Bedhead, minimal makeup, normal clothes. How cool to see powerful characters—and the gutsy actresses who play them—finally looking like us.
If your small screen seems like a mirror lately, it’s not your imagination. It’s the new slate of TV heroines that reflects how successful midlife women choose to look. Fictional, yes, but authentic compared to the glamour gals of “reality.” No wonder we’re tuning in.
Exhibit A: Keri Russell, in her Golden Globes-nominated role as Kate Wyler on The Diplomat. Sure, as the U.S. ambassador to the UK, Kate’s got fancy functions to attend, but she never dons a slinky gown without an eye roll. Her everyday attire is a basic black suit that reads off the rack, and she’s quick to manage a wardrobe malfunction with a paper clip instead of a costume change. After watching Kate do a pit sniff before dashing off to avert an international incident, I had no qualms about throwing on yesterday’s jeans and pulling my hair into a ponytail to meet an editor for lunch.
The Real Deal
“Hollywood, especially streaming TV, is recalibrating what female power looks like,” Liane Bonn Starr, author of Stream This Next: 1,000 TV Shows to Suit Your Mood, told me. “Showrunners are now developing more interesting, complex characters, who often don’t look perfect—and they’re casting serious actresses who aren’t overly attached to being ‘beautiful’ on screen.”
One reason? Real women watch TV—plenty of it, in fact. According to the 2024 Hollywood Diversity Report, the majority of streaming TV viewers in 2023 were female. Plus, more women than ever are in charge, accounting for an unprecedented 36 percent of program creators on streaming platforms in the 2024-25 season.
“As women age, our priorities shift and our looks change—and it’s high time the industry is acknowledging that,” noted television writer/producer Lisa Melamed.
“It’s satisfying to genuinely feel that these female characters have earned their power, that they’ve been through some sh*t to get where they are.”
And while GenX creatives like The Diplomat’s showrunner Debora Cahn are leading the way, some men have come to embrace the trend. Consider Pluribus, the latest from Vince Gilligan of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul fame. The plot revolves around romance novelist Carol Sturka—a role written expressly for Saul alum Rhea Seehorn—who is oddly immune to the hive mind that’s besotted the rest of humanity.
The character is exceptional, but her wardrobe of sweats, jeans, and tees is anything but.
“Carol is an everywoman working hard to save the world—and it was important to our whole team to stay true to the circumstances,” executive producer Alison Tatlock explained to PROVOKED. “Perfect hair and makeup feel false in the midst of mayhem, and can take the audience out of the moment.”
In other words, we know BS when we see it.
A Style—and Substance—of Their Own
It’s not that these characters are clueless about fashion and beauty. They can afford to glam it up, but instead they skip the Spanx and contrivance in favor of comfort and ease. And they like how they look. Kate’s loose, messy mane on The Diplomat is a running theme. In one episode, she snaps, “It’s a style,” to her Secret Service double, whose own disheveled ‘do is a don’t.
Turn to the Claire Danes’ drama The Beast in Me to watch Pulitzer Prize-winning author Agatha Wiggs in soft button-downs and boxy blazers, with a habitually un-done bun. Subtle, casual yet distinctive, very much her own.
Heroines aren’t the only ones going against the glam grain. Patricia Arquette has a dual role on the hyper-stylized sci-fi series Severance: As evil exec Ms. Cobel, she menaces in sleek, somber turtlenecks, while nosy neighbor Mrs. Selvig has a taste for mismatched hippie garb. For both characters, Arquette’s hair is a no-apologies gray.
“Characters who prioritize comfortable, practical clothes are relatable because it’s honest—most of us don’t live in red carpet dresses,” opined fashion stylist Abby Wood. “The message is: You can be stylish, confident, and powerful without spending a fortune or trying to look younger.”
For any midlife woman, seeing real clothes on real bodies is a relief—even a tacit statement of support. And for an actress, a gritty role can be a smart career move—even awards bait. Indeed, Seehorn nabbed a Golden Globe win for Pluribus.
“Most of my very attractive actress friends would embrace the opportunity to leave their vanity at the door,” Melamed said. “Remember the big deal about Farrah Fawcett in [the 1984 domestic violence drama] The Burning Bed? She was nominated for an Emmy and was taken a lot more seriously after that.”
A Little Glam Goes a Long Way
Although I never went in for Housewives, Kardashians, or Golden Bachelors, I know my share of intelligent women who eat up such eye candy. And who am I to glam slam? I binge on elaborate period pieces and thank heavens for Dancing with the Stars. Besides, there are times when gobs of glam are fitting—for example, on All’s Fair, about an all-female LA-based law firm that specializes in celebrity divorce. A New York magazine article on Laura Wasser, the real-life attorney who inspired the series, even cited her thigh-high leather Chloe boots and diamond tooth gem.
What does bother me is when strong females are styled like cartoons. Soccer sitcom Ted Lasso has its charms, but team owner Rebecca Welton (Hannah Waddington) is such a garish glamazon, I’m embarrassed for her. Poufy platinum coif, acres of cleavage, skintight everything—Rebecca makes Jessica Rabbit look like Elmer Fudd.
Any surprise that the creative trio behind Ted is a boys’ club? “To be blunt,” said Bonin Starr, “when men are in the driver’s seat, it’s more important that female leads be f*ckable than relatable.” Interestingly, however, Ted’s Rebecca has trouble finding dates, while posh pols on both sides of the pond compete for a chance to bed Diplomat Kate.
Guts Over Glam
Back in the day, AbFab’s Patsy (Joanna Lumley) and Edina (series creator Jennifer Saunders) satirized the glamorous life with their ludicrous outfits and antics. Turns out their silliness was prophetic, since the current anti-glam trend has a serious side—it’s set the bar for the generation coming up, and not just on TV.
Consider this summer’s Supergirl movie, starring newcomer Milly Alcott. “So many times female superheroes are so perfect; she’s not that at all,” DC Studios honcho James Gunn teased at a press event.
When not in tights, cape, and logo, Alcott’s comb-averse Kara Zor-El sports a washed-out T-shirt and a rumpled trench coat—causing the Hollywood Reporter to deem her “messily human.”
Such authenticity might ultimately be more than refreshing entertainment. “Put something in people’s living rooms, let it become familiar, and maybe it’ll have some impact in the real world,” Melamed said. “Allison Janney in The Diplomat as President of the United States? See, not so scary!”
Well, here’s hoping. Meanwhile, anything that represents midlife women as we actually think, feel, behave, and dress has my vote.
So excuse me while I slip into my yoga pants and press play.
6 Responses
I see Rebecca has already been defended. Good. Realism is fine when it fits the script, but a bedhead diplomat isn’t realistic, it’s just frump. It’s true glam often detracts from our truth. But if it adds “Rebecca-power”, more power to it.
Hi Melissa and Jennie, fair points. Rebecca’s glam absolutely functions as armor, strategy, and power play, especially early in her arc. And Hannah Waddington is a force.
The larger thesis of this piece we just published isn’t that glam is wrong or shallow, but that we’re now seeing a broader spectrum of female power on screen—women whose authority doesn’t depend on polish, sex appeal, or spectacle. Rebecca is one version. Kate, Carol, and others are another. They can coexist.
And honestly, that’s the real win: women on TV no longer having to fit one mold. After all, women at midlife are not a monolith.
That’s putting some words into our mouths as I’m pretty sure none of us said they couldn’t co-exist! Rather that Rebecca as a character didn’t really fit the box she was assigned here, and the author could have found a better example (like any woman by Taylor Sheridan, natch). I personally loved everything about Carol on Pluribus, including her character wardrobe.
Jennie, have you read the recent piece I wrote about Taylor Sheridan’s women?
Did you really not get that the Ted Lasso Rebecca character’s over the top glam was the point? Was everything that made this series so wonderful completely lost on you? Do you really write for a magazine called Provoked that perhaps is not very provoking? That is the biggest laugh and sadly just another example of how this society continuously sells women down the superficial road and women continuously buy into it. And by the way, sniffing the pits was a cheap steal from the Carrie character on Homeland.
This! Rebecca weaponized her glam against the world (and especially her ex), and I always found it an interesting part of her story. Plus what a joy to watch Hannah Waddington work!