Tuesday 27 January 2009

Another Attempt at My 1st Paragraph

'Ugly Betty' is orginally an american television comedy-drama series, which was adapted from the Colombian Telenovela Yo Soy Betty, La Fea ("I am Betty, the ugly"), written by Fernando Gaitan. This series comedy drama has a new-york setting and has won many awards including; golden globe for best comedy as well as many emmy awards. 'Ugly Betty' has been a huge success since it was first brought to the U.K on January 5, 2007 by channel 4. On the first day it attracted 4.5 million viewers, however 2 weeks later the show became so popular it had a stagering 5.5 million viewers watching and since then the number has just been rising. The Colombian Telenova 'Yo Soy Betty, La Fea' has a similiar narrative to 'Ugly Betty' it is also about the life of a latino girl, who is an efficent assistant working for a Fashion design company; 'Ecomodo', in America, both the main characters with the drama's have the same name Betty. 'Ugly Betty' is presented as a 'ordinary', 'your everyday girl' in a high class, fashion obsessed setting, where she definatly does not 'fit in'. She is shown to have braces, thick framed glasses with no sense of fashion, and she presented to be fat; all the 'no's' within the fashion industry. This is purposely done, as 'Ugly Betty is the protagainist it gives all female audience's someone they can relate to, may it be because of her looks, weight or even occupation. 'Ugly Betty' like 'Betty' (from the telenova adaption) becomes Daniel Meade ( The Editor in Chief of MODE) assistant at ofcourse 'Mode magazine'. Betty tries to 'fit in', within the world of fashion, but is faced with many hurdles and objects along the way, may it be from her private life or her high maintanace job. Even though 'Ugly Betty' is a sitcom, it has many different genres in term of the issues and debates that are carried out though the drama, many having relevance to the media; paparazzi and the fashion industry such as; size 0 models and the main genre- Beauty. The comedy that we are presented in 'Ugly Betty' with is not highlighted so much, due to the serious issues that are covered in the sitcom. This sitcom also has many themes and ideas that convey the idea of zeigeist, such as Fashion, Beauty, Capitalism, Celebrities as so forth. Representation of women has been changed immensly through 'Ugly Betty'. As the women are shown to be acting and men are shown to be appearing, roles seem to have swapped compared to the old representation of women. This is done purposely as 'Ugly Betty' is a portrayal of the modern society where men and women are equal to eachother.

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