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Ogre-Drag
I've been thinking about the Shrek movies and Ogre-Drag. I really wanted the films to be innovative and different. To me, they were more of the same-worse because they pretended to "subvert" traditional fairy tales (Poniewozik 1). "Surely Health and Human Services [U.S.A.] can find a better spokesperson for healthy living than a character who is a walking advertisement for McDonald's, sugary cereals, cookies and candy," said Susan Linn, director of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood and an instructor in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School (qtd in Crary). To me there is nothing new about having a male partner who is an Ogre. "Shrek would seem to be a smart choice. The green-tinged ogre had already been featured in two highly successful movies, each of which raked in hundreds of millions of dollars in domestic box office alone..." (Pattison). Women are often with "less desirable" partners, especially in fairy tales. Women are supposed to be good looking. Take Beauty and the Beast, for example. A beautiful woman can be with a beast. She cannot be the beast if he is good looking.
In Shrek 2, Princess Fiona says, "I want what any princess wants - to live happily ever after...with the ogre I married."
Princess Fiona is a good-looking Ogre. She is still an Ogre though. It is interesting that she is both cute and an Ogre. So she fits a good-looking standard for women in fairy-tales and she can be an Ogre because he is. What I am trying to say is this: an "ugly" female can be with an "ugly" male, but an "ugly" female cannot be with a handsome man. In this case, he has to be an Ogre.
In Shrek, the following dialog takes place:
Shrek: Fiona? Are you all right?
[Stands up and looks at herself, then at Shrek]
Princess Fiona: Yes. But, I don't understand. I'm supposed to be beautiful.
Shrek: But you are beautiful.
[They kiss.]
The "beauty trope" is so foregrounded in the Shrek films; image is everything. "The moral of Shrek's story is that beauty lies within" (Fitzgerald). The gorgeous Cameron Diaz plays Princess Fiona. She is the referent. The gorgeous Michelle Pfeiffer plays the wicked, ugly witch in Stardust on a quest for beauty and eternal youth. You get the point. The "sacrifices" these women make with respect to how they look refer back to them as beauties. Big surprise.
In Shrek, the familiar set-up is established: the beautiful princess is rescued. The twist is that he is an Ogre. Not only that, but at sundown she becomes an Ogre as well. In a very fairy-tale way, they find "true love" with each other.
In Shrek 2, they begin on their honeymoon and travel to the kingdom of Far Far Away to see her parents, the king and queen, who are planning a big celebration for them. The evil fairy godmother wants Princess Fiona to be with her son, Prince Charming.
Shrek the Third sees Shrek negotiating fatherhood and the possibility of being King.
To me, that which is leaky or excessive is full of potential for subversion. "I do not believe that cross-dressing is the same as drag-to me they are different terms. To cross-dress is to buy into an idea of an other, what is usually perceived as an "opposite" gender. Drag is more about layering codes. Codes can be pretty much anything, but here they suggest dominant belief structures. My feeling is that drag plays with these codes and subverts them. I do not believe drag has to be about clothing, but it often is. Clothing can be an awesome marker of gender. I believe we have to revise the meanings for the words "man," "woman," "gender," "sexuality" and "species," just to name a few. To me, "identity" is about expressing oneself; drag seems to articulate this. Many people assume sexuality is aligned with drag. It can be, but I do not believe it has to be.
I performed with The Greater Toronto Drag King Society because it was part of my research and it was fun. The people involved were amazing. I did female drag and I am female. I did not cross over to another gender. I was interested in how female behaviour can be learned by the same sex. Speaking of which, "sex" is defined as being physiologically male or female-although this is definitely complicated by transsexuality, which I am not discussing here-and "gender" involves the meanings we give to those categories.
People use the expression to be "trapped" in a body. To me, the body is fluid. Likewise, I feel most categories and definitions are blurred, including sexuality. Most everything is on a spectrum. Some people identify with a category strongly. There is no right or wrong in all of this, but it is necessary to look at the role ideology plays.
There is no "inside." We can manifest a difference. Mahatma Gandhi said, "Honest differences are often a healthy sign of progress." The ideas of inside and outside the body are conventions to me.
I had emergency brain tumour surgery in August of 2003. I was in a coma for five months and I did not speak until March of 2004. This condition is called Akinetic Mutism. Cognitively, I am fine, but physically I am not as I was. I am in a wheelchair and I have a voice and speech impediment called dysarthria. My fingers are bent. The left side of my body is very weak and there are other things as well, but the point is made. I call what I am experiencing now "disability drag." I am not putting anything on but I am manifesting a difference. There are lots of presumptions when it comes to disability. "The Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) [in the UK] defines a disabled person as someone who has a physical or mental impairment that has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on his or her ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities." (United Kingdom).
My identity has inadvertently changed. I enjoy playing with preconceived notions. For instance, it stuns many people that I have a PhD. The fact that I used to act and look different really bugs a lot of people. I have few issues with my current physicality, but others seem to. My current physical status is a doozy. It is quite the challenge, but I have a unique opportunity here to explain what I mean by "drag." Believe it or not, this can be viewed in a positive light. My current physicality resonates with many of my interests. I am very willing to use my situation. I do not feel that this is exploitative. It is realistic. It is also how I cope. I am using my situation, but I did not ask for it nor would I have chosen it.
Drag is resistance to societal norms. It is an effective way to make a point. Most drags do not recognize that they are doing this. They really do not need to-it is what they signify that is important. It also helps if they are read appropriately. I like that drag shakes things up. Drag foregrounds expectations and presumptions. It resists dominant forms of being. It is quite radical. Whether you like it or not, it puts things we take for granted into question.
Difference is something that most people avoid. Fitting in becomes a goal. Personally, I think difference is valuable. It is the "same" that irks me. Variation is not the same as inconsistency. One can be incredibly multi-tonal and consistent. That is what I mean by "layered."
Drag intervenes with identity. Gender seems to be a focus. Many identities would be effective tools for discussion and exploration. For instance, I have a permanent shunt in my head to drain excess fluid off my brain. I am taken out of the realm of being human into a new world, occupying cyber territory. I am now a cyborg. To me this is cyborg-drag. "Though both are bound in the spiral dance, I would rather be a cyborg than a goddess" (Haraway 181).
As before, I did not ask for a shunt, but I do have it. I am not making light of my situation by calling it drag. The confusion arises because "drag" is often considered silly. It is serious to me. The idea of foregrounding identities by practical means is substantial. It is critical.
Drag is a stew of ideas. It can be very tasty if we are open to new flavours. This means we need an open mind; we might need to acquire new tastes. It is challenging but incredibly worthwhile (Shiller, You Never Know).
Drag is very layered and as such is full of potential for interesting contradictions. It is about "difference." It involves change, and it "is concerned with what might be called a philosophy of transformations and incongruity" (Newton 105). The move from standard looks to alternative ones is compelling, to say the least. In the case of all three Shrek films, it could be truly amazing, but the standard parameters for the fairy-tale that are upheld belie that. There is no going against the grain here. Sorry. Even though there is "transformation," a hallmark of drag, codes remain as they were. If there was a combination of the new or if the film created something new, well, that would be special.
In Shrek 2:
Shrek: A cute button nose? Thick, wavy locks? Taut, round buttocks? I'm-I'm...
Maiden #1: Gorgeous!
Maiden #2: I'll say.
I cannot stand that this is called a feminist film. "Cameron Diaz has admitted she loves the fact that her character Princess Fiona gets all feminist in the latest installment of hit animation films Shrek" ("Shrek Princess Goes Feminist"). There is a prevalent idea about what constitutes feminism, as we can see in the Cameron Diaz quote. In this so-called post-feminist age, my perspective might seem antiquated. I believe it is necessary to be straightforward. According to the book Third Wave Feminism and Television, by the head of women's studies at South-Carolina University, Merri Lisa Johnson, I am a third wave feminist.[2] I am quoted pretty extensively in Johnson's book. Being called a third wave feminist by an expert in a critical book was validating of my past, of my life's work. It is only a part of my structure or process-but it has always been there. "I won a book prize in high school and was given a book entitled Subject Women (Oakley). I used to read a lot of women's critical theory. I was quite young, a teenager, and did not understand much of it but I was not deterred. I was very drawn to this area of concentration." (Shiller, Again) In the latter half of the 1990s I wrote this: "With so much attention being paid to drag queen (male to female) performance, one might arrive at the assumption that female to male cross-dressing or Drag King performance inhabits a like territory or domain, it is, in fact, quite distinct and multifarious" (Shiller, Drag King Invasion).
In The Greater Toronto Drag King Society, in the latter half of the 1990s, there were gradations of gender and sexuality; some members were straight, bisexual, gay and, while it was independent of their performances, often their sexual identity, if known, commented on their performances. In a previous article I wrote:
Femme performer Louise - playing Olivia Newton John playing the film character Sandi in Grease - brings to her performance not only recognizable aspects of her own femme-play and the femme-star but of the femme-character the star adopts in the film. The sticky sweetness contained by a leather jacket, blond wig, high heels and tight pants are aspects of the film character's transformation from femme-goody two shoes to femme-slut. In the finale, Louise also includes Barbie business. This performer has a physique which lends itself to the Barbie "look" and she camps that up with makeup, accessories and attitude. The levels of femme play are woven together in a patchwork characterization. The result is a camp and gender performance soup with dashes of Louise, Olivia, Sandi and Barbie. (Shiller, Drag King Invasion)
There is so much potential in the Shreks to challenge dominant ideas about women. To me, the amalgamation of female identities in The Greater Toronto Drag King Society is amazing to this day.[3] The de-essentialisation of various identities was spectacular:
Third Wave feminism celebrates women's multiple and sometimes contradictory identities in today's world. Third Wave feminists are encouraged to build their own identities from the available buffet, and to not worry if the items on their plate are not served together traditionally. Women can unapologetically celebrate a plate full of entrée choices like soccer mom, career woman, lover, wife, lesbian, activist, consumer, girly girl, tomboy, sweetheart, bitch, good girl, princess, or sex symbol. Third Wave feminism encourages personal empowerment and action. Third Wave feminists like to think of themselves as survivors, not victims. (Rockler-Gladen)
I played Marie Osmond quite self-consciously. This was fantastic research for me. In Again, I say: "There was an amazing conflation of ourselves and the pair we were playing. I am very pleased we gave ourselves completely to the process.
I remember shooting a promotional spot on television and the producer cleared the studio because Joy L. put something down her pants so that she was anatomically correct. Maybe the producer wanted a banal G.I. Joe® representation. "...[T]here was the infamous Breakfast Television appearance that was almost cancelled when the producer worried for the children in the audience after seeing that [Joy L.] was packin'..." (Paquette). Who knew that anatomy could be so offensive or insulting? I remember thinking that the response was totally inappropriate. In fact, I was naïvely stunned. Even though we played a brother and sister, we camped it up with inappropriate, longing stares; there was an air of desire and sexuality. We never discussed doing this, we just did." (Shiller Again).
It is cool that there are contemporary references in the Shreks. For example, in Shrek 2, there are references to the films Mission Impossible and Flashdance. The fairy godmother hands out her business card. The Gingerbread Man has a Starbucks coffee. If anything, the modern references suggest a new way of thinking.
In Shrek the Third the following dialog takes place:
Snow White: Right! Ladies, assume the position!
[Sleeping Beauty falls asleep, Snow White lies down in her coffin facade, and Cinderella seats herself on the floor gazing languorously into space]
Princess Fiona: What are you doing?
Snow White: [annoyed] Waiting to be rescued!
It is commendable that the characters are shown to know the rules, but they still conform to them. Even Princess Fiona in the first film acknowledges that, "she knows how it goes," but she is still rescued. Knowledge and action do not link up.
In the first Shrek, Donkey says, "Blue flower, red thorns! Blue flower, red thorns! Blue flower, red thorns! Oh, this would be so much easier if I wasn't color-blind!" Sometimes we are blind to what is right in front of us.
A revision of the fairy-tale. A contemporary way of envisioning women. Old hat. Nothing new in all three Shreks.
Alan Cohen, a popular holistic keynote speaker, said:
It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power.
Championing the new or different is commendable, but recuperating ancient notions is, frankly, deplorable. It is so good to validate difference, but when that is couched by hidden ideology, it becomes suspect. It ends up validating old concepts. It ends up doing the opposite.
WORKS CITED
Cohen, Alan. 2006. "Alan Cohen." Wisdom Quotes. 3 Sept 2008 .
Crary, David. "Advocacy Group: Drop Shrek From Anti-Obesity Ads." The Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood. Associated Press 25 April 2007. 30 Aug 2008 .
Fitzgerald, Shawn. "Shrek." musicOHM. 30 Aug 2008 .
Flashdance. Dir. Adrian Lyne. Paramount Pictures, 1983.
Gandhi, Mahatma. Mahatma Gandhi quotes. ThinkExist.com. 3 Aug 2008 .
Haraway, Donna. "A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century." Simians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature. New York: Routledge, 1991.
Johnson, Merri Lisa, ed. Third Wave Feminism and Television: Jane Puts It in a Box. London & New York: I. B. Tauris, 2007.
Mission Impossible. Dir. Brian De Palma. Paramount, 1996.
Newton, Esther. Mother Camp. Female Impersonation in America. Chicago & London: U of Chicago P, 1972.
Oakley, Ann. Subject Woman. New York: Pantheon, 1981.
Paquette, Daniel. "The Personal Memoir of a Size King." Xtra! Archives. Jul 28 1999. Pink Triangle Press. 3 Aug, 2008 .
Pattison, Mark. "Doing ads against obesity yet shilling for junk food: What the Shrek?" The Online Angelus. 1 June 2007. Catholic News Service. 3 Aug 2008 .
Poniewozik, James. "Is Shrek Bad for Kids?" TIME Magazine. 10 May 2007. Time Inc. 30 Aug 2008 .
Rockler-Gladen, Naomi. "Third Wave Feminism: Personal Empowerment Dominates This Feminist Philosophy." Suite 101. 3 May 2007. Suite101.com Media Inc. 3 Sept 2008 .
Shiller, Romy. "Drag King Invasion: Taking Back the Throne." Canadian Theatre
Review 86, Spring 1996: 24-8.
---. A critical exploration of cross-dressing and drag in gender performance and camp in contemporary North American drama and film. National Library of Canada, 1999. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk1/tape7/PQDD_0007/NQ41312.pdf or http://hdl.handle.net/1807/13142 (accessed September 14, 2008).
---. Again. Forthcoming.
---. You Never Know: A Memoir. Victoria, BC: Trafford, 2008.
Shrek. Dir. Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson. Dream Works, 2001.
Shrek 2. Dir. Andrew Adamson, Kelly Asbury and Conrad Vernon. Dream Works, 2004.
Shrek the Third. Dir. Chris Miller and Raman Hui. Dream Works, 2007.
"Shrek Princess goes feminist." Metro.co.uk. 23 May 2007. Associated Newspapers Limited. 3 Sept 2008 .
"Third-Wave Feminism." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. 28 Aug 2008. 3 Sept 2008 .
United Kingdom. "Definition of 'disability' under the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA)." DirectGov. 30 Aug 2008
[1] This article was inspired by a conversation with Professor R. Harries of Bishop's University.
[2] Wikipedia defines third-wave feminism as "a term identified with several diverse strains of feminist activity and study beginning in the early 1990s. The movement arose as a response to perceived failures and backlash against initiatives and movements created by second-wave feminism of ca. the 1960s to the 1980s" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_wave_feminism).
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