托福阅读：绝不能错过的5部美剧之SATC

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Sex and the City is an American cable television series. The original run of the show was broadcast on HBO from 1998 until 2004, for a total of six seasons.
　　Set in New York City, the show focused on four women, three in their mid-thirties and one in her forties. The quirky drama/comedy had multiple continuing story lines and tackled socially relevant issues such as sexually transmitted diseases, safe sex, and promiscuity. It specifically examined the lives of big-city professional women in the late 1990s and how changing roles and expectations for women affected the characters.
　　The show was primarily filmed at New York City’s Silvercup Studios and on location in and around Manhattan. Since it ended, the show has been aired in syndication on networks such as TBS, WGN, and many other local stations. However, basic cable outlets excise certain explicit show content that was broadcast in the original version.
　　Origins
　　The show was based in part on writer Candace Bushnell’s book of the same name, compiled from her column with the New York Observer. Bushnell has stated in several interviews that the Carrie Bradshaw in her columns is her alter ego; when she wrote the "Sex and the City" essays, she used her own name initially; for privacy reasons, however, she created the character of Carrie Bradshaw, a woman who was also working as a writer and living in New York City. Carrie also has the same initials, which reiterates her connection with Bushnell.[1]
　　Darren Starr, the show’s creator, paid $50,000 to Bushnell for "lock, stock, and barrel" rights to her columns, according to fellow author Toby Young.[2] The show "bears only a passing resemblance to its source material";[2] the columns were "darker and more cynical" than the "gentler" series that Starr produced.[2] According to Sex and the City: Kiss and Tell, by Amy Sohn,[3] Starr wanted to create a show that expressed true adult comedy and sex in an up-front way.

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Plot
　　The narrative of the show focused on Carrie Bradshaw and her three best friends, Miranda Hobbs, Charlotte York and Samantha Jones. The women discussed their sexual desires and fantasies, and their travels in life and love. The show often depicted frank discussions about romance and sexuality, particularly in the context of being a single woman in her mid-thirties. Each episode in season one featured a short montage of interviews of people living in New York City regarding topics discussed in that episode. These continued through season two but were then phased out.
　　Another feature that would eventually be scrapped was Carrie breaking the fourth wall (for example, looking into the camera and speaking to the audience directly in an aside). Bradshaw would question scenarios and ideas, asking the audience for an opinion or insight on different situations. The pilot also had the characters of Miranda and Charlotte as well as a few minor characters speaking directly to the camera/audience. The last such event by Carrie occurs in episode three of the second season, "The Freak Show".
　　The method of expressing inner monologues was shifted exclusively to voiceovers by Carrie in future episodes. Her main narration usually revolved around the premise of that week’s "article", where she summed up her thoughts with, "I couldn’t help but wonder...". As she says that, her computer monitor is shown while she is typing the text of her voiceover.

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Overview of characters
　　Main characters
　　Carrie Bradshaw —— Sarah Jessica Parker
　　She is the narrator of each episode. Each episode is structured around her train of thought while writing her weekly column, "Sex and the City," for the fictitious newspaper the New York Star. A member of the New York glitterati, she is a club/bar/restaurant staple who is known for her unique fashion sense (particularly footwear: Manolo Blahniks to be exact). This is evident in the episode "The Real Me" in season four, when she is asked by Lynne Cameron (played by Margaret Cho) to be in a New York fashion show. She works on her PowerBook in her apartment, writing newspaper articles focusing on the different aspects of a relationship. In later seasons, her essays are collected as a book and she begins taking assignments from Vogue and New York Magazine. Carrie is house-proud; her one-bedroom, rent-controlled apartment is in an Upper East Side brownstone. Carrie is a simple/open-minded girl looking for love, but also having fun in the process. She experiences moments of both happiness in her independence and loneliness, and is probably the most relative to normal everyday females. Most can relate to her. Despite several long-term boyfriends, Carrie is entangled with "Mr. Big" (Chris Noth) in a complicated, multifaceted on-and-off-again kind of relationship.
　　Samantha Jones —— Kim Cattrall
　　She is the oldest and most sexually confident of the foursome. Samantha is an independent businesswoman, with a career in public relations. She is confident, strong, outspoken, and calls herself a "try-sexual" (meaning she’ll try anything once). One of Samantha’s best qualities is her loyalty to her friends. She believes that she has had "hundreds" of soulmates and requires that her sexual partners leave, "an hour after I climax." During the course of the show it is revealed that Samantha’s glamorous, impenetrable facade and dismissive approach to love actually hide a sensitive, caring nature. Samantha has a number of relationships in the show . In Season 6, Samantha’s character further develops when she is suddenly diagnosed with cancer when visiting a plastic surgeon for a breast implant consultation. An operation and chemotherapy challenge Samantha, but she beats cancer and it becomes clear the experience has renewed her with a new perspective on life and love with her most permanent and fulfilling relationship yet, with a younger man, the handsome model/actor, Smith Jerrod. In the movie, Samantha is still in love with Smith, they are living in California, where both of their careers are running fast. She begins to ask herself if a stable relationship is really for her.
　　Charlotte York —— Kristin Davis
　　She works in an art gallery and has had a conventional Connecticut upbringing. She is the most optimistic of the group, the one who places the most emphasis on emotional love as opposed to lust, and is a true romantic; always searching for her "knight in shining armor." She scoffs at the lewder, more libertine antics of her friends (primarily Samantha), presenting a more traditional attitude about relationships, usually based around "the rules" of love and dating. Despite her traditional outlook, she has been known to make concessions (while married) that even surprise her more sexually liberated girlfriends. Charlotte was a "straight A" student who attended Smith College where she was a member of Kappa Kappa Gamma (note that there are no sororities at the real Smith College) majoring in art history with a minor in finance. During the series, it is also revealed that Charlotte was voted homecoming queen, prom queen, "most popular," student body president, track team captain and was active as a cheerleader and teen model. After a long struggle to get pregnant and one miscarriage, Charlotte and her husband adopt a little girl from China and named her Lily, after Charlotte’s favourite flower. In the 2008 movie, Charlotte is still in love with her husband and Lily is now four years old. Unexpectedly, Charlotte discovers that she is pregnant and gives birth to a girl at the end of the movie. The baby is named Rose.
　　She is a career-minded lawyer with extremely cynical views on relationships and men. A Harvard Law School graduate from Philadelphia with two siblings, she is Carrie’s best friend, confidante, and voice of reason. In the early seasons, she is portrayed as masculine and borderline misandric, but this image softens over the years, particularly after she becomes pregnant by her on/off boyfriend, Steve Brady, whom she eventually marries. The birth of her son, Brady Hobbes, brings up new issues for her Type A, workaholic personality, but she soon finds a way to balance career, being single and motherhood. Of the four women, she is the first to purchase her own apartment (across the park from Carrie, on the Upper West Side), and later a home in Brooklyn. In the 2008 movie, Miranda is dealing with the choice of either divorcing Steve or forgiving him after he admits that he has had sex with somebody else outside their marriage.
　　Miranda Hobbes —— Cynthia Nixon
　　Also starring
　　Mr. Big/John Preston —— Chris Noth —— Seasons 1 - 6 + Movie
　　"Mr. Big" (aka Big) is a pseudonym for the charming, attractive, sarcastic, and wealthy love interest for Carrie Bradshaw. He is the reason for many of Carrie’s breakdowns as he never seemed ready to fully commit to Carrie. During the course of the series he marries Natasha, who is ten years younger than Carrie. An affair with Carrie destroys Big’s marriage and Carrie’s relationship with her other major love interest, furniture designer Aidan. In the final episode, Mr. Big realizes that life without Carrie is nothing. He is a big jazz fan and a heavy cigar smoker with plenty of money to burn. His name was not revealed until the end of the series finale.

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Steve Brady —— David Eigenberg —— Seasons 2 - 6 + Movie
　　He is Miranda’s on and off boyfriend throughout the series since he was introduced in the second season. He eventually marries Miranda at the end of Season 6, after they had a child together at the end of Season 4. He is one of the few men on the show meant to counter-balance all the emotionally unstable men encountered throughout the series, as he is a constant and sensitive male character. His alcoholic mother, Mary Brady, played by Anne Meara, is also a prominent recurring character.
　　Aidan Shaw —— Willie Garson —— Seasons 1 - 6 + Movie
　　He is Carrie’s best friend outside of the three women. A gay talent agent from an aristocratic family with a sense of style paralleled only by Carrie’s, viewers receive the impression that they have a long-standing relationship built within their younger, wilder days in the New York City club and bar scene in the 1980s. He had said that they have been friends since Carrie was riding the subways and wearing Candie’s. The only supporting character to receive his own storylines on occasion, Stanford represents the show’s most constant gay point of view to sex on the show, generally based on the physical insecurities and inadequacies of someone who does not "have that gay look." In the last two seasons of the show, he is partnered with Broadway dancer Marcus Adente, however in the movie, he is single. He is sometimes associated with Anthony Marentino, a gay wedding planner, and friend to Charlotte.
　　Smith Jerrod —— Jason Lewis —— Season 6 + Movie
　　He is a young waiter Samantha seduces. She tries to maintain her usual sex-only relationship with him, but he slowly pushes for something more. He is a wannabe actor whose career Samantha jump starts using her PR connections (including changing his name to "Smith Jerrod" from "Jerry Jerrod"), getting him a modeling job that turns into a film role. Just when she thinks Smith’s age and experiences aren’t enough for her, he gives her unconditional support during her fight with breast cancer. In the final episode, Smith flies back from a film set in Canada just to tell her that he loves her, which she counters with "You have meant more to me than any man I’ve ever known," which, for Samantha, is a far greater statement than it might be for anyone else.
　　Harry Goldenblatt —— Evan Handler —— Seasons 5 - 6 + Movie
　　He is Charlotte’s Jewish divorce lawyer who is incredibly attracted to her from the beginning. She is not attracted to him initially, but tries to pursue a sex-only relationship with him, which leads to one of exclusivity and love as opposed to her relationship with Trey, which was reversed in this aspect. After her conversion to Judaism and one big argument that sends them in separate directions for a few weeks, the two marry and begin trying to have/adopt a child. In the end, they are approved for a Chinese adoption and adopt a girl.
　　Aleksandr Petrovsky —— Mikhail Baryshnikov —— Season 6
　　Referred to by Carrie occasionally as "The Russian", he is a famous artist who becomes Carrie’s lover in the final season. He sweeps her off her feet with huge romantic gestures and shows her the foreign pockets of New York that she has never seen before. Her relationship with him brings up all sorts of questions in Carrie’s mind about finding love past "a certain age" and whether or not she wants children. When he’s preparing to return to Paris for a solo exhibit he invites Carrie to come live with him, which, after several deliberations (and one fight) with her friends, she does. After spending some time there, she realizes that he will never reciprocate the level of emotional involvement that she offers because his life and career will always come first.

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Episodes
　　The series was divided up into six seasons altogether. The first season was twelve episodes (two discs of 6), the second season was eighteen episodes (three discs of 6), and the third season was eighteen episodes (three discs of 6). Then the fourth season was eighteen episodes (three discs of 6), the fifth season was eight episodes (two discs of four), and the final season was twenty episodes. In total, there were 94 episodes of Sex and the City.
　　Viewer response and impact
　　Sex and the City premiered on HBO, June 6, 1998, and was one of the highest-rated sitcoms of the season, and the last original episode aired on February 22, 2004.
　　The show became well known and lauded for its frank dialogue about women and sex. An unlikely supporter of the show is author Orson Scott Card. Card stated that although the crudity of the series left him numb, the show contained some of the best writing on television.[4]
　　However, the characters have been criticized for being shallow, superficial, and self-absorbed.[5]
　　Criticism
　　Sex and the City has been analyzed by feminists both as an example of progress in women’s rights and life options, and as an example of the effects of corporate culture, marketing and the more individualistic strands of feminism in presenting women’s empowerment as mainly tied to achieving coupledom, beauty, and personal upward mobility, rather than collective organisation for progressive change.[6]

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Films
　　A feature film based on Sex and the City, written produced and directed by Michael Patrick King, has been produced.[7][8][9] The film originally was slated for production near the end of the broadcast series run in 2004, but the movie deal fell through at that time. Multiple press reports at the time indicated a personal dispute between Parker and Cattrall, as well as Cattrall’s refusal to sign a contract for the film at a pay scale considerably less than Parker’s.[10]
　　Michael Patrick King wrote and directed, and the four lead actresses returned to reprise their roles, and Chris North signed to reprise his role as "Mr. Big." In addition, Oscar-winner Jennifer Hudson appears in the film as Carrie’s assistant. New Line Cinema disributed the film, and New Line president of production Toby Emmerich, Richard Brenner and Kathy Busby oversaw the project. Parker and John Melfi produced. Filming started on September 19, 2007 in New York City.[9][11][12]
　　The plot of the film revolves around the lives of the four main characters, four years after the time frame of the finale of the HBO series.[11]
　　Evan Handler, David Eigenberg, Jason Lewis, and Willie Garson reprise their roles.
　　Filming of the Sex and the City movie was completed early December 2007.[13]
　　The film’s world premiere was in London’s Leicester Square in early May 2008. The film was released on May 28, 2008 in the U.K. and was released May 30, 2008 in the US with an unprecedented $55.7 million three-day gross. The debut made Sex and the City the top-opening R-rated romantic comedy of all time.[14]
　　In November 2008, Cattrall confirmed that a second movie was in the works and is expected to begin filming in August 2009.[15] It was confirmed in January 2009 that all four leading ladies had committed to a sequel and would be commanding higher salaries for the second film.[16]