Despite being interested in the subject material and knowing that others quite enjoyed this, I am afraid that this is Not For Me. It’s hard to explain, but I expect that this will do well with plenty other people.

A wonderful very timely collection of essays about the portrayal of women in Pop Culture, mostly movies. All the stereotypes and corresponding movie are presented. This book will make you think and reexamine those stereotypes and why they exist. This book should be enjoyed by anyone with an interest in movies, not just women.

This book uses essays to discuss various depictions of women in popular movies and television. This book explores the use of media to define and box women into specific categories and to perpetuate various myths such as the sex kitten. It presents an opportunity for women to look at these roles and to also begin to recognize them more in popular media. This book would be great for a women's studies class or a class on popular media and its portrayal of women.

“You Play the Girl: On Playboy Bunnies, Stepford Wives, Train Wrecks and Other Mixed Messages” is a four part book of well written and analytical essays of various cultural themes. Popular films, books, articles and famous people and events are added and highlight author Carina Chocano’s stories and observations. Chocano, a journalist and storyteller takes pride in the creative thinking process, her short stories and articles have been featured in several notable publications including the NYT, Texas Monthly, Elle, and others.

In the first essay, Chocano revealed she learned about sex through Playboy Magazines and Bugs Bunny in Drag (no relation to the sexy human toon Jessica Rabbit). As children, many of us knew about the forbidden nature of the carefully hidden adult magazines. Playboy reached its peak of readership between 1966-1976. Heffner called his beautiful hostesses and models “Playboy Bunnies” featured by the Bunny logo. Heffner influenced American culture in numerous ways, more notably the unrealistic beauty standards and behavior for American women. Chocano explored this theme further with the emergence of “The Feminine Mystique” (1963). This was at a time when there were few single parent households, and women typically worked outside the home for extra spending money, not because they needed a double income. “The Stepford Wives” (1972) existed only to please, nurture, and reflect a positive manner on their husbands social and economic status.
If a marriage failed in the 1950’s-1970’s— it didn’t matter that the husband was a womanizer, had a gambling, drinking, or domestic violence problem, the broken marriage was typically blamed on the “regrettable lack of wifely effort”. The popular Ladies Home Journal “Can This Marriage Be Saved” column (1953-2014) totally advised women on the strategies of keeping their marriages intact.

The wedding has always been another way for a woman of lesser means to snag a gazillionare, and live a life of luxury and prestige. So goes the story when Chocano worked in the Silicon Valley in 1992, going into debt buying overpriced sandwiches in the company lobby. The wages were low/pitiful, and the rumor was that a $3,000 Christmas bonus was to materialize, so she remained on the job… was it a good decision? It was too easy to fantasize about a fairy tale wedding-- Cosmopolitan Magazine reminded women: “It was just as easy to date a rich man as a poor one.” The drawback was that these wealthy men had unrealistic standards (a lot of them, in fact) as to what their princess bride should look like.
The Bachelor transports viewers to a “fantasy world” of Grand Canyon romance. Helicopters whirl over the grand mansion setting, long walks, sincere talks and sweet picnics with food and flowers—a girl can be seen winning her bachelor, she is lovely and admired by all. Will the implied wedding date follow? The bachelor and his bride may date briefly, and likely break it off. In any event, the show is romantic and fun to watch.

In her 4oth year, Chocano was not feeling as brave or courageous as Elizabeth Gilbert in her book “Eat, Pray, Love” (2006). Following the birth of her daughter Kira, Chocano took her time reading Gilbert’s book. In fact, she was overeating Cheetos and googling “how to put a hex on someone’s balls” while reading it. Traveling to exotic locations as “Liz” had done after shedding her annoying husband was out of the question for Chocano, she certainly would never find “balance and spirituality in the pursuit of pleasure” in India or in an Ashram. With Oprah Winfrey’s promotion of the book, and 9 million copies sold, Gilbert was a wealthy woman. However, at the start of her memoir, LIz presented herself in an entirely different manner. Are the elements of romance, escapism, exotic getaways combined with self-help advice that connect readers with the author’s life experience for real? There were some pointed questions to consider.

In “Girls Love Math” we realize that women have an expiration date, this date arrives long before a man’s. Older men are distinguished as they age,(George Clooney, Richard Gere). Chocano has laid awake mentally calculating how much time she would have before reaching the age when women were expected (at age 39 or 40) to simply go away. Even talking Barbie dolls have said: “Math is hard” (I agree). The films Chocano chose to write about were overly long and less interesting. However, Chocano makes up for it in a big way: by the topics she writes about from “Gothic Celebrity” (which was excellent)- -to “Train Wreck”-- to writing about Kira's pre-school (Mom jeans and all). The stories shared about Kira were alright. Despite the topic of Virginia Woolf being overly written about, (the closing essay) there was really a good spin on this presentation, which matched the overall style of the book.
*With thanks and appreciation to Mariner Books- (Houghton-Miffin-Harcourt) via NetGalley for the direct e-copy for the purpose of review.

This was a fun book to read about the stereotypes/boxes women are placed in by society in popular media. Although I enjoyed the book, I'm afraid that I will begin looking at all movies, books etc. for the angle/perspective it projects of women, instead of simple entertainment. Is it possible that a movie is sometimes simply a movie and not an indictment against society? Perhaps I am being simplistic. Either way, I enjoyed reading this book due to the history and the dots the author connected between many of the iconic images and movies that have become a part of our cultural lexicon. Worth a read, but not sure it will remain top of mind.

Carina Chocano's observations of life are excellent, interesting, and witty. Her analyses of pop culture, feminism, motherhood were so insightful, and her tone so inviting, that reading these essays is like having coffee with your smartest and funniest friend. These essays are never dry, infused with humor but not laugh-out-loud, and really pushed the boundaries of how I think about many things. I love rethinking my understanding of the world. I really think this is a great addition to any library's essay collection.

A mixed bag of essays on the portrayal of women on the silver screen, the small screen and now digital media screens, that starkly highlights the gender divide. Chocano's reference points are so broad, that it's really hard for the reader to always be able to connect to the topics she is discussing. In general, the essays resonated much more strongly with me if I had seen the actual TV show or movie that she is referring to.
As such, it definitely skews to a more mature audience, as she takes the reader on a magical mystery tour from the late 1970s onwards. There is definitely a lot of great material in here, however I did find myself skimming pages where I hadn't already seen the show. It did have me going back and revisiting some old episodes of Bewitched though!

I was unable to read this as the file was corrupt.

Due to formatting issues I was unable to actually read this book myself.