I wonder what motivated the bright red for Phyllis in the original. Maybe she wanted to get Ben's attention too.
I with you all the way on Team Phyllis.
Sally is a nasty, manipulative psycho-bitch, who pretends to be sweet and innocent just to get people on her side. And it looks like it worked with all of you gullible fools.
She tried to steal Ben away from Phyllis, and when it didn't work, she faked a suicide attempt to make him feel guilty. Nice.
She never loved Buddy, but married him anyway, ludicrously thinking it would make Ben jealous. Even nicer.
She lives her life like a shut-in, drinks all day and takes pills, leaves coffee cups piling up in the sink for days, spends hours in what she calls her "garden" (although no flowers or vegetables grow there) or doing her "painting" (at an always-blank easel--don't ask!), and sometimes she stands in the middle of the floor, not going left, not going right, virtually catatonic from all the booze and pills.
She fights with everyone, including her two sons, whom she saddled with the names Tommy and Timmy. They moved to San Francisco--wouldn't you?--where they avoid their crazy mother's phone calls. Thomas has been in psychoanalysis for years, trying to come to grips with his seeming hatred of women. Tim lives in a commune in Haight-Ashury, where he studies transcendental meditation, does hallucinogens to "open his mind" and practices "free love." He says the Earth is his mother now.
And then Psycho-Bitch Sally comes to New York, to use Mr. Weismann's reunion as her last-ditch effort to sink her claws into Ben and steal him away from Phyllis.
Don't fall for her woe-is-me line and let her gain your sympathy. She always needs someone new to fight with.
Phyllis, on the other hand, is a nice girl who came to New York with a small amount of talent and good legs, got a job in the Follies, fell in love with a man who loved only himself, educated herself about art and literature and politics so she could fit in with his friends, learned the ways and customs of the social, political and business worlds her husband worked in so she could be an asset to his career, and kept telling herself tomorrow would be better until she woke up and realized that it wasn't.
But she never stopped loving Ben, even when she hated him, and she never loved anyone else, including herself.
In the end, they're perfect for each other: Ben seems to love only himself (but, really, he hates himself), and Phyllis doesn't love herself at all (but, really, she takes care of herself pretty well).
Updated On: 5/28/11 at 09:24 AM
.jpg?format=auto&width=365)
