Move over, Jeremy Clarkson. TV is now ruled by the ‘Mama drama’
She is quirky or ethereal but attractive. Stylish in her own way. Slim. Always. With loyal, ethnically diverse friends, a handsome spouse – and, ideally, a kitchen island the size of Madagascar. But from the moment those opening credits roll we instinctively know her picture-perfect life overlooking the bay, in that smart executive cul-de-sac or the double-fronted Victorian villa is about to come crashing down around her drop-pearl ears.
Welcome to the world of Mama drama, the genre that unashamedly aims for the mums’ market by way of a counterbalance to the Dad TV staples of Jeremy Clarkson, Jack Reacher, Yellowstone and Mortimer and Whitehouse: Gone Fishing. Over on the distaff side we have the likes of high net-worth divorce drama The Split, Big Little Lies and anything by Harlan Coben.
Annette Bening as an errant matriarch in Apples Never Fall? Mama drama. Keri Russell as The Diplomat? Mama drama. Suranne Jones playing a wronged wife in Dr Foster, a whip-smart detective lady-bossing a submarine crew in Vigil or the UK Prime Minister in the new Netflix series The Choice? Mama drama. She’s pretty much the poster girl, dammit.
Recollections may vary but as far as I recall, in the beginning was Desperate Housewives, way back in 2004. Here was a deep dive into a very different America from the identikit cop shows and mean street narratives, set on picture-perfect Wisteria Drive where we were offered a tantalising glimpse into the beautiful people’s shiny lives – and the dark lies that propped them up.
It proved to be a game-changer; the first series drew in four million viewers on Channel Four with a further one million on E4. And although ratings tailed off for subsequent seasons, it continued to be the sine qua non of water cooler conversation in offices the length and breadth of the country. These days it’s just as likely to be coffee shops and WhatsApp groups where midlife, middle-class women gather to extol the aesthetic virtues and hedonistic vices of The White Lotus or Little Fires Everywhere.
Incidentally, I use (neologise) the term Mama drama advisedly; what constitutes edge-of-the-sofa action is very much in the eye and arguably gender of the beholder. My husband’s idea of drama is the 101st Airborne Division getting their limbs blown off in Band of Brothers. Mine is when high flying architect Morven Christie gets usurped by her devious maternity cover Vicky McClure in The Replacement or any show in which the female protagonist discovers her new best friend has been secretly hanging out with her old best friend – and they are planning a spa day. No blood is shed but by God it runs colder than a double helping of Scandi trailblazer The Killing.
We women prefer our carnage to be emotional, rather than physical. I’ll take familial strife and the battle of the sexes over gangland violence every time. After all, who needs snoring boring car chases and yet another CGI explosion when you can have Suranne silencing the baddies with a single razor-sharp look of reproof? It may be a generalisation but female viewers and certainly this female viewer tend to be gripped by the domestic frontline; the salvos shot across the breakfast bar, the secretive teenagers edging close to disaster, the frenemies exchanging exquisitely hurtful barbs round the dinner table.
A quick straw poll of my own circle reveals the definition of Mama drama is anything with a “strong matriarch, ideally a wedding, too much booze, and a few terrible secrets competing to be uncovered”. Then, of course, there’s the frocks and shocks sub-genre. “Who doesn’t love period Mama drama?” one friend asks rhetorically. “The whole concept has been reinvented by Bridgerton with the eye candy men, the high production values, the lavish colour coordinated costumes and interiors. Not forgetting the music – Taylor Swift pop given a classical makeover, the passion and, obviously, the sex.”
But you can’t roll any old historical series into this; Mary and George makes the cut thanks to Julianne Moore but The Winter King does not. Too many sharp objects, not enough Mama. Oh and by the way Mama drama often contains far more naked flesh than Dad TV: let’s just say sales of Prosecco will peak once the Jilly Cooper adaptation of Rivals starts screening on Disney +.
In the interim there’s reality Mama drama to keep us going. I put the Married at First Sight franchise right up at the apex. It’s shamelessly voyeuristic stuff – parties, booze, extraordinary clothes, hierarchies – with a dollop of female wit and genuine jeopardy that elevates it above other reality shows. Plus, despite living in an age of po-faced inclusiveness we’re still allowed to relentlessly mock Australians for being awful, which makes the current series of MAFS Australia a really quite cathartic must-watch. Spoiler alert; no good ever comes of a groom sporting a man bun. Yes it’s cheap TV masquerading as a serious social experiment, but it’s also an anthropological rollercoaster.
People are fascinated by people hence I can’t resist any sort of psychological thriller, which explains my soft spot for Harlan Coben. Sure, I have friends who take gleeful pleasure in pointing out the inconsistencies but I find myself willingly swept up into these fictional worlds. To question their internal logic (or indeed its absence) is on a par with trying to winkle out how illusionists make passenger planes disappear, which is to say mean-spirited and spoils the enjoyment of everyone else. I believe because I want to, not because it makes sense.
While we’re on the subject of sense and common senses, there is, inevitably, a certain crossover between pink and blue telly, whether by intent or default. The clue is when your other half gets up to go up the loo; if he isn’t bothered about you pausing the programme, chances are it’s more your bag than his. And vice versa.
Ultimately, mothers like me post wine o’clock (as we were once allowed to call it) want escapism rather than grit, Louis Poulsen lights and gravel driveways. A boot room. The walls may be spattered with blood but the paintwork is definitely Little Greene – ‘Putti’, I think. Death is par for the course but it’s no reason for standards to drop. We very much do not want hopelessness, ugly furniture or anything that smacks of the cost of living crisis.
So what have we got to look forward to? I, for one, am excited about the forthcoming series The Perfect Couple starring obligatory Mama drama doyenne Nicole Kidman. Here, she plays a disapproving matriarch (tick!) reluctantly presiding over a family wedding (tick!) when a body is discovered (triple whammy!).
I don’t know about you but I’m already visualising the designer neutrals, the clapboard summer house by the lake, the seemingly unassailable fortress of country club privilege rocked to the core by a slew of appalling revelations. How terrible. How tremendous. How Mama drama.
