"Better a fallen rocket than never a burst of light."
~ Tom Stoppard, The Invention of Love

Wednesday, November 28, 2018

Favorite Characters: Charley Bordelon (Queen Sugar)


After Queen Sugar’s pilot, I expected that Nova would be my favorite Bordelon sibling, and she’s undeniably wonderful, but over the course of the first season, Charley found her way deep into my affections.  Like all the Bordelons, she’s flawed, damaged, and prone to making bad decisions when she lets her emotions get the better of her.  She’s also amazing (some Charley-related spoilers.)

Even before you get into the main thrust of the show, in which Charley is often the biggest mover and shaker, there’s a tremendous amount of story potential in this character.  Charley at the outset of the series reminds me a little of a modern-day version of Marnie from The Hour, a woman who’s does everything “right” and yet still sees her “perfect” life crumbling around her.  Ambitious, whip-smart, and totally classy, Charley has cultivated a fine image for herself, her basketball star husband Davis (who she manages,) and her teenage son Micah.  She has the gorgeous house, tons of money, the well-to-do friends, and a reputable name as the woman behind a renowned sports celeb.  She has everything she could want.

Even when the plates start to wobble, Charley keeps them spinning.  When rape accusations are made against several of Davis’s teammates, Charley stands in support of her husband and immediately goes into damage-control mode to make sure the vile actions of his teammates don’t negatively impact his career.  As the story evolves, news is brought to light that implicates Davis in the rape, and even as Charley cracks wide open, letting her private life spill out in front of news cameras in a moment of abject disgust, she stitches herself back together and clings to the increasingly-flimsy hope that it’s all lies, that Davis would never, that her perfect life isn’t being eaten from the inside out.

It’s in the midst of all this that Charley’s father unexpectedly dies, leaving her, Nova, and Ralph Angel his Louisiana sugarcane farm.  At first, Charley tends to the business side of the farm distractedly, as an afterthought to be seen to only after she gets her house in order.  But as the foundations of the life she knew erode further and further, she allows herself to be wrapped in the complicated task of managing the farm.  It’s partially an escape, literally getting out of town with Micah, away from paparazzi, judgmental faces, and fair-weather friends, sequestering herself among family.  It’s also something to pour her energy into, something to take her mind off of everything that’s fallen apart.  Finally, it’s a chance for her to prove – to others, but more importantly, to herself – her worth as a businesswoman.  For Charley (and Ralph Angel, in a somewhat different way,) the farm is a symbol of what she’s capable of, and she attacks the work like her life depends on it.

On that side of things, I like that Charley, while very competent at what she does, has a steep learning curve.  Running a farm isn’t much like managing a pro athlete, and there’s a lot she doesn’t know.  She makes rookie mistakes because she’s too proud to admit she needs help, her determination to make this work can cause her to be reckless, and in part because she’s the one with the money, she tends to do things unilaterally without talking them over with her siblings.  But at the same time, she has a good head on her shoulders, and as she gets dinged up, she also learns.  She learns to use her resources and listen to good advice.  Once she comes at the farm from a humbler, more committed perspective, she proves a quick study and understands the business better everyday.  And although the work is very different, the skills she cultivated as Davis’s manager still come in handy.  In particular, she knows what she has to do to demand respect within a boys’ club, and when someone tries to play her for a fool, she outmaneuvers them in a show of strength. 

From the fields to the Queen Sugar mill (the first owned by a Black woman in Louisiana,) making boardroom deals and surviving racist/sexist a-holes, Charley continues to make mistakes, but she also continues to fight.  She’s a force to be reckoned with, and she won’t let you forget it.

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