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“Wonderfalls” Lesbian Republican and Her Bisexual Girlfriend

Although the pilot of the new Fox series Wonderfalls kicked off on March 12 with the myth of the Maid of the Mist, the show features two other figures that are often considered a myth by both lesbians and TV execs alike: the lesbian Republican, and the bisexual woman.

Wonderfalls is a dramedy revolving around Jaye (Caroline Dhavernas), a recent college graduate who is now back in her hometown of Niagara Falls, living in a trailer and working at a souvenir shop, when inanimate objects suddenly start telling her to do things and effectively turn her into “Fate’s bitch.” She also has a full-time job antagonizing her respectable WASPY family – including her older sister Sharon (Katie Finneran), a Republican immigration attorney whose permanently-single status is a constant source of frustration to their mother.

In the pilot, Jaye set Sharon up on a blind date with a UPS delivery man, Thomas (Gabriel Hogan). During dinner, when Thomas won’t accept Sharon’s polite dismissal that he’s just not her type, Sharon finally tells Thomas she’s a lesbian. Thomas repeats this information to Jaye just before he develops an allergic reaction to his food and has to be rushed to the hospital by Jaye and Sharon.

“What was that crack about you being a lesbian?” Jaye asks Sharon on the car on the way there. “I mean, it’s not that horribly surprising, but are you?” “What do you mean, it’s not horribly surprising?” Sharon asks defensively, to which Jaye points out “You drive an SUV.”

Later at the hospital, Thomas’ ex-wife Beth (Kari Matchett) comes to see him, and meets Sharon. “Are you his girlfriend?” she asks. Mesmerized, Sharon blurts out “I don’t have a girlfriend,” and Beth smiles knowingly, then leans over to wipe the ink off Sharon’s cheek in slow-motion.

A few minutes later, we see Sharon and Beth gazing at each other over Thomas’ hospital bed, until finally Beth offers to give Sharon a ride and they go off together.

The fourth episode (“Pink Flamingo”) airing this Thursday, April 1, at 9pm, is about Jaye’s efforts to take down an old high-school rival, Gretchen, per the instructions of the talking chicken in Gretchen’s hairclip, but it also picks up again on the relationship between Sharon and Beth, as Sharon’s closetedness derails their attempts to get together.

The episode includes a funny scene in which Sharon introduces Beth to her mother as the woman with whom she carpools, and a truly hilarious one in which Beth’s father sleep-walks in on Beth and Sharon making out in the living room.

Complicating matters is that Sharon discovers in this episode that Beth is “not exclusively” gay” (that’s TV talk for “bisexual”). “Does it bother you that I’ve had sex with a man?” Beth asks Sharon, and Sharon stops to consider this. She then asks, “Will you again?” to which Beth responds “I don’t know.”

Sharon is obviously uncomfortable with this answer, and raises the issue again in Episode 8 (“Safety Canary”), when her attempt to make Beth choose between chunky versus smooth peanut butter quickly escalates into a different conversation altogether and leaves both women unhappy – until a walk in the woods looking for a pair of lost birds makes Sharon reconsider her position.

The issue of Sharon’s sexuality is referenced in little ways throughout the episodes, and Sharon’s closeted status is a constant source of humor for the series. Whether it’s snarky comments from Jaye (to their mother: “I think Sharon is a closet environmentalist”), their mother’s constant attempts to find Sharon a boyfriend (on meeting Beth: “that Beth seems like a sweet girl, I bet she has a boyfriend”), or Beth’s weariness with Sharon’s herculean efforts to hide their relationship, the show clearly illustrates how much work is involved in being closeted.

“My family assumes I have no life so everything gets dumped on me,” Sharon complains to Beth, but Beth won’t indulge her self-pity, countering, “Well, your family doesn’t really know anything about your life, so you can’t really blame them.”

Beth’s obvious comfort with her own sexuality – even if it’s less easily defined than Sharon’s – provides a refreshing contrast to Sharon’s unease with being open about her’s.

Although the series does not show the women actually kissing (due to restrictions imposed by the network, as co-creator Bryan Fuller explained in this interview), by dealing with subjects like bisexuality and lesbian Republicans, Wonderfalls is actually fairly progressive.

The repeated discussion around Beth’s sexuality, and the writers’ refusal to either demonize Beth or easily categorize her sexuality, is heady stuff for television, since TV writers almost never touch the subject of bisexuality unless it’s a joke about how much it turns straight men on.

And except for Mary McCormack’s character on the short-lived series K Street, TV lesbians are almost always portrayed as, or assumed to be, liberals. While there is hardly a huge, underrepresented population of Republican lesbians in America, they certainly do exist and it’s helpful to have a series that represents and explores the diversity that exists within the lesbian community – and makes us laugh at the same time.

Finneran and Matchett have good chemistry, and are perfectly cast in their roles. Beth’s more laid-back, easy-going personality is a nice complement to Sharon’s tense, Type-A personality, and Sharon’s relationship with Beth enables us to see the softer side of Sharon, who can come across as brittle and overbearing at times when interacting with her family.

Although it is Jaye’s relationships and personal life that is the focus of the show, Sharon is nonetheless one of the primary members of the cast and appears in almost every episode. And while she clearly has flaws, Sharon is a realistic, well-rounded, and sympathetic character – no minor accomplishment considering the only other lesbian characters on primetime network TV this season have storylines that are either boringly and insultingly stereotypical (ER) or non-existent (Two and a Half Men).

It helps that Wonderfalls is also very funny, with at least a few brilliant one-liners in every episode (and often more). Although in early episodes the series’ quirkiness can occasionally veer into cheesiness, it gets better and better as the series progresses, eventually – as we see in this week’s episode – offering some of the funniest moments on television.

Unfortunately, Wonderfalls has garnered low ratings so far, and this Thursday’s episode may be its last chance to prove to Fox that it can find an audience.

While it may be tempting for lesbian viewers to overlook this show and its lesbian relationship while The L Word is still on, if we don’t help keep Wonderfalls on the air, all we’ll have left when The L Word ends in a few weeks are storylines about baby-swapping, pregnancy, and custody battles.

So watch Wonderfalls this Thursday at 9pm on Fox and save one of the few interesting lesbian storylines on primetime TV – or you just might get your own visit from the talking chicken.

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