Kim Akass

More than ever this year I find myself coming up against Facebook
memories.  You know, the ones that pop up and remind you of how many
years ago it was since something nice happened, like meeting up with
people in crowded places pre-Coronavirus, memories of family, friends
and moments passed, gatherings that now seem impossible: sweaty pubs,
dinner parties, concerts, crowded classrooms, in person meetings, nights
out with colleagues and, of course, theatres and cinemas.

If going to the cinema and sitting in crowded rooms seems a lifetime
away, watching television is something that has become increasingly
familiar.  Pandemic bingeing is the new box-set bonanza and, for many, a
lifeline to the outside world.  Never has  television viewing meant so
much to so many and yet, ironically, 3 months into the pandemic and
television drama production [could be under
threat](https://www.radiotimes.com/news/tv/2020-06-23/tv-filming-coronavirus-restart-how-when/) while
the BBC has begun [a series of swinging cuts to regional
staff](https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/jul/02/local-tv-stars-to-go-as-bbc-cuts-450-staff-from-regional-programmes) as
well as [possibly axing
BBC4](https://cstonline.net/everybody-needs-a-place-to-think-or-do-they-the-end-of-bbc-four-arts-programming-and-precarity-by-leanne-weston/).

These news stories fill me with horror as my life and memories are
punctuated by compulsive television viewing.  Like many, I use TV to
distract from real life as well as to enrich it.  I only need to read
about a television programme and the feelings and emotions associated
with it are instantly aroused.  For example, any number of Andrew
Pixley's blogs about television (too many to link here -- just put his
name in the search bar above) will prompt a rush of memories and an
email flurry between us as I bore him rigid with memories of [*The
Clangers*](https://cstonline.net/the-game-of-the-name-by-andrew-pixley/)
and watching TV with my dad, how his blogs [are going to be used in my
American TV history
classes](https://cstonline.net/what-have-itc-ever-done-for-the-us-by-andrew-pixley/)
and just why [this particular blog made me
cry](https://cstonline.net/village-people-by-andrew-pixley/).

John Ellis's blog about [Broadcast TV in a
Crisis](https://cstonline.net/what-do-we-need-in-a-crisis-broadcast-tv-by-john-ellis/) had
me weeping (I must admit to crying at the drop of a hat at the moment)
as it reminded me of the British TV that I still so badly miss.  It also
made me think of the way watching television during the pandemic has
united and sometimes divided families (see John Ritchie's blogs
[here](https://cstonline.net/what-are-we-watching-by-john-ritchie/),
[here](https://cstonline.net/blurring-by-john-ritchie/) and
[here](https://cstonline.net/prime-mover-by-john-ritchie/)).

In fact, one of the very few good things about this lockdown -- in
addition to the planetary pollution pause -- is the sheer amount of
really good television we have been watching and, at CSTonline, the
variety of excellent blogs we have received.  Take Elke Weismann's
[wonderful
contribution](https://cstonline.net/returning-the-public-bbc-television-in-lockdown-by-elke-weissmann/)
that introduced me to *The Room Next Door*, Matt Hancock's Daily
Briefing and all things Dominic Cummings:

And not to mention the programme's take on Trump's Disinfectant Claims
which actually made me cry with laughter (yep, crying again):

  
It takes a lot to make me laugh about politics at the moment, but *The
Room Next Door* totally does it for me.

In addition, Elke's post made me think about the way TV functions in our
lives (both now and in the past), as she comments on how pandemic TV is
a great leveler: reducing hierarchies 'that structure contemporary life'
as 'we start to relate to ... celebrities as fellow pandemic
lockdowners'.  A subject that [Liz Guiffre's recent
blog](https://cstonline.net/comedy-television-equals-tragedy-plus-time-are-we-there-yet-by-liz-giuffre/)
also taps into when she talks about *Staged*.

In fact, looking back over the vast amounts of blogs we have received
over the past few months I realize that not only are we lucky to have
had so many people writing for us, but that the contributions have come
from across the world.  Without Liz writing about Australian TV I would
never have even known about *At Home Alone Together,* let alone how to
meet a younger man post 60:

I owe you one, Liz.

Without the blog series coming out of the [Reaching Young
Audiences](https://comm.ku.dk/research/film-science-and-creative-media-industries/rya/)
project, I would have no awareness of the Danish web series,
[*Centrum*](https://cstonline.net/covid-19-from-a-teenage-web-series-perspective/),
or the [popularity of singing series with the Danish viewing
public](https://cstonline.net/family-binge-watching-in-times-of-corona/). 
I'm also pretty convinced that I would have had no idea of how [*The
Goodies* had been repeated umpteen times on Australia's Broadcasting
Corporation](https://cstonline.net/goodies-down-under-by-marcus-harmes/). 
And, maybe, just maybe, if Victoria McCollum had not written her blog
about [why we should be watching *Parks and Recreation* during the
pandemic](https://cstonline.net/why-you-should-be-watching-parks-and-recreation-during-the-pandemic-by-victoria-mccollum/)
Michael Schur would not have written a [pandemic special of the very
same
show](https://www.vulture.com/2020/04/parks-and-recreation-reunion-coronavirus-episode.html). 
Well, maybe he would. Still, the synchronicity of that blog amazed me.

In the past few months, CST bloggers have brought us astonishing
insights into international television, how TV has been traded globally
both
[past](https://cstonline.net/what-have-itc-ever-done-for-the-us-by-andrew-pixley/)
and present, [what the television archive means for
us](https://cstonline.net/what-do-we-make-of-the-television-archive-by-helen-wheatley/)
(which may take on a whole new meaning post-pandemic), [what it means to
succumb to Netflix in
Mexico](https://cstonline.net/succumbing-to-netflix-in-mexico-by-toby-miller/)
and how [that same streaming service encourages families to watch
TV](https://cstonline.net/family-watch-together-tv-netflix-and-the-dark-intergenerational-fantasy-by-djoymi-baker-jessica-balanzategui-and-diana-sandars/)
together.  We have also been given insights into [Scandinavian Slow TV
for
children](https://cstonline.net/scandinavian-slow-tv-is-moving-strongly-into-the-2020s-and-is-now-also-for-children/)
and how programmes about death take on a new meaning when watched during
a pandemic
([here](https://cstonline.net/why-the-fk-not-you-montaigne-six-feet-under-and-life-in-the-face-of-inevitable-death-by-christopher-nunn/)
and
[here](https://cstonline.net/reliving-your-master-day-montaigne-nietzsche-and-russian-doll-by-chris-nunn/)).

[And I haven't even mentioned *Tiger King*
yet](https://cstonline.net/circus-a-la-king-by-andrew-j-salvati/).

Suffice to say, there isn't much that we haven't covered on this website
since the Coronavirus pandemic locked us down into our isolated
television viewing madness.

Over the years I have been so proud to read every single blog that has
appeared on this website -- the variety of approaches, the amount of
different voices and the sheer hard work that has gone into these
contributions week in week out takes my breath away.

As this is the last day for CSTonline until we kick off again on 4
September, I wanted to take a moment to pause (much like nature has over
the past few months) and say a big thank you to everyone for continuing
to write for us.  You do this freely (and for free) and I don't think I
have ever expressed the gratitude I feel for your continued support.

So, excuse the cheesiness but, ...

While I'm at it I'd like to especially thank contributors that have been
there since the very beginning of CSTonline. Jonathan Bignell, for
example, whose blog on [the first
Bond](https://cstonline.net/the-first-screen-bond-casino-royale-on-tv-in-1954-by-jonathan-bignell/)
beautifully chimed in with my teaching last semester; Toby Miller whose
[blog this
week](https://cstonline.net/football-television-race-and-ownership-by-toby-miller/)
is, as usual, timely and pertinent and John Ellis, who appeared on the
CSTonline re-launch in February 2011 writing [from
Philadelphia](https://cstonline.net/letter-from-america-by-john-ellis-3/)
-- a mere 20 minute drive from where I live now.  What goes around comes
around and I am reminded that CSTonline has been in its present form for
nearly 10 years with amazing support from a variety of people. 
 [Douglas L
Howard](https://cstonline.net/you-cant-go-home-again-some-long-overdue-thoughts-on-deadwood-the-movie-by-douglas-l-howard/)
and [Gary R
Edgerton](https://cstonline.net/hollywood-apolcalypse-by-gary-r-edgerton/)
are among those that I haven't mentioned yet but have been with us since
the start. As has Richard Hewett whose last blog on being [locked down
in Muswell
Hill](https://cstonline.net/locked-down-in-muswell-hill-by-richard-hewett/),
you guessed it, had me blubbing with homesickness, again.

Talking of old familiars, ECREA continues to supply the site with
regular international blogs such as these from [Berber
Hagedoorn](https://cstonline.net/the-power-of-my-own-platform-nikkietutorials-and-television-talk-in-the-age-of-platform-culture-by-berber-hagedoorn/),
[Manuel José
Damásio](https://cstonline.net/covid-19-the-end-of-the-audiovisual-sector-by-manuel-jose-damasio/)
and [Sarah
Arnold](https://cstonline.net/reflections-on-media-education-during-the-covid-19-lockdowns-by-sarah-arnold/). 
 Without the editing skills of Elke Weissmann and David L Palatinus, my
job here would be so much harder.  And, on that note, a HUGE SHOUT OUT
to Tobias Steiner for supporting me over the past few years, making sure
the website runs smoothly and giving me regular sage advice beyond just
the technical know-how.

There really isn't enough room to thank everyone.  I haven't even
mentioned the editorial board of *Critical Studies in Television* and
especially my collaborator and partner in crime, Janet McCabe, who
continues to helm the journal brilliantly as well as Christine Geraghty
who, along with Richard Hewett, deals with the book reviews.   In fact,
let it be known that if you aren't mentioned here, it isn't that I don't
appreciate you and that your contributions are not valued.

While I'm on the subject of *Critical Studies in Television*, I'd like
to take another moment of your time to mention that we are going to
publish a series of short essays or 'Provocations' about TV studies in
the age of COVID-19 in the Winter 2020 edition.  We couldn't let this
historic moment pass without marking it in some way.  Not only have we
contended with the pandemic, but we've had \#BlackLivesMatter and the
appalling events that led up to the recent protests across the globe. 
What a year it has been.  We would therefore like to invite you to send
a provocation into the journal for consideration.  Some themes we'd like
to address (but, of course, this is not exhaustive) are:

- What role do you think television scholarship can (and should) play at
  this particular cultural moment?
- How have different national TV territories responded to this current
  moment, and how might those responses make us think differently and/or
  with fresh eyes?
- How has TV studies responded, what have we learnt and how should those
  lessons translate into our work?
- How do the images that have been beamed around the world impact on the
  way we watch and/or thinking about TV?
- How are we to de-colonize and de-center TV studies and the curriculum?

Finished articles of around 1-3,000 words should be submitted by the end
of August to our submission site.  [Details
Here](https://cstonline.net/submission-guidelines/).

And, before I sign off, I wanted to go back to a problem that has
plagued me since arriving in America last September.  I was relieved to
read that, according to Cathy Johnson at least, I am not alone. For even
if [TV viewing has surged during lockdown -- it has become too technical
for
some](https://cstonline.net/tv-viewing-has-surged-during-lockdown-but-has-become-too-technical-for-some-new-research-by-catherine-johnson/).
On that final note I want to reassure everyone that I have, at last,
learned how to turn the TV off. [\[1\]](#_edn1){#_ednref1}

Until September, keep safe and have a good summer.

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------

**Kim Akass** is Professor of Radio, Television and Film at Rowan
University. She is co-founding editor of *Critical Studies in
Television: The International Journal of Television Studies*, co-series
editor of 'The Reading Contemporary TV' series for I.B. Tauris (now
Bloomsbury Academic) and is managing editor of CSTonline. She is still
working on her monograph: *From Here to Maternity: Representations of
Motherhood in the Media* and is stranded in the USA because of Trump's
travel ban.

 

 

#### Footnotes

[\[1\]](#_ednref1){#_edn1} Literally in the last week.  I'll say it
again, technology is not my friend.


More than ever this year I find myself coming up against Facebook memories.

THAT WAS THE YEAR THAT WAS (OR, HOW TV KEPT ME SANE DURING A PANDEMIC)

Toby Miller

I don't have much time for WikiLeaks or its narcissist-in-chief. Anyone
surprised by their revelations (consider, you know, the history of the
US government domestically and internationally since, oh, 1776) or his
conduct (q.v. [Julian Assange v. Swedish Prosecution
Authority](http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20131202164909/http://judiciary.gov.uk/media/judgments/2011/assange-judgment-0211201))
is naive in the extreme.

It is touchingly romantic, if predictable, that cybertarian true
believers
[anoint](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-923X.2011.02250.x/abstract)
the narcissist-in-chief as 'the modern figurehead for a new world order
defined by openness, transparency and Internet freedom.' For WikiLeaks
echoes the very pomposity and secrecy of the states it seeks to expose.
Furthermore, it is comfortably bounded within old-fashioned Western
liberal norms and foci.

This despite its avowed position: WikiLeakers dedicate vast amounts of
time and energy to decrying the state and the middle-aged media. But
these are the two entities whose attention they most desire.

Although avowedly a critic of government, Assange seeks its protection
to [control the use of his
name](http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/feb/28/julian-assange-trademark-name)
in what he calls 'public speaking' and 'entertainment.' He first sought
this service through the splendidly Dickensian law firm, Finers Stephens
Innocent[](#_ftn1){#_ftnref1}---an aptly 19th-century name for a very
traditional business, working on behalf of a very traditional person,
depending on very traditional state aid.[[^\[1\]^]{role="button"
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renamed, prosaically,
HowardKennedyFSI.com.]{#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3750_52_1
.footnote_tooltip}]{.footnote_referrer}

Then he sought governmental sanctuary from Sweden due to the charge of
sexual assault. He tried to do this by electoral means in Victoria but
wasn't credible as a Senate candidate, obtaining [fewer
votes](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/09/07/assange_fails_in_bid_for_election_to_australian_senate/)
than the Australian Sex Party, and the Help End Marijuana Prohibition
Party. So he remains in Ecuador's London embassy. In other words,
without the state, he'd be defenceless. Some libertarian he.

And the *bourgeois* media? WikiLeaks craves coverage and knowledge from
journalists, because it lacks people who know what to make of the
material it collects. WikiLeakers generally need the texts they have
obtained to be scrutinized, authenticated, redacted, legitimized,
promoted, and released by the middle-aged media, who do much more than
add second-order meaning---though they offer a great deal of that.

So what of the latest tranche, which appeared Monday? '[The
archive](https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/) appears to have been circulated
among former U.S. government hackers and contractors in an unauthorized
manner, one of whom has provided WikiLeaks with portions.'

I have to admit that, despite my attitude, I love the new documents.
Why? Because of their disclosures about television.

The revelations show [poor old
Samsung](http://www.samsung.com/us/note7recall/) accused of making TVs
that provide the CIA with '[covert
microphones](https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/).' As if the company hadn't
endured enough: dangerous technical incompetence in [the operation of
its phones](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQQOiilJwJ0);
[recalls](https://pages.samsung.com/us/tlw/index.html) of its washing
machines; and [heroic levels of
corruption](http://www.bbc.com/news/business-38591931) (over decades).

WikiLeaks asserts that the CIA's Embedded Devices Branch and Britain's
MI5/BTSS developed a technology called "Weeping Angel" to transform
Samsung F8000s, such that when seemingly turned off, they are in fact
recording noises and dispatching them to CIA servers. This involves the
wonderful syntagm '[Fake-Off
mode](https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/cms/page_13205592.html).'

'Weeping angels' calls up both [a Nigerian
film](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3ZLs5YEP1I) and the revived [*Dr
Who*](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZigY1LKXpw), whose eponymous hero
confronts Weeping Angels that 'can't ever die.' Described as 'the
deadliest beings ever created,' these are entirely malevolent creatures.
The key to survival is not blinking in their presence...

So let's understand what is happening. As computers and televisions
converge, even the least fancy sets often boast software of the kind we
use in tablets or telephones. One way we interact with these services is
[via
microphones](https://theintercept.com/2017/03/07/wikileaks-dump-shows-cia-could-turn-smart-tvs-into-listening-devices/),
the device infiltrated by MI5 and the Agency.

It looks from the documents released that this had to be set up
physically, by using a universal [serial bus
port](https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/cms/page_13205592.html). The
splendid ['Things You Might Do'
page](https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/cms/page_13762801.html) endeavors to
explain why any of this might matter.

Samsung's privacy policy states: 'Please be aware that if your spoken
words include personal or other sensitive information, that information
will be among the data captured and transmitted to a third party through
your use of Voice Recognition.' It passes on viewers' commands to
[Nuance Communications](http://www.nuance.com/index.htm), which
transliterates sound to text as a guide to firms about consumers'
preferences and guarantees to corporations that it can 'keep your
documents secure.'

But this doesn't matter to our great libertarian saviors. Why? Because,
as ever, the anti-governmental romantics of WikiLeaks and their trusting
fans are focused on the state. As ever, they couldn't give a shit about
corporations spying on viewers and profiting from the sale of their
desires.

And sorry, but there's [nothing new here about
TVs](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2737708/Is-smart-TV-SPYING-family-Investigation-reveals-personal-data-TV-sets-knows-you.html)
being used to spy on viewers. With specific regard to Samsung, WikiLeaks
is behind the times: [it's been two
years](https://www.cnet.com/news/samsung-changes-smarttv-privacy-policy-in-wake-of-spying-fears/)
since concerns were voiced by the public about the specific risk of
corporate surveillance through the company's TVs.

What of the F8000, the product of Samsung's motto: '[committed to
quality](http://www.samsung.com/uk/tvs/full-hd-f8000/)?' At 55 to 75
inches, the [2013
release](https://www.cnet.com/au/products/samsung-un75f8000/review/2/)
[retailed](http://www.techradar.com/reviews/audio-visual/televisions/plasma-and-lcd-tvs/samsung-ue55f9000-1175948/review)
for over AUD\$4,000 or UK3,000 pounds.
[Samsung](https://cstonline.net/samsung-a-korean-wave-of-misconduct) is
currently [promoting its QLED](http://www.samsung.com/us/) as the 'next
innovation in TV...smarter than ever.' [Shipping starts this
month](http://www.samsung.com/us/televisions-home-theater/tvs/qled-tvs/55--class-q8c-curved-qled-4k-tv-qn55q8camfxza/).
[Be there or be square](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68FNfGueHrg).

And the narcissist-in-chief? As ever, Assange is relying on state
sanctuary. And he remains, like his brother-from-another-planet ally Mr
Trump, [frightened of
Sweden](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh5DAOeqkMU).

 

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References
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I don’t have much time for WikiLeaks or its narcissist-in-chief. Anyone surprised by their revelations (consider, you know, the history of the US government domestically and internationally since, oh, 1776) or his conduct (q.v. Julian Assange v. Swedish Prosecution Authority) is naive in the extreme.

WIKILEAKS AND THE T.V. SET

Martha P. Nochimson

Part Two:  Whose Show?

\[*Part Two of "GENRE OUT OF THE BOX" delves further into the connection
between genre and gender\]*

[In Part One](https://cstonline.net/genre-out-of-the-box), I explored
the genre hybridity of Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries, and began my
inquiry into how the hybridity impacts on the construction of gender in
the series,   concluding with the question of what happens in the series
to conventional fears expressed in purer versions of the detective genre
about the power of women because of the amalgam of the detective genre
and the fantasy genre.  The answer in MFMM begins subtextually almost
immediately, but breaks through the surface only in the middle of Season
2, after in "Death at the Wheel," Detective Inspector Jack Robinson
thinks heroine Phryne Fisher has been killed in a car accident and
experiences unbearable anguish. When he learns that she is alive, he
tells her he must cut her out of his life in order to continue to
function.  In the next episode, "The Blood of Juana the Mad," on the
detective story level, it becomes clear that Jack is hard pressed to
solve a mystery without Phryne.  (I venture to say that Phryne needs
Jack just as much in order to close her cases too.)  Their mutual
cooperation makes them each more effective. Fears that women will gum up
the detection process prove groundless on the level of narrative.  Of
course, this vocalizes the feminist edge of the series, but I'm not sure
how much of a punch that would pack if it were not for the co-presence
of the fantasy aspect of the series which takes the question to a deeper
level through the visceral images of the male and female together.

![Phryne and Jack
1\`](http://cms.cstonline.net/resizeimage.php?width=300&height=209&image=http://cdn.cstonline.net/assets/image/user_94/Phyrne%20and%20Jack.jpg "Phryne and Jack 1"){.addCaption
.aligncenter loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="300" height="209"}

With glamour, wit, and sometimes riotously bawdy humor, the series
alters the existing fantasy images of masculinity on the playing field
of James Bond and most other sleuths, by introducing a different, female
set of genitals as emblems of power to complement the de rigeur phallic
guns and cars of the old style detective.  Guns and cars are present.  
Phryne has a gun; Jack's is bigger.  Jack has a car; Phryne's is sleeker
and more expensive.  Phryne flies a plane; Jack rides a motorcycle.  But
the visual language of the series impresses us that Phryne's power is
not primarily her ability to play the phallic game.

The ever present fantasy spectacle of Phryne's female body not only
emphasizes her feminine presence but, in a very good humored way, at
times points directly to her crotch.  Phryne's fantastically accoutred
body is absurd as far as street action is concerned, but in this fantasy
setting the balance between the expected phallic images of crime fiction
and Phryne's female anatomy has major emotional ramifications.  Jack has
a body that has not escaped the notice of the women in the audience, but
male potency is always give a lot of play in mainstream fantasy.  No
surprises there.   It is references to the Phryne's potency in images
that point toward female genitalia that alter the playing field.  In
"Queen of the Flowers," Jack interrupts Phryne teaching some young girls
judo.  "I hope you're not concealing a dangerous weapon under that
skirt," he says.  "I'm concealing a lot of things," says Phryne, "that's
what a lady does."  Later in the episode he informs Phryne that one of
the girls is thought to be a pyromaniac.  "Thank you," she says
disinclined to believe it.  "I'll keep a close eye on my flammables."  
As she speaks, she rises and he is staring at her pubic area.  There is
a sublime comic moment in "Away With the Fairies" when Jack, crouched on
the floor looking at a body, not knowing Phryne has just walked in turns
and finds himself staring into her crotch.  In "Murder Most Scandalous"
she conducts our vision of her body upward, when she practically puts
her breast in his mouth when she goes undercover as his escort in a
gentleman's club.  Mother power.

![Phryne and Jack
2](http://cms.cstonline.net/resizeimage.php?width=350&height=258&image=http://cdn.cstonline.net/assets/image/user_94/Phryne%20and%20Jack%20smolder%20more.jpg "Phryne and Jack 2"){.addCaption
.aligncenter loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="350" height="258"}

Fictional detectives don't regularly encounter or represent the female
crotch or even attend much to the female body on other television shows
that are more purely in the preserves of the genre.  The women who are
featured in the mystery shows in the Scully and Mulder tradition will at
time create a sensation by appearing in noticeably feminine glamorous or
sexy clothes.  But Miss Fisher's in-the-spotlight body is always front
and center.  So the question of whether a man can function in
partnership with a woman is replaced in MFMM with the question of
whether men and women can function without each other.  It is Phryne who
voices that reply, bringing very close to the surface what I would like
to think is the underlying premise of the series, that to separate is
death for both of them:  "What we do best, us together you'd sacrifice
that?  If you did that Jack I would feel like it was you lying dead in
that wreckage. Please can you think about that?"  At this point they are
both still thinking.

Phryne and Jack do resume their partnership, but the situation voiced in
"Death at the Wheel," is not resolved, only tabled.  It remains, at
least as I see it, the primary mystery of MFMM.  What can become of
women and men in the maelstrom of male and female desire if men do not
automatically take control, and if women do not automatically direct
their desire toward only one man.  If the reactions that have been made
manifest in the social media are to be believed, the detective stories
in MFMM are not the big attraction for the growing audience.  The
audience has been galvanized by the two fantasy elements that represent
the dilemma of Phryne and of Phryne and Jack.  Phryne's independence is
conveyed on the fantasy level of the series by the stunning, prize
winning costumes that rivet the audience's attention to Phryne's
spectacularized body, about which many fans enthusiastically speak.

![Phryne\'s
costumes](http://cms.cstonline.net/resizeimage.php?width=350&height=245&image=http://cdn.cstonline.net/assets/image/user_94/Miss%20Fisher's%20costumes.jpg "Phryne's costumes"){.addCaption
.aligncenter loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="350" height="245"}

The issue of male and female desire is encapsulated by the problem of
Jack and Phryne's endlessly discussed (by fans) relationship, a
relationship which propels us way beyond wondering "will they or won't
they?" toward a contemplation of what love means when old rules no
longer apply.

Much feminist film criticism has noted that in Old Hollywood the heroine
is initially presented as having a spectacular female body, but is
transformed into something more drab when the female star falls in love
and is "tamed" by the male star, a metaphor for the triumph of
patriarchy over women's energy.  That doesn't actually happen much these
days and will not happen in MFMM.  But the co-creators of the series,
Cox and Eagger, are of two minds about what to do with Phryne and Jack.
And on that question hangs the fate of the series' hybridity, and what
it will, finally express about men and women.   In my e-mail
correspondence with Cox, she told me she inclines to be "old fashioned"
and wants them to be together though not necessarily in a domestic way,
and that Eagger inclines toward a free standing Phryne.  That was
confirmed by my interview with Eagger.  In her words, for her, this is
not the Jack and Phryne show.  It's Phryne's story.  She's quite
passionate on the subject: "most of our default positions in
storytelling are to give male characters the lead when it comes to
action.  It's only natural that the default position in our culture is
to give the male characters the lead when it comes to action given this
is what we mostly witness in scripted drama.  With Phryne I know I have
to actively work against this in my own head. This is a fear vocalised
by the network and some of the male writers of not emasculating the male
characters in the scripts, in particular Jack. I get that, but we always
have to watch that this "fear" of not "emasculating" our male characters
is not to the detriment of Phryne. It would be like someone solving
Sherlock's or Cracker's cases. These characters have help, but it's
their smarts / intuition that we watch the show for.  There have been
scripts that Deb has had to quickly rewrite or reposition, where Phryne
has been relegated to the role of bystander, rather than protagonist. So
while Phryne has her team of Dot, Bert & Cec \[two witty and interesting
working class Communists\] and Jack, it is her show. It perplexes me
that we have to consciously keep an eye on this."

![Phryne with Bert and Cec in the
background](http://cms.cstonline.net/resizeimage.php?width=300&height=430&image=http://cdn.cstonline.net/assets/image/user_94/Phryne%20with%20Bert%20and%20Cec%20in%20the%20background.jpg "Phryne with Bert and Cec in the background"){.addCaption
.addCaption .aligncenter loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="300"
height="430"}

When I began writing this blog, I believed that the genre hybridity I
see as the heart and soul of the series required the pairing of Jack and
Phryne as the center of the series.  I would have said that it would
work against the many faceted genre mix to give Phryne center stage and
relegate the mutual love between Jack and Phryne to the periphery.  And
here's where it all gets very interesting for me.  I have made a career
of writing criticism that includes interviews with the creators of the
film and television I am exploring.  Being confronted with the bracing
reality of what the creators are about has always kept me from getting
stuck in my own fantasies.  My dialogue with Cox is typical of this
dynamic.  She differs somewhat from me, but not in any radical way,
keeping things real and lively.  But my interview with Eagger takes the
process to the next step.  I admire Eagger very much for her feminist
goals and delight in Phryne's independence, but her impulse to make the
series very clearly Phryne's show at first seemed to make my genre
analysis irrelevant.  What happened next, I call a critical process out
of the box.

I stand by my claims that it is important to recognize that the mixture
of genres in the series is crucial to the expansive way the show
expresses itself about women and women's experience.  But my very
preliminary interviews with Cox and Eagger have caused me to think again
about just what form that expression will take as they continue to
develop MFMM.  Perhaps it will not be as I was originally certain it
should and would have to be.  As unnerving as I find this thought, it is
also bracing to be forced to see that the series' hybridity might not
have the implications I was certain of.  My correspondence with Cox and
Eagger have laid bare assumptions of mine that I hadn't questioned.  I
had assumed that the show's hybridity would free Jack and Phryne to be
together against all odds because that's what I want.  But once
hybridity opens up the path away from the convention, anything can
happen.   I am not at all prepared to say that Jack and Phryne's
relationship isn't the engine of MFMM, but where I was once certain, I
now wonder.

It is, I now see after my correspondence with Cox and Eagger,  my desire
and not my insight into the genre issues on MFMM that connects the
hybridity to a certainty that Phryne and Jack must share center stage if
the content is to work properly with the form.  But it is not the
critic's desire that drives the creation of a series.  My correspondence
has highlighted this reality that I had forgotten in my enthusiasm. 
Whose desire is it?  The creator's?  And if Cox and Eagger have opposing
visions?  Or could it be that a desire will emerge in time, after much
play with the material, from the collective subconscious of Cox and
Eagger that is more than just the sum of the different ways they are
inclined right now?   Or is the mover in fact the moved?  Are mass media
craftspeople driven by what they intuit is the desire of the audience?  
Eagger says that while Essie Davis (and ostensibly Eagger too) regards
the Jack and Phryne relationship as very important and "often her
\[Essie Davis's\] touchstone for the emotional context or subtext for
the episode," both Eagger and Essie "shamelessly encourage Phryne to
have as much sex as feasible. I enjoy her appetite and her subverting of
the male gaze -- it's naughty, but nice."  Hmmm.  Eagger has further
acknowledged that this is tricky in terms of Jack and Phryne's
relationship.  Tricky indeed.  I would say that at first Phryne's sexual
freedom might define her liberation, but, as she gets closer to
acknowledging the mutual love she and Jack share, if her unbridled
satisfaction of lust goes on for too long, I am curious about whether
the heart will go out of the series.  I'm also curious about what Eagger
thinks makes Phryne's free-wheeling sex despite her deep feeling for
Jack a subversion of the male gaze.  Perhaps future conversations will
clarify this.

Cox and Eagger have each separately told me that they value their
conversations with me because the hectic pace of making the show leaves
little time to deliberate and just the questions I sent them opened up
some opportunities for them to take a breath and think.  A high
compliment.  But also a sign of a rare openness that makes MFMM the
fresh, unique show it is.  I've worked in American television and I
recognize the truth of what they say, but their interest in finding a
time and place to explore questions is unusual in that industry in my
experience.  Cox and Eagger humble me.  I spoke above of what might not
be conscious in Cox and Eagger about what they have created, and I now
speak of what was not conscious about my critical approach to their
work.  I have made an important discovery as I cast off my uninspected
certainties about a show that is still in a vital stage of development.

I find it hard to believe that I can ever enjoy what I imagine must
happen to both Phryne and Jack and their heart connection if she
continues "to have as much sex as feasible," with many temporary objects
of desire.  I place my faith in storytellers to reveal to me what I
never imagined before, but I now see why hybridity might alarm some.  My
predisposition toward breaking boundaries and innovation had blinded me
to the potential oppositions to my desires in the unknown possibilities
for women and men in a hybrid fantasy that breaks up old conventions. 
When the playing field is wide open, all bets are off.  I confess to
both apprehension and excitement.

In summing up her comments, Eagger wrote:  "Watch this space."  Yup.

 

**Martha P. Nochimson's **26 year career as a University Professor of
film and literature is only part of her story. In addition to the
pleasure she has taken at being in the classroom at Mercy College and
the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University, she has worked as
an editor for Cineaste magazine, written for American television, and
has had the privilege of being in long running conversations with both
David Lynch (25 years and counting) and David Chase (ten years and
counting).  She has published six books and is about to start work on
Inner Tube:  Television Beyond Formula for the University of Texas
Press.


Part Two:  Whose Show? [

 Part Two of “


 GENRE OUT OF THE BOX” delves further into the connection between genre and gender


 ]

In Part One, I explored the genre hybridity of Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, and began my inquiry into how the hybridity impacts on the construction of gender in the series,

GENRE OUT OF THE BOX ON MISS FISHER&#8217;S MURDER MYSTERIES: THE EVOLUTION OF A CRITIC, PART TWO

Elke Weissmann

As the UK moves closer to the end of its annual academic teaching period
and we are becoming reflective and perhaps also a [bit optimistic about
the
future](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aj4wcuo9Mgo){target="_blank"}, I
am struck by one big question: what does it mean to teach television
today? A few weeks ago, in his CSTonline Blog, [Toby Miller made a
case](https://cstonline.net/tv-is-dead-by-toby-miller-2014/){target="_blank"} for
the continuation of television in its most traditional of forms. I
wholeheartedly support his arguments, also because so much of the
newness of new technology is just a digital transformation of old
practices (Twitter and chat continue talk over television, for example).
So when I use the word 'today', I am not thinking about potential
transformations of the medium as a result of new technologies. Rather, I
am wondering if there is a different transformation going on which has
much more to do with the academy than with the medium or technology.

That I am asking these questions now probably has to do with two
experiences: first, I have been asked to teach television on a second
year module, and I have been given the topics for my sessions. As a
result, I ended up giving lectures on television narratives, television
genres and televisuality. The last one, I discovered later, was supposed
to address medium specificity, particularly as far as narrative is
concerned. I discovered this when I read [the accompanying
blog](http://sensesofcinema.com/2003/feature-articles/sopranos_televisuality/){target="_blank"} which
students were given as an example of an analysis focused on
televisuality. On closer inspection, I discovered that the blog
described televisuality as 'the unprecedented ability of television to
produce virtually endless visual, serial narratives, both fictional and
non-fictional', suggesting an understanding of the term in ways
that [Jeffrey Sconce described
as](https://www.academia.edu/4353980/What_If_Charting_Televisions_New_Textual_Boundaries){target="_blank"} 'cumulative
narrative', rather than, you
know,[ televisuality](http://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=h-KnOn45fZYC&oi=fnd&pg=PR7&dq=televisuality+caldwell&ots=fzMH7s_A3r&sig=-f9eWPJeurt2Qb97mVThXdIha6E#v=onepage&q=televisuality%20caldwell&f=false){target="_blank"}.
The second experience comes from the fact that I am finding myself being
asked by several film scholars if it's not amazing that film and
television are moving closer and closer together, particularly in the
United States. I am happy to report that my first-year students would
probably respond with a similar quizzical face as I do, and point to
programmes such as *77 Sunset Strip* (Warner Brothers, 1958-1964).

 

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In other words, the problem that I think I am facing -- and I am
wondering if others are as well -- is that I seem to be working in an
environment where the rest of the academy is starting to do television
studies and think they know what that entails. What I am ending up with
is a focus on television drama, and, worse, a focus on *programmes as
texts*.

To be fair, we might have to blame ourselves a little for this: after
all, there is a tendency in our scholarship -- and I am as much to blame
for this as others -- to focus our textual analyses on programmes rather
than other things such as trailers, brands or other ephemera. We should
maybe also not forget that there are a number of book series, such as
I.B.Tauris's *Reading...* series or the BFI's *Television
Classics* series, focused on specific programmes that substantiate these
tendencies. But at the end of the day, one of the defining texts of our
discipline wasn't about a programme,[ it was about
flow](http://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=9XYfPRBR3awC&oi=fnd&pg=PR7&dq=television+flow+raymond+williams&ots=bgCYJnzBVk&sig=OKuec5v2-VOx_cwJow_GGA5nuMM#v=onepage&q=television%20flow%20raymond%20williams&f=false){target="_blank"}.
And for me, some of the most exciting work of the early years of TV
studies was more interested in audiences (for example, [Charlotte
Brunsdon's
work](http://screen.oxfordjournals.org/content/22/4/32.extract){target="_blank"})
or trade relations than programmes (for example, [Philip Schlesinger's
analysis](http://ejc.sagepub.com/content/1/3/263.short){target="_blank"}).
Indeed, the aspect that I continue to value above all else in television
studies is that it openly subscribes to a multi-disciplinary approach
that recognises the industry, the texts and the consumption in equal
measure. To be fair, film studies is nowhere near as mono-disciplinary
as I am making it out to be here. But my experience of having my subject
area (pre-)defined for me has made me wonder about the dominance of
specific approaches within that field, too.

So, what does it mean to teach television today? In a module that
introduces students to key concepts of television studies, surely ideas
of flow, distraction, intimacy, liveness and immediacy should still
matter? Of course, these concepts developed in the context of the
dominance of specific approaches in their related disciplines (including
film studies) that are specific to the time when they first entered our
vocabulary. And the number of concepts will have to be expanded to
consider other aspects, including issues of production, distribution and
real audience engagement. But surely they are still useful, particularly
as the role of the live event for television has become amplified in
recent years, and new media attempt to create an even more intimate and
immediate experience for audiences. Is there a space to get students to
think about television as a medium that offers particular pleasures and
forms of engagement that derive from much more than the scope of the
programme text? What do you think? And more importantly: what is
teaching television today like for you?

 

**Elke Weissmann** is Reader in Film and Television at Edge Hill
University. She is currently considering changing this to Reader in
Television and Film, however. Her books include *Transnational
Television Drama* (Palgrave) and the edited collection *Renewing
Feminisms* (I.B.Tauris) with Helen Thornham. She is vice-chair of the
ECREA TV Studies Section and sits on the board of editors for *Critical
Studies in Television*. She migrated to the UK in 2002 after realising
that German television was as bad as she remembered.


As the UK moves closer to the end of its annual academic teaching period and we are becoming reflective and perhaps also a bit optimistic about the future, I am struck by one big question: what does it mean to teach television today? A few weeks ago, in his CSTonline Blog, Toby Miller made a case for the continuation of television in its most traditional of forms.

Messaggi di Rogue Scholar

THAT WAS THE YEAR THAT WAS (OR, HOW TV KEPT ME SANE DURING A PANDEMIC)

WIKILEAKS AND THE T.V. SET

GENRE OUT OF THE BOX ON MISS FISHER’S MURDER MYSTERIES: THE EVOLUTION OF A CRITIC, PART TWO

TEACHING TELEVISION: WHERE DO I START?