Modern Love

Sep 24, 2022
6 min read

Updated: Jan 13, 2023

Starring Anne Hathaway and Gary Carr

Modern Love, a series adapted from the weekly column of my all-time favourite - The New York Times, is the perfect bed-time story ‘watch’ before a good night's sleep. Just as I like it, every episode in the show has a new narrative from the weekly column, and so there is definitely no way you’re dozing off while watching it. Even though I ended up watching the Amazon Original way back when it first came out, I find myself coming back to this one episode over and over : “Modern Love Season 1 Episode 3: Take me as I am, Whoever I am.”

While the opening credits of all episodes are kept the same, I reckon it being important to detail even the most minimalistic attributes in the making of the beautiful show that it is. Grainy, black and white photographs flash over the screen tuned to the heartwarming song of “ Setting Sail” by Gary Clark and John Carney. The photographs mostly include the different sorts of relationships shared between people. Black and white pictures fuel up with colours as the beat drops and the vintage pictures of old people laughing slowly turn into a pair of girls romantically canoodling. As this transition from the old age to the modern one crops up, you’ll see that the only thing kept constant in all photographs is the feeling of love - the perfect preface to the show.

Fading into a fairy-tale-like, magical soundtrack, you see Anne Hathaway as Lexi glaring into her computer whilst setting up her dating profile. As she does so, a simple question that asks her to answer "who she was" rolls her back to the peach story, an incident that helped shape “who she was.” Now this is going to get complicated. Crafting herself as the narrator, Levi’s quirky side is what drives the mellow setting to scream words. Hathaway does this glamorously by physical actions like uncontrollably raising her eye-brows or even hasty hand gestures.

Right next, you’re flashed back into Levi’s memory of her dreamy, La La Land place: A supermarket (as crazy as it sounds). One of the most eye-catching ones in the entire episode, this scene evidently plays around with colour-grading and props that aid glorify Levi’s personality as that of a young-spirited, enthusiastic woman who finds joy in sufficing her craving for peaches looking for them in a grocery store early in the morning. A sleek appearance supported with a shimmery top, Lucy Corrigan, the costume designer for the series carefully pieces together Hathaway’s outfit for it to compliment her current emotion. In the “search for adventure” at a food store, Levi lays her eyes upon an attractive guy who senses a glimpse of Rita Hayworth in her. And obviously when a nice guy sees you that way - you go on a date with him (considering you’re as Rita Hayworth-y as Anne Hathaway is ;) ). The bright yellow colour of hope and youth filling the background in the form of fruits and vegetables has been colour-graded to depict Levi’s unparalleled enigma, literally. After all, who would have shoppers perform as her backing dancers in a supermarket early in the morning? That’s right - Anne Hathaway.

It’s only after she comes back; having gone on a date early in the morning, performing a dance ensemble with pedestrians at the parking lot and chatting with her friend from the office that she returns to her bed and IT finally kicks in: her bipolar disorder. A zoom in shot of sun rays transforming into moonlight reflecting on the peaches flares up the dull whites in Levi’s bedroom and the radiant setting becomes gloomy once again. Showcasing a metamorphosis from a scintillating atmosphere of a La La Land to the shadowy confinement of four walls, I find this scene to be one of the most impressive ones in changing the mood of the scene so swiftly within a matter of seconds.

Messing up her date with the probable love of her life, Levi’s face encircled frowziness and a downcast vision for herself for not being able to appear desirous or vibrant in front of her date anymore, who at this point, only attempts to see through her. Nevertheless, there’s always a next time, or so she promised him.

Following next, the cinematic setting is replaced with a theatrical one. Moreover, an on-stage, one-shot monologue of Levi describing her story of having dealt with the disorder lights up the screen. The hazy, hand-held camera movement inculcated also connotes the imbalance of chemicals in Levi’s brain and how erroneous it feels to be perceived that way. The raw and unfiltered scene imprints the human-like essence of what it feels like dealing with a disorder which this scene undoubtedly achieves.

The next day as the balance of chemicals in her head shifts and Levi once again finds herself on a merry-go-round, her jovial persona doesn’t allow her to miss any second making up for the date she was now planning to turn around. Anne Hathaway’s shivering movements inclusive of brisk impulses and continuous fidgeting while speaking to her date over the phone are also the portrayal of supplementary symptoms a bipolar patient often faces. Once again, Lexi is lost in her title sequence of “The Lexi show” and imagines herself as the main character in a state of thousands while “cleaning the bipolar out of her place”. Now that the audience is aware of Lexi’s disorder, even though the colour scheme stays sharp and brilliant, it only comes across a façade of distinct colours in her brain that separates reality from her time and again.

Night arrives and Levi’s all set for her date. On the TV, Rita Hayworth, the artist she was referred to as by her date and her friend from the office earlier appears. Levi, in utter admiration of Rita’s flawless moves, remembers a quote by her, “Every man I knew went to bed with Gilda, and woke up with me.” Gilda, Rita’s stage name was the savoury figure she unveiled to the rest of the world. However, when the night ended, all she was, was Rita - the crudest version of herself. Once again infusing Levi with emotions of self-dejection, she found herself staring at the mirror in her bathroom. Ceaseless attempts to snap back but all that saw forth was her self-built conundrum that she couldn't escape. The sound effects of Hathaway’s feet clicking the floor or her dropping her mascara are specifically increased to highlight the quietude passivity in the aura and the opposite in her veins to show how every single movement is a squeal for help. Levi’s slant positioning falling down on the bathroom floor as she breaks down is emblematic of the disturbed circumstances. Shifting downwards, the camera angle further elucidates the shrieked and squeezed sentiments surrounding Levi.

While her date finally stops knocking and leaves the porch door, Levi is only left with resent in heart and decides to speaks her mind out. This particular dialogue consists of short lines, repetitions - all formulated into the colloquial language that intensify the deepening effect of the same. Wondering whether or not her date would have stayed, had he known she was bipolar, Levi realises how her date was a man who didn’t want his peaches stained. And well, she was stained. She knew it had to be stopped. She knew it was her taking upon Gilda. “And it was beautiful, but it can’t last.” There had to be someone who’d accept the two people in her. While her date was surely not making a comeback, he had pinned her onto something way more important in her life.

The next day, Levi, fired for missing consecutive days at the office, finally reveals herself to her friend from the office. Anne Hathaway’s remarkable build-up that goes from being moderately accepting to her shattered into pieces as she puts across her state of mind comes about as highly impactful. Her ironic laughs, deep breaths, quivering lips, and eyes staring into her friend’s own to seek validation - all only contrive her condition that she had been holding back. Following next, fast scene changes during Levi’s cathartic stages illustrate how trusting one good friend, had made rapid improvements in how she dealt with the process.

And lastly, the fairy-tale-like music resumes and we flash out of Levi’s memory into her room, with her having finally answered the question to who she was. She was doing well on her medication now, and more than anything - ready to be back in the dating scene!

Now that I have rewatched this episode for the 50th time, all I wish for is to watch this episode for the first time once again only to see how surreal it had felt. And obviously, to support my eternal fandom of Hathaway’s unmatched on-screen fashionista vibe in both Modern Love and The Devil Wears Prada.

Directed by John Carney

Produced by Trish Hofmann

Written by David Bowie

Starring