Amanda Crew.
photo: John P. Johnson. Acquired via HBO Media Relations.
In the tech world, working women are a rarity. The problem isso pervasivethat the cover story for lastmonth’s issue of The Atlantic boasts the headline, ‘Why is Silicon Valley So Awful to Women?’. The article outlines the outrageous added level of dismissive discrimination and outdated sexist rhetoric that female workers have to go through in order to be taken seriously in the field.
On the small screen, HBO series Silicon Valleyhas been quietly tackling that issue by putting a female venture capitalist in the tech world front and center. Monica, as played by actress Amanda Crew, is a womanwho is bold, cunning, and deals with things her own way. And, while some viewers would try to pigeonhole her as the love interest for Pied Piper CEO Richard Hendricks (Thomas Middleditch), her presence on the series meansso much more than a narrative crutch for a male character. In fact, Monica isone of a fewfemale characters on the small screen who are leading the way toward a better understanding ofthe very real barriers women face in the workplace.
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This week, we caught up with Crew to chat about her deft portrayal of Monica on Silicon Valley. Admittedly, Crew feels a bit intimidated by her alter-ego because she’s just so high-functioning. She said, “No one ever recognizes me in real life because I don’t look anything like Monica. She’s got the hair, and she’s so well dressed and put together, and she’s articulate and assertive, but also nurturing. I want to be Monica.”And even though Crewdoesn’t look much like Monica in real life, she does a fantastic job of portraying the confidence that women need in male dominated industries.
Underscoring the fact that women can retain their femininityeven in a male-dominated field, Crew applauded Monica’s fabulous yetprofessional wardrobe, stating,“I love that she’s well dressed! She’s not hiding under a garbage bag. Sometimes there’s the myth that women are distracting people by the way they dress, or doing their makeup, and its like ‘oh, I didn’t know I had to come out like a soggy wet bag so I’m not distracting to the men.’ I’m inspired by her, and by the fact thatshe holds her own in that world.”
Monica, an associate at fictionalventure capital firm Raviga, is arguably one of the most competent characters on TV today. Justlike Carrie Coon’s police chief Gloria Burgle on Fargo, and Rhea Seehorn’s lawyer Kim Wexler on Better Call Saul, Monica’sentire job is tomake stressful and difficult decisions. However, in a portrayalthat’s true to real-life, that role is made harder as she works in a patriarchal field that frequently seeks to marginalize her influence and intelligence.
Amanda Crew, Thomas Middleditch.
photo: John P. Johnson. Acquired via HBO Media Relations.
While Crew says she’s been approached by women who relate to Monica’s struggle on the show, she herself said that she doesn’t experience much discrimination in her current job on Silicon Valley because, “as far as my experience on the show, all of those boys are such feminists, so it’s such a great environment. But it is interesting in the business world how it can all pan out. It makes me really angry.”
Crew haschanneled that anger into a wholly realistic representation of a woman struggling to maintain her individuality in a field that has historicallyderided femininetraits.Shesaid,“[Monica] demonstrates that women don’t have to resort to this stereotypical ‘male’ energy, and bully theirway up and knock everyone down who’s in theirway, like the Gavin Belson way. Women can succeed by following a moral compass and what they believe in.” Crew believes that Monica continues to stick her neck out for Richard and the Pied Piper gang because, “I think she knows that there’s something special about him in the way that he sees the world and technology. She doesn’t know exactly how he’s going to make this thing work, but she knows that whatever it is, it’s going to be much bigger than some small little app.”
Even though Monica is an attractive, impeccably put together woman,her primary role on the show is as a driven, career-focused individual, and not as a romantic foil for a male character. Crew credits writers Alec Berg and Mike Judge for that opportunity, stating, “The show, especially when it first came out, it got a lot of heat that there weren’t more women, and the response was that the show was a satire and they wouldn’t be doing justice if they put a bunch of women in there, because there are barely any women in tech. Something that no one ever talks about is that Mike and Alec have written two female characters on the show – Monica and Laurie [played by Suzanne Cryer] – who don’t serve as the love interest.”
Amanda Crew, Suzanne Cryer.
photo: John P. Fleenor
Crew clearly relishes playing a woman who doesn’t predominantly serve as the love interest, but that doesn’t mean it was a familiar role for her as an actress. In fact, it was quite the opposite. Shewent on to detail her initial experience getting into character as Monica, stating,“When I first started on the show, in my first couple of scenes, I noticed that I was really nervous and almost uncomfortable, and I realized that I wasn’t used to playing a character that wasn’t flirting. Those are things that I can do in my sleep now because all of my auditions. All of my scenes up until then were playing ‘the girl next door’ or ‘the girl that the guy has a crush on’, and she has to be likeable and cute and charming and charismatic. I couldn’t fall on those tricks in my bag with Monica because that’s not who she is. That’s not her role on the show, and that’s also not how she navigates her life or gets things she wants. She’s not successful in her job because she’s flirtatious with the men or a sexy seductress. No. She’s really smart and she knows her sh*t.”
Monicafollows her own story without getting bogged down in flirtatious stereotypes, however, justbecause shedoesn’t primarily serveas a sexual conquest doesn’t mean that she and Richard can’t get together at some point in time. Crew did revealthat she secretly hopes that there’s a romantic future for her character and the ever-awkward CEO of Pied Piper CEO. She said, “There is the part of me though that hopes when the show ends that they do finally get together. Nothing happens in all of the seasons of the show, but the final episode, when the show is over, I don’t know how it ends, but that Monica and Richard have some sort of moment. Hopefully it’s comedic too, but hopefully they seal the deal.”
‘Silicon Valley’ airs Sunday nights at 10/9c on HBO.
