How to Tell a True Love Story

The Case Against (Some!) Rom-Coms

I am ambivalent about rom-coms.¹ I enjoy many of them and have watched Legally Blonde and The Wedding Singer at least a dozen times each (and Clueless is not far behind). Some rom-coms—The Philadelphia Story and Bringing Up Baby, for example—are among the greatest films ever made.

Team Cary Grant!

But some rom-coms don’t tell a True Love Story. (Here I’m alluding to the chapter title “How to Tell a True War Story” from Tim O’Brien’s novel The Things They Carried.) As with a True War Story, a True Love Story is only possible if we refuse to accept destructive myths. “What the heck, Happy Wanderer?!” I can hear you all muttering to yourselves. “Way to ruin Valentine’s Day!” I promise that I love Valentine’s Day, and love stories, too. However, I believe that we will be more successful in enjoying our own True Love Stories if we reject the hidden ideology of some rom-coms.

The Hidden Ideology of (Some!) Rom-Coms

Here are three rom-com myths I’d like to see exploded:

Only women want relationships. The stereotypical rom-com hero wants to be a lone wolf on the prowl. He wants Friends with Benefits, not a girlfriend. He’s Harry in When Harry Met Sally, who takes a full twelve years (!) to realize that he loves Sally. He’s the guy in those Judd Apatow movies who is having too much fun hanging out with his buddies and smoking pot in a fetid apartment to commit to a woman. The way some rom-coms tell it, if it weren’t for all the pushy women pestering the guys for a commitment, we’d have a lot more Hugh Hefners, mooching around in their pajamas and being serviced by a bevy of Bunnies.

I don’t know anyone who’s like this in real life.² In my experience, men want love and relationships just as much as women do. And the data bear this impression out. Surveys invariably show that married people are happier and healthier than single people.³ (Here is another article reporting on a survey of almost 300,000 people that documents that married people are happier than singles.) If anything, the data reveal that men want relationships more, not less, than women, at least according to a recent survey of single people in the UK, in which 61 percent of single women but only 49 percent of single men reported being happy with their status.

I have a hypothesis for why rom-coms so often depict women as the pursuers and men as the pursued. In real-life romance, we still expect men to take the initiative and do the planning. The dating situation for young guys is really tough these days. I bet it’s fun for men to watch a movie where they are considered the objects of women’s desires for a change. The moral of the story is, Men, go ahead and admit you want a relationship! And women, speak up when you like someone! Go after him as though you were Katherine Hepburn in Bringing Up Baby. He may have been waiting for you to clamber up on that dinosaur skeleton to propose!

Love ruins everything. The full quote, from Moonstruck, is

Love don’t make things nice—it ruins everything. It breaks your heart. It makes things a mess. We aren’t here to make things perfect. The snowflakes are perfect. The stars are perfect. Not us. Not us! We are here to ruin ourselves and to break our hearts and love the wrong people and die.

I agree that we aren’t here to make things perfect, and far be it from me to suggest that Cher should stick with boring old Danny Aiello when she could be with a young Nicholas Cage instead.

I mean, dang!

The problem with believing that love ruins everything is that we flawed humans can have a tough time distinguishing love from infatuation. What if we only think we’re in love, and we wind up ruining our True Love Story for a passing fancy? Don’t forget that Cher’s dad is cheating on the magnificent Olympia Dukakis with some floozie because he, too, thinks that love ruins everything, including a decades-long marriage to a terrific woman. Likewise, to me, the famous scene in Love Actually—where the best man holds up signs confessing his love for the newlywed Keira Knightley and is rewarded with her attention, smiles, and a kiss—isn’t much of a love story. Couldn’t the best man have tried dating literally anyone else, or at least told Keira about his feelings before the wedding (as Nicholas Cage had the grace to do in Moonstruck), instead of taking those stalker-ish wedding photos and then trying to steal his best friend’s wife?

I don’t agree that love ruins everything. I think love is an exciting adventure full of laughter and learning. I think true love makes us better people—less selfish, more open to other people’s perspectives, and more willing to work to promote the happiness of those we love.

There are large main dogs and small emergency backup dogs. I stole that line from Dave Barry, who has written many amusing pieces about Earnest (large main dog) and Zippy (small emergency backup dog), including this one. Or, for a more literary expression of this myth, we can quote George Orwell: All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others. Or, to wax philosophical, we could also put this myth in Kantian terms: Some people are an end in themselves, and others can be used as a means to an end.

Whichever formulation we choose, the point is the same: Some rom-coms advance the false ideology that certain people are important, interesting, and worthy, while other people are just tools for improving the lives of the important people. We see it in the manic-pixie-dream-girl or -boy trope, where a character exists solely to rehabilitate a flawed person, with no separate story of his or her own. I mean, Natalie Portman in Garden State has epilepsy—can’t Zach Braff take some time off from moping around to ask her how she’s feeling once in awhile? And Leonardo DiCaprio literally gives his life for Kate Winslet in Titanic—and says he is grateful for the opportunity. (Human psychology says thumbs-down on that.) As many commenters have asked, why couldn’t Kate budge over to make room for Leo on that board?

To be fair, Princess Leia seems way too calm about the destruction of Alderaan throughout the original trilogy, and not just here.

We see it in the idea of “You complete me”: Even though Renée Zellweger is a busy single mom, for some reason it’s up to her to help Tom Cruise become a better person. I know that Tom Cruise is a Scientologist and all, but what if he had just tried therapy instead?⁴

A particularly amusing example of the myth that some people are more equal than others shows up in movies whose climactic moment is the Public Declaration of Love, in which the hero or heroine makes a long speech about their journey to recognizing and accepting love. Sometimes this declaration happens in Grand Central Terminal (Friends with Benefits), sometimes it’s at an eighth-grade graduation ceremony (Crazy, Stupid Love), sometimes it’s at soccer practice (10 Things I Hate about You). When there’s a Public Declaration of Love, the crowd, instead of going about their business, stands around watching and applauding the declaration. I am skeptical that this has ever happened in real life. If a stranger had embarked on a long declaration of love and a discussion of his personal development during my kids’ graduations, I would have been looking for the vaudeville hook. (Well, ok, I do acknowledge that if Justin Timberlake or Heath Ledger organizes a flash mob, people are going to watch.) I mean, we have all read about how only a few people out of more than a thousand commuters stopped to listen to the world-class violinist Joshua Bell outside the subway; surely they wouldn’t drop everything they’re doing to listen to and then applaud a declaration of love from a random stranger, right?

True Love Stories

You may still be thinking that I am ruining Valentine’s Day with my grouchy quibbles. Are there love stories that express feelings honestly, that demonstrate that love doesn’t ruin things but is instead a lot of fun, that value the worth of all people, and that show love makes us better? Why yes, many! Here are a few of my favorites:

Shakespeare, Sonnet 130, My Mistress’ Eyes Are Nothing Like the Sun

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damasked, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.
     And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
     As any she belied with false compare.

At first glance one might prefer to be the Fair Youth who is the inspiration for Sonnet 18 (“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”). But how much more meaningful and long-lasting is Shakespeare’s love for the Dark Lady! He sees her as she truly is and loves her for all her imperfections. Shakespeare’s sonnet to the Fair Youth speaks ominously about “rough winds” and admits that “every fair from fair sometime declines.” But Shakespeare doesn’t care that the Dark Lady has aged—her “dun” breasts and black wiry hair suggests she’s no longer young—and he even overlooks her bad morning breath. He “love[s] to hear her speak” and compliments her down-to-earth good sense: “My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.” After all, as Shakespeare reminds us in Sonnet 116, “Love is not love / which alters when it alteration finds.”

Pride and Prejudice. No, not for the reason you think. While I do love Lizzie and Mr. Darcy and anticipate a blissful future for them, the novel ends shortly after their marriage and gives us only a glimpse into their later married life. In fact, there are very few examples of long, happy marriages in Jane Austen’s novels. (Long, miserable marriages yes—think of the reasonable John Knightley saddled with the querulous hypochondriac Isabella in Emma; or of Maria Bertram and Mr. Rushworth in Mansfield Park, condemned to remain married after Maria’s infidelity; or, for that matter, of Mr. and Mrs. Bennet.)

The True Love Story in Pride and Prejudice is that of Lizzie’s aunt and uncle Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner. Both characters are fun-loving and sensible, and we see them leading active, productive lives, running a thriving business in London and raising a burgeoning family of four children. But in spite of their busy lives, the Gardiners take time to listen to and help Jane, Lizzie, and even Lydia. We also see them making their relationship a priority when they plan a trip together without their children (whom they leave “in Aunt Jane’s capable hands”). They are affectionate and patient with each other: Mrs. Gardiner has trouble walking and her husband offers her his arm, and she is happy that her husband can spend a pleasant day fishing while she stays back at the inn. The Gardiners show that love makes us better people—generous, warm, and able to laugh together—even several years into marriage.

The Thin Man movies. A smart, sophisticated, funny married couple with a clever dog? What’s not to like? In between parties and martinis, Nick and Nora Charles solve mysteries together. As with the Gardiners, this couple turns not inward to complete each other or fix each other’s flaws, but rather outward, to solve other people’s problems together. And they have a great time doing it, too!

Check out how William Powell gazes at Myrna Loy!

36 Questions. A group of scientists came up with a wild idea: Could they make people fall in love by having them discuss their answers to 36 questions and then stare into each other’s eyes? They could! Two sets of participants even got married shortly after the study. The reason this approach works is simple: The questions are fun (“When did you last sing to yourself? To someone else?”); they’re deep (“For what in your life do you feel most grateful?”); they encourage emotional generosity (“Tell your partner what you like about them; be very honest, . . . saying things that you might not say to someone you’ve just met”); and they require honesty and vulnerability (“If you were to die this evening with no opportunity to communicate with anyone, what would you most regret not having told someone? Why haven’t you told them yet?”). The questions distill the most important components of a loving relationship and prompt the partners to focus on these deeper emotional truths rather than on superficial qualities. 36 Questions is already a podcast musical. Wouldn’t it make a terrific rom-com too? Are there any screenwriters reading this?

The Basset Hound Mug: My True Love Story

One morning a few years ago, I woke up with sharp stomach pains. I tried to ignore it and hopped in the shower, but the pain became too intense (since you asked, it felt like my intestines were being scrubbed from the inside with a Brillo pad). I crawled from the shower back to bed, sopping wet hair and all. When my husband came to check on me, I said, “I’m ok! My stomach just hurts.” He took one look at me and called my doctor, who told him to call an ambulance. The whole ride to the hospital, I kept insisting that I was fine, but he refused to listen.

At the hospital, the ER doctor gave me a pain killer, and once it had taken the edge off, I tried to get off the gurney and make a break for it. My husband insisted, “No, you’re staying.” He took care of checking me in, calling our insurance company, and paying the ambulance driver.⁵ Long story short, it turned out that I had appendicitis AND diverticulitis, so I had to be admitted for emergency surgery. Unfortunately, even after the surgery my infection still raged, so I needed to stay in the hospital for a week to receive IV antibiotics.

While I was in the hospital, my husband worked full-time, took care of the kids, did all the shopping, cooking, and laundry, and visited me every day. He brought me my basset hound mug to cheer me up.

In the hospital, I was not a pretty sight. There was no montage sequence in which I was magically transformed into a beautiful babe to the delighted gasps of the hero. Quite the contrary, because the doctor had pumped my belly full of air for the laparoscopic surgery, I looked six months pregnant—and not in a radiant way, but rather in a tube-with-bloody-goo-dripping-out-of-the-incision way.

On one visit, I noticed that my husband looked wiped out:

Happy Wanderer: I’m so sorry. You’ve had a hard week.

Husband [deadpan]: Me. I’VE had a hard week.

HW: Well, yes! You’ve had to do everything at home without me.

H: It’s true. If anyone asks what their wife does all day, I can recommend sending her to the hospital for a week. They’ll find out.

See? We were able to appreciate each other and even joke around! I readily concede that The Basset Hound Mug is not the kind of story that would make millions at the box office. This is why I write this little newsletter and leave screenwriting to the experts. (Maybe one of them will write 36 Questions?) But it is a True Love Story, nonetheless. Love makes us better people—patient, generous, and able to accept and value our partner for who they truly are.

How about you, readers? What is your favorite True Love Story, from movies, literature, or your own life? Please share your thoughts in the comments, and happy Valentine’s Day!

The Tidbit

My favorite Public Declaration of Love comes from The Wedding Singer. Unlike in many rom-coms, here it’s totally natural that a bunch of strangers would be captivated by this Public Declaration of Love. They’re literally a captive audience—stuck together on a plane—and Robbie’s sweet song is the most interesting entertainment available. Plus, there’s Billy Idol!

1. A disclaimer: This entire essay will consider only cishet rom-coms and relationships. This is for two reasons: First, as a cishet person, I lack the experience to discuss LGBT relationships, and second, the vast majority of rom-coms in popular culture depict cishet relationships. But the ideas in this essay should apply to everyone, of whatever identity or orientation.

2. OK, fine. I had one friend in college, an extremely attractive guy who looked like a young, blond Treat Williams, who was determined never to get married but instead to keep playing the field. You guessed it—he’s been happily married for years.

3. It’s important to note that there’s a huge correlation-causation issue here: People who are already happy and healthy are more likely to get married in the first place.

4. I confess that I have a soft spot for Jerry Maguire, though, not least because it has given us the immortal phrase “shoplifting the pootie from the single mother.” I also get a kick out of the scene where Renée Zellweger’s sister is scolding her for dating yet another irresponsible guy, and the sister says, as she’s about to open the door, “He better not be good-looking!” She opens the door, and there he is: Tom Cruise! Tee hee!

5. This happened while we were living in Prague. In the Czech medical system, ambulances are paid separately and in cash, but they only cost about $100. Stay tuned for a future post about healthcare in the Czech Republic.