Near the end of 9 to 5, the chairman of the board walks through an office that is running better than he has ever seen it. Productivity is up twenty percent. There is a daycare down the hall. People are on flexible hours, and two women are splitting one job so that both can keep working. He loves every bit of it. Then he lowers his voice and asks for one change to be undone. The equal pay has to go. That scene is forty-six years old, and a lot of people are meeting it again this week. Dolly Parton died on August 25 at eighty. ABC aired a 20/20 special about her that night, Disney+ and Hulu picked it up the next day, and the comedy that made her a movie star climbed back into the Disney+ top ten in the United States. It is worth going back to. Just not for the reason most people remember it. The story is easy to explain. Three women work for the same awful boss, get high together one night, and take turns describing how they would kill him. Judy (Jane Fonda) pictures a big-game hu...
Personal essays on television and film. One viewer's honest thoughts on the stories worth watching — written with care.