There are “kinds” of women who get lauded for doing the same things that other women have already been doing for quite some time. Martha Stewart is just such a kind of woman to receive praise for things that women in the latter category would instead be (and are) maligned for. And while her Sports Illustrated cover signals what one can only hope is a greater shift toward acceptance of women being sexy and sexual at whatever the fuck age they want to be, it also serves to reiterate a double standard in our society. One in which “good,” “homemaking” women are more respected than women who have been associated with iconoclasm and shirking “conventional femininity.”
Although Stewart was long ago forced to shed her impervious image of full-stop goodness after being sent to prison in 2004 for insider trading, securities fraud, obstruction of justice and conspiracy (oh my!), her reputation didn’t take long to bounce back. And, if anything, her time in prison only augmented the public’s fascination with her. All of the sudden, she was way more interesting once the veneer of “infallibility” cracked. She had “cred.” Even Snoop Dogg started to hang out with her after she got incarcerated. But it was just the “right amount” of an impish streak, one that still made the public see her as a generous, ultimately docile and obedient soul. Her appearance on the cover of the famed Swimsuit issue of Sports Illustrated marks her, at eighty-one, as the “oldest” cover model. In fact, one might say that setting records for being the oldest to do something is a new trend of late—considering Joe Biden’s presidency. And it speaks to a larger trend about how the so-called elderly are no longer shutting themselves away inside to avoid being met with torches and pitchforks for their mere existence. This was something that would have been unfathomable in the Old Hollywood era, when stars seemed to retreat permanently into their mansions at a certain age or die in bleak obscurity after their drug/alcohol addictions got the better of them (e.g., Barbara Payton and Mabel Normand). Better than to be “caught” looking as they did in their “aged” state. Arguably the first actress to defy this tacit, Logan’s Run-esque Hollywood rule was Gloria Swanson when she played, in meta fashion, a washed-up silent movie star named Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard. A faded star, as it were, who stays, as alluded to, shut inside her house to avoid the reality that the outside world might inflict.
But oh how times have changed since 1950, with “old” women out and about parading themselves like it’s no big deal at all. And it really isn’t. Especially with all the advancements in anti-aging treatments. Ones that a woman like Stewart can afford with no problem. And yet, despite looking barely a day over fifty (hell, maybe even forty with the right airbrushing), Stewart is still having a “break the internet” moment by gracing this cover. For it pushes a new boundary and sets a new precedent. Except that, well, it actually doesn’t. Because there’s been a certain other woman who’s been rallying behind anti-ageist views and gatekeeping for some time now, only to be met with venom and vitriol as a result. That woman, of course, is Madonna. Who has appeared on countless magazine covers and within their “spreads” to show as much (usually more) skin as Stewart is in Sports Illustrated. And sure, Stewart is almost a full twenty years older than Madonna, so it is more noteworthy in that sense, but the real reason so much praise instead of acrimony is being hurled toward Stewart is because she represents what society views as the abovementioned “right” kind of woman. More specifically, the “right” kind of “old” woman. She is “tasteful,” “beneficent,” “not slutty.” Madonna, in contrast, has always wielded her sexuality like the key ingredient of her personality that it is. And, obviously, part of her hyper-sexed nature is a result of growing up Catholic, told from the get-go that sex was wrong, forbidden, sinful—but it was especially wrong for any woman to take actual pleasure in sex. An act meant solely for men’s pleasure…and for women to fulfill their “duty” as a birthing mill.
Stewart herself is a symbol of that kind of conventional “domestic goddess” femininity that patriarchal society still champions and reveres. And, funnily enough, she was raised Catholic as well. But it seemed the indoctrination of that religion didn’t instill within her quite the same rebellious sexual exhibitionism that it did within Madonna. It did, however, perhaps make her appreciate the value of pageantry that extended into her various homemaking and entertaining endeavors. Yet, despite being a symbol of “domesticity,” Stewart is in direct opposition to that stereotype by capitalistic virtue of being one of the most successful businesswomen in history. Monetizing reproductive labor in a manner that few women actually performing it in their day-to-day lives can. Madonna, then, is her polar opposite—the “whore” (yes, it’s ironic considering her name) on the two-sided spectrum of things that women can “be” in the eyes of men. Who still dictate what we digest via media outlets like Sports Illustrated. And, like Stewart, she is one of the most successful businesswomen ever to have existed. Except what she’s selling is not “home and hearth” (even if she did appear on the cover of Good Housekeeping back in 2000, not to mention a cover for Ladies’ Home Journal in 2005).
Though she did attempt to for about a five-year period during her eight-year marriage in the 00s. Indeed, while married to Guy Ritchie, Madonna did have something of her “Martha Stewart phase,” catering to tropes about being “the missus” and “the Guv’nor’s wife” and “Mrs. Ritchie” as she moved to the English countryside and dabbled in writing children’s books before soon restoring herself to her original hyper-sexual form after the divorce (see: the W magazine cover that immediately followed: “Blame It On Rio,” in which she was featured “canoodling” with her brand-new, barely-clothed boytoy, Jesus Luz, among other men with anti-British bodies). In the end, Madonna perhaps realized that she couldn’t sell conventional domestic life with conviction, which is why she’s done her own version of it by being both “mother and father” to her brood of six children, three of which (Mercy, Stella and Estere) were adopted from Malawi after her divorce from Ritchie.
Stewart flies more under the radar for her unconventional femininity, also having divorced her husband, Andrew Stewart (whose last name would prove invaluable to Martha), long before her empire reached its apex. Even so, that she’s dated so minimally (with Anthony Hopkins and Charles Simonyi being about the extent of her romantic past) since the divorce has undeniably helped fortify her “homey” image. A virtuous nun worshipping at the altar of homemaking and entertaining.
In May of 1995, Stewart was heralded by New York Magazine as “the definitive American woman of our time.” That hasn’t really changed, despite the illusion of the alleged changing face of the domestic sphere. One that hasn’t gone much beyond the “progressiveness” of a movie like Mr. Mom in 1983 (side note: “Mr. Mom” only conceded to step into that role because he lost his breadwinning job). With Stewart’s Sports Illustrated cover, it is encouraging that women are being shown (in a rare instance of patriarchal weakness) that it’s possible (with enough money) to be “sexy at any age.” But, by the same token, it’s not comforting to realize that the reason this is being conceded to is because the underlying message remains the same as it always has: so long as you’re the “right” kind of woman, who has long advocated for the “right” kind of values, you’ll be embraced.
