, while the brouhaha over whether or not Ellen Morgan was lesbian made the typically divergent homosexual reading the dominant 182

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subject position, many also saw it functioning as expert publicity by a company that has often led the industry in marketing.

Disney’s reputation in marketing and publicity is well known and somewhat envied within the motion picture industry. With the arrival of Eisner, Wells and Katzenberg, the Walt Disney Company became extremely bold and aggressive in its marketing campaigns for the new Touchstone Pictures films, for the push into television, for the revamped animation department, for the video release of classic Disney films, for the new rides at the theme parks and so on. Eisner was quoted as saying “Once you’ve got the product, you’ve got to let people know about it. We are a consumer company and marketing is at the top of the list.”4 Many give credit to Team Disney’s enormous advertising push for the rapid turnaround of the company after 1985.5 Disney’s reputation for aggressive marketing has become so well known, even to the general populous, that the studio was able to slyly make fun of itself in the animated feature
Hercules
(1997), where (within the film itself) the hero gets his face and name placed on sneakers, clothing, cups, action figures and the like.

Viewing the surge of discussion about
Ellen
as a marketing strategy points out why advertising and publicity are so vital to analyze when dealing with a “queer” film or television text. The “
Ellen
Watch” feature that developed in
TV Guide,
as well as the numerous other articles that started reading the series with a “lesbian sensibility,” reveal how marketing and publicity influences reception. If the press leak was a delib-erate maneuver on the company’s part, this strategy manifestly discussed the subject of homosexuality at a time when the series itself was still “playing coy.” Although
Ellen
itself would not label Ellen Morgan as a lesbian until the final three episodes of the 1996–97 season, the publicity about the show
was
doing the labeling much earlier.