This is not the time to attack Kim Cattrall. The poor woman is grieving and lashing out. She’s just lost her little brother.
It’s understandable that she’s not thinking clearly. No one would be, when they’ve just experienced a loss like that. But her very public comments to her Sex And The City co-star Sarah Jessica Parker have set off a huge media storm that isn’t good for her, or Parker, or women in general.
Rumours about the feud between Cattrall and Parker began nearly two decades ago, around the time SATC premiered.
Listen: The Mamamia Out Loud team talk about what working with women is really like. (Post continues.)
It was claimed that Parker was jealous of Cattrall, and Cattrall found herself on the outer. The rumours continued for years, through the production of the two movies, and the decision not to go ahead with a third.
Then, earlier this month, when Cattrall’s younger brother Chris was found dead after disappearing from his home in Canada, things exploded.
When Parker expressed her sympathy on Instagram, Cattrall gave her a blast, finishing with, “You are not my friend. So I’m writing to tell you one last time to stop exploiting our tragedy in order to restore your ‘nice girl’ persona.”
Media outlets gleefully leapt on Cattrall’s comments. With almost no consideration for the fact that Cattrall had just suffered a terrible tragedy, they blew the story up. Other actors were asked to take sides.
Us magazine turned it into “Team SJP or Team Kim”, putting Parker’s former co-star Dean Winters on the spot at the Writers’ Guild Awards on Sunday.
“I mean, [I’m] always Team Sarah,” Winters said. “I’ve known Sarah for 25 years. Look, whatever’s going on, I don’t give a f—k.”
Watch: Kim Cattrall tells Piers Morgan about her and her co-stars’ relationship. (Post continues.)
Why are we so obsessed with women fighting? Why don’t we ever hear stories about male co-stars and their feelings for each other? No doubt, with all those egos, there are plenty of on-set clashes.
But as Parker herself pointed out in a 2016 interview with Howard Stern, the men of The Sopranos were never asked if they all got along.
“No one ever said to them, ‘Did you hang out this weekend with each other? Did you give each other Christmas presents?’” she said.
To search for signs of friction between women, and invent them if they don’t exist… that doesn’t help women. It just reinforces the idea that women are shallow and catty and spend their time bitching, while men simply get on with the job.
This shouldn’t be the legacy of a series about female friendship and sexual empowerment. Sex And The City, and what it stood for, is more important than any behind-the-scenes tension.
There shouldn’t be a Team SJP and a Team Kim. Right now, there is a woman who, we have to assume, was genuinely offering her sympathy, and a grieving woman who said something she may well already be regretting.
Let’s be like Dean Winters and do our best not to “give a f—k” about whatever’s going on. Because, honestly, it’s not helping anyone.
Listen to the full episode of Mamamia Out Loud here or download from your favourite podcast app.