The Popular Ryan Murphy Filled with Glee

After watching the season premiere of FOX’s Glee on May 19th, I was intrigued to learn more about the quirky teen musical show. I searched Glee in IMDB and came across a director that I was already familiar with: Ryan Murphy. Along with Glee, Murphy created nip/tuck which is a show that I am mildly obsessed with. The concept and creativity behind both shows interested me to look deeper into Murphy’s past and present television creations. From watching all six seasons of nip/tuck, tuning in weekly to watch Glee, and downloading the beginning episodes of Popular, I have come up with a few observations regarding Ryan Murphy’s cinematic creative style. My findings come largely from the commonalties in particular camera shots and sounds. Also, I have found that there is a frequent theme of obsession with self-image and a multiplicity of similar characters as well. More specific examples are from season 1 episode 1 of both Glee and Popular, episode 4 of Glee, and season 4 episode 1 of nip/tuck.

Ryan Murphy attended Indiana University where he was a writer for the school newspaper. His first television series in 1999 airing on the WB was named Popular, a show about high school teenagers trying to figuring out the meaning of popularity. In 2003, he created nip/tuck, a cable series about two male plastic surgeons with major egos. Most recently, Murphy is the creator of FOX’s new hit series Glee, which follows a group of high school teens involved in show choir. It is common for him to use the same actors in more than one series. Glee’s Jessalyn Gilsig plays Terri Schuester, a manipulating lying wife. She also stars in nip/tuck as a similar character; Dr. Christian Troy’s love interest in Season 5. Actors in Popular, Leslie Bibb, Bryce Johnson, Leslie Grossman, and Lisa Darr are among other’s appearing in individual episodes of nip/tuck.

Cinematic Reoccurrences:

To get the ball rolling, I noticed that in the premiere episodes of both Popular and Glee there is an establishing shot of the school where the show takes place. In Popular it is Kennedy High and in Glee it is William McKinley High; coincidentally or not both are “popular” president’s names.

A camera movement that I observed multiple times in each television series was an extreme close up of an object or person followed by the camera pulling back to show a medium to long shot of the subject. In the beginning of the fourth episode of Glee, Kurt is dancing to “Put a Ring on It” by Beyonce. The camera starts off showing an ECU of his legs then pulls back to expose him dancing while his dad is walking into the frame. In Popular there is a ECU of a jar of dead frogs, the camera then pulls away and reveals a room with students wearing gloves waiting in line with their dissection trays in hand. One scene in particular in nip/tuck is where Julia is getting an ultra sound. There is an ECU of her stomach with a hand rolling over the goo on her belly, subsequently the camera pulls away to show the room with the machine and ultra sound technician. This particular ECU/pull away technique that Murphy uses helps create ambiguity in a scene allowing the audience to draw conclusions from the ECU and have their assumptions answered when the camera pulls away.

While watching the episodes for a second time, I listened more carefully and figured out that Murphy likes to switch between non-diegetic and diegitic music of the same track within a scene. An example of this happens in Glee when Kurt trys-out to be a kicker for the football team. He begins his try-out by doing a dance to “Put a Ring on It” which is diegtic music since you can see the boombox. As he hits the ball through the goal the music continues and bridges into the next scene which makes it now non-diegetic. In nip/tuck this common sound trend happens whenever Dr. Christian Troy and Dr. Sean McNamara start a surgery. They put a CD into their modern-cd player that is mounted to the wall; again diegetic music switches to non-diegetic, bridging into the next scene.

Common Characters:

Murphy acted in musicals in high school which is reflected into his work. The concept with high school singing did not start with Glee; in fact it was with Popular 10 years prior. There is a shot where the football jock, Josh, is watching a girl audition for a role in the school musical and then it cuts to him sitting in his desk thinking, “the musical auditions are tomorrow how am I going to cut practice”. This exact conflict happens again in Glee with jock, Finn, when deciding if he really wants to be a part of the Glee club in episode one.

Self-Image Theme:

In Popular, Sam opens up episode one by saying she will “never be a Seventeen Magazine girl because there is no air brushing in real life”. On the contrary, every patient in nip/tuck is asked the question “what don’t you like about yourself”. Both shows are creating an image of incomplete satisfaction with ones body. It is almost like nip/tuck is the answer to questions and conflicts that characters on Popular have with themselves. The opening credits in both Popular and nip/tuck have special theme songs. In Popular, it is a song about high school and the problems teens face being categorized into different groups. nip/tuck’s opening song plays as there are images of mannequins and then ends with the words “perfect face, perfect life”. Glee has many instances of separation by self-image. The cheerleaders are depicted as always wearing their uniform with hair tied back while the football players are always wearing their jerseys. The main character Rachel is not associated with a particular clique and therefore helps create the representation of the Glee club posse.

Sources:
IMDB.com
Wikipedia.com