Heroines abound on cable, but 'The Starter Wife' is something new
10/09/2008
Debra Messing stars in 'The Starter Wife'
Cable television, where the lineup features mobsters, serial killers, psychopathic bikers and drug-dealing suburban parents, Friday night rolls out the real gamble: a chick flick.
That would be the series version of "The Starter Wife," which began as a miniseries last year and did so well it's returning for 10 more episodes (9 p.m., USA).The key to this resurrection, says co-writer Sara Parriott, was convincing Debra Messing to continue as the star. "We would not have gone forward without Debra," Parriott says.No surprise there. Cable has scored big by creating edgy, literate scripts for female stars, from Glenn Close in FX's "Damages" to Holly Hunter in TNT's "Saving Grace," Kyra Sedgwick in FX's "The Closer," Mary McCormack in USA's "In Plain Sight" and Katey Sagal in FX's "Sons of Anarchy."But Messing's Molly Kagan is different from the others, whose common trait is being tougher than the men around them."I wanted to play a woman at the top of a man's profession," Close said this summer when talking about her character, lawyer Patty Hewes. "Totally in control."McCormack's Mary Shannon tells her adoring boyfriend to shut up when he says he wants their relationship to be more than just sex.In AMC's "Mad Men," where the dance is different only because the times were different, Christina Hendricks plays an office manager, Joan Holloway, who's a Parris Island drill instructor in bright red hair.One also would be advised not to mess with Mary-Louise Parker's Nancy Botwin, the pot-dealing central character in Showtime's "Weeds" - and that's a comedy.All these women create great drama. They do not create chick flicks.Molly Kagan does.For starters, she enjoys being a girl.When "Saving Grace's" Grace Hanadarko starts remembering things she'd rather not remember, she grabs a bottle and drinks until she forgets.When Molly remembers how it used to be before her divorce, she drops in at her old shoe store and pines for the $1,200 boots she can't afford anymore. When she leaves, she waves to them: "Bye-bye, boots."Where other TV heroines are cutting a scorched-earth path through their careers, Molly is a divorced woman who was crushed to discover her husband considered her a "starter wife."So now she's raising their 7-year-old daughter, when her annoying ex doesn't get in the way. She has had one six-month relationship that seems to have fallen off-track, and she's struggling to establish herself as a writer.It may or may not help that the writing workshop she recently joined is taught by a roguish fellow who's totally hot and may or may not have her best interests in mind.
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