As Long As I Can Breathe & Kneel
An ode to Samantha Jones.
Several years ago, myself and my friends Ciara and Kat sat through a long-winded production of Anthony and Cleopatra at the Liverpool Playhouse, starring the one and only Kim Cattrall. Being in the same room as Kim was a transcendental experience, even though we were up in the Gods and I’d forgotten my glasses, so Kim was nothing but a golden blur in a black wig. Kim was born in Liverpool and despite not growing up in the city, she proudly declares herself a Scouser. She comes back to the city a lot to visit relatives who still live here (she infamously has an Auntie who works in M&S), and once took on the Mayor to protest a proposed housing development on Sefton Park. As a much-maligned city, Scousers tend to value loyalty above all else, and for this reason Kim is always welcomed back into the city with open arms.
Kim was playing Cleopatra of course, and I recently learned that on her already bought and paid for gravestone, located somewhere in the city, Kim refers to herself, rather iconically, as ‘The Cleopatra of Liverpool’. My friends and I sat through almost three hours of Shakespeare because we were told there would be a Q&A with the actors afterwards, alas Kim did not attend, saying she didn’t want it to become all about her, which it inevitably would have. We were disappointed, but we understood, and so we politely sat and listened as a group of theatre actors discussed their love of Shakespeare for one whole hour.
This was in the days before the public had learned of the animosity between Kim and her Sex and the City co-stars, and in retrospect it was possible she didn’t want to talk about SATC simply because the experience was no longer something she looked back on fondly. It’s always sad to hear the actors on your favourite shows don’t get on in real life. Of course, acting is acting and fiction is fiction, but there’s always a part of you that hopes those lines blur slightly, and these self-proclaimed fictional soulmates love each other as much in real life as they do on screen. My immediate bias was of course to be Team Kim, but ultimately none of us truly know what went on behind the scenes. As a millennial woman SATC was one of the most pivotal shows of my youth and so I try not to let what we now know dampen my enjoyment of something I’ve loved for a long time.
Despite the negative reaction to the second film, the prospect of a third was still exciting, and when it was announced last year that a third film had indeed been proposed, but Kim had turned it down, I was disappointed. Surely, she could put aside her feelings about her co-stars and do this for the fans? But then I had a word with myself, she doesn’t owe us anything, why should she re-enter an environment she has made clear she was unhappy in? Then I hoped they wouldn’t go ahead with any prospective re-boots because how would they possibly work without her? Alas, last week it was announced that HBO will be airing a ten-episode special entitled ‘And Just Like That’ later this year, and our Samantha-less fates have been sealed. Samantha being my favourite SATC character may have a hint of Scouse bias, but I don’t think it can be argued that this re-boot just won’t be the same without one of its most integral players.
Aside from sharing a surname, I am nothing like my fictional heroine Samantha Jones. I don’t have a high-powered PR career, I (sadly) don’t live in New York City, and I don’t partake in anywhere near as much casual sex. When I first watched Sex and The City I was in my late teens, and women having sex on TV wasn’t something I’d seen an awful lot of. Nowadays it’s much more common for female characters on television to be sexually empowered, but there is a still a double standard when it comes to how many sexual partners are considered “acceptable” for a woman to have had – on Love Island when the Islanders discuss their ‘body counts’ the guys will often trot out numbers nearing the hundreds, meanwhile the girls will be judged if they admit to double figures. Shows like SATC attempted to tackle these double standards, but unfortunately as they are often dismissed as ‘girly rubbish’ they are unable to smash these taboos as effectively as they would like.
All the girls in SATC have healthy sex lives, but it is Samantha who enjoys the most encounters (41 men and one woman to be precise). And whilst Samantha’s escapades were often used for comic relief, the show didn’t shy away from dealing with the more complicated issues surrounding casual sex such as sexual health – in one episode Samantha admits she has never had an HIV test and the girls convince her to get one. Samantha is the only character in the show whose sexual exploits are not part of a quest to find a long-term partner. She is happily single, and when she does end up falling for hotelier Richard Wright, it is the act of being in love that she struggles with, rather than the fear of losing it. It is fascinating to see a character usually so in control, unwittingly fall for this man who turns out to be a sleazebag whom she eventually catches ‘eating another woman’s pussy’. After throwing a dirty martini in his face and sticking up fliers around his neighbourhood that brand him a CHEAT and a LIAR, Samantha takes Richard back. It’s disappointing, yes, but also realistic as it tells the audience no one is infallible when it comes to falling in love.
In the end Samantha dumps Richard once again uttering one of her most iconic lines; “I love you, but I love me more.” She says this again in the first film, to her long-term partner Smith Jerrod. Smith is Samantha’s most significant relationship, her supports her through her battle with breast cancer, and she supports his career as an actor, even moving away from her beloved NYC to Hollywood as his career starts to progress. It would have been easy for the writers to give Samantha the traditional ‘happily ever after’ by having her remain with Smith, but that’s exactly the point a character like Samantha proves – happily ever after is not one size fits all.
Samantha is a character with flaws, she sleeps with married men and feels no guilt, she doesn’t see eye to eye with Charlotte much of the time because neither character fully understands the motivations of the other. However, her lack of moral high ground regarding her own behaviour makes her the least judgemental of the four women, which is why it is she Carrie chooses to confide in when she is having an affair with Big. “Don’t you want to judge me, just a little?” Carrie asks her, “Not my style.” Is Sam’s reply.
My favourite episode of SATC is season fours My Motherboard Myself in which Carries laptop breaks and she loses all her work because she didn’t realise she needed to back it up (insert eyeroll here), and Mirandas Mother dies. It is the first episode in which we see the girls dealing with the concepts of grief and death and in trying to process how she feels about the situation, Samantha loses her orgasm (“in the cab?!”). It is a clever way of demonstrating Samantha’s struggle whilst still remaining true to the character. Unable to convey how she feels to her friends, her body reacts by removing the one thing she can always rely on. Eventually Samantha reaches out to Miranda at the funeral and the floodgates open, and yes, her orgasm returns (although not at the funeral, I hasten to add).
I can’t imagine what this reboot will be without Samantha’s sage words of wisdom and dry wit, however I know I’ll still watch it. I’m looking forward to a show that will represent women in their 50s with careers and sex lives, as shows about older women are still sorely lacking. I don’t know if the characters will acknowledge her absence, and I really hope they don’t take the easy way out and kill her off. It’s hard to believe she will have left New York, and it’s hard to imagine that she would have fallen out with Carrie and co, so where does that leave her? Ultimately, I am pleased that Kim has done what’s best for her, and I hope she continues to create iconic characters for many more years to come, but there will only ever be one Samantha Jones (and one Scouse Cleopatra).