gilmore global village

"The plural of cul-de-sac is culs-de-sac? That doesn't even sound like English."
"That's because it's French."
-Lorelai and Rory, "The Nanny and the Professor"

My father is an extremely conservative Republican, born-again-Christian attorney from Houston. He enjoys Frank Capra movies, oldies radio, and working in the yard.

Dogooderlawyer is an extremely liberal Democrat, Jewish law student from Brooklyn. He enjoys David Fincher movies, classic rock, and drinking good beer.

The only thing that they inexplicably have in common, so far as I can see, (besides a peculiar, vaguely-articulated antipathy towards the French) is a love of Gilmore Girls.


I hadn't even heard of this show until I went home for my brother's wedding last October and discovered my dad's new obsession. He took to quoting the show in our phone calls and sending me "Gilmore-ism" e-cards for no reason. Since I don't own a television and don't tend to identify with his aesthetic choices (when I was a child he religiously recorded every single episode of The Rockford Files), I just enjoyed his enthusiasm from afar.

Then I met dogooderlawyer. He reads all the recaps on Television Without Pity, records the episodes he misses, and tries to make me watch the WB on Tuesdays at 8:00 pm. I called one day last May, and he answered with the greeting, "Can I call you back in 45 minutes when Gilmore Girls is over?"

Um, okay. I've been scratching my head ever since.

So it appears that the show cuts across a few demographic lines. Its writer-producer, Amy Sherman-Palladino, recieved financial support to start the show from the Family Friendly Programming Forum, a consortium of national advertisers that aims to promote programming "appropriate in theme, content and language for adults and children. It has cross generational appeal, depicts real life and resolves issues responsibly." So that explains my father.

But Sherman-Palladino is also a feminist television executive that works to bring an original voice, a theater-esque look and pace, and a progressive portrayal of women to a medium in which they are still regularly given very short shrift (cf. The O.C., Dawson's Creek, and even some episodes of The West Wing and Sex and the City). Plus, she's a Buffy fan! So that explains dogooderlawyer.

Apparently, there might be something in this show for me, too, as jabooshee contends that I identify with Rory. We were watching the episode "But Not as Cute as Pushkin," which is a total shout-out because he is my absolute favorite Russian author. (I even have his portrait, framed, hanging at home.) Jabooshee made this observation during a scene in which Alexis Bledel's character waxes eloquent about the Yale library's collection and smells books. (I would just like to point out for the record that I have never in my life done this. Once, okay, I have done this once. Maybe twice. Three times, tops.) Rory also mentions here that it is rumored that one can graduate from Yale if sufficiently fluent in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. Nah, there's nothing here to interest me at all.

So, is Gilmore Girls a panacea for the world's ills, bringing disparate people together through the highly-caffeinated, highly-animated repartee that seems endemic to Stars Hollow? I think the diversity of media outlets below that enthuse over this show is evidence enough.

(N.B. The woman who writes most of GG recaps on TWOP, Pamie, who doesn't actually seem to like the show all that much? A UT grad. Just puttin' that out there.)

PopMatters review

The National Review review

Slate on GG's bookishness

Slate on GG's snappy dialogue

Little Corner of the World

Terry Gross's interview with ASP on Fresh Air

NYT interview with ASP