A site I have never heard of (Mamba Online? Do you know it?) has an essay on media representation that poses an interesting question: is the representation of bisexuality better on television than in film?
You can read the essay if you want (I didn’t find it that well written, but you may disagree), but the general conclusion seems to be, yes, TV shows do a better job with the bisexuals, giving us more space to flesh our identities out while movies tend to flatten us into stereotypes.
But what I’m interested in is less if TV shows are better at doing bisexuality and more why TV shows are better.
I think there are a couple of possible answers here. First and foremost, the funding models for TV and film are different; for the most part, the movies that get made these days are either giant blockbusters or tiny indies, with very little in between. TV, on the other hand, is given a lot more range. There’s a reason why major film stars like Meryl Streep are performing in a medium they wouldn’t have deigned to touch in an earlier era: there’s just more interesting work on TV now.
So that’s one possibility; and if that’s the case, then bisexuality is better on TV, not because TV is somehow inherently more bi-friendly, but because the currently economy has created an ecosystem where the more complex, thought provoking stories are landing on TV, and those complex, thought provoking stories are the ones that happen to do the best job representing bisexuality.
But I don’t actually think that’s what it is.
What I think is actually something much simpler: TV is better with bisexuality because TV has more space.
Because, really, what is good bisexual rep if not the ability to show the shifts and variations that someone’s identity experiences over time?
I’m not saying that movies can’t accomplish this — and certainly I think that movies can be fantastic at showing elements of the bi experience and biphobia (::cough::Chasing Amy::cough::) — but I do think that TV simply has an easier time of it. You can go slower with your development of a bisexual character on TV; you don’t have to rush things to make sure that the audience knows from the jump that THIS PERSON IS BI. Even some of the shortest TV runs — say, a first season that totals just three hours — still give you more room to explore, to develop, than some of the longest films.
And I’m not saying bisexuals are greedy, but I do think that we benefit from having more breathing room.
Because, honestly? When I think about my own bisexuality; when I think about how I would want it represented in an honest and nuanced way — it would have to be on TV. It’s not that you couldn’t tell my life (or part of my life) through film; but every time I’ve attempted to write a screenplay based on myself (yes I have done this), it always feels like I’m having to amputate a part of my story, like I am honing in on one particular moment to the detriment of the others.
TV, on the other hand — it’s very format is set up to accommodate multiple stories, multiple arcs, multiple ways of being a person. As a bisexual, I am proud to contain multitudes. And I simply think that TV is better at capturing my many dimensions than film ever could be.
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