In 1988, Hollywood gave us a terrific version of the most frequently told tale of any: Cinderella. That film starred Melanie Griffith as the lead character, trying to catch the attention of the prince, Harrison Ford, and draw him away from the wicked stepsister, Sigourney Weaver, with the help of her best friend and fairy godmother, Joan Cusack while she hoped to help prevent her corporation from a hostile takeover.
And a couple of years later we got this TV adaptation. Where the film version of this story follows the Cinderella legend (and really improves upon it, from my perspective), this TV adaptation really couldn't. How could you drag that story out week after week of a regular series?
But some things did remain the same. The lead character was Tess McGill, and that's Sandra Bullock. She's still from Staten Island, taking the ferry right past the Statue of Liberty, to the subway, to her office. The program's theme song was, just like the movie, the Oscar winning "Let the River Run" (sung by someone who sounded as much like Carly Simon as the budget could afford), and Tess had a pal, Lana (Judy Prescott) also from the neighborhood who works with and hangs with her both at the office, on coffee breaks and at lunch, and occasionally around the homestead.
Tess got a promotion from the company owner, Mr. Trask (Tom O'Rourke) which tossed her from the secretary pool into the shark tank. The vast majority of the antagonism comes from a woman boss lady named Bryn Newhouse that seemed to be standing in the way of Tess and her attempts to rise up the ranks. That's Nana Visitor, in what clearly is based on the oppressive Sigourney Weaver role.
New elements that got added in this version of the story are Bryn's executive secretary played by Eyde Byrde, who sympathetically helped Tess out wherever she could, Everett (George Newbern) who also attempted to climb that corporate ladder, step for step with Tess, a local guy named Sal (Anthony Tyler Quinn) who romantically pursued Tess back in Staten Island, and Tess' parents (David Schramm and B. J. Ward), who provided a little homelife angst away from the office issues.
To the credit of the series, there wasn't any one single love interest that the female lead characters were vying for as in the movie; most of the competition is directly related to the elements of business and how Ms. Newhouse lorded her power over Tess and attempted to slap her down at every opportunity. But the irrepressible Tess thrived, handling unexpected assignments, dealing with problems and setbacks and keeping her positive energy afloat.
New York played a part because of the split between Ms. McGill's home and work space, a gap that seems much wider than New York Harbor, that interesting time when women would commute to their jobs in running shoes and then change into their high heels at the office, and the need to stay focused and ready for work because anything can either make you a fortune or create the need to file for Chapter 11, based on a single action.
What I feel was unfair about the show's construction is based on that last point - Ms. Newhouse was leading an office and attempting to make sure everything was up to her extremely high standards, but the point should have been that women were not commonly in charge of businesses, even in 1990. So, there would have been legitimate reasons for Newhouse to make demands, as she positioned her division and herself to have success.
For the most part, her criticisms were played for comedic effect, and displayed, more or less, as capricious attacks on a slightly younger employee, who at times was even seen as a threat instead of help.
Even though Tess might have viewed Newhouse that way, I think if they had balanced those requisite complaints with the facts, this might have made more sense within the plots, justified the reactions in a way that viewers could relate with and helped make Newhouse seem less like a shrewish banshee, without losing any of the comic effect.
And then, there's Sandy's hair, which was its own sitcom! The production stills included tell the story and while some of them look okay, no. Just, no. And Tess' Staten Island accent was also a crucial part of the laughs, though the audience was told Tess was attending "speech class" at night school to improve on that. I guess the intention would have been that Tess slowly starts to lose that accent as she would have improved her business sense while the series continued.
In the end, this televised "Working Girl" wasn't nearly as focused or fun as the film version, which put this incarnation of Tess back on the subway to South Ferry a lot faster than she wanted to be.
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