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Chapter 1
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Play It As It Lays, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Meaninglessness
Gender Inequality and Identity
Loss and Recovery
Superficiality
Summary
Analysis
The second film Maria made with Carter was Angel Beach. She played a girl who was raped by a motorcycle gang. Maria saw the film twice, though she never recognized herself as the girl. Carter’s original ending featured a shot of the motorcycle gang “as if they represented some reality not fully appreciated by the girl,” but the studio ended the film with a long shot of Maria walking across a campus, which was the ending Maria preferred. Maria liked the film, because the girl seemed able to “control[] her own destiny.”
Maria can’t relate to her self-assured character in Angel Beach because she can’t “control[] her own destiny.” Carter’s preferred ending for the film, in which “reality [is] not fully appreciated by the girl” dehumanizes the character. In fact, Carter’s dehumanizing treatment of Maria’s character could suggest that he’s not particularly fond of women in general.
Active
Themes
The other film of Carter’s that Maria worked on was Maria, which involved Carter filming Maria as she went about her day in New York—talking on the phone, doing a photo shoot, sleeping on a couch at a party. The film ended in negative film, with Maria appearing dead. It won a festival award and was popular with UCLA and USC students, who talked among themselves of “using” Maria the way commercial directors talked about using A-list actresses. When students would approach Carter while her and Maria were out, they would talk to Carter and only glance at Maria, who had nothing to say to them.
Carter dehumanizes Maria in Maria, as well, essentially following her around until she appears dead on screen—almost as though he’s stalking and hunting his prey. The vastly different reactions Maria and Carter receive from the film’s fans implies a sexist attitude inherent in the culture. The college students speak of Carter “using” Maria, language that objectifies her and deprives her of bodily and artistic autonomy. Maria’s comparison of these students to commercial directors suggests that mistreatment and dehumanization of actresses is as common in art filmmaking as it is in the stereotypically seedy commercial film world.
Active
Themes
One night, when Maria and Carter went to BZ and Helene’s, BZ started playing the film on a projector. Maria immediately became ill and sat outside smoking cigarettes while the rest of the group watched the film. Later, Maria asked Carter why BZ played the film so often, and Carter said that BZ wanted Helene to see it. When Maria insisted that Helene didn’t even like the film, Carter frustratedly told Maria that she “[didn’t] understand anything” before going to bed without another word. Maria decides that she doesn’t “want to understand” anything about BZ’s motivations.
Active
Themes
