Female Representation within British Drama; Shameless Analysis

Shameless is an "offbeat drama about the roller coaster lives and loves of the dysfunctional Gallagher clan" based in Manchester on the 'Chatsworth estate'. It is an excellent example of British Drama within television, with a mixture of comical and hard-hitting storylines.

I have looked into how the females are portrayed within this drama, as it will help us to develop our character representation for our film.

The character profile pages on channel 4's website for shameless describe one of the main female characters, Karen Maguire as 'famous for her sexual skills'. Throughout the series, Karen is displayed as being a strong yet very sexual character. Karen has various sexual liaisons especially at the begin of the series before she is married. The most controversial is where she has a sexual affair with her boyfriends father. This is shocking for the audience as, generally speaking, it is unacceptable and immoral to behave in this way. The audiences sympathy is then very much not with her character. However, Karen later is diagnosed with Bi-polar disease and the audience are shown the deteriorating process that she is led on. The sympathy is now thrown back to with Karen. Her mother-in-law Mimi Maguire tries to cover it up and begins telling people that instead of Karen being in rehab that she is in prison for assault. Karen stands up to Mimi and says that she has nothing to be ashamed of by her illness and that its a mental health disorder but that she still a person. This reflects to the audience that Karen is a strong woman when independent. But as they see throughout the series, is easily tempted by men.

If we were to portray our character in the same way as Karen is reflected in Shameless, it would indicate to the audience that most women are like this. As this is not the case, we may consider aspects of Karen's personality, yet not all of them when developing our protagonist.

Mimi Maguire is definitely one of the Dramas most memorable characters. She is married to the drug-dealer Paddy Maguire and is equally as violent and ruthless as he is. She is very loyal to her family and even goes to prison in place of her son. She has very traditional beliefs about family. The family have Irish heritage and she is displayed to respect that. She is feared by other characters within the estate and can/has taken on any man just as well as a man could. Mimi is rarely shown as a sexual figure, perhaps because of her age and her motherhood, except for the short affair she has in series 7. Mimi's role within the drama is clearly as a mother and a business woman and her sexual side is rarely shown. if anything, she is viewed as equal to the men as she is feared as much as her partner Paddy.

Mimi is reflected as a much more aggressive and violent character, this could be useful as we were considering showing a rougher representation of our character. However, Mimi is shown to have very little feminine qualities other than motherhood. Her age, her size and her status in the family affect this. This would be an unrealistic way to represent our protagonist as she will be much younger and without children.

Maxine Donnelly is one of the few characters within the drama that has no blood relation to any of the characters. She is described as "saucy and full of life" and she "isn't afraid to give as good as she gets". She has only been around for the last two series yet quickly befriended Debbie Gallagher. She is displayed from the offset as being very smart and quick and knows easily how to work around people. This is displayed as her and Debbie go shoplifting regularly and Maxine is able to get the pair out of the situation quickly mainly using sweet talk. Maxine is well aware of her sexuality and in early episodes, uses this to her advantage. For example, showing her boobs to bouncers of a club to let her in for free. At first she is shown as care-free with little to tie her down. She later develops a relationship with local 'stud' Karl Gallagher. After a while, she secretly aborts a baby that was fathered by Karl. When he finds out the deceit he ends the relationship. This reflects Maxine as being a deceitful person that is inconsiderate about her loved ones feelings. This is further mirrored as she then begins to have a relationship with Karl's brother; Ian Gallagher. The relationship tears the brothers apart and after a number of events, Maxine calls off the relationship due to this. this gives her character some redemption and the audience are subverted to feel that she is not such an immoral person.

The contrast between Maxine's carefree nature and the seriousness of the issues she faces have been very well done by the Shameless directors. In our film, it could prove very effective to have a stark contrast with the age of our protagonist - the fact she is young and should be care free - and the harsh situation - of homelessness - she is found in. We will have to develop ways to portray this to the audience through further research.

Having looked into the main female characters within Shameless, it would seem that the young females are shown to be strong and independent women but with an equally strong sexual desire. This desire then forces them to conflict with their morals. This may lead the audience to believe that women who are strong and independent are led astray by sex. Also, the young characters, Maxine and Karen, have both been deceitful to their partners throughout the series with little remorse. This implies that young women can be deceitful and irrational. Within our trailer, we wish to reflect realistic portrayals of women and we must consider all ways of representation.