THE HUGH GRANT ARCHETYPE: STEREOTYPING BRITISH IDENTITY

THE HUGH GRANT ARCHETYPE

STEREOTYPING BRITISH IDENTITY

WRITTEN BY SHELBY COOKE

There’s a prominent Grant made a career for himself of stereotype associated with being the pre�y, posh Englishman, the male Bri�sh actor: he is finding fame playing the aloof, o�en English (or English- some�mes “naughty,” but always presen�ng); he’s from an upper- charming, men of Richard Cur�s’s middle/upper-class background, roman�c comedies. These are the exuding an aura of humble poshness; roles we come to associate with him: he’s a bit bumbling, but is able to quote Shakespeare perfectly thanks to his educa�on at Eton or Harrow. He’s the English gentleman: a fic��ous Prince in shining armour. We see these tropes in old stars such as Laurence Olivier and Alec Guinness and contemporary actors with the likes of Colin Firth and Benedict Cumberbatch. But perhaps no one personifies the archetype of the baffled Englishman quite like Hugh Grant. Daniel in Bridget Jones’s Diary (2001), William in No�ng Hill (1999), the unnamed Prime Minister in Love, Actually (2003). But Grant’s first, and perhaps most influen�al, ou�ng as this cinema�c Englishman was as Charles from the smash-hit Four Weddings and a Funeral. Wri�en by Richard Cur�s and directed by Mike Newell, Four Weddings and a Funeral premiered in 1994 and became the prototype for a new wave of Bri�sh roman�c films. The film earned cri�cal and commercial success, gaining a Best Picture nomina�on at the 67th Academy Awards and becoming an instant classic. The film follows a group of upper-class friends as they a�end -you guessed it -- four weddings and a funeral. Grant plays Charles, a perpetual bachelor who is always the best man but never the groom. A�er a�ending the wedding for his old friend, he meets the mysterious and enigma�c Carrie (Andie MacDowell), an American who runs in the same social circle as Charles but never seems to appear anywhere other than at the weddings of rich people. Charles and

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Carrie start an on-again-off-again affair before Charles decides to se�le down and marry his ex-girlfriend out of societal pressure. When Four Weddings released, it was revolu�onary for its blunt discussion of sex and use of awkward comedy. But it hasn’t aged par�cularly well: it’s riddled with sexist dialogue and unrealis�c expecta�ons of marriage and rela�onships, has very li�le respect for its female characters, giving them dry personali�es and no agency, and it also treats queerness and queer rela�onships like it’s 1954. Yet, Four Weddings and Cur�s’s other Hugh Grant roman�c comedies are revered as modern classics that depict the reality of contemporary Britain. We’re asked to believe the characters in these films played by Grant, Firth, Knightley, Rickman, and even Mr Bean are the real people living in 21st Century Britain. Of course, we know these films and their characters are far from accurate portrayals of modern Britain. Rather, they depict a roman�c, idealised, even glamorous country; a fic�onal and stereotypical Britain that projects Englishness and upper class as the norm in society. Grant’s characters represent a Britain that is s�ll dominated by imperialist ideology, ignorant of its classist brutality. Cur�s’s characters have created a legacy for Grant, and the many Bri�sh actors following him, that perpetuates the idea that Britain is filled with only rich people, who have absurd accents and are excep�onally good looking. This is, for obvious reasons, simply a fantasy -an unrealis�c version of England that only exists in roman�c comedies and costume dramas. What we see in Four Weddings is a group of friends that represent quite a detestable breed of people: they have li�le responsibili�es other than being socialites, they possess a seemingly extor�onate amount of money, they live in their grand London apartments and estate homes rent-free, they’re unaware of their privilege and are happy to maintain their posi�on at the top of the class hierarchy. They are very unlikable. Yet somehow, we do like them… Well, we like Hugh Grant, anyway. He’s beau�ful and charming; we fall in love with him, just like we do with his other annoying, immature privileged characters. We come to associate the character with the actor, making both one and the same. So if we like Hugh Grant, we must like Charles… they’re the same person! We are asked to accept his privilege and his class without ques�on, to find his ignorance of the world around him as an endearing trait rather than societal complacency. The popularity of films like Four Weddings and actors such as Hugh Grant, who embody this fic�onal version of Englishness, influence how Britain is perceived on the global stage. We adore characters like Charles and his friends because they’re played by beau�ful and charming people. What this creates is a connota�on associa�ng Britain and Bri�shness with white, middle-class Englishness. This appears problema�c as these depic�ons, which only represent a small percentage of the diverse and culturally mixed Britain of today, become the way global audiences come to understand Britain. The cultural and societal implica�on of these representa�ons becomes an overbearing weight on Britain’s na�onal iden�ty, crea�ng a misleading and o�en mythical idea of what being Bri�sh actually means. By crea�ng stereotypes within their representa�on, these idealised Bri�sh stars, like Grant and the characters he plays, are placing limita�ons and restric�ons on the reality of Bri�shness that is presented on screen, narrowing society’s understanding of that culture. Of course, we can’t blame Grant en�rely for this misrepresenta�on: the blame lies addi�onally on screenwriters, directors, producers and media influencers that perpetuate this troped Bri�sh iden�ty. And, to give Grant and his fellow posh actors the benefit of the doubt, these are usually the only roles available to them at the start of their career. Once they find fame (and, in the cause of Grant, age out of young roman�c lead typecas�ng), some of these stars develop a career that is more diverse and introspec�ve. Take, for instance, Benedict Cumberbatch, who used the fame and profit made from playing “quintessen�ally” English characters like Sherlock Holmes, Christopher Tietjens, and Alan Turing to produce and star in the television adap�on of Patrick Melrose, a series that brutally examines the toxic privilege and uncontested power of aristocra�c families in Bri�sh society. But that doesn’t mean we as audience members should just blindly accept these representa�ons as the reality of Britain. By being more engaged, insigh�ul, and understanding of how these stars func�on within the cultural landscape of Britain, we can begin to track how the media and its representa�ons influence the forma�on and cul�va�on of na�onal iden�ty, allowing us to start holding crea�ves responsible for these biased and outdated views of society.