Opposites often attract in the best of friendships, and that’s true of the sweeping story of Tully Hart (Katherine Heigl) and Kate Mularkey (Sarah Chalke) in the Netflix series “Firefly Lane,” adapted from the bestselling novel by Kristin Hannah. . Not only do Kate and Tully admire each other’s personalities, but the way they choose to live their lives on the road also complements the two supposed “halves” of adult womanhood.
Like Hannah’s novel, Season 2 Part 1 of the Netflix show continues to detail the three different timelines of the main female friendships it ties together. The two younger actresses portray teenage versions of Tully (Ali Skovby) and Kate (Roan Curtis) when they first meet in the seventies, but their bond extends into the future to the new millennium 2000.
Series creator Maggie Friedman told TheWrap, “We live in a very ageist culture, it seems like women don’t matter past a certain age or we become invisible, or people don’t want to tell our stories. Huh.” “I think it’s really important to show women of all ages. Here are these women in midlife who are vibrant, and they have a lot to say, and their lives are interesting, and they’re sexy, and their Life doesn’t end at 40. I feel like we don’t see that enough on screen. So it’s really important to me to reflect the real experience of women, frankly, women in their 40s are awesome And they should be seen more on screen.
From early childhood, both girls show an inclination toward different “sides” of womanhood—not so much a black-and-white binary of motherhood or choosing a career. Kate comes from a stable, loving family while Tully raised herself and her mother the other way around instead.
“The thing that initially attracted them is how different they are. Tully seems to have the courage and charisma that Kate desires, and Kate has the family and grounded life that Tully desires,” Friedman says. “They have each other, even as they grow in different directions. hold tightly to and want such different things.
Hannah’s book highlights these stark differences in friends, and the author relates more to Kate, whose character mirrors both her and her mother.
,[As] A writer, I had this kind of rare world where I was a stay at home mom, and a working mom at the same time, because I was able to work completely from home at the time I wanted to, and I It was needed, Hannah told TheWrap. “My mom was a stay-at-home mom, and this book was a love letter to my mom. It was kind of a thing, so it was very important to me to show this dynamic at home, mom, your choices are judged.” And you can often reach a point in your life where you feel you haven’t done enough, versus, you know, a working woman can totally unleash her ambition, achieve a lot But it can also get to a point where ‘you wonder if this is all.'”
Tully’s career ambitions do not fully satisfy her loneliness without a romantic life partner or children, and Kate struggles to return to creative writing after devoting most of her time to raising Marah.
“I think it was important for me to say to women, it’s all about what you want. At the end of the day nobody feels like they did everything right,” Hannah continued. “You’re always feeling as a woman like you didn’t do enough on any front. And I just wanted to celebrate the two choices that women make and show that they’re both so important. It’s really It is up to women to decide what they want to do for themselves, not in response to societal pressure.
The historical context of the book and show reflects how freedom of choice expanded for young women at the turn of the century.
Friedman said, “The interesting thing is that both Kate and Tully are in a generation where you had to choose one or the other, and now it’s different.” “We’re very open-minded about ‘women can do a lot.’ But you know, they were both born in the early sixties, when it was like, I mean, they kind of came of age in second wave feminism, when you can have a career, but still feel like You can either have a career or be a mother. They both chose their path, and I think Tully is conflicted about the idea of being a wife and mother anyway for a number of reasons, but I think They each get – even though they’ve chosen these different paths – they each get what the other is going through in a unique way, and can depend on each other. I think it’s kind of easy because they both chose different paths, that they complement each other.
In Hannah’s book, Kate’s time as a stay at home mom is extended when she becomes pregnant with twin boys. Book Kate doesn’t get much time to write novels for many reasons. In the show, Kate does journalism with Tully, but she still edits with a more laid-back attitude than Tully, knowing deep down that she wants to be a mother. The book version of Kate often worries about making Tully work instead of pursuing her true desire.
“For Kate, it started with, ‘Okay, this is what I want to do, and this is the path I’m going to go,’ and then a big part of it was like, ‘Actually I just I want to be a mom. I think it took a while for her to really recognize that and feel okay about making that choice,” Chalke told TheWrap. “And then obviously, down the road, once Marah is starting to be a teenager and she’s ready to reintroduce that kind of [writing career] aspect of his life. I love how the first season portrayed that it’s not simple, you don’t just go back where you left off, and the sacrifices women make and how to balance trying and trying and really I come inside. Touch up with what you want. I loved that the show really covered all sides of it with Kate and Tully.
While Tully has a few romantic nuggets in Hannah’s novel, none of them measure up to her almost-relationship on the show – currently with Max (Jon-Michael Acker) and in the past with Danny Diaz (Ignacio Serricchio) – Where she really thinks about true love. Tully’s fractious relationship with her mother, Claude, plays a part in eroding her faith in fate, true love, and motherhood.
“For me personally, we’ve been told we can do it all, and I believed that quite honestly. I thought they meant it all at once,” Heigl told TheWrap. “You can’t have it all at once, you’re essentially compromising and sacrificing your career or your family. You can’t do both at the same time and do both well.” I just know for myself, because I’ve asked myself this a lot as my kids were little and growing up. ‘Can I just be one or the other?’ I could never choose the career I want, but I also know that if I’m honestly dying, I couldn’t just choose to work at home and be a mother. If I had done that, my A piece would have been completely repressed, and if I had been like Tully and chosen career above everything else, a very large part of my soul would never have been illuminated, so there is no black and white answer. To that one
Factoring in abortion, Roan Curtis, who portrays the young version of Kate, links the juxtaposition displayed by the two women to present day events for young women everywhere.
“We look at both sides of it in very different ways and there are feelings of regret or curiosity about what might have happened if she had chosen the other thing and I think a lot of you know, a lot of gray areas.” Between Tully where she’s so career-oriented and where Kate is where she stays home and she’s got a baby and that’s been her whole life,” she said. “Personally, I think it’s so deeply unfair that as women, we often have to choose. Being in this industry where our bodies are our tools, it’s something I’ve thought about in my I mean, I’m 26 years old and I think it’s something where I’m about to come that will factor into every decision I make both professionally and personally.
“I think it’s very unfair and it’s a sign of the patriarchal system that we live in, but I really hope and I think it gets better as we go forward and something like Netflix Companies are getting better about supporting women and the choices they make,” Curtis continued. “So hopefully, it’s a choice we don’t have to make now, but I also think it’s important to respect both sides of it. I know there’s a lot of judgment about women who choose not to have children.” choices, and and I think our show does a great job of taking a very non-judgmental look at that choice and respects that choice and knows that it’s not for everyone and that It doesn’t have to be and that your life can be deeply fulfilling regardless of which side, even if you choose not to have children, is no good for us women.
‘Firefly Lane’ Season 2 Part 1 is now streaming on Netflix.