The B Word: Bisexuality in Contemporary Film and Television

4. Bisexuality on the Boob Tube

203 As the flippancy of this chapter’s naming and epigraph suggest, the vast majority of representations of bisexuality in television involve femme women, with the bi-suggestive character or narrative inevitably reconsigned to monosexual logic–if not immediately (as with Dana’s retort above) then soon thereafter. As a number of lucid if lesbian-centric readings have pointed out, televisual representations of non-monosexuality historically have featured sensationalized forays into “lady love” sparked by the short-term appearance of an alluring temptress timed to coincide with network sweeps periods or as a lastditch effort to revive flagging ratings. These “very special episodes” (as networks are known to bill them) feature visits by characters established to be “real” lesbians, thus serving, as Sasha Torres argues about their frequency in the single-woman sitcom, to “ease the ideological threat of such ‘feminist’ programs by localizing the homosexuality which might otherwise pervade these homosocial spaces.”1 But rather than fully resurveying that history here, I wish to consider the rich (though rarely realized) potential of serial television’s extended narrative format to create spaces for representing sexual fluidity, and to consider what’s happening lately–by asking how and to what degree representations of alternative sexualities escape the constraints of bisexual disavowal and compulsory monosexuality in contemporary English-language serial television. Where the default-to-status-quo structure of episodic television and the contained temporality of feature films create a pressure to resolvequestionsofsexuality ,thenarrativeopen-endednessandexpanded four Bisexuality on the Boob Tube 204 The B Word time-frame that characterize serial television drama offer a particularly promising site for mounting long-range and multifaceted explorations into bisexual characters’ identities and experiences. Television narrative encourages bisexual representation by permitting it to unfold over time, necessary for the accumulation of experiences that renders bisexuality not practically viable–for any individual is potentially bisexual, no matter his or her behaviors to date–but rather representationally legible. But while it has become commonplace for television relationship dramas to introduce female same-sex couples, this potential for bisexual story arcs and character development has in practice been stymied by the predilection of TV characters to undergo radical personality tranformations from one season to the next–or even one episode to the next, as in the case of nighttime teen soapThe O.C. (Josh Schwartz, Fox, 2003–2007), in which the second-season romance between two femme young women, reportedly an attempt to boost ratings, lasted a mere four episodes and, once concluded, appears not to have caused series regular Marissa (Mischa Barton) another thought.2 Olivia Wilde, who played Alex, object of Marissa’s momentary affections, went on to play secretive bisexual Dr. Remy “Thirteen” Hadley on House M.D. (David Shore, Fox, 2004– 2012), though seemingly with the stipulation that she not act on her same-sex desire except in her occasional self-destructive, drug-fueled one-nightstandspromptedbyherdifficultyacceptingthatshehasafatal disease. When Wilde leaves the show at the end of season eight, it is in the arms of her character’s girlfriend, only recently revealed onscreen though still not warranting a name or a single line of dialogue despite her role in whisking Thirteen away from her doctor duties to a new life in Mykonos. This type of character noncontinuity is not uncommon in televisual attempts to explore female same-sex relationships, with notable exceptionssuchasthethree -season-longcouplingbetweenWiccancoedsWillow (Alyson Hannigan) and Tara (Amber Benson) on Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Joss Whedon, WB/UPN, 1997–2003), and between high schoolers Spencer (Gabrielle Christian) and Ashley (Mandy Musgrave) on South of Nowhere (Tommy Lynch, The N, 2005–2008).3 Though The O.C.’s Marissa and Alex are presented as being at the end of their teens and early twenties,respectively,andwithconsiderableprevioussexualexperience, 3.137.174.216] Project MUSE (2024-04-26 08:31 GMT) Bisexuality on the Boob Tube 205 one might apply a different set of criteria when looking at young adult characters such as those in South of Nowhere as well as two U.K. shows featuring young queer teens, Skins (Brian Eisley and Jamie Brittain, Channel 4, 2007–present) and Sugar Rush (Katie Baxendale, Channel 4, 2005–2006).4 As with the female institution films featured in chapter 2, owing to content regulations and cultural concerns about adolescent sexuality, younger-aged characters may be less readable as bisexual in some ways (limited sexual experience, pressure to conform socially) and more bi-suggestive in other ways. In Sugar Rush, for instance, the crush that protagonist Kim (Olivia Hallinan) develops on...