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‘Diane von Furstenberg: Woman in Charge’ streams on HULU

Posted on by Francine Brokaw

Women around the world know the name Diane von Furstenberg, or DVF. With one little dress she changed the industry and the world, basically. Diane von Furstenberg: Woman in Charge explores the life and career of this woman with interviews with Diane herself as well as others in the industry and in pop culture.

At age 22 DVF invented the wrap dress and it is still in style today. This iconic fashion transformed the closets of millions of women as well as Diane’s life trajectory. Her life has been interesting, to say the least. At 76 she says she embraces age. “I’ve had a full life,” she states.

Her mother was a survivor of Auschwitz and when she was freed she weighed a whopping 44 pounds. After regaining her weight and her health, she went on to have a baby and raised Diane to be independent and unafraid. Diane believes everyone should “take responsibility for yourself,” and “be true to yourself.” These ideas still rule her life. 

At 18 she met Egon von Furstenberg, a German prince. At 22 she married him and instantly became a princess. They moved to New York City where they were the “it” couple of the day. They later divorced and to Diane it was freedom. She was now completely in charge of her destiny and her life. 

The wrap dress was inspired by the wrap tops ballerinas wear over their leotards. Initially Diane designed wrap tops and skirts, but after seeing Julie Nixon on TV wearing her wrap top and matching skirt, Diane had the ingenious idea to meld them into a single dress, which for the women of the day was a “uniform for freedom.” They were able to be feminine while still being respected. No longer were women relegated to wearing male-style suits to gain respect. This little wrap dress was all they needed. 

At one time DVF was making 25000 dresses a week. This dress was iconic and is still in style and in closets around the world.

At a time when women were models, not designers, DVF changed the industry. 

Today she is very close to her children and is still an advocate for women. She says she is not afraid of death. “Life is a journey and death is a destination.” Diane enjoys her life and is grateful her mother went against the doctors advice and got pregnant giving life to little Diane. 

From the time of her birth to now, Diane von Furstenberg has and is making a statement with her life. This documentary is a deep dive into her history, her family, her career, and her philosophies.

Diane Von Furstenberg: Woman in Charge begins streaming on HULU beginning June 25, 2024. 

About the Author
Francine Brokaw has been covering all aspects of the entertainment industry for over 30 years. She also writes about products and travel. She has been published in national and international newspapers and magazines as well as Internet websites. She has written her own book, Beyond the Red Carpet The World of Entertainment Journalists, is the entertainment correspondent for Good Day Orange County, and has her own TV show, Beyond the Red Carpet, on Village Television in Orange County. She is a longstanding member of the Television Critics Association and is accredited by the MPAA.

Courtesy image HULU

‘TrollsTopia’ arrives on Hulu and Peacock

Posted on by Francine Brokaw


Inspired by the beloved DreamWorks Animation films, TrollsTopia is the next chapter in the hair-raising adventures of the trolls. Now that Poppy knows there are other musical trolls scattered throughout the forest, she bottles up her endless positivity and invites delegates from every troll tribe in the forest to live together in harmony in a grand experiment she calls TrollsTopia!

TrollsTopia begins its 6 episodes on February 17, 2022. The show is available on Hulu and Peacock.

‘The Great’ returns to explore how an idealistic dreamer survives a deadly environment, let alone thrive

Posted on by Francine Brokaw

 

What would you do if you’re trapped in a bad marriage and do not see a way out? Tony McNamara of The Favourite fame thinks this is a contemporary conundrum that needs to be studied in a young woman’s journey to power in the 18th century Russia.

Adapted from his own 2008 stage play, Hulu’s The Great* – *an occasionally true story  takes a farcical and contemporary approach to the life of the famed Russian Empress, Catherine The Great. McNamara’s signature biting and absurdist vision of history is apparent in this young, ambitious woman’s dreadful and continuing conundrum of leading Russia into a greater future while surviving the ‘kill or be killed’ deadly environment. It’s not a run-of-the-mill restrained period piece for sure. McNamara always strives to create an exciting show about a great character with a contemporary twist so that his 21-year-old daughter would watch.

The Great‘s initial season chronicles the coming-of-age adventures of the bright-eyed and bushy-tailed German princess in the 18th century Russia. The young and ‘fierce’ (interpretation: educated and sharp, hence threatening and annoying to men) Catherine (Elle Fanning) arrives with hopes and dreams for a fairy-tale romance and a happily-ever-after ending. Peter III (Nicholas Hoult), however, turns out to be a narcissistic, undisciplined, cruel, and mercurially violent Emperor. A chauvinistic pig? That’s a given, right? Once Catherine realizes she’s trapped in the gilded cage to be a voiceless, invisible, and subservient baby machine, the suffocating reality informs her to switch her focus on overthrowing this greatest menace to Russia. The first season ended with Peter discovering Catherine’s plot to have him killed, but he spares the pregnant Empress in the name of their unborn child, Paul.

Season 2 picks up moments after Catherine’s coup and explores the aftermath of her coming into power while pregnant with his child. Idealistic and disciplined to a fault, the expectant mother is gung ho about bringing the backward country with horrific and bizarre customs (to her, mind you) into an enlightened one. Underestimated and dismissed by almost everyone around her — court, her strategic and military advisors, Peter’s loyalists, nobles, and the peanut gallery — Catherine desperately wants to be taken seriously and gain some RESPECT. She just wants to become a mother to Russia as well as to Paul.

Can her self-appointed title, Catherine The Great, and her pie-in-the-sky ideas born out of bright-eyed optimism put her feminist and enlightened stamp on a country that refuses to step out of the dark ages? It’s easier said than done, especially when the unhinged and hungry Peter is placed under house arrest and his loyalists are doing everything they can to sabotage Catherine’s disciplined efforts for a greater Russia. But first she needs to survive the imminent ‘kill or be killed’ danger coming from every which way you can imagine.

Season 2 digs deeper into the whys and wherefores of the royal couples’ dysfunction. Catherine’s unwavering needs to be perfect is tested when her mother, Joanna (Gillian Anderson), shows up with an agenda and treats her like a delusional and clueless idiot. Catherine realizes that she, too, was raised by a toxic mother who has gained power by manipulating men.

Confronting your toxic parents (whether mummified, imaginary or alive & kicking) is not for the faint of heart, but it must be done in order to grow up and feel comfortable in your own skin. Peter seems to have come around; he claims he’s ready to give up his God-given throne and all he wants is to be a good father to Paul. Has he really changed? Can he be trusted? This is the guy who killed your lover, Catherine!

When Catherine’s arrogance is chipped away and people see the chinks in her armor, she will realize that she’s not perfect after all. She has to learn the power play strategies for women; taking risk, making mistakes, and asking for help. Then, and only then, she will appreciate my favorite Rumi quote: “Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.” But wait! Who am I kidding? Even though The Great is a character study of a fictionalized Catherine, the real Catherine The Great learned her lessons, changed, and became the longest-ruling Empress of Russian history.

All ten episodes of The Great Season 2 are streaming on Hulu.

About the Author

Meg Mimura is a TV critic who actually watches shows zealously in search of thought-provoking and paradigm shifting human drama worth our precious time. She is a member of Television Critics Association. Follow her on Twitter.

‘Mrs. America’ answers our burning question – ‘How did we get here?’

Posted on by Francine Brokaw

I was born and raised in Japan, the eternal Mad Men land, and I saw no bright future in the patriarchal and chauvinistic society. So I escaped to the Land of Opportunity! Since then my life experiences have been decidedly and drastically better than those in my motherland. I genuinely thought I had died and gone to heaven. So you can imagine my surprise when I previewed FX’s fascinating eye-opener Mrs. America. I neither grew up here nor was around in the 1970s. I had no idea women’s rights are still not constitutionally guaranteed!

Mrs. America, a thought-provoking limited series, tells the story of the movement to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) and how the amendment was stopped in its tracks. The show contrasts the conservative women’s movement led by Phyllis Schlafly with the feminist women’s movement represented by the likes of Gloria Steinem. “What really struck me about all the women from this period was how messy they were. They’re contradictory in nature. They quarrel. There’s joy, there’s love, and there’s hate. I wanted to have all the characters contain multitudes,” explained Creator/Showrunner Dahvi Waller at a press conference held early this year.

Phyllis Schlafly (Cate Blanchett) aka ‘the sweetheart of the silent majority’ was, indeed, a woman of contradictions. While she advocated ‘pro family, pro life value’ by projecting a perfect wife and mother at home, she stood on the shoulders of her successful lawyer husband to get into the good ole boys club in DC, where she dismissed as ‘Godless leftist city.’ She knew how to schmooze her way into her domain of military & defense strategy by tailoring her ‘little ol’ me’ persona to neither antagonize nor intimidate high-ranking government officials and powerful industry leaders.

As a matter of fact, Schlafly ran for Congress twice, in 1952 and 1970, and lost both times. Waller took her failures to imply “she wasn’t getting any traction in terms of defense strategy and managed to find a different way into the politics.” This conservative activist emerged out of nowhere and created controversy when the ERA was about to get bipartisan support. She led the STOP (Stop Taking Our Privileges) ERA campaign and stopped the amendment in its tracks. The ERA is a constitutional amendment designed to guarantee equal legal rights for all American citizens, regardless of sex, but Schlafly argued that the measure would lead to gender-neutral bathrooms, same-sex marriage, and women in military combat, among other things.

The other side of the decades of equal rights history is represented by lionized second wave feminists such as Gloria Steinem (Rose Byrne), Betty Friedan (Tracy Ullman), Bella Abzug (Margo Martindale), and Shirley Chisholm (Udo Aduba). And believe me they fought and argued about their vastly different agenda! Mrs. America shines a light on some sore spots and tensions (a lot of it!) within the pro-ERA women. Whatever side of the fence they were on, they were all flawed and of all different political, ethnic, and religious persuasions and socioeconomic backgrounds. No wonder they didn’t have ‘one voice’ like the silent majority. They simply couldn’t have.

The ERA is considered as one of the toughest battlegrounds in the culture wars of the 70s, but according to Waller the series is “like an origin story of today’s culture wars, and you can draw a direct line from 1972 to today through Phyllis Schlafly and really understand how we became such a divided nation.” Yikes! This skillfully interwoven story sure enlightened me as to how we got to the current ‘unhappily divided place,’ but at the same time it disappointed, distressed, and depressed me to no end. I was under the impression that I had moved to the most advanced country in the world that constitutionally guarantees equal legal rights for all Americans regardless of sex, but if that was merely my wishful thinking…where do we go from here? Does Virginia’s vote to ratify the ERA mean it will be adopted as the 28th Amendment to the Constitution eventually? Experts say that an amendment that is already nearly a century in the making is not likely to end in 2020. Talking about the Constitution, I’ve always wondered why there is not a separation between church and state in this country’s “democracy.” I thought that is unconstitutional…Just saying. So many questions! So little time!

Mrs. America streams the first three episodes on April 15, 2020 and every Wednesday a new episode drops on FX on Hulu, the FX-labeled part of the streaming service.

About the Author

Meg Mimura is a TV critic who actually watches shows zealously in search of thought-provoking and paradigm shifting human drama worth our precious time. She is a member of Television Critics Association. Follow her on Twitter.

Editor’s note: What is the ERA? This is exactly what it is: “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.”

For information about the ERA, click here.

‘The Beatles: Eight Days a Week’ streaming on HULU

Posted on by Francine Brokaw


beatleseight
There was no way of predicting the lasting impact. Four unassuming lads from Liverpool stepped up to mike on The Ed Sullivan Show at 8:12 p.m. on Feb. 9, 1964 and literally sparked a musical revolution with the first chores of I Want to Hold Your Hand.   Some 73 million television viewers witnessed the birth of Beatlemania that fateful night.

Yet there was a price to be paid. Within the span of four years, The Beatles performed 815 times in 15 different countries and 90 cities throughout the world, but unlike many groups that came before and after, The Beatles collectively knew when it was time to step away from the marathon concert schedule and concentrate solely on the creative process. As Paul McCartney recalled, “In the beginning things were really simple By the end it became quite complicated.”

In choosing to reinvent, evolve and survive, their subsequent work in the studio gave vent to many of their most memorable songs – All You Need is Love, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, Penny Lane, and Strawberry Fields.

For Baby Boomers, who want to relive those treasured memories, or millenniums, who know ever lyric of their brilliant music catalogue, but little of the members’ personalities, Academy Award winning director Ron Howard recounts the story of the inner workings of those exceptional touring years, underscoring the band’s unique musical gifts and their remarkable, complementary personalities in the insightful but hardly trail blazing documentary The Beatles: Eight Days a Week.

Drawing from more than 100 hours of rare and unseen footage collected from fans, news outlets, national archives, as well as the Beatles’ private collections, this material is coupled with in depth interviews with surviving Beatles’ members McCartney and Ringo Starr.

As a traditional purveyor of feel good nonfiction and proficient storyteller, Howard does make one misstep by interspersing a number of talking head segments with Whoopi Goldberg, Elvis Costello, Larry Kane, and Dr. Kitty Oliver among others. Cute in themselves, the story of Goldberg’s mother surprising her with a pair of Beatles’ Shea Stadium tickets lends little to the storyline.

A musical gem on its own merits, the film includes 12 full and partial performances that have been recut, re-mastered in high-definition and 5.1 surround sound. Included in the collection is their final roof top rendition at Apple Studios of Don’t Let Me Down, lifted from what turned out to be the album Let It Be.

Stevie Van Zandt’s Rock and Roll Forever Foundation hosted the New York premiere of Ron Howard’s documentary. For several years this non-profit group, founded by Bruce Springsteen and Van Zandt has been offering extensive educational materials free-of-charge to middle and high school teachers interested in taking their students on a historical exploration of popular music. It will be launching a nationwide educational effort focused on the Beatles film. Those materials will join more than 70 preexisting multi-media lesson plans on the Website.

In addition to the materials offered at no cost to teachers at RRFF’s teachrock.org Website, Scholastic, Inc. will host a national webcast on Oct. 19th, moderated by Whoopi Goldberg, with Van Zandt and special guests speaking to students nationwide about the Beatles and their lasting impact.

Enjoying a brief theatrical run earlier this month, The Beatles: Eight Days a Week” can presently be seen Hulu, which the streaming channel is using to launch its Hulu Documentary Films division.

About the Author

Winnie Bonelli is a former entertainment editor for a daily metropolitan New York City area newspaper. She is passionate about movies and television and loves to take readers behind the scenes.