GRAY IN L.A.
We are surrounded by trends. Not a day goes by where some media isn't announcing a trend. Any trend. Now we finally have a divorce trend that matches my hair color and that of a very large number of the population. There are certain divorces with puzzlingly high numbers that have been quickly labeled "gray divorce." Yes, you guessed it. The gray rebellion we hear so much about is not just about colorful clothes and a "to hell with it" attitude but about letting go of the other, apparently not better, half of you and with it the idea of tottering off with hubby into the sunset as old people.
The divorce rate among people 50 and older has doubled in the past 20 years, according to research by Bowling Green State University sociologists Susan Brown and I-Fen Lin. Their paper, "The Gray Divorce Revolution," examines the factors driving the trend -- which I don't want to get into right now. I'm not married, so I'm not worried. But what I've noticed is that the idea of duos isn't dead at all -- certainly not in the entertainment industry.
On the contrary, it's Dynamic Duo time on TV and soon in the movies again. And since two women are often better than one, the duos in these cases are indeed women. What's even more, we are talking old women who are grabbing the audience with their frank talk and audacious antics.
First, season two of the Netflix hit "Grace and Frankie" just started. It stars Jane Fonda, age 78, and Lily Tomlin, age 76, something she calls "the darker side of 70." Both are having the time of their life as precisely the "gray divorcees" the industrious researchers are talking about. The plots are a little too stressed for my taste and there is too much interior decorating involved, but still, to have two old women have it out without being caricatures is pretty good.
And this reminds me that I've heard talk again the other day about a remake of that once shocking potboiler "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?", the sad, sick story of aging Hollywood has-beens with ghastly makeup -- in the shape of then only 50-plus Joan Crawford and Bette Davis, at their nasty best.
I can easily see Susan Sarandon (69) and Geena Davis (60) in an updated version, giving the story a fetching Thelma-and-Louise-touch. And since that movie was all about independence (with a bad ending, no less) I'd like to mention that it is the women who mostly initiate the "gray divorces"!
The other really good news in happy couplings -- at least for an Anglophile like me -- is that one of my favorite duos will be back this summer in a big movie -- in the totally overdressed shape of Eddie and Patsy, the (divorced!) dizzy dames from "Absolutely Fabulous," a landmark comedy series played with devilish hilarity by Brits Jennifer Saunders (57) and Joanna Lumley (70).
I've noticed while I'm writing this, that not one of these women are lying about their age -- or feel even uncomfortable. I read somewhere the phrase that the actresses of the 60s generation have "bitch-slapped Father Time." It must have hurt the poor guy. We ourselves are enjoying it, gray, divorced and all.
"GRAY IN L.A." is a humorous weekly column about surviving Los Angeles as a single with style and bravery.
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