Audrey Taylor is the one character who shows compassion and understanding. And she recognizes the importance of understanding too. She tells Fink that he doesn’t understand Mayhew, and when fink cannot write, she tells him that all he needs is a bit of understanding, which turns out to be love—or at least sex.
So should we see Audrey as a New Testament saint offering love and forgiveness as against the old Hebrew religion of a terrifying and capricious God represented by Lipnick and Meadows? After all, Audrey tells Fink not to judge her and Mayhew. Kc, your comment about Lipnick fits in here.
So perhaps we have one opposition between Lipnick and Mayhew, and another between Audrey and jealous Meadows?
12 comments:
Hmmmm.
This idea appeals to me.
What do you make of the fact that she wrote the last few Mayhew books and he got the credit for them?
If she had survived, it looked like she was going to write Fink’s screenplay too.
Unlike all the other characters who are determinedly self-centered, she cares about others. She could have written Mayhew’s books for the simple reason that was he going broke and needed the cash. Or maybe she saw how much he was suffering from the inability to write and thought she could “help”. But perhaps she is a flawed saint. Even if she was trying to help Mayhew by writing his books, he was bound to resent it. Perhaps this is why he treats her so badly.
The cops connect Fink to the murders only after Mayhew is killed. At first I thought this was a mistake on the Coens’ part that happened because they needed something to advance the plot. How would Meadows know about Mayhew, and why would he bother to go find and kill him? Then I remembered that Meadows would have overheard everything said and done between Fink and Audrey. Meadows could hear sex in the room on the other side of Fink’s, so he could certainly hear Fink’s room. It is easy to see that he killed Audrey out of a fit of sexual frustration and jealousy. But why Mayhew? Well, he overheard Fink’s rant about Mayhew not writing his own books and Audrey trying to spin it as only being minor help. What in this interested Meadows? Did he kill Mayhew out of some direct anger or as part of his scheme to torment Fink or out of jealousy towards everyone attached to Audrey?
Gosh, I completely missed that he killed Mayhew. How was that revealed?
The cops had not been able to ID Audrey without her head, so the first time they talked to Fink, they just wanted info about Meadows who was their only suspect. But then Mayhew was killed, and that lead them to realize that the dead woman was his assistant. Since Fink had been seen with them both, the cops now considered Fink to an accomplice and not just a material witness. That’s why they handcuffed him to the bed.
Yeah, OK. Thanks for the explanation. That part about Mayhew had totally eluded me.
I think there may be a feminist thread in the story through presentation of anti-feminist themes in Audrey. It's impossible to overstate how anti-feminist it is to have a woman who writes novels for a famous novelist who beats her and she doesn't get any credit. And she was about to become writing slave to Barton Fink when she was killed.
It doesn't appear that the film is trying to say anything anti-feminist through this character, so I would say that the filmmakers are trying to provoke an audience reaction. Trying to provoke a feminist reaction in the audience is probably too simplistic an explanation, but I can't think of anything else it might be.
Yeah, I think having Audrey write the books was a way of saying: Look, here's a creative person who doesn't really have any deep egotistical interest in her creations. She creates to help out other people — Mayhew and Barton — and possibly to pay the rent. She doesn't have the pomposity and self-absorption that the men have about the "life of the mind." She just does what needs to be done. She actually reminded me of the Wolf in "Pulp Fiction." Situations would arise that needed "handling" and she would handle them with grace and a minimum of fuss, whereas Mayhew and Barton would stew in their own self-importance and creative impotence. It's impossible to imagine either of these men putting the shoe on the other foot — writing a book for someone else and not getting any credit or glory!
In the end, Barton is told by the studio: We're going to use your creative talents the way we see fit, and probably not at all, but you have to keep toiling for us and taking our abuse.
Didn't Charlie say something about "understanding" at the end? Seems like it struck me at the time, after Audrey had emphasized "understanding" so much.
Yes, he did. I think Charlie and Audrey are interesting because they are both linked to people who live "the life of the mind." Charlie is not really appreciated by Barton, who professes a deep appreciation for the common man, and Audrey is not really appreciated by Mayhew — she's an extension of his own ego rather than a person in her own right. Charlie and Audrey are both skeptical about the "life of the mind" and what it has to offer. Charlie is a man of action, and so is Audrey, really. They go through life doing what needs to be done to get to the next day.
And Charlie is envious that Audrey gives her "understanding" to someone so undeserving of it as Barton, so he kills her, as Rick says, out of a fit of frustration and jealousy.
But speaking of Audrey, why, really, would she offer herself to Barton like that? Honestly, why would she want yet another helpless, self-absorbed man in her life?
I wondered the same thing. When she started to kiss him, I wanted to yell at the screen. What could she possibly have found attractive about this loser?
Ahh, there you might have the main weakness of the film. Perhaps Fink should have been made a bit more likeable so that Audrey’s attraction made more sense. Or maybe she was just a sucker for the type.
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