Screenwriting blog-a-thon: Boo You Whore and Other High School Observations in Tina Fey's "Mean Girls"

When I decided to do this Blog-a-thon, I had some trouble coming up with the perfect screenplay to talk about. Some of my personal favorites are ones that almost everyone loves and would probably be discussed better than I could (Annie Hall, Network, Sunset Boulevard) while other screenplays aren't that great on paper and are improved upon on screen (Bringing Up Baby, Duck Soup). So, I decided to focus on a newer screenplay that I rightly consider the best (so far) of this decade:

Tina Fey's wise, observant and painfully hilarious adaptation of Rosalind Wiseman's non-fiction Queen Bees and Wannabes entitled Mean Girls. I know this isn't a conventional choice, but just go with me on this. Throughout the entire script of Mean Girls, Tina Fey captures the subtleties of surviving high school while never losing her edge and wit. While the film is extreme in some ways (the Burn Book fight in the hallway), it's the only film about high school that I can look at and see my high school experience in (Clueless was brilliant but way too upper-class and The Breakfast Club is a pure fantasy). Plus, Tina Fey's hilarious anarchaic writing style is the one I want to imitate most.

Since I believe that Tina Fey’s dialogue is the most important aspect to the success of Mean Girls, I am going to go through some of the best quotes in the film and describe their relation to the film and to the real world.

CHIP: Hey, how was school?
CADY: Fine.
BETSY: Were people nice?
CADY: No.
CHIP: Did you make any friends?
CADY: Yes.

I think is one of the most intelligent quotes in the entire movie. After only one day, Cady quickly realizes that high school is a combat zone and it’s natural order is not to be fucked with. No one really likes each other, but everyone is forced to join some clique in order to survive the ordeal (I myself was in the non-sexually active band nerds). Everyone has their own place and it’s very hard to go from one clique to another.

COACH CARR: Don't have sex, because you will get pregnant and die! Don't have sex in the missionary position, don't have sex standing up, just don't do it, OK, promise? OK, now everybody take some rubbers.

Anybody who has gone to high school in the past five years understands this paradox. Teachers are only supposed to teach abstinence-only education and try to scare teens away from sex by frightening them with STDs and pregnancy (I once even had a “Save Sex for Marriage” program at my school that my mother was appalled by), but then hand out condoms and show how to use them. That Tina Fey decided to include this little scene shows that she understands what is going on schools today.

KAREN: I can’t go out. [fake cough] I’m sick.
REGINA: Boo you whore.

GRETCHEN: That is so fetch!
REGINA: Gretchen, stop trying to make fetch happen! It’s not going to happen!

Every school has a Regina George. She’s the bitch whom everyone despises and fears at the same time. She’s the kind of a girl who would kick her parents out of the master bedroom because she wanted it. She manipulates those around her to do what she wants and follow everything she does. Regina is the ultimate diva bitch, but like Meryl Streep’s Miranda Priestly, we see her vulnerable side for a brief moment (in the cafeteria when she admits that her sweatpants are the only ones that fit) and it adds so much to her character.

MR. DUVALL: Well, I just wanted to let everyone know that we have a new student joining us. She just moved here all the way from Africa.
MS. NORBURY: [to black girl] Welcome!
MICHIGAN GIRL: I'm from Michigan!
MS. NORBURY: Great!

I just think this is the funniest part in the movie. Ms. Norbury simply assumes that the black girl in the class is from Africa and totally makes an ass out of herself without breaking a sweat. The moment goes by so quickly, but it’s just one of the many tiny, brilliant moments that add up to make Mean Girls so different from the average high school movie.

CADY: And they have this book, this burn book, where they write mean things about all the girls in our grade. JANIS: What does it say about me? CADY: You're not in it.
JANIS: Those bitches!

This is an extremely interesting circumstance that I can relate with Janis on. She knows that it’s not good to be made fun of by The Plastics, but the minute she finds out that they don’t even mention her in the Burn Book (when everyone else is) Janis lashes out at them. I know I would rather be hated by someone than be totally ignored by them (I even think it’s funny when someone hates me because it’s often for the stupidest reasons).