Great Character: Sally Albright (“When Harry Met Sally”)
The Great Character theme for the month: Women Written by Women. Today: Sally Albright from the 1989 movie When Harry Met Sally, written by Nora Ephron.
The late, great New York City screenwriter, director and producer Nora Ephron has thrust plenty of intriguing female protagonists onto the big screen with her long-stretching, dynamic penmanship. Ephron’s fruitful career bared a prosperous harvest that led to a trio of Academy Award nominations in the Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen category. There was Silkwood with Meryl Streep, Sleepless in Seattle with Tom Hanks and the Rob Reiner-directed, $92,823,546-grossing, 1989 romantic comedy hit When Harry Met Sally starring Billy Crystal as Harry Burns and Meg Ryan as Sally Albright. With Sally we get an ambitious, self-respectful, enthusiastic, loving lady living a life of her own design. But the contrast comes in the form of Sally’s struggle to link with a deserving male counterpart that fits her modern fairy tale of life ever after.
When Harry Met Sally plot summary from IMDB:
Harry and Sally have known each other for years, and are very good friends, but they fear sex would ruin the friendship.
Sally and Harry first meet on an 18-hour car ride from Chicago to New York City, with the sexually experienced Harry already in a relationship and the romantically naive Sally single, but in a relationship with her optimistic future. If opposites do in fact attract, we are made privy to enough differences between Sally and Harry to make some magnetism eventually manifest itself.
Harry’s last name “Burns” gets illustrated with his look-on-the-bad side worldview, contrasted by Sally’s last name “Albright” showcased by her shiny-happy-people persona.
SALLY ALBRIGHT: It’s amazing. You look like a normal person but actually you are the angel of death.
The previous intimacy experience that Harry has and Sally has not puts her in a reluctant pupil position in their friendship. But she fights back, refusing to be schooled by Harry’s point blank blunt proclamations of what “reality” is.
SALLY ALBRIGHT: You say I’m having sex with these men without my knowledge?
When Harry’s persistent projection of his every inner thoughts and feeling begin to free Sally from her rigid, micro-managed and calculated actions and behaviors, she begins to lay out her own desires and beliefs. Her confined cocoon begins to crack and her butterfly begins to flap its willful wings.
SALLY ALBRIGHT: Most women at one time or another have faked it.
Sally’s social freedom even evokes a classic, golden moment of humor by way of a certain series of erotic noises in When Harry Met Sally that has become an iconic signature for the film during its 26 years of pop culture integration.
Sally’s growth from her youthful innocence to her seasoned and halfway jaded evolution gives a layer of grit to Sally’s once “all bright” point of view. Harry helps her realize that some of her assumed happiness has been an illusion.
SALLY ALBRIGHT: How much worse can it get than finishing dinner, having him reach over, pull a hair out of my head and start flossing with it at the table?
The spunk and resistance that we witness in Sally takes on even more shape and size when her plutonic friendship with Harry continues to wobble and weave towards the curiosity of intimacy. The attraction that they both share becomes something to hide and pretend that it doesn’t exist. Harry’s male ego seems to be a motivator for Sally to keep her heart beating privately.
SALLY ALBRIGHT: Harry, you might not believe this, but I never considered not sleeping with you a sacrifice.
When the sexual divide that has kept Sally and Harry as friends, regardless of the primal urges and emotional sparks that have surged between them gets broken, their new afterglow the day after their bedroom activities fades quickly. Sally’s stiff wall of sensual protection from being hurt proves not powerful enough to fake her feelings. She wants more than one night with Harry.
The advantage of Sally’s character is that Nora Ephron gave her strength to be an independent woman who doesn’t rely on men for success, but still sensitive enough to demonstrate a need for true, honest affection. Even when she pushes Harry away because her feelings have been shattered, she is truthful enough with herself to recognize what she really wants.
SALLY ALBRIGHT: You see? That is just like you, Harry. You say things like that, and you make it impossible for me to hate you.
For her self-reliant, go-getter pioneering spirit, for her sharp responses and demand for complete respect and for her warm, tender core that requires some contemporary romance — Sally Albright is one beautifully written GREAT CHARACTER by the successful scribe Nora Ephron.
Sally Albright, one of the most iconic female figures in the history of romantic comedies and many thanks to Jason for sharing this analysis of her character.
A special end note to this week’s Great Character post:
My name is Jason Cuthbert, a GoIntoTheStory.com contributor to GREAT CHARACTERS since June 8th 2012. I’m directing my very first feature length documentary entitled: “COLOURING BOOK: The Mixed Race Documentary” that compares diversity in the United States to Canada, through three generations of my own multicultural family. Academic experts and animated segments will be blended in to enhance the educational value of the core storyline. My team and I are currently raising funds at SeedandSpark.com to finance equipment for “COLOURING BOOK,” as well as future documentaries and scripted narratives. Any support would be incredibly appreciated.
CONTACT INFORMATION:
Website Link: http://www.colouringbook.info
Campaign Link: http://www.seedandspark.com/studio/colouring-book-productions
Jason’s Twitter Handle: @A2Jason
Colouring Book Twitter Handle: @ColouringBk
There are at two damn good reasons to throw some support Jason’s way. First, this looks like a fascinating and worthy documentary. Second, a show of gratitude to Jason for his steadfast contributions to this blog and to the life of the online screenwriting community with his insightful weekly Great Character posts.
To contribute to Colouring Book, go here.