My Favorite Character

As we approach the end of "Better Things," here is a love letter to my favorite character on television, Phil.

A "retirement-phase" Californian, Phil has some unconventional ideas. She basically steals a man from the man's ailing wife; this is especially uncomfortable because she, Phil, is white, and there is a sense of white entitlement/obliviousness in Phil's behavior. (Phil also blindly alludes to one of her granddaughter's friends as a "scholarship student." The retort: "He is not a scholarship student. His father is Harry Belafonte.")

No one around Phil is happy with Phil's choice of boyfriend, but Phil has a startling speech. "Yes, my boyfriend is married. But, when you reach my age, there are so many roadblocks to divorce. Questions about health, money, family, property, mental fitness, impending death. People my age do not have the luxury to clutch their pearls all the time. People my age cannot be as rigid as people in their thirties. At my age, the question is not: ARE YOU MARRIED? The question becomes: HOW MARRIED ARE YOU?"

This is surely the greatest moment in "Better Things," delivered with dignity and charisma by the brilliant Celia Imrie. The episode then scales new heights: Phil attends an Easter egg-hunt with her boyfriend, and Phil finds herself alone with the boyfriend's ailing wife. With strange restraint and even a sense of strength, Phil says, "I'm pleased to meet you. Your husband is very fond of you." The wife is beyond communicating; she is near death, maybe. But then Judy Garland comes onto a small TV screen and begins singing "The Easter Parade." Moved by music, reunited with her child self, the ailing wife sings, too, and she knows all the words. Phil joins in. I can't think of a more-surprising script I've encountered, in the TV world.

Phil is in some ways a terrible mother; she blithely rips into her own daughter's parenting style. ("Sam lets those kids walk all over her.") Phil can't part with her driver ID, and she ends up mowing down her own grandchild. Stunned and ashamed, Phil quietly blames the grandchild--and this is an ugly, "very human" moment. Then, in private, Phil does the right thing. She surrenders her ID. Phil has little patience for boundaries: She poaches her daughter's gardener even as that gardener tries to do his scheduled work. It's wonderful to see Sam wrestling with her ambivalence toward Phil; when Sam treats Phil in a brutal way, abruptly canceling a birthday retreat, we know that Sam is thinking about the many times *her own children* exhibit monstrous, selfish behavior. Great, rich, provocative writing.

Finally, I love when Phil chats with her daughter-in-law, whom she hates. The hatred leaks out in amazing ways. "Why would you purchase this chandelier for an LA house? An earthquake could hit at any moment. I could be crushed by your chandelier." The loathsome daughter-in-law tries to be an adult: "No one is requiring you to stand under that chandelier...." Later, Phil scores points by rejecting a gift of rare British cheese. ("You've used the wrong temperature.") The iciest lines in TV surely belong to the daughter-in-law: "Do you need help? I see you gagging? It looks like you may need some help?" And Phil's pettiness reaches a climax during the family photo shoot: "I'd like the next portrait to feature BLOOD RELATIVES, and only BLOOD RELATIVES...."

Sometimes, in TV, a grandmother is allowed to be only a saint. Or a grandmother is allowed to be only a source of comic relief. Phil is not a cardboard cutout. She is unpredictable, angry, petty, inspired, funny, wise, childish, reprehensible. When she enters a scene, I expect some kind of chaos. I never know what shape the chaos will take. That's a gift from the writers--and from Celia Imrie.

Can't wait for Season Five.

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Raymond Carver: "What's in Alaska?"

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Liars and Saints

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