I focused on Daisy here (in part to keep to a reasonable word count), but Myrtle and Jordan have been weighing on my mind as I wait for tomorrow’s midnight showing. Though it is unfortunate, I suspect that most of Fitzgerald’s social commentary will be discarded, which is what draws me to the Daisy-centric (great term!) soundtrack as a small way of reclaiming the text’s potential. I am wondering if maybe the film will use some of its soundtrack women in ways that enhance the supporting characters more — we don’t see much of the other women in trailers, but we also don’t hear nearly all of the soundtrack women in what’s been released so far. Perhaps the soundtrack will give Luhrmann a way of adding depth to these female characters, even if he can’t give them as much screen time.

Sadly, I too anticipate that this adaptation will have shaved away most of the narrative’s complexity in favor of the Daisy/Gatsby story — in fairness, the book as a whole is a really intricate story to tell in two to three hours. Not that it’s any consolation. . .

But one thing that troubles me about the soundtrack (and really the entire film adaptation, as I’ve been able to glean from the trailers and press discourse) is the thematic privileging of the central romance and the doomed fabulousness of Daisy Buchanan over the book’s scathing critique of class, materialism, and proscribed gender roles. Importantly, Fitzgerald’s critique extends beyond Daisy and creeps into the lives of characters like Myrtle Wilson. It also affects Jordan Baker (aside: my favorite character). So I’m wondering two things. One, when we say “women,” do we mean “Daisy”? Two, can we extend the contributions from this confluence of female pop vocalists to address the subjectivities of the book and film’s central *and* supporting female characters?

~Regina