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One of the most well known female characters on television (or Netflix) today is Claire Underwood (Robin Wright) on House of Cards, the cold-blooded and inspiring wife to the President of the United States Frank Underwood (Kevin Spacey). Claire is ruthless when she needs to be, although she is often seen as the more sensitive half to the dynamic duo that rules the free world; but by no means is the first lady any less ambitous than her commander-in-chief counterpart. Since season 1 Claire has been both the head of an internationally recognized non-profit organization and the U.N. diplomat to the white house. While those are two high powered and impressive positions it is easy to feel shadowed when your husband is the President, especially when he is the one who got you the U.N. dipolmat job in the first place. So by the end of season 3 Claire feels that she didn’t get all she deserved when Frank became President (particulary with all she had to sacrfice for that to happen) and decides that she needs to make her own way. Claire is an excellent example of a female character with a traditional role of power. Not a woman who is powerful (in her attributes) which Claire definetly is, but simply a woman who holds a high level or saught after proffesional or beaurocratic position.

When searching for female film or television characters who have held traditional roles of power one can not venture too far back in time or they will find no examples at all. One early, and well known example, of this would be Elizabeth Taylor in Cleopatra. But like Cleopatra herself, this was an exceptional case. This seems to have started a trend of women only playing high powered roles when the role is a biopic of one of the few woman in history who did have power. Some examples being Judi Dench and Emily Blunt playing Queen Victoria, Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett playing Queen Elizabeth I, Helen Mirren playing Queen Elizabeth II, Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher, Katherine Hepburn and Glenn Close as Eleanor of Aquitane, and Sigourney Weaver as Isabella I of Castille to name most of them. It makes sense why barely any woman have played the President. Wikipedia actaully has a seperate list for actresses who have played Presidents becasue there are so few of them. One example would be Polly Bergan in Kisses for My President in which President Leslie McCloud realizes she isn’t spending enough time with her family so she resigns her position as President to become a housewife.

Only in the past decade or so have women really started playing traditional roles of power just because, not only to be Maria Theresa of Austria. Although many of these roles seem to follow the careers of certain actors (some of whom are mentioned above), Meryl Streep playing Miranda Priestly is probably one of the most famous, but Meryl has also played the Chief Elder in the recent film The Giver and, as previously mentioned, was Margaret Thatcher. Judi Dench’s portrayal of M in the recent James Bond films, Helen Mirren’s voice acting as Dean Hardscrabble in the recent pixar film Monster’s University, as well as Cate Blanchett’s depiction of Galdarial in the Lord of the Ring’s franchise are all example of women who seem to get far more these types of roles than most other actresses. Although this fact is much different in the realm of comedy.

The recent Rom-Com trend follows in the footsteps of Knocked Up where the high powered career focused woman somehow falls for, or breaks up with, or looks in the direction of a fun loving, but unambitous loser (or scrub as TLC woud say). These roles have been filled by the likes of Katherine Heigl, to Elizabeth Banks, to Kristen Bell, but these characters are often only used a foil to their male counterparts.