TV

When she was released from jail last June, Paris Hilton seemed to be looking for redemption---some way to give back to society---to help down-and-out women. But first things first: She is on the prowl for a new bestie. But maybe the two are linked.

 

Why the sudden friendship deficit? I can only speculate. A few of her well-known friends wound up in the clink in recent months and the Paris-Nicole relationship just isn’t what it used to be. Nicole has a two-month-old baby (and when one woman has a child and another doesn’t, it can alter even the best of normal friendships).

 

So the socialite-heiress-celebrity-newsmaker announced plans to star in a new 10-episode reality show on MTV, tentatively titled “Paris Hilton’s My New BFF.” The series is scheduled to begin production in May and planned to air during the fourth quarter of the year.

 

The premise: Paris will be selecting from among 20 potential BFFs (best friends forever) to find the fairest of them all (male or female), a bestie. According to Broadcasting and Cable, the bestie will “accompany her to A-list parties and personal business functions.”

 

Paris has explained that she can "teach the secrets of celebrity living — how to turn your enchanted life into a multimillion dollar brand, how to manage public feuds and always rise above, how to survive scandal and then make it work for you, all the while wearing 6-inch heels."

 

An online voting site was launched on Thursday at ParisBFF.com to solicit BFF hopefuls who will vie to join a group of 20 from which she will choose the fairest of them all.

 

To be eligible, wannabes are asked to submit a 90-second video that answers the following:

• What is the wildest thing you've ever done?
• If you became a celebrity, what secret would you be most fearful of having exposed?
• Why do you think you would fit in with the socialite circle?

 

Well I know one woman who might fit the bill and could sure use a best friend right now. Paris, you might want to give Ashley Alexandra Dupre a casting call.

Picture of Paris Hilton courtesy of K Pinguino under Creative Commons.  

The fourth episode (called Bombay Highway) of Candace Bushnell's hot new TV series Lipstick Jungle raises an important set of issues that many women grapple with during the course of their friendships with one another.

 

What should a friend do or say, if anything, when her Bestie does something illegal, immoral or hurtful to herself or to others---or something that clearly conflicts with her own moral or ethical values? Can they still remain close friends or will it eventually alter the nature of their relationship?

On Lipstick, Nico Reilly (played by Kim Raver) plunges into a steamy affair (behind her professor husband's back) with a young stud named Kirby. There are hints that her husband, too, might be having an affair but he comes across as a pretty decent guy.

 

Nico, a high-achiever like the other women on the show, has such strong needs for affirmation that she never considers the potential ramifications of her lusty indiscretions for her marriage or her career---let alone her own self-esteem. Her friends Wendy (Brooke Shields) and Victory (Lindsay Price) are a bit taken aback and seem puzzled by this out-of-character behavior. They accept it to Nico's face but talk about it disparagingly behind her back.

 

This scenario isn't far-fetched---nor is it only the stuff of Hollywood scripts. When I surveyed women for my friendship study, women of all ages told me stories about friends with addictions who they painfully watched destroying themselves; ones who were abusive to their husbands or children; ones who lied to their friends and let them down; and ones who committed crimes. They struggled with the feelings of dissonance over these once-close but now fractured friendships.

 

Is it the duty of a good friend to support whatever path her friend decides to take? Or should she dissuade her friend from jumping off a cliff? Should she ignore, isolate or overlook behavior she doesn't condone? To step in, how egregious does the behavior have to be?

 

Although the answers aren't clear-cut and depend on the people involved, what has transpired, and how discrepant the friends' values have become, it is truly a myth that, "Good friends stand behind you, no matter what."

 

Lipstick, along with Cashmere Mafia, is one of a genre of TV shows that depict women's friendships---like I Love Lucy, Laverne and Shirley, Kate & Allie, Cagney & Lacey, Mary Tyler Moore, Rhoda, Friends, Designing Women, The Golden Girls, Sex and the City, and Desperate Housewives that came before them. What women love about watching these shows is that they raise issues in Technicolor that are often just beneath the surface of our own lives.

I met Dr. Rita Dunn when I was just eleven years old. She was a kindergarten teacher and I was her class monitor. I stood at the end of the line as she took her little ones to the playground, and I helped pick up their blocks and clean the messy jars of finger paint after play period. I loved the time I spent with her. She was beautifully attired, stunningly attractive, and had a knack for making an awkward preteen feel special.

Also the school drama coach, Dr. Dunn coaxed me to try out for the role of Ado Annie in Oklahoma---and ultimately gave me the part. I never could imagine another circumstance under which such a shy young girl would ever find the self-confidence to appear center stage and belt out, “I Can’t Say No.” She told me I could do it and I did. In the audience, my startled parents beamed with pride. From time to time, I still hum the lyrics in the shower and look back at the cast photos in my closet...