Emmy FYC: Kristin Scott Thomas in "Fleabag"
Thursday, June 13, 2019 at 1:15PM
Team Experience will be sharing FYCs as the Television Academy votes on Emmy nominations over the next two weeks. Here's Ben Miller...
I have an appreciation for a skilled performer’s ability to shut up. Watch the scene in Doubt between Viola Davis and Meryl Streep. Once Davis gets going, Streep knows to step aside and let Davis do her thing. Fleabag creator and star Phoebe Waller-Bridge does the same thing with Kristin Scott Thomas in her standout scene in the third episode of Fleabag’s (pretty much perfect) second season.
After chasing down Thomas’ Belinda to take back an award, the main character spends some time drinking and flirting at a bar, listening to Belinda speak about the patronization of women in business. Then comes the speech --sit back and enjoy...
In case you didn’t watch the video (and if you didn’t, what the hell is the matter with you?), here’s the speech in word form:
Women are born with pain built in. It’s our physical destiny. Period pain, sore boobs, childbirth, you know. We carry it within ourselves throughout our lives.
Men don’t. They have to seek it out. They invent all these gods and demons and things just so they can feel guilty about things, which is something we do very well on our own. Then they create wars so they can feel things and touch each other, and when there aren’t any wars they can play rugby.
And we have it all going on in here, inside. We have pain on a cycle for years and years and years. And then, just as you feel you’re making peace with it all, what happens? The menopause comes.
The f*cking menopause comes and it is…the most wonderful f*cking thing in the world. And yes, your entire pelvic floor crumbles and you get f*cking hot and no one cares – but then, you’re free. You’re no longer a slave, no longer a machine with parts. You’re just a person, in business.’
If you are going to have a speech of that magnitude, you need an actress of Thomas’ caliber to give it meaning beyond the words. It plays with the idea of “women in business”, misogyny, maturity and sexuality in a two minute span. Everything Belinda conveys comes across as truly genuine and earned as a woman of her age and experience.
Waller-Bridge sits there and listens. You get her reactions and being the writer and star, she could have written it as a back-and-forth, but she realizes what a skilled performer Thomas is and lets her at it. Scott Thomas is so smooth and sexy and distinguished that Waller-Bridge can’t help but kiss her at the end of it. Can you blame her?
Kristin Scott Thomas might be the most underrated actress of the last 30 years, and she deserves the Emmy for this moment alone. Her remarkable career is surprisingly limited in award recognition, and this needs to be remedied. Just don’t take her award back after she wins it.
Reader Comments (7)
It's badly edited and dubbed but KST is always game.
A thousand times yes. Anywhere she shows up is suddenly better. And when it is already genius like Fleabag, look out!
YES!
Nominate Fleabag in all categories please and thank you!!
As a woman who has been through menopause and come out the other side, please give KST a god damn emmy, and PWB an emmy for having the genius to write this wonderful speech.
And yes, KST is definitely under-rewarded when it comes to awards. But this can be remedied.
Love love her. And this cameo was fantastic. A perfect scene.
Can’t wait to see her next as the diabolical Mrs Danvers in Netflix’s Rebecca.
Guest Actress in a Comedy should come down to a tie between her and Blanchett in Documentary Now
While JLD will probably win (and this year's Comedy Actress category is so stacked it's ridiculous - absolutely any one of them could win and nobody can make an argument against it), I am hoping for a PWB upset.
It's either KST or Blanchett, and then I don't see how anyone will prevail against Olivia Colman.
I think this show will win the writing and directing awards and Veep will win for series and actress simply for the sentimental reasons. But once again, you can't really make a case against any of the nominees for actress or series this year. They are all just that good.