YOU KNEW MY SEXUAL HISTORY WHEN YOU MARRIED ME!
Jill (Meryl Streep) to Isaac (Woody Allen) in “Manhattan”
One could go on and on reciting the glories of Woody Allen’s masterpiece “Manhattan” such as Gordon Willis magnificent black-and-white cinematography …
However, from a queer perspective, the standout, among all the gifts Woody gives us in this movie, is Meryl Streep’s blistering, low-key, no-nonsense turn as Isaac’s (Allen’s) second ex-wife, Jill. When they married, she was bisexual. When they broke-up she was a confirmed lesbian. She left him for another woman, and now she is writing a tell-all memoir about their marriage.
Jill is portrayed as sharp, confident, and unapologetic. She cuts through Isaac’s neurotic self-absorption with icy wit, embodying independence and self-possession. Though she appears only in a few scenes, Jill’s character underscores the film’s themes of fractured relationships, shifting sexual identities, and the self-centered chaos of Manhattan’s intellectual elite.
With this performance, together with her work in Julia (1977), The Deer Hunter (1978), The Seduction of Joe Tynan (1979) and Kramer vs. Kramer (1979), Meryl Streep had arrived as the greatest actress of her generation. And she is still thriving!
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