Tag: People

Elizabethan government

PARIS: I think that the basic structure of the Elizabethan government is relatively sound. The division of power between the monarchy, the privy council, and the parliament all seem to work.

Elizabethan government was that in England under the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (reigned 1558-1603). Her government was extremely structured and complex, and made up of:

The Monarch – Queen Elizabeth herself, who ruled by divine right. She is generally regarded as one of England’s best monarchs, which is probably why Paris thinks her government would be the best to emulate.

The Privy Council – the queen’s advisors. They gave advice to the queen, but she could rule against them if she preferred. They handled routine administration.

Parliament – was made up of the House of Lords (nobility and upper level clergy) and The House of Commons (ordinary people who were elected to their position). Unlike today, it had very little power, and was mostly there to handle the financial side of things, such as taxes.

Local government – very important in Elizabethan times. Counties, cities, and towns all had their own governments to deal with issues on a local level, while the nobility ran their own manors.

Courts – the justice system was made up of a number of courts, all dealing with different types of crimes, from the most serious offences to petty matters. The wealthy and the poor had different court systems to try them, and there were separate courts for financial and religious issues.

David Mamet

EMILY: I have to get out everything she’s [Richard’s mother] ever given us. Thirty-five years worth of fish lamps and dog statues, lion tables, and stupid naked angels with their … butts!
LORELAI: Whoa! Stupid naked angel butts? What, did David Mamet just stop by?

Lorelai is probably referring to David Mamet’s 1983 play Glengarry Glen Ross. It shows two days in the lives of four Chicago real estate agents prepared to do anything, no matter how illegal or unethical, to sell some undesirable real estate. It won the 1984 Pulitzer Prize, and in 1992 was made into into a highly-acclaimed film, with the screenplay written by Mamet.

The play is notorious for its use of profanity, and Lorelai is teasing her mother for her uncharacteristic use of the word “butts”. Maybe the butt model conversation affected her.

David Mamet is one of Amy Sherman-Palladino’s own favourite playwrights.

Emily’s statement suggests that she and Richard have been married for thirty-five years, so since 1965-1966.

Madonna

LORELAI: I still can’t get over that I’m related to God. It’s gonna make getting Madonna tickets so much easier.

Madonna (born Madonna Ciccone in 1958) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and businesswoman. Regarded as the first multi-media pop icon, she is is known as the Queen of Pop. Her debut album was released in 1983 to immediate success, and was followed by several best-selling albums; her 1998 album Ray of Light won Best Pop Album at the Grammys. Many of her songs have gone to #1 in the charts, including Like a Virgin, Papa Don’t Preach, Like a Prayer, and Vogue. She is the best-selling female recording artist of all time, and in the US is second only to Barbra Streisand. She is the most successful solo act of all time, and the highest-grossing solo touring artist of all time. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008.

This is the third time that Lorelai has mentioned Madonna, and I think it is safe to assume that she is one of her favourite singers, especially as Madonna first became a star when Lorelai was a teenager.

Madonna had her Drowned World Tour tour in 2001; she was due to appear in New York at Madison Square Garden during July 25-31 that year. Lorelai’s comment suggests that she may have been trying to obtain tickets to the event. Gilmore Girls episodes didn’t cover this period of the year, so it’s possible that Lorelai and Rory did make it to the concert.

 

“Camelot is truly dead”

LORELAI: Do you know that butt models make $10,000 a day? [Rory chuckles]
EMILY: Camelot is truly dead.

Camelot is the name of King Arthur’s castle and court in Arthurian legend. Americans use the term to refer to the presidency of John F. Kennedy, which was first applied by his widow Jacqueline Kennedy after his assassination in 1963.

Jackie referenced a line from the 1960 stage musical Camelot: “Don’t let it be forgot, that once there was a spot, for one brief, shining moment, that was known as Camelot”. Indicating that this was one of John F. Kennedy’s favourite lyrics from the musical, she added, “There will be great presidents again, but there’ll never be another Camelot again”.

I’m not sure where Lorelai received her information from, but butt models in the movies actually make about $500 a day, double that if they go nude. Outside the movies, it might be as little as $200 a day – they get paid by the hour, and let’s face it, hardly anybody wants to film a single butt all day. These days, a butt model could make as much as $5000 from just one Instagram post, but that isn’t the norm, and the option didn’t exist in 2001.

The Kennedy Clan

EMILY: Well, this is just ridiculous. Three intelligent women sitting here in complete silence. There must be something to talk about. Do you know that every night at dinner, the Kennedy clan would sit around the table having lively debates about everything under the sun? They would quiz each other about current events, historical facts, intellectual trivia. Now the Gilmore clan is just as smart and worldly as the Kennedys, so come on – somebody say something.

The Kennedy family have been prominent in American politics, business, and public life since the 1880s, with many of them elected to political office since the post-war era. Some of their most famous members include Joseph P. Kennedy, ambassador to the UK 1938-1940; John F. Kennedy, president from 1961-1963; Robert Kennedy, senator for New York from 1965-1968, and Ted Kennedy, senator for Massachussets from 1962-2009.

Emily is correct that the Kennedy family would quiz each other at the dinner table, but it was a far more competitive environment than she makes it sound. Joseph Kennedy would set one of his children a topic to study, and all the others would have to study it too so that they could quiz him or her to see how well they had learned and understood the topic. Joseph would sometimes enliven proceedings with dinner time lectures, complete with maps and notes.

Incidentally, one of the Kennedys is named Rory – Rory Kennedy (born 1968) is the daughter of Senator Robert Kennedy, born six months after his assassination; her name was chosen to sound like his (“Bobby”). She is a documentary film maker, and her first film was American Hollow in 1999, about life in an Appalachian valley (it bears little resemblance to Stars Hollow). I don’t know if Kennedy influenced the choice of Rory Gilmore’s name in any way.

“Peace out, Humphrey”

EMILY: Everyone’s awfully quiet tonight.
LORELAI: Sorry Mom, I’m just tired.
RORY: Me too – school.
LORELAI: Work.
RORY: Life.
LORELAI: Dig it, man.
RORY: Peace out, Humphrey.

The audience knows why Lorelai and Rory are so quiet. Rory is depressed about breaking up with her boyfriend Dean, and Lorelai’s relationship with Max has hit an impasse: they reunited and both love each other, but the problems that ended their relationship are still there with no solutions in sight.

Lorelai says, “Dig it, man”, which is hippie slang from the 1960s meaning, “Get it, understand it, know it”. The hippies might have added the “man”, but “dig it” goes back at least to the 1930s as African-American slang, and even in the 19th century Americans spoke about “digging” in the sense of knowing or studying something.

Rory responds in a similarly counter-culture way by saying “Peace out, Humphrey”. “Peace out” is hippie slang meaning “Goodbye, go in peace”, influenced by the radio sign-off, “Over and out”.

Rory is possibly referring to Hubert Humphrey (1911-1978) who was the Vice President under President Lyndon Johnson from 1965 to 1969. The main author of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, he introduced the initiative of the Peace Corps and the National Peace Agency. Sceptical of the war in Vietnam, he was forced to support it in loyalty to Johnson. He was the Democratic nominee in the 1968 presidential election but lost to Richard Nixon – you could say that he “peaced out”.

Madame Curie and Jennifer Lopez

PARIS: Yeah well, I doubt highly that Madam Curie was voted most likely to dress like Jennifer Lopez.

Marie Curie, born Maria Skłodowska (1867-1934) [pictured] was a Polish-born French physicist and chemist who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity. She was the first woman to win a Nobel prize, the first person and only woman to win it twice, and the only person to win it in two different sciences. The Curie family, including Marie, her husband Pierre, daughter Irène Joliot-Curie, son-in-law Frédéric Joliot-Curie, and son-in-law Henri Labouisse, has won more Nobel Prizes than any other family. She was the first woman to become a Professor at the University of Paris, and the first woman to be entombed at The Panthéon in Paris on her own merits.

Jennifer Lopez (born 1969) is an American actress, singer, dancer, and fashion designer. She began her career in 1991 as a dancer on television before branching into acting in 1993 (although she’d made her film debut as a teenager in a low-budget film). Her first starring role was in Selena (1997); she went on to star in other films in the 1990s, becoming the highest-paid Latina actress in Hollywood. She ventured into the music industry in 1999, with her debut album On the 6, which had two Top Ten singles. In January 2001, a few weeks before the events of this episode, she brought out her second album, J.Lo, around the same time as the release of her romantic comedy, The Wedding Planner, becoming the first woman to have a #1 album and #1 film in the same week.

We learn here that Paris’ ambition is to work in medical research toward the better understanding and treatment of cancer. It apparently doesn’t work out that way. Oddly enough, Liza Weil, who plays Paris, would later play a character who dies from cancer on medical drama Grey’s Anatomy.

Kreskin

CHASE: No no, Lorelai! I’d have to feed the information into a computer to get the answer. I’m no Kreskin!

The Amazing Kreskin (born George Kresge in 1935) is a mentalist who became popular on American television in the 1970s, and is still performing. Kreskin’s main act is to make correct predictions, although he bills himself an an entertainer working with suggestions, not a psychic.

Leopold and Loeb

EMILY: He [Chase] was just telling me that he actually grew up right around the corner from here.
CHASE: … Stone house on the corner.
LORELAI: Oh, the one with the Dobermans.
CHASE: That’s right. Leopold and Loeb.

This refers to Nathan Leopold Jr. (1904-1971) and Richard Loeb (1905-1936), collectively known as Leopold and Loeb. They were two wealthy students at the University of Chicago in 1924, when they kidnapped and murdered a 14-year-old boy named Robert “Bobby” Franks, who was a second-cousin of Loeb, and well-known to both the murderers.

Leopold and Loeb were of high intelligence, and committed the murder to demonstrate their intellectual superiority. They thought they would be able to commit the “perfect crime”, and that their intelligence meant that they could do as they like, even a thrill kill, and claim it as an experiment.

Arrested about a week later, they both confessed to the crime and were represented by the famous defence lawyer Clarence Darrow. The case became a media spectacle, and was billed as “the trial of the century”. Thanks to Darrow’s impassioned pleas, Leopold and Loeb escaped the death penalty and were given a sentence of life imprisonment instead.

Loeb was killed by a fellow prisoner in 1936, while Leopold became a model prisoner who made significant contributions to improving the conditions at Stateville Penitentiary in Illinois. He was released on parole in 1958, married, and moved to Puerto Rico, where he led a blameless life giving an enormous amount to the community in numerous ways – thus justifying Darrow’s defense that the death penalty would give them no chance to rehabilitate.

Chase’s parents obviously had a dark sense of humour when they named their pet Dobermans after two child killers.