Modeling Manhood:: Adam Sandler's Portrayals of Masculinity and Manhood

By K.B. Chapman

K.B. Chapman spent over three years studying and analyzing the filmography of Adam Sandler in preparation for her Master’s Thesis. In Modeling Manhood: Adam Sandler’s Portrayals of Masculinity and Manhood, she provides a concise look into the thinking behind the films. Her analyzation of Sandler's characters and the females he is attracted to in each film became a study in gender dynamics. Chapman avoids typical feminist rhetoric, looking instead through a lens of intelligent common-sense reasoning about day to day performances of masculinity in late twentieth- and early twenty-first-century America. This book is invaluable to students of gender, sociology, psychology, and film, as well as news and entertainment reporters and critics.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jan 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9781483548050

Book preview

MODELING MANHOOD:

Adam Sandler's Portrayals of Masculinity and Manhood

By

K. B. Chapman

ISBN: 9781483548050

Cover Art by Hillary E. Gaines

NOT YOUR TYPICAL ADAM SANDLER BOOK

While working on this project I read every book I could locate on Adam Sandler. Most of the authors couldn’t resist the temptation of adding a good dose of their own humor, which often led me to wonder about the work’s validity. YOU WILL NOT WANT TO READ THIS BOOK IF you are looking for something humorous - it’s not. This book is a scholarly work, based on my Master’s Thesis which is available from the California State University Stanislaus library where the official document is on file electronically.

HOWEVER,

YOU MIGHT WANT TO READ THIS BOOK IF you are a film scholar or critic, a news/entertainment reporter or commentator, a student of history, psychology, sociology or gender, especially masculinity. It provides the reader with solidly researched information and insight on Sandler’s character formation while growing up in the north-eastern part of the United States during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. It also gives background information on the cultural influences that impacted his generation of filmmakers. Perhaps most importantly, it provides insight into his views on, masculinity, manhood, and fatherhood, because that is the focus of this work.

At the beginning of movies produced by Adam Sandler’s film production company, Happy Madison, there’s a picture of Adam’s father who says, Terrific. The movie 50 First Dates is dedicated to him, with a touching sentiment reminiscent of Robert Bly’s ideal of the Mythopoetic Father: My father, my mentor, my teacher, my coach, my idol, my hero, my family’s leader, my mom’s best friend, and by far, the coolest guy I have ever known. These are the character qualities Adam learned from his father; the traits he associates with ideal fatherhood. They are what drive his efforts to influence ideas of masculinity, manhood, and fatherhood.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

The Back-Story of American Culture

Masculinity, Fatherhood, and Film

Formation of Adam Sandler’s Masculinity

Natal Family and Childhood

University and Early Career

Comedy Family

Marriage and Fatherhood

Sandler’s Lessons in Masculinity: An Overview

Key Masculine Role: The Bully

Key Masculine Role: Extended Adolescence

Key Theme: Heterosexual Engagement with Homosexuality

Key Characterization: The Girl

Key Characterization: Family and Fatherhood

Key Theme: College Education

Key Theme: Masculinity and Body Image

Key Theme: Joking as Communication

Film Analysis

Masculinities and Fatherhood in Grown Ups

Masculinity in I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry

Masculinity and Fatherhood in Spanglish

Masculinity in The Waterboy

Conclusion

References

Appendices

A. Adam Sandler Filmography Used For This Thesis

B. Stan the Man Lyrics

C. Gross Receipts American Theaters

Endnotes

Author Information

INTRODUCTION

Film critics decry Adam Sandler’s comedic films with nearly universal condemnation.¹ Interestingly, their words are contradicted by the seven People’s Choice Awards, three Emmy nominations, and one Golden Globe nomination Sandler has received thus far. According to film scholar Aaron Taylor The popular sympathy, and critical antipathy, that Sandler’s work provokes can be traced to his specific mobilizations of timely and resonant beliefs about maleness as a social condition.² In other words, they don’t like the way he portrays men in his films and fail to look past the obvious lack of decorum for the deeper meaning in his character’s journey.

Sandler is most readily defined as a comedian due to his work with the television program Saturday Night Live, his stand-up comedy, and many of his films, but he is much more than a comedian. He is a son, a brother, an uncle, a husband, a father, and a philanthropist, and according to scholar Timothy Shary, is considered to be one of the most prominent male actors of the past generation.³ His films influence all levels of society, reaching every age, gender, and economic background. What imbues his portrayals with cultural importance is that his audiences are offered masculine role models that are attainable by the ‘average guy.’ This is in opposition to elitist, muscular-mesomorph, or John Wayne-style, bigger-than-life models which are difficult, if not impossible, to achieve. According to fashion critic Pamela Keogh, Sandler even dresses in baggy shorts and t-shirts, topped with a flannel shirt, purposely to show the public he’s just an average kind of guy.⁴ In truth, he may simply want to be comfortable, but it serves his ‘regular guy’ persona as well.

Ultimately, Sandler’s films are cultural artifacts embedded with social commentary, and as an actor, he chooses roles and writes scripts that reflect important sociological and historical changes in American masculinity and fatherhood. His motive is to promote what is termed here as contemporary family values; defined by equality and freedom of choice in gender roles, plus an abiding belief that family, especially children, are top priority.⁵ His portrayals are designed to demonstrate that middle-class manhood - through higher education, responsible choices, and gainful employment - is the most successful. Beyond that, he has chosen dramatic roles that contribute to the national conversation surrounding mental health issues and presents images of manhood that accept Lesbian, Gay, Bi-sexual, and Trans-gender (henceforth LGBT) people as valuable and important members of society.

The terms manhood and masculinity are often used interchangeably, but in fact, there is an important distinction between the two. Michael Kimmel, one of America’s foremost scholars on the subject offers the following definitions: manhood expresses the capacity for autonomy and responsibility...the opposite of childhood, or being a dependent, while masculinity must constantly be demonstrated,⁶ meaning that a man’s dress, behavior, et cetera must not be perceived as feminine or homosexual. Masculinity then, is a moving target, always changing with societal fluctuations and within cultures, while manhood is comparatively stable. (Sandler’s films generally demonstrate white, middle-class manhood, but include various forms of masculinity; these will be discussed fully in later chapters.) In this work, Kimmel’s definitions are used to evaluate Sandler’s film portrayals and contrast them with other adolescent-male genre films. They help establish Sandler’s message design; Message design logic represents the extent to which people can produce messages that accomplish their goals in alignment with the receiver’s goals,⁷ so in other words, what Sandler hopes to teach his audiences.

THE BACK-STORY OF AMERICAN CULTURE

Adam Sandler and his generation have reaped both the whirlwind and the benefits of social changes in America since 1945; the earliest of which primarily affected young men returning from war and the brides who had been left behind to fill their shoes here at home. As this generation raised their families, society’s remarkable changes were embedded into the fabric of their lives. A brief recounting will help the reader fully understand what motivates Adam Sandler and his generation of filmmakers.

Three major developments occurred during the twenty-five years following World War II. They shaped the national popular-culture conversation surrounding gender and laid the groundwork for Sandler’s film portrayals. The first was the publication of Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, written by biologist and sex researcher, Alfred Kinsey in 1948. It sold two hundred thousand copies in its first month and exposed the shocking statistic that thirty-seven percent - over one third - of all males had enjoyed at least one homosexual encounter. This statistic was the catalyst that ignited open dialog and began facilitating change in America’s perception of homosexual behavior. At the time, homosexuality was illegal, considered by many to be immoral, thought to be a form of mental illness; men who were homosexual were judged as failures at manhood.⁸ During the next few years, thousands of American men and women employed by the military and the federal government were fired due to their homosexuality in what was known as the Lavender Scare. The government’s position, that gays were more susceptible to blackmail and therefore a security risk in the Cold War environment, prompted President Dwight D. Eisenhower to sign Executive Order 10450 banning employment of homosexuals in government and by government contractors on April 27, 1953.⁹ Three years later, psychologist Evelyn Hooker presented her research to the American Psychological Association in a paper titled, The Adjustment of the Male Overt Homosexual. Hooker concluded that there was little difference between hetero- and homosexuals, and her paper was very influential in altering clinical responsiveness to homosexuality.¹⁰

Public opinion slowly began shifting; this opened the door for homosexual organizations and publications, and enabled courageous men and women to engage in public debate to further change perceptions and put an end to the persecution of gays and lesbians. Their cause was aided when the "United States Supreme Court rule[d] in favor of the First Amendment rights of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and trans-gender (LGBT) magazine, One: The Homosexual Magazine," on January 13, 1958.¹¹ The suit was filed because the FBI and the Postal Service deemed that the publication was obscene, but unfortunately, the court’s decision was undermined by public opinion for over ten years. Even so, it had established significant legal groundwork to build upon.

Eleven years later, on June 28, 1969 though, homosexuals had finally had their fill of being marginalized and harassed. When the New York City police raided a gay bar known as the Stonewall Inn, homosexuals finally fought back.¹² Police raids on homosexual hangouts were common at the time, but the violence, which bled out into the street that evening, lasted six days. Years later, many of the men involved expressed the sentiment that fighting back had empowered them, as compared to their previous response of submitting to the persecution they regularly experienced.¹³ This was a big step in laying a foundation for individualism in the ways Americans defined their own lives when it came to gender. It is important to this argument because Sandler’s ability to extend acceptance to LGBT people in his films is possible thanks to Kinsey, Evelyn Hooker, and others who fought for the rights of non-heterosexuals.

The second major development in the conversation surrounding gender and sexuality was the advent of Playboy magazine, which Hugh Hefner, a disciple of Kinsey’s work, began publishing in December of 1953.¹⁴ Though his target audience was male, Hefner revolutionized sexuality for both genders with his full-color centerfolds and controversial articles by challenging the cultural norms of wives as homemakers and mothers, and males as husbands and bread-winners. According to scholar Bill Osgerby, Playboy’s success heralded a transformation of American sexual morals, a legitimizing of pornography within mainstream culture, and a rise of masculine identities that embraced affluence, sophistication, lighthearted leisure, and sexual license.¹⁵ The publication promoted bachelorhood as the ideal state for men, encouraging them to pursue a variety of sexual partners and experiences. The ideal of the 1950s middle-class, family-man (whose fatherhood role included close interaction with his children) was presented with a different option: the urbane bachelor model. In Hefner’s view, masculinity was measured by the number of women a man had sex with. Playboy also spawned a more vivid sexualized image of females that gave men tacit permission to value women for their physical characteristics rather than for qualities associated with the ideal middle-class wife and motherhood - being a good cook, keeping a clean house, and having well-behaved children. Hefner’s message, that the homemaker role was no longer the only feminine ideal, brought a new level of sexual objectification into the national conversation. The discussion took place not only in the media, but in the homes and bedrooms of Hefner’s readership. Wives now had to compete with full-color, airbrushed images of gorgeous women, with perfectly coiffed hair, women who wouldn’t nag hubby to take out the trash or pick up his dirty clothes. Playboy remained highly influential throughout the remainder of the twentieth century, and Sandler routinely uses the Playboy model of masculinity in his films when his characters are still in their extended-adolescent stage of development.

The third major development in the national pop-culture conversation occurred ten years later with the publication of Betty Friedan’s book, The Feminine Mystique in 1963. The book set off a firestorm of debate and ignited a second wave of feminism by challenging the traditional representation of the happy housewife. Friedan’s research subjects were college educated women; her investigation showed that not all of them were happy in their housewife role.¹⁶ Friedan’s publisher initially printed only two thousand copies, but when McCall’s Magazine and Ladies Home Journal printed excerpts book sales grew exponentially; the first paperback edition sold 1.4 million copies.¹⁷

The feminist revival was originally a movement begun by educated, white middle-class women, but quickly moved beyond that as leaders wrote articles for popular women’s magazines. Liberal feminism brought out concerns about social equality,