NY Times Writer Laments Lack of 'Choice' in 'Knocked Up'

Mireya Navarro of The New York Times took 32 paragraphs in her June 10 Fashion & Style section article to tell you what I'm about to in one sentence. (h/t Clay Waters of NB sister publication TimesWatch)

Liberal Hollywood doesn't feature women having abortions in TV and movies very often because it's bad to alienate a sizable chunk, if not an outright majority, of your audience who are pro-life.

Of course, you can't fault Hollywood for being pro-choice where it counts to them most. Choosing plotlines and conventional stories that boost the bottom line. That is, unless you're an artiste who is forever battling the crass capitalistic forces of banality, like say, Christopher Keyser. You know, the cinematic Michelangelo that gave us the late-1990s Fox drama 'Party of Five.' Navarro thought it important that we hear from him and other liberals in the industry who lament this one area where Hollywood remains mostly conservative, if only because they feel the heat rather than see the light.

Keyser complained to Navarro that the Fox network nixed one 'Party' plotline where a 16-year-old character was going to have an abortion. Instead the network prevailed on the show's writers to have the character "miscarry before she goes in for the procedure," for fear of sponsors pulling their commercial spots.

"It was a cop-out... It was an attempt to avoid the issue but it was the best we could figure out under the circumstances," Keyser told Navarro.

And if it wasn't enough to indulge us with the fine whine of Navarro and other filmmakers, Navarro couldn't help but adhere clumsily to the left-wing lexicon as she described how some conservatives are celebrating the movie.:

Many conservative bloggers have claimed "Knocked Up" as an anti-choice movie, in part because the movie never presents abortion as a serious option.

I'm still scratching my head as to how a film about a woman making and sticking to a choice -- for life -- is an "anti-choice" movie.

Related post by Warner Todd Huston here.