It’s not only my imagination that what’s deemed middle-aged has shifted younger recently. Faye Dunaway’s hard-ass, ratings-obsessed character on Network refers to Max (played by a William Holden at 58), the coworker she’s having an affair with, as middle-aged twice (that I caught). It’s used in an insulting way along with the emasculating taunt of him also being “menopausal.” There is an implied age gap and the two have different values since she’s part of the “TV generation.” And yet, Faye Dunaway was 45 years old in this film. It’s hard imaging a woman in her 40s now being viewed as young, idea-filled and radically different from a man 13 years older when they’re both essentially middle-aged.
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