This shows the passion of his character as it relates to how much in love he is with his wife. Just to even suspect he has to deal with another man having his wife drives him crazy. It would drive any man crazy who truly loves his wife. It didn't have to be Peck! It could have been any man!
No, it revealed Raymond's stupidity. A good husband, no matter how much he loves his wife, will not hit her and make a stupid scene in the restaurant. Sure, it's upsetting to think of your spouse making out with someone else, esp. someone who you dislike. But if Raymond had exercise self-control and maybe talked to her in private about it and maybe they had their argument in private and he'd not resorted to childishly hitting her, he'd have shown a deeper love for his wife. Also, Raymond may have made things worse by killing Peck; I'd think he'd end up in jail.
If anyone was the hero of this story and movie, it was Amy Wallace. Amy went thru just as much crap as Raymond (being a lesbian in a homophobic world and a woman in a still-sexist male-dominated occupation is no Club Med vacation), but did not use that as an excuse to act stupid or go flying into dumb, childish rages and throwing chairs.
Even when Amy overhears Kathleen screaming and carrying on and accusing her of being Raymond's "f&&cking girlfriend" , she doesn't use that as an excuse to attack Kathleen or to act stupid; she's profoundly embarrassed by what she overhears, but keeps her dignity and talks to Raymond about business as if nothing happened, although I'm sure she wanted to sink into a hole in that scene.
Later on, she actually meets Kathleen and is warm and very polite and graciously smiles at Kathleen and greets her as if she'd heard none of Kathleen's screaming fit; someone of lesser character and class would have acted all cold or make some snotty crack about the screaming match...but Amy doesn't do any of that, which illustrates that she's much more mature than most of the other characters.
Amy also showed dignity in calmly handling Raymond's tantrums; when Raymond bangs the chair on the floor and breaks it in one of his immature tantrums, Amy stays calm (although inside, she must have been frightened and her heart must have been going five hundred miles a minute), ignores it and carries on with her business.
I say Amy Wallace was the real hero of the story, much more than Raymond ever was.
Roseanne + Jackie forever
reply
share