It seems that most Fairfield students are missing one show in their weekly TV schedule: Ugly Betty.
Produced by Salma Hayek and based on a Columbian telenovela entitled “Yo Soy Betty La Fea,” “Ugly Betty” won the Golden Globe for Best Musical or Comedy Series- beating out both “Desperate Housewives” and “The Office.”
America Ferrera, best known for her role in the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, won the Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Comedy or Musical Series for her role of Betty Suarez, the brace-faced, be-spectacled heroine who aspires to work in the magazine industry.
The titular character, Betty, is truly a fish out of water at the Vogue-ish fashion magazine “Mode,” where everyone is slim and fashion-obsessed, except of course, her. Episodic motifs usually involve her coming out on top of any situation, even though fellow workers, especially Marc and Amanda, two highly fashionable assistants who love their jobs, typically patronize her.
The plot revolves around how Betty quickly lands a job at “Mode” as the assistant to editor-in-chief, Daniel Meade, a New York playboy who was recently given the position despite his lack of qualifications by Bradford Meade, the President of Meade Publications and Daniel’s father. Bradford hires Betty as Daniel’s secretary because she is one of the few women in New York who Daniel will not sleep with.
All of “Mode” is hesitant to accept this new editor-in-chief, especially Creative Director, Wilhelmina Slater (Vanessa Williams). Upon the death of the former editor-in-chief, Wilhelmina seemed like the obvious candidate for the vacated position, so when Daniel landed the job instead, it was a snub noticed far and wide across the fashion world. It is no mistake to the viewer that Wilhelmina definitely has something up her couture sleeves, as she regularly conducts meetings with a masked women discussing their plans to take over Meade Publications.
Also integral to the plot of comedy are Betty’s family in Queens, who Betty can’t help take responsibility for. This includes her father, Ignacio, sister, Hilda, and nephew, Justin. The viewer cannot help but notice how close the family is, despite Betty’s constant absence due to her job.
Notable recent guest stars include Rebecca Romijn and executive producer, Salma Hayek, who commented that it was such a struggle to find a suitable actress for the part of Sofia Reyes, that she eventually decided it would be fun for her to step in front of the camera in her own show. Her character appears at Meade Publications as a new editor who not only attracts Daniel’s attention, but changes him as a person.
“Ugly Betty” premiered not long after “The Devil Wears Prada” left theaters, and the plot is not far from that of “Prada.” The main difference separating the two is that while Andie from Prada gets a makeover and is changed by her experience, Betty works at Mode unchanged and never gets jaded. The viewer can enjoy the same cattiness and divalicious editors they found in “Prada” but now on a weekly basis.
To catch up on old episodes of “Ugly Betty,” head to www.abc.go.com and launch the episode viewer which has the entire series available online.
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