How to Play a Superhero: Lynda Carter, Popular Culture Feminism, and the Search for Wonder Woman

After three decades of searching in vain for another Wonder Woman, it’s time to reiterate the importance of Lynda Carter’s iconic portrayal and its meaning to popular culture feminism.Pop[ular] culture n. Culture based on popular taste rather than that of an educated elite, usually commercialized and made widely available by the mass media. Feminism n. Advocacy of the rights of women (based on the theory of equality of the sexes). — Oxford English Dictionary

Poor Adrianne Palicki. It must feel awful having the rug pulled from under her feet after so much hype. In February 2011, it was widely reported that she was chosen to play Wonder Woman in an upcoming NBC television series about the iconic comic book superheroine. Despite generating enormous publicity and boasting a high-profile writer and executive producer (David E. Kelley), the series fizzled out even before it began. It was cancelled by NBC in May shortly after a test screening of the pilot (Rice, “NBC”).

The cancellation didn’t surprise many people as public sentiment about the series was ambivalent from the start. In March, the release of a publicity photo showing a “modernized” Wonder Woman costume struck horror into the hearts of many fans (Rice, “Wonder”), and the subsequent “leaks” from the cancelled pilot did more to confirm these misgivings than to counter them. As was expected, a major point of controversy concerned the casting of Wonder Woman. Even people who liked Palicki from Friday Night Lights tended to agree that she was miscast, while people who knew little about her also didn’t hesitate to denounce her, which seemed a tad unfair since the brunt of their criticism wasn’t so much based on anything she did as who she wasn’t.1

In short, she wasn’t Lynda Carter, who is still seen by most people as the ideal Wonder Woman.

Given the supposedly “ephemeral” nature of comic books and popular TV shows, the fact that Carter’s three-decades-old performance can still generate such wide recognition and fierce loyalty is akin to wondrous. The original television series lasted three seasons. Season one, The New, Original Wonder Woman, appeared on ABC between 1975 and 1977. Seasons two and three, The New Adventures of Wonder Woman, appeared on CBS between 1978 and 1979. Although after the show ended, Carter has continued to pursue an acting and music career, nothing from that subsequent career has come close to matching the fame and success she achieved from playing Wonder Woman.

Whether this complete identification with one role is something that deserves praise or criticism is a moot question. On the one hand, you could say that her inability to transcend her first major role proves that she never had enough talent to succeed in anything else. On the other hand, you could say that what she did with that role was so exceptional she has virtually owned the role ever since. The public perception that Carter’s version of Wonder Woman is “definitive” and “irreplaceable” has been reinforced by the fact that every subsequent attempt to date to remake Wonder Woman has failed.2 While it would be a distortion to claim that the failure of all these projects was because none could match Carter’s example, the consistent lack of success indicates both the immense challenge of bringing Wonder Woman to screen and the undeniable impact of Carter’s portrayal.

Before someone complains (with reason) that the last thing the world needs is another comic book-related vehicle, it should be mentioned that Wonder Woman isn’t just any comic book character. Apart from being one of the original Golden Age comic book superheroes, she has a strong claim to being popular culture’s most enduring, recognizable, and iconic woman hero.3 Since her debut in All Star Comics in 1941 (her first cover appeared in January 1942 in Sensation Comics), Wonder Woman’s comics have been continuously in print: a feat surpassed only by Superman and Batman. Not only is Wonder Woman recognized by people anywhere in the world where American popular culture is known, but she is also one of the few fictional characters who have acquired significance beyond their original medium. In popular vernacular, her name conveys the generic idea of an extraordinary woman.4

Accordingly, Wonder Woman has long been seen as a feminist icon.5 Yet, as is true of most feminist achievers, Wonder Woman has had to fight harder for respect and recognition than almost any of her male peers. Comic book historians tend to play down her feminist message and play up her fetishistic appeal.6 Furthermore, it only takes a quick internet search to discover how intensely some sections of the comic book community seem to hate her (e.g., Ashby). In 1972, Wonder Woman became specifically a second-wave feminist icon when Gloria Steinem, who grew up reading her comics, put her on the cover of the first issue of Ms. magazine. Yet, in the magazine’s feature essay, Joanne Edgar also noted Wonder Woman’s problematic position as a preeminent female in a predominantly male genre. Edgar recalled that a common belief among the comic book collectors of her childhood was that “[o]ne Superman is worth three Wonder Woman’s” (52). Judging by the number of screen adaptations devoted to these characters in recent years, it would appear that the value principle underlying this belief still holds sway.

In the past three decades, Superman and Batman have been adapted enough times to reach a double-digit figure. Less iconic heroes (e.g., the Hulk, Fantastic Four, X-Men) have also made their way repeatedly to the big screen. Even relatively obscure characters (e.g., Ironman, Thor, Hellboy, Blade, Kick-Ass) have had no trouble clinching lucrative film deals. Yet, somehow, Wonder Woman is still trapped in an indefinite creative limbo. For any other character, this failure wouldn’t be especially remarkable; not many people are holding their breath for, say, a Big Barda or Scarlet Witch movie. But for the genre’s leading woman hero, it inevitably raises the suspicion that her predicament is symbolic of a larger social and cultural dilemma facing women in any male-dominated area.7 If equality, equal opportunity, and equal representation are relevant to feminism, the search for Wonder Woman is surely a pertinent feminist issue in popular culture discussion.

The fact that it’s possible to move this discussion beyond defensive pleading is largely thanks to Lynda Carter.

Not Searching for Debra Winger:
Talent/Non-talent and the “Character” Actor Defence

The claim that an actress playing a superhero is an achievement — let alone a “feminist” one — may sound so absurd as to require further explanation. This is because, when most people discuss acting as an achievement, they usually have in mind a high-culture concept of a gifted actor playing a serious role in a reputable genre. Likewise, when they discuss acting as a “feminist” achievement, they usually have in mind a gifted actress playing a serious role in a serious picture about real women. It follows that when people are asked to nominate a “feminist” actress, they are likely to mention Carter’s erstwhile co-star, Debra Winger.

Winger played Drusilla, Wonder Woman’s younger sister “Wonder Girl,” in three episodes in the first season. She reportedly hated this role so much that she not only rejected an offer to star in her own spinoff series but also bought herself out of her contract (Pingle 30). After leaving the show, she gradually established herself as one of her generation’s most highly regarded actresses through a range of critically acclaimed performances in films such as An Officer and a Gentleman (1982), Terms of Endearment (1983), Shadowlands (1993), A Dangerous Woman (1993). Since the release of Rosanna Arquette’s Searching for Debra Winger (2002), a feminist documentary exploring the challenges that Hollywood actresses commonly face in their professional and personal lives, Winger has also become — albeit not by her own choosing — a symbol of “Hollywood feminism.”8

Winger has never made any secret of her opinion that Wonder Woman is “trash.” Nowhere was this opinion more memorably or entertainingly expressed than in her appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman in 1993 (“Debra”). Although the interview finished with Winger reprising her role as Wonder Girl as a practical joke on Letterman, she spent a good part of the interview dishing the dirt on Wonder Woman. She was especially sarcastic about Carter: not only did she use Carter’s family problems as fodder for her wisecracks, but she also implied that Carter had nothing to offer audiences except for her lavish eye-shadow and big breasts.9 By contrast, Winger insisted for herself that she had “moved on” and had “nothing to do with that anymore”: a not-so-subtle dig at her former co-star for being a one-hit wonder. In short, Winger was insisting that the difference between them represents worth/talent/feminism versus trash/non-talent/anti-feminism.

Personal digs aside, Winger’s attack was on the basis of artistic meritocracy: she had no respect for Carter’s acting abilities. This invites the question: what is good acting? If good acting entails traditional dramatic skills such as the ability to exhibit versatility, verisimilitude, vocal/physical nuances, emotional range, and psychological depth, Winger would seem to have legitimate reasons to consider herself superior: it isn’t for nothing that she has had three Academy Award nominations.10 Nevertheless, her obvious bias against the comic book genre should alert us against uncritically accepting her view as conclusive.

Contrary to Winger’s suggestion that superhero acting is something from which serious actors “move on,” since the 1970s, there has been a steady rise of first-rate dramatic actors dabbling in the comic book/action fantasy genre. By now, it’s almost become a cliché to expect every Hollywood blockbuster to include at least one Shakespearean actor and/or Oscar winner to anchor the picture.11 Yet, while casting an established actor in a supportive or antagonist role may boost a film’s credibility, the biggest challenge has always gone to casting the lead actor. And if there is a general rule for casting a lead actor in a superhero picture, it is this: acting abilities are no reliable indicator of success.

Take the obvious examples. In theory, George Clooney, Halle Berry, and Charlize Theron would be ideal for playing superheroes: they are all Oscar winners, sexy, stylish, talented, charismatic, popular with the public. Nevertheless, their attempts at playing superheroes are among the most disastrous mistakes in the genre.12 Winger might see things differently, but the argument that the genre is “unworthy” of serious actors is only as true as the argument that the genre offers some distinctive challenges for actors of any calibre to overcome. While outstanding acting isn’t unheard of in the genre — look no further than Heath Ledger’s Joker in The Dark Knight (2008) — generally speaking, when a good actor does a convincing job playing a superhero, the actor is convincing for qualities that don’t necessarily come from his or her acting abilities.13 A good actor miscast is sufficient to sink a movie, but the right actor playing the right role can transform an average picture into something enjoyable, memorable, and enduring.

In the lore of superhero casting, Lynda Carter has defined perfectly the meaning of the right actor playing the right role.14 Perhaps her only rival for the honor of completely embodying a superhero is Christopher Reeve in the role of Superman. Although Reeve was a classically trained actor (a Cornell and Julliard graduate no less), his success as Superman owed less to his acting abilities than to his striking physical presence and complete rapport with the role. These qualities are also at the heart of Carter’s success. Yet her success is arguably even more distinctive than Reeve’s, since many other actors beside him have played Superman adequately, whereas she is the only actor who has truly personified the genre’s definitive woman hero. Hence, while we cannot call her a “character actor” in the sense of possessing the versatility and aptitude to play different roles convincingly, we can nonetheless call her a character actor: i.e., an actor who has played an iconic character so well that she has not only set a benchmark for the genre but also achieved an iconic status through her performance.

How to Play a Superhero: Looks, Aura, and Spin

Winger insinuated that Carter’s performance was all about physical appeal, and in a way, she was right. To play a superhero, one must look like a superhero. Carter fit this bill to a tee. In her instantly recognizable Wonder Woman costume designed by one of Hollywood’s most renowned costume designers — multiple Oscar and Emmy nominee Donfeld — she cut a strikingly impressive figure.

Yet, being too strikingly impressive has obvious disadvantages: people focus on appearance and dismiss everything else. As Winger’s comments indicate, this attitude isn’t confined to sexist men.15 It is also a view shared by some, mostly radical, feminists.16 Interestingly, Gloria Steinem was among these critics. She gave Carter a backhanded compliment: while acknowledging that Carter’s portrayal captures many of the original character’s positive messages (e.g., super-strength, pacifism, an appeal to young female viewers), she also accused Carter of being “a little blue of eye and large of breast” (“Introduction” 17).

Bawdy jokes about body parts may be good for a laugh — Winger proved that much in her Letterman interview — but one would have expected Steinem of all people to be above them, considering the extent to which she has been denigrated not just by the popular media but also by other feminists for being too attractive to be a “serious” feminist.17 If anything positive can come out of such derogatory remarks, it’s the reminder that diverse viewpoints exist within feminist thought.18 Accordingly, it’s also within the frame of feminist discussion that Carter’s physical appearance can and should be defended.

The first thing is to ask whether the “sex symbol” label misses the forest for the trees. People who snigger over “why Wonder Woman dresses like a stripper” are often too caught up in their own cleverness to consider the costume’s more serious import in the historical context of gender politics: its relevance as a symbol of defiance against the patriarchal expectation that “good girls” be modest, demure, proper, docile, and ladylike.19 In terms of body exposure, Wonder Woman’s costume is really no sexier than the costume of a track-and-field runner, gymnast, swimmer, ice skater, or ballerina. While no doubt many sexist men think that women athletes are only good for a perve, the question is whether it’s reasonable to allow such sexist attitudes to debase these women’s athleticism. If not, it’s also unreasonable to allow sexist attitudes to debase Wonder Woman’s heroism.

Rather than male titillation, the principal message of Wonder Woman’s unconventional costume is that physical confidence is an important aspect of female empowerment: the liberal skin exposure is an insistence on the rights of women to feel comfortable in their own skin irrespective of other people’s reaction.20 When I hear or read jokes about adolescent boys “getting a woody at the sight of Wondy,” I always think of The Simpsons episode in which Comic Book Guy meets Stan Lee:

STAN LEE: Hey, aren’t you the guy who was stalking Lynda Carter?
COMIC BOOK GUY (takes out a Wonder Woman action figure and strokes it): The term is “courting.” The restraining order says “no-no,” but her eyes say “yes-yes.” (“I am Furious Yellow”)

Comic Book Guy represents a parody of the phallocentric straight male: because they find Wonder Woman/Lynda Carter sexy, therefore Wonder Woman/Lynda Carter exists only to be sexy for them. In this way, the sexist male enshrines himself as a subject and objectifies anything he fancies for his own sexual gratification. Ironically, the radical feminist critique is just the opposite side of the same coin: because sexist men find Lynda Carter/Wonder Woman sexy, therefore let’s blame Lynda Carter/Wonder Woman for being a sex object.21 I suggest a better way of dealing with sexist attitudes is to hold to account people who are being sexist, not to require Wonder Woman (or any woman) to cover herself up out of shame, diffidence, fear, embarrassment, or conformism. With Wonder Woman’s choice of costume, the personal is political.22

The second thing is to dispute the assumption that the “normal” beholder of Wonder Woman is the sexist straight male. The problem with this assumption is that it not only privileges sexism as “normal,”23 but also marginalizes the character’s meaning to her most loyal followers: the generations of women and gay men who grew up seeing Wonder Woman as a figure of inspiration.24 Wonder Woman enthusiast Andy Mangels expresses this view perfectly: “When I look at Wonder Woman, I’m not seeing a woman in a bathing suit that’s well-endowed. I am seeing a woman that’s powerful, a woman with a sense of truth and grace to her. Her message was always about accepting everybody as equals, and about making the world a better place.” (“Fanatical”) That is Wonder Woman in a nutshell. If there’s a “normal” view of Wonder Woman/Lynda Carter, it should be Mangels’s appreciative view, not Comic Book Guy’s exploitative view.

Though Steinem might not have wanted to acknowledge this, what she achieved for popular feminism through her role as a media advocate is similar to what Lynda Carter achieved for popular feminism through the role of Wonder Woman. Just as Steinem’s glamorous image helped “sell” the messages of feminism to the mainstream public, so Carter’s glamorous image helped make the idea of a superheroic woman accessible to a wide range of viewers.25 And the qualities Carter embodied in her Wonder Woman costume — grace, strength, vitality, kindness, sensitivity, and self-confidence — made her an ideal symbol of the robust optimism of women’s lib in the 1970s.

As important as it is for an actor portraying a superhero to be physically striking, the portrayal still wouldn’t be successful if the actor lacks the ability to make the character real and believable. Critics often assume that this ability is insignificant because the skills involved aren’t those that traditionally define “good” acting. Yet, many “good” actors (including Debra Winger) have proved less than equal to the genre’s biggest challenge: namely, how to make an outlandish, potentially ridiculous character come across as natural and likeable as well as dignified and heroic.26 More important than traditional acting abilities, the key to success lies in an actor’s rapport with the material and his or her willingness to enter fully into the spirit of the character.

This ability Carter had: not only did she understand what her character stood for,27 but she also knew how to balance the characterization between comedy and drama, making the character fun without making fun of the character. This approach, which she has described in interviews as “straight acting” and “playing it for real,”28 turns out to be exactly what the role calls for. Her approach not only throws Wonder Woman’s heroism into sharp relief against the broad humor around her, but at the most effective moments, it also produces self-referential irony that is the hallmark of sophisticated comedy.

A useful example is a scene from season one’s “Fausta, the Nazi Wonder Woman,” in which the Nazi interrogator Colonel Kesselman (played by Bo Brundin) forces Wonder Woman to reveal the secret of her origin. Her explanation that she comes from “Paradise Island,” where women “are able to develop [their] minds and [their] physical skills unhampered by masculine destructiveness” is prima facie farcical. Yet, thanks to Carter’s earnest delivery and Brundin’s over-the-top reaction, the audience is wrong-footed into believing farce over facts. Her explanation may sound silly, but his refusal to believe it is even sillier. The scene thus nudges the audience into going along with Wonder Woman’s “truth” at the expense of Kesselman’s hysterical demand for a rational explanation. Without Carter’s convincingly earnest performance, the comic tension would have been far less effective.

Finally, what elevates Carter’s performance from a very good one to an outstanding one is the touch of creative ingenuity that she brought to the role. It’s one thing for an actor to look stunning in costume and be believable in character; it’s another thing for her to have introduced an idea so ingenious that it has permanently entered the character’s iconography. Yet, Carter did just that by inventing the way in which Diana Prince transforms into Wonder Woman. The idea of the “wonder spin” originated from Carter’s training as a dancer: she called it a “pirouette” (“Beauty”). Whatever her shortcoming as an actor in other films and genres, if one juxtaposes Carter’s version of the wonder spin against Debra Winger’s version of the wonder spin, one would see a decisive demonstration of grace against gaucherie.

So, physical likeness, spiritual rapport, and creative ingenuity: that’s the formula for playing a superhero derived from Carter’s performance. With a limited dramatic range, she has nonetheless succeeded where many great actors haven’t and captured the tone, spirit, and presence of an iconic superhero with ease, elegance, and exactitude. Surely it’s an achievement that’s worthy of recognition, notwithstanding sexist misappropriation and snobbish disparagement.

Still Searching for Wonder Woman

Comic book artist Alex Ross has aptly summarized this achievement: “Lynda Carter has a near equal importance to the legend of Wonder Woman, a character that is [over] sixty years old, as the creators. She personified it for the modern generation in a way that it will never be forgotten” (“Beauty”). He isn’t exaggerating: to many people, Carter is Wonder Woman. Nevertheless, Carter’s achievement also underlines a continuing problem for the character. When it comes to screen adaptations, Wonder Woman’s peak is still stuck in the mid-1970s.

This apparent inability to move forward has led some critics to question her value and viability as a character and cultural icon. It was especially common during the late 1990s and mid-2000s — the period when postfeminist screen heroines such as Xena and Buffy were at the height of their popularity — to find people praising these darker, grittier “It girl” heroines at the expense of Wonder Woman.29 Yet, even if all that might be said in favor of other heroines has been said, Wonder Woman is still the only female in popular culture that can claim to be:

• A heroine whose name has entered popular usage as a synonym for female empowerment.30
• A heroine whose history of representation has reflected the ongoing debates about women’s roles in U.S. social history for seventy years (and counting).31
• A heroine so universally recognizable that merely changing her uniform could spark international headlines.32

Whether Wonder Woman is “lame” or “cool” is a matter of opinion about which everyone is entitled to make up their mind.33 Yet her status as the genre’s most iconic heroine is a matter of fact that no one can deny without rewriting popular culture history.34 Let’s face it: as long as popular culture exists, new crops of warrior gals, action chicks, and kickass babes will spring forth with every turn of the seasonal cycle. While enjoying their time in the sun, some of these heroines will be hyped up as the hottest, coolest, greatest, awesomest heroines in the universe (and some people will buy into all the hypes, too). After their season has peaked and the dust has settled, a few of them may even retain a “cult following” among some fans and academics. Yet, it’s doubtful that the rest of the world will recognize the majority of these heroines in twenty or thirty years — seventy years is asking too much — let alone bothering to have an opinion about them.

By contrast, I challenge anyone to say that Wonder Woman will cease to be a prominent part of the popular cultural discussion about heroic women in twenty, thirty, even seventy years. As surely as anything can be predicted, it’s fair to say that Wonder Woman’s cultural position is guaranteed. Notwithstanding the peaks and troughs of cultural trends, she has never ceased being relevant. Put her likeness on the cover of Playboy, and feminists rallied in protest.35 Fiddle with her costume, and wide-ranging debates about gender equality, sexual identity, empowerment, nationalism, and cultural relativism spread across America and beyond.36 Lobby for the improvement of women’s representations in the industry, and she is still the definitive index by which the discussion is framed and progress is charted.37 Anyone who considers themselves “feminist” and still gets a thrill out of trashing Wonder Woman should ask themselves what popular culture would be like without her. If they are honest, they must acknowledge that it would be futile to speak of another woman hero as being remotely equal to the most iconic male heroes: Superman, Batman, Spiderman.38 Without Wonder Woman, the debate would have been lost before it began. She is that important.

It’s a tribute to Lynda Carter that her version of Wonder Woman still stands among the most definitive in the character’s history, so much so that her endorsement can still lend credibility and legitimacy to any new project related to Wonder Woman.39 To those who say, “Of course, Carter is never going to win an Emmy,” note that Lindsay Wagner won one for Bionic Woman, and Kate Jackson was nominated three times for Charlie’s Angels. Whether or not she wins the award, Carter’s place in popular culture history is already secure. As the search for another Wonder Woman continues, anyone who cares about female heroism in popular culture should be grateful to Carter for showing that it’s possible for a live adaptation to do complete justice to the iconic heroine.

Normally, one would expect Debra Winger to be above any of this stuff and nonsense about comic book characters.40 Yet even she has acknowledged that her stance against the genre has met with an unexpected challenge. Last year, Winger told New York Times Magazine that not only does her 13-year-old son follow Captain America, but he has also urged her to do a superhero movie. She said:

It’s hilarious. I spent my entire early career trying to live down Wonder Woman, and then I spawn this child who . . . . Well, I should just show him the series. That’d probably end the discussion. (Harris par. 10)

The article doesn’t mention whether or not she got around to showing her son the series. Either way, someone should tell her not to count on being able to “end the discussion” so easily in the forum of popular culture. Seventy years from now, how many people will still be “searching for Debra Winger”? Most likely, the number will be similar to the number of people interested today in finding out who won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress seventy years ago.

Yet here’s an alternative theory to tickle your fancy and pique your wonder: As long as popular culture has a place for a woman hero, Wonder Woman is relevant; as long as Wonder Woman is relevant, Lynda Carter is relevant. For the sake of popular culture feminism, let’s hope the search for Wonder Woman strikes gold sooner rather than later. But whatever happens, it will be a tall order for any actress to measure up to the benchmark that Lynda Carter has set, be she a triple Oscar nominee or otherwise.

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