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The Womanizing of Mark Antony: Virile Ruthlessness and Redemptive Cross-Dressing in Rome, Season Two

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The Womanizing of Mark Antony: Virile Ruthlessness and Redemptive Cross-Dressing in Rome, Season Two THE WOMANIZING OF MARK ANTONY: VIRILE RUTHLESSNESS AND REDEMPTIVE CROSS-DRESSING IN ROME, SEASON TWO Margaret M. Toscano This essay explores the way Roman masculinity functions as a signifier for imperial potency and domination, vulnerability, and loss, in Season Two of the acclaimed HBO-BBC series Rome. I argue that the development of the character of Mark Antony is pivotal for understanding how gender and sex are used as metaphors for the movement of power and redemption within the story. After the death of Julius Caesar, the eternal city erupts into mad chaos and a ruthless grab for power. Only those with steel nerves and blades can survive in this environment. Raw, masculine strength is needed to take control. What is respected in this context fits with tradi- tional Roman notions of maleness – the ideal of the strong, “invincible warrior,” who penetrates with but is not penetrated by his sword and his penis.1 Softness and vulnerability are not just despised as womanly; they presage the loss of empire. In her essay, “Spectacle of Sex: Bodies on Display in Rome,” Stacie Raucci argues that what is original about the way sexuality is treated in Season One of the HBO-BBC series is the way “the virtue and strength of men are contingent upon sexual prowess, and their arena is the bedroom, not just the battlefield.”2 She further argues that Mark Antony is “the pri- mary sex symbol of the series” and that it is “by exhibiting his body, not by fighting, that Antony demonstrates his virility.”3 Something fundamental about this equation changes, however, during the second season of Rome, 1 Octavian uses the term “invincible warrior” in Episode 8 to describe the ideal Roman male. Jonathan Walters, “Invading the Roman Body: Manliness and Impenetrability in Roman Thought,” Judith P. Hallett and Marilyn B. Skinner, eds., Roman Sexualities (Princ- eton: Princeton University Press, 1997) 29–43, argues (30) that Roman discourse “defined men as impenetrable penetrators” in a way “that characterized those of high social status as being able to defend the boundaries of their body from invasive assaults of all kinds.” Kirk Ormand, Controlling Desires: Sexuality in Ancient Greece and Rome (Westport, CT and London: Praeger, 2009), reinforces this model as he summarizes the scholarship on Roman masculinity from the past few decades. 2 Stacie Raucci, “Spectacle of Sex: Bodies on Display in Rome,” in Monica Cyrino, ed., Rome, Season One: History Makes Television (Oxford: Blackwell, 2008) 208. 3 Ibid., 208–209. © Margaret M. Toscano, 2013 | doi:10.1163/9789004241923_008 This is an open access chapter distributed under the terms of the CC BY-NC 4.0 license.Margaret M. Toscano - 9789004241923 Downloaded from Brill.com10/02/2021 10:34:48PM via free access 124 margaret m. toscano which throws everything off balance. Now the male body is not merely on display as a sign of prowess and strength. Instead, the male body is under attack as a representation of Roman invulnerability. That the noble states- man, Marcus Tullius Cicero, would end with his body broken into parts, with his hands and head displayed in the Forum, is not simply a warning to others but also a sign of fractured masculinity. The question is whether any body, including the aristocratic male body, can remain inviolable in the midst of the vicious and violent power strug- gles of a monumental civil war. As the various factions, both among the plebs and elites, fight for control of Rome and empire, manliness itself becomes a contested category. In order to gain mastery over one’s rivals, a man needs to penetrate not only his enemy’s camp but also his man- hood. Castration and anal rape are the actual mechanisms used by the plebs in the second season of Rome, whereas the ruling class uses more subtle weapons of political strategizing to unman their competitors. The gang boss Erastes Fulmen attacks Vorenus’ person as the paterfamilias by claiming he “fucked” Vorenus’ children before he killed them. Quintus Bubo is castrated because he defiled Carbo’s nephew; then in retaliation Carbo is anally penetrated while using the latrine, which leads to esca- lated violence among the gangs on the Aventine. When Pullo bites off Memmio’s tongue, reducing him to an animal in a cage, Memmio loses his manhood by losing his ability to speak and negotiate. And when the King of Bithynia says he wants to “see a Roman woman fucked by a baboon,” it is not just spectacle he desires but the humiliation of the category “Roman” because “Roman woman” is still a class above “foreign man.” When Atia resorts to male techniques to torture her old enemy Servilla by having her anally raped, it is at this point that Timon the Jew finally refuses to cooperate, as he shouts “I’m not an animal.” He may not be able to claim Roman manliness, but he clings at the end to his humanness.4 Mark Antony, played by James Purefoy, begins the second season where he ended the first. As the best soldier in Rome, he is beloved by the people; he is the epitome of Roman maleness with a hard body and a hard-on that seemingly never abates. As such, he is the fit avenger of Julius Caesar’s death. On the day of Caesar’s funeral, he refuses to rise from the bed he shares with Atia until, as he says, “I’ve fucked someone.” He jokingly says that the old slave woman Merula will have to do when 4 As Walters (36) illustrates, “the right to protect one’s body from the sexual assault of another” was a right connected to Roman citizenship and class, which adds to Atia’s humiliation of Servilla. Margaret M. Toscano - 9789004241923 Downloaded from Brill.com10/02/2021 10:34:48PM via free access virile ruthlessness and redemptive cross-dressing in rome 125 Atia says she does not have time or the inclination. Calling him the “king of goats,” Atia sends for one of the slave girls to meet Antony’s need. Antony’s virility never wanes in the series; he remains sexualized and potent to his death in the last scenes. And his beautiful, fit body never becomes soft. But his masculinity changes as he lets himself be influ- enced by the input of the women around him that eventually softens him emotionally, leading to his tragic end. In the process, his character also changes and deepens as he feels the impact of his feelings for women and their feelings, which was not true in the first season. When Antony first encounters Cleopatra in Episode 2, Season Two, on her return to Rome, she tells him that he has “a changeable look” about him. Astute viewers will recall the connection the ancients made between women and insta- bility, as expressed in Virgil’s (Aeneid 4.569–70) well-known line: “Varium et mutabile semper femina” – “woman is always a fickle and changeable thing.” That it is Antony who is changeable is a sign of his inclination toward feminization. When Octavian is debating about what to do with Antony and the grain problem in Episode 9, he remarks, “Who knows what Cleopatra has made him do. Antony was always a fool for his women.” It is not just that Antony has an eye for pretty women and a lust for their bodies, though he does throughout the series. In Episode 7, at Jocasta’s wedding to Posca, Antony winks at a pretty female slave while he passively talks of marriage to Atia. It is not just that Antony’s over- whelming passion for Cleopatra undoes his soldierly calculation and his sense of Roman masculinity. The important factor is that he begins to care about the concerns of women as the series progresses. In the private scenes between Antony and Cleopatra in Egypt, we see both a steamy, erotic passion and an intimate tenderness. “What’s the matter, baby, are you sad?” he asks softly as he touches her affectionately in their last hours together. They talk about how happy their life together has been, almost like they are an ordinary married couple.5 Although Antony begins as the stereotypical womanizer who objectifies women, he gradually opens up to their feelings, as seen in his relationships with both Cleopatra and Atia. Atia is crucial for understanding Antony’s character development because she adds another dimension to what it means for him to be in the power of women. If Cleopatra were the only one who influenced him, then it could be attributed to the mysterious power of the foreign witch 5 In James Purefoy’s commentary about the relationship between “Antony and Cleo- patra” recorded in the bonus features of the DVD, he movingly talks about the deep love between the mythic lovers. Margaret M. Toscano - 9789004241923 Downloaded from Brill.com10/02/2021 10:34:48PM via free access 126 margaret m. toscano queen who gets him under her magical spell, or simply the power of eros that stimulates their monumental passion. But the fact that Antony devel- ops a real relationship with Atia after all their years together as ardent lovers shows something more is happening to him as the series moves along. This is seen when Antony comes to Atia’s door just before he leaves for Egypt, forced from Rome by Octavian who is angry at what he sees as the debauchery of his family. Like a lovesick man (amans) at the doorstep of his mistress (domina) in Roman elegiac poetry, Antony waits outside Atia’s house, denied access by Octavian’s guards but calling out his lover’s name until she appears.
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