"Masked Man" by Steven Cohan and "Pillow Talk"

    This reading shows the "masculinity" of men back in the 1950's. Holden also known as Hal is the main actor in the movie called Picnic. Hal is stocky and muscular. He is the guy that women see and they just melt.Throughout the reading, Hal is looked at from many viewpoints: Milly's curiosity, Mudge's attraction, Flo's suspicion, Bomber's rivalry, Rosemary's hostility, and Mrs. Pott's admiration. The woman that plays the lead role in the movie falls for his rugged, chiseled look. Every time she sees him around, she loses herself. When Hal's shirt rips, his abs are exposed and she is completely consumed by him. "But let me tell you something- you're a fake!...and what Rosemary exposes is the male masquerade-witness his muscle-flexing, his showing-off, his lying-that constitutes his virility (pg. 178)." Rosemary basically tells Hal off. She lets him know straight forward that he is scared to act his age and he is trying to get women by showing off his body.
    At the beginning of "Pillow Talk", Brad shows his masculinity by being on the phone with different woman singing the same song to them, but just changing up the names. He gets into argumentative situations with Jan because he is always on the phone and it defeats her from getting her work done. He was a well dressed, well groomed, handsome man and he had charm. Those qualities in a man is what women love. However, after talking to his best friend Johnathan (who is in love with Jan), he decided to pretend to be a visitor from Texas and try not to let his identity get out to Jan. Eventually, when Johnathan finds out what Brad is doing with the woman that he loves, he confronts Brad aboout it and tell him to go away to Connecticut to work on his songs. There he invites Jan to go along with him and Jan finds the song sheets and realizes Rex is really Brad. She is so angry that she left him and Brad realizes he is in love and finds any way possible to get her attention. Jan ends up re-decorating his apartment and does a horrific job. Brad so angry, walks to her apartment, kicks her door down, picks her up, walks her all the way to his apartment and throws her on his bed. He continues to show how upset he is and Jan finally realizes she wants to be with this man. They end up getting married and having children.
    Brad shows his masculinity, by showing his charm to these woman, but then finally realizing he loves Jan, calls all the women he has been with and breaks it off with them and wants to marry Jan. He goes to her apartment and picks her up with his hands and makes her feel infuriated at first, but eventually she seemed to like it. Men have this type of way of putting up this masculine front to get away from situations until they realize that this is who they want to spend their life with or realize they made a huge mistake.