Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
During its original run, Gilmore Girls got plenty of love — from fans, its network, and even critics. One group that it was consistently snubbed by, however, was award shows. The show won one Emmy for Outstanding Makeup for its famed Season Four episode “The Festival of Living Art,” but was never nominated again. Gilmore snagged one Television Critics Association award for New Program of the Year and the Golden Globes nominated Lauren Graham once for Best Actress, but frankly the only award show that consistently proved its love for the Gilmore girls’ was the Teen Choice Awards — Graham and Alexis Bledel both won two, the show won one, and other supporting actors were often nominated — and that’s a real shame.
Throughout its initial seven year run. Gilmore turned out witty dialogue, impressive emotional beats, and superb chemistry among its leading ladies. The two women who most deserved award recognition were, unarguably, Graham and Kelly Bishop (Emily Gilmore). The two were able to seamlessly keep up with creator Amy Sherman-Palladino‘s signature fast-paced dialogue without missing a beat, all while navigating Lorelai and Emily’s emotional and complicated relationship.
For proof of their merits acting together look no further than season Season Six’s “The Prodigal Daughter Returns.” When Rory decides to reconcile with her mom, move out of the elder Gilmores house, and head back to Yale Emily does not take the news well. It seems as if she’s having flashbacks to when Lorelai left all those years ago and instead of coping with junk food or rom-coms as many would, she reacts by trying to time share a plane. This is Emily Gilmore, after all. What follows is a truly devastating scene of Emily’s breakdown, Lorelai’s attempt at consoling her mother, and an Emmy worthy performance of epic proportions. It’s a scene that could’ve been cheesy or appeared overdone with lesser actors, but Bishop and Graham brought a poignancy, stark sense of reality, and believable heartbreak into it. It’s scenes like that that make me wonder how such snubs could’ve occurred for all seven seasons of Gilmore Girls.
Flash forward nearly a decade after the original show wrapped; the girls’ are back in Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life and, again, are deserving of nominations and awards. There are two scenes where it’s abundantly clear that this is true — one in “Winter” and the other in “Fall.” In the former, Lorelai thinks back on the night of her father’s funeral — a unfortunate, but necessary devastation that the the show handled masterfully — when she and her mother got into one of their signature fights when Lorelai couldn’t think of one good story to tell about her father. Both women are brilliant, but it’s Bishop who stands out — and who should secure her nominations — declaring, “You blow through life like a natural disaster knocking down everything and everyone in your path.” It’s a hard scene, one where you can deduce that this — the fighting, bickering, and general disagreement — is the only, albeit dysfunctional, way these to characters can work past their pain. This is where Gilmore Girls was always best — when the conflict is so good, so poignant because no one is right and no one is wrong. Both characters say things they probably shouldn’t and toss around insults like they’re insignificant, but they both have valid complaints and valid points, all of which Bishop and Graham bring to the forefront.
It’s in the revival’s final episode where Graham truly shines. In the best of the four episodes, Lorelai heads off to California to do Wild — the book, not the movie. Though she never makes it on the trail thanks to a series of unfortunate events, she finds her own peace — where else but behind a coffee shop. When she looks out into nature she has an “a ha” moments of sorts and picks up the phone to call Emily. In a callback to the previously discussed scene, Lorelai shares a memory about Richard’s kindness one day when he found Lorelai had skipped school, escaped to the mall, and stolen one of Emily’s shirts. Instead of a punishment or harsh words he bought his daughter — distraught over a break up — a pretzel and took her to a double feature. Afterwards they never spoke of it again. With Lorelai sobbing on end of the phone and Emily smiling on the other, the elder woman simply thanks her daughter for the tale, giving the viewer the feeling that these women will be okay. Graham displays such an utter sense of grief and loss in the minutes long monologue, that you can actually feel the emotions pouring out of her. It encompasses the hurt from the years of estrangement from Lorelai’s parents’, but solidifies just how much they mean to her yet.
Whether the show was overlooked because it appeared on the same channel as Dawson’s Creek and One Tree Hill, because it was a show run by a woman nearly sixteen years ago when that wasn’t the norm, or because it was too simple in its concept, it’s a real disservice to its writers and actresses that they were never gifted with prestigious accolades. With the Golden Globe nominations just weeks away, and with the show’s move to Netflix — a respected, award winning network — one can hope that misses of the past won’t be repeated again. Its chances seem fairly decent for nomination, being in the Mini Series category rather than the Drama one is sure to help matters, and it’s high time that these two women be recognized for their ability artfully demonstrate the ins and outs of their turbulent mother/daughter bond.
