Elizabeth Perkins Is the Best R.W.R.D. on TV Right Now

By Chris Revelle | TV | August 9, 2023 |

By Chris Revelle | TV | August 9, 2023 |

Ever since I was but a young budding queerling, I’ve adored, venerated, and revered a certain femme character archetype I’ve come to call the Ridiculous Woman in a Ridiculous Dress. The RWRD (which looks like the name of a coupon app pronounced “reward,” no?) can be found in many different modes, but she’s always remarkably dressed and has an undeniable power. They’re not ridiculous in the sense that they deserve ridicule but in how much of a splash they can cause simply by being themselves. They’re big personalities, they take up space, they exude effortless confidence, and they know who they are. It’s a highly intoxicating thing to see when you feel uncertain of your nature and struggle to value yourself enough to live your truth. I aspired to be one of these magnetic femmes that demand attention and hold court. This archetype can be called by many names, but they’re instantly recognizable as classically camp characters that pop in stylized settings. All this came rushing back to me when I saw Elizabeth Perkins on TV again.

That isn’t to say Elizabeth Perkins hasn’t been present on our screens more recently. You could find her on Sharp Objects, playing the dream role of Patricia Clarkson’s best friend with the hottest goss. She was a mealy-mouthed and seemingly pilled-up executive at BanShe, the parodic streaming platform that briefly anointed Sally and her show on Barry. This was not nearly enough Perk for me though, and as luck would have it, she’s absolutely slaying it on not one but two fantastic series as the imperious Isobel on The Afterparty (AppleTv+) and the glamorous business queen Constance on Minx (Starz).

Isobel and Constance are two different flavors of RWRD, but both are women of ostentatious wealth with an edge of eccentricity. Isobel quivers with pampered sensitivity as if the world around her and all the people in it frustrate her simply by existing. She externalizes her biases like she has an emotional Gatling gun spraying bullets all over her son’s wedding festivities. She terrorizes her would-be daughter-in-law Grace and her parents, as well as Grace’s sister Zoe and the main character Aniq, with accusations and casual racism. It’s not clear how tethered to reality Isobel is within the sprawling grounds of her vineyard thanks to Perkins infusing her performance with a battiness befitting a rich loon. It remains to be seen what role Isobel plays, if any, in the murder at the center of Afterparty’s mystery, but Isobel is fun to watch as a wandering foil, antagonizing all she crosses with a sharp tongue and withering glare.

On Minx, we meet Constance at her castle where she’s commissioned portraits of her and her new pet himbo. Constance wears sexy loungewear as the romance-novel-cover beefcake sprawls across her lap nude like a sexual La Pieta. As the show’s lead character Joyce fumbles with camera equipment, Constance advises her from the settee on which she’s being shot to be a better boss and learn how to do everything her employees do. The castle helps, but Perkins finds a royal bearing in Constance’s knowing eyes and measured words. With her teased-high hair forming a particularly ’70s halo around her face and her unflappably cool demeanor, Constance is something of a proto-girlboss in how she stands for powerful femininity but also stands for classic capitalism. She came into ownership of her husband’s company when he died and then the board ousted her, unable to trust a woman as a leader. Constance sees Minx as a fresh start and an opportunity to prove her acumen. She’s received as a hero by Joyce, who wishes to be as successful and cool-calm-collected, and spars frequently with Nick, the scrappy, scuzzy owner of Bottom Dollar, Minx’s publisher. Constance exudes the sense that she’s allowing her patience to be tried, but she won’t suffer fools without dressing them down.

In both roles, Perkins taps into the cutting looks and perfectly-spit fire of Celia Hodes, the salty suburbanite on Weeds. There’s a similar prickliness and caustic wit, a similar impatience for bullshit. I’ve missed this perfect balance of snark and pathos that Perkins can offer and it’s wonderful she can give it to us in not one but two smart, stylish comedies. While researching her, I learned that she MeToo’d noted flesh-eating ghoul James Woods. Reminding everyone that James Woods is a repugnant asshole is a public service up there with dunking on transphobes and mocking objectivists in my book. I know there’s a whole construct of decorum around celebrities and how they talk about each other, but more celebrities should call each other out in public, whether it be for garden-variety assholery or something much worse like Woods. The recently departed William Friedkin did it! It’s much preferable to how they appear to close ranks around each other like the embarrassing flaps over defending the honor of the Worst Chris or Jeremy Strong or Torey Lanez or Kevin Hart or Ellen.

I’m not sure if Elizabeth Perkins has a huge gay following, but she should! She feels like an iconic femme in the queer pantheon on the level of Madeline Kahn, Leslie Anne Warren, or Angela Bassett. Am I alone on this? Am I the only one adding her icon to my altar? I don’t care, I will love her work enough for 10 gays. Elizabeth Perkins can step on me and I’m not afraid to admit it!

This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the series being covered here wouldn’t exist.