In the film Tootsie, what good does it do <PERSON> to disclose on-the-air that he is a man?
In the 1982 film Tootsie, the actor <PERSON> portrayed a character who is also an actor, <PERSON>. <PERSON> pretends to be a woman ("<PERSON>") in order to land the role of a female character in a soap opera. The trick works, and the character becomes an accepted part of the soap opera.
But eventually <PERSON> wants to tell everyone the truth and quit the soap opera. Various reasons are given for him to maintain the charade. His manager suggests that the disclosure would create problems for them in terms of business or in terms of legal liability. 378
And <PERSON> worries that his friend who auditioned for the same soap opera role unsuccessfully (despite being an actual woman) will be crushed to learn that he got the role, and a man who has proposed marriage to "<PERSON>" will be humiliated.
One day the cast of the soap opera are informed that part of the recording of the next episode has been damaged, and they will have to play a scene on live television. During this live performance, <PERSON>'s female character on the soap opera goes off script and delivers a long, strange story about her past, which somehow comes to <PERSON>'s removing his wig and female makeup, revealing during a live television broadcast that he is a man.
It seems like the film thinks that something is clever about this choice, but I cannot figure out what it is. It seems to be no better for the soap opera, which might have wanted to hide the facts about <PERSON> (and which is now by the way apparently forced to follow that live portion with the tape in which his character is still a woman). All of the problems identified earlier in the film -- bad business, legal liability and hurt feelings -- all seem as bad as ever.
I feel like it's acceptable within the film to see it as an unreasonable choice by <PERSON>, who is under enormous pressure and just cannot maintain the lies any longer. But is there really no logical reason at all why he shouldn't have just stopped showing up at work, or told everyone the truth while off-camera? 295