The Existentialism of Fleabag
“I want someone to tell me what to wear every morning. I want someone to tell me what to eat. What to like, what to hate, what to rage about, what to listen to, what band to like, what to buy tickets for, what to joke about, what not to joke about. I want someone to tell me what to believe in, who to vote for, who to love, and how to tell them. I just think I want someone to tell me how to live my life, Father, because so far I think I’ve been getting it wrong.” - Fleabag
At first, Fleabag can appear like a corny, 50-cent rom-com tv show, with the main plots revolving around the modern life issues of a 30-ish, no-name woman, only known by the titular Fleabag, in London. But soon enough, the show blows the audience’s mind with dark and adult comedy, and a lot of chef-kiss British sarcasm.
And throughout only two seasons, Fleabag beautifully portrays both the tragedy and the euphoria of life. It deals with a very big, existentialism question in history: ‘How to be happy?’ and what it’s like to be a human being: to be deeply flawed, but at the same time, desire greatness, love, and acceptance.
Dealing with death, grief, and alienation underlines Fleabag as an existentialism and absurdism work. And in this article, I would discuss how Fleabag brilliantly executes these themes. There are a lot of shows, movies, and books out there that choose to focus on existentialism and absurdism of life, but there’s something much special about Fleabag. Perhaps it’s the whimsical performance and the genius screenwriting of Phoebe Waller-Bridge, the color palette, the cinematography, and everything, that creates the most simple, but realistic and beautiful show that I have ever seen.
Fleabag is just a young woman, with short curly dark hair, a heavy London accent, and red lipstick. No one ever calls her name during the whole 2 seasons, we just know her as Fleabag from the show title. The charms of Fleabag come from her quick-witted, sarcastic sense of humor, and her quirky, maniacal personality. She’s mean and judgmental to other people, in a very comical and cherubic way. She talks directly with the camera, and calls us, the audience, her secret friends. She opens a cafe shop full of guinea pig decorations, inspired by her pet Hillary. The cafe shop isn’t doing very well, and she struggles to take out a loan from the bank cause people think the guinea pig cafe is weird as shit.
She has a sister and a father. Her sister, Claire, is the opposite of Fleabag. A successful corporate businesswoman, a total workaholic, wearing chic overcoats, with cynical facial expressions.
“My sister. She’s uptight and beautiful and probably anorexic, but clothes look awesome on her so..”
They always argue and quarrel, but despite the differences, they have a beautiful sibling relationship and make a great chaotic, comedic duo. As for her father, although the show doesn’t portray any of their childhood relationship, in the present, her dad is emotionally unavailable, absent, and uncomfortable with his 2 daughters after the death of his wife.
“Dad’s way of coping with 2 motherless daughters was to buy us tickets to feminist lectures, start fucking our godmother, and eventually stop calling.”
He remarried her wife’s old best friend, an insensitive, pretentious, pass-aggressive woman.
‘To be fair. She’s not an evil stepmother. She’s just a cunt.’
2 major events happened to Fleabag was the death of two most beloved and important people in her life: Her mother, and her best friend, Boo. These evoke in her loneliness, melancholy, alienation, and the desire to find human companionship and acceptance that she always gets eluded.
About her dating scene, she’s constantly seeking instant gratification like hookups, meaningless sex, and masturbation to fill in her self-hatred and insecurity. And she sabotages every chance of having a stable and long-lasting relationship with her ex, Harry. She obsesses with sex
“I’m not obsessed with sex. I just can’t stop thinking of it. The performance of it. The awkwardness of it, the drama of it. The moment you realize someone wants your body… Not so much the feeling of it.”
And also….
unavailable men, and well, women.
This is in season 2, where Fleabag flirts and kisses Claire’s coworker at the pub after having a conversation about living a life as a woman. She is rejected, cause she’s not Belinda’s type.
‘I want to do that with you.’ - Fleabag
‘No.’ - Belinda
Later on, in season 2, she falls deeply in love with a very interesting character, a cool, whiskey-drinking, Hot Priest, who must abstain from sex and romantic relationship according to religious faith.
As we can see, Fleabag isn’t living an ideal life for a 30-ish woman in this society: Dead mother and best friend, bankrupt, unable to form healthy romantic relationships, being an outcast in the family, wallows in self-pithiness, despair, and loneliness.
Death, Grief, and Guilt in Fleabag
Death, grief, and guilt are the deepest rooting for Fleabag.
In episode 1 of season 1, Fleabag has flashbacks from the past, about a blonde woman. It’s her best friend, Boo.
At night, inside the cafe shop. Boo laughs. She pulls Fleabag’s face close to hers.
‘Come on. Let’s never ask for anyone for anything. They don’t get it.’
‘Deal.’ - Fleabag nodded her head.
Then, throughout season 1, Fleabag keeps having more flashbacks and panic attacks about Boo. She calls Boo on the phone, just to hear her voice through the voicemail. Those scenes portray Boo as a pure, kind, positive, and bright person, which is the opposite of our cynical and sarcastic Fleabag. Boo’s dead now.
Inside the cab, Fleabag having a conversation with the driver.
“Yeah. She’s dead now. She accidentally killed herself. It wasn’t her intention but it wasn’t a total accident. She didn’t actually think she’d die, she just found out that her boyfriend fucked someone else and wanted to punish him by ending up in hospital and not letting him visit her for a bit. She decided to walk into a busy cycle lane, wanting to get tangled in a bike, break a finger maybe. But as it turns out bikes go fast and flip you into the road. Three people died.”
Fleabag laughs.
‘She was such a dick.’
Boo is more than a best friend to Fleabag. She is the one who understands her, is full of hope and positivity, and love for Fleabag, and always sees the best in her. The moments they shared together: Fleabag gifted Boo the guinea pig Hillary, when Boo puts on Fleabag’s clothes so Fleabag can pretend Boo is herself, to throw every self-hatred bit at, meant so much to Fleabag. And especially, after her mom’s death, Boo is the only one left that really sees and loves her.
In season 2, episode 4, at Fleabag’s mom’s wake.
‘I don’t know what to do with it.’ - Fleabag
‘With what?’ - Boo
“With all the love I have for her. I don’t know … where to – put it now.” - Fleabag
“I’ll take it. You have to give it to me. It gotta go somewhere” - Boo
In this episode, we also have a chance to see another side of Fleabag and her dad’s relationship. The death of her mom finally sinks in, and she gets overwhelmed with her emotions. Her dad was sitting next to Fleabag and comforts her. Two people, despite all their differences and tension, now share the same thing: grieving over their lost loved one.
“I just, I don’t know what to—” - Fleabag
“I know. Buck up. Smile. Charm. Off we go. We’ll be Ok.” - Dad
He stands up. They are holding hands. He drops her hand gently.
People are all we got left. And it sometimes strikes me that way.
Phoebe Waller-Bridge has successfully captured the grieving and lingering over death by showing Fleabag running around the cemetery where her mum was buried in season 1. It’s such a surreal feeling, when you used to see a person with your own eyes, you touch them, hear them laugh, and now, they just disappear, and buried underground.
But, there’s something more about Boo’s death that haunts Fleabag so bad. In season 1, there’s an episode where Fleabag and Martin, Claire’s husband, go to a shoe store to buy a birthday gift for Claire. And there’s Boo’s old boyfriend. He waves at Fleabag. She looks shocked and painful, and she runs out of the store. But surprisingly, we can hardly see any anger or resentment. It implies something more complicated about Boo’s death.
And finally, in the final episode of season 1, the mystery is revealed. When Fleabag told Claire that Martin tried to kiss her, Claire didn’t believe Fleabag.
‘Please don’t. - Claire
‘Claire, he came out into the garden -’ - Fleabag
‘Please, I don’t wanna hear it.’ - Claire
‘Claire, you have to believe me.’ - Fleabag
‘How can I believe you?’ - Claire
‘Cause I’m your sister! ’ - Fleabag
‘After what you did to Boo.’ - Claire
It is a moment of shock when the audience finds out ‘someone’ that Jack, Boo’s old boyfriend, fucked, was Fleabag. They had an affair behind Boo’s back. And Fleabag is ultimately the indirect cause of Boo’s suicide. It was an unbelievable moment for me. And in this particular moment, the show has turned Fleabag into a deeply flawed protagonist. From a funny and likable character, with a dead best friend and dead mom, whom the audience has empathy for, turns into a hypocrite bitch that backstabs her best friend.
At this point, the show successfully handles the multi-dimension of its main character. It also reflects the nature of humans, that we are so complex with many layers. We can be great and beautiful, but we can also be despicable and petty, in just the next moment. We are every possibility.
I don’t believe much in the debate about nature vs nurture, that whether we were born good or bad, then we become a certain way because of the environment we grow up in, and that deep down we are something else. I believe we are just the way we are right now. We are capable of doing so many things. Who said a Nazi can’t be a good dad and a good husband, right?
Every action we humans choose to do reflect our capacity of doing it, and our willingness to do it at that exact moment. We are too complex, and well, too humane, to be placed in a black-or-white area. There is a whole color spectrum in between just black and white.
The show didn’t have any clear explanation for the promiscuous sex of Fleabag with Boo’s boyfriend, but it can be explained through Fleabag’s naturally drawn to self-destructive behavior, with the recent death mom as a catalyst. The show lets Fleabag self-punishing herself, eaten alive by the guilt, and lingers over the death of Boo. People keep telling Fleabag to abandon the guinea pig cafe shop, but it was Boo’s idea, and they made a promise to never let it go, no matter what.
Inside the cafe shop.
‘We did this.’ - Fleabag
‘Whatever happens, we never let it go, okay?’ - Boo
Alienation in Fleabag
The theme of loneliness and alienation is also another big part of the show.
As I already mentioned before, Fleabag isn’t living an ideal life. No established career, drowning in debt with a dying cafe shop, and no healthy romantic relationships. She sabotages every good chance of having a stable relationship, instead falling into endless hedonism of sex, hookup, one-night stand, and chasing emotionally unavailable people. Being an outcast and rejected by her own family. Eaten alive by guilt and self-punishment over the death of her mother and best friend.
A very iconic and unique thing about the show is the way Fleabag treats us, the audience, as her secret friends. She looks directly in the camera and gives us her crazy side-eyes and smirks, as if we’re sharing the same thoughts. The more uncomfortable, and self-destructive the situation is, the more she seeks comfort from her secret friends. It’s a way of portraying the alienation and loneliness of Fleabag. She disassociates in her own world, and instead, seeks empathy in another place.
In season 2, a new character is introduced. The whisky-drinking, cool, Hot Priest. His belief, his way of living, and his coping mechanism, is completely in contrast to Fleabag. He finds consolation in God, and in religion. But at the same time, they share so much in common: quirky personalities, sarcastic humor, family problems, and the alienation, melancholy, and loneliness deep down rooting inside them. Both these 2 people struggle with their fragile identities, their purpose and a way to live a life. We don’t even know their name. They are just fleabag and a priest to everyone else.
They see something at each other that no one else can. At the dinner party in episode 1 of season 2, for 45 minutes, no one from the family bothers to ask Fleabag a question.
Fleabag talks to camera.
“No one’s asked me a question in forty-five min—”
“So what do you do?” - Priest to Fleabag
Everyone stops and stares at Fleabag. She’s shocked. She looks at him.
One of the most shocking and unexpecting moments in the show is when the Hot Priest realizes that Fleabag get disassociated, and then, he FUCKING LOOKS directly at the camera, looks directly at us, in episode 4.
“What?” - Priest
“What? - Fleabag
“She … she, what?” - Priest
“She …” - Fleabag
Fleabags laughs then turn to the camera.
He’s a bit annoying actually.
The Priest notices her turn. He looks where she was looking, right at us.
“What is that?” - Priest
“What?” - Fleabag
“That thing. That you’re doing … it’s like you disappear.” - Priest
Her little secret friend is revealed, and the Priest sees right through at her.
Love and Attraction in Fleabag
Many people believe Fleabag and Hot Priest are soulmates. They understand each other in a way no one else can, The Hot Priest is the only one who can see when Fleabag dissociates and talks to the camera, Fleabag is the only one who can see the fox that haunts the Hot Priest, and they share the same deep roots of alienation, lonely, melancholy, fragile identities, and no direction in life. And whenever these two drink beer and have a conversation with each other, we, the audience can really feel the comfort and coziness between them. Their relationship makes us wonder so many things, cause at the same time, they are so bloody different.
Fleabag believes in the meaningless existence of life, while the Priest has faith in God. Fleabag dwells in pessimism and self-pity, while Hot Priest wants to believe in wonderful “Why believe in something awful when you can believe in something wonderful?”. Fleabag finds ecstasy and self-worth in sex and masturbation, while the Hot Priest abstains from sex and romantic relationship.
Finally, after the confession of Fleabag inside the church about she doesn’t know what to do with her life in episode 4, they end up having sex and a secret love affair (cheating on god, basically).
In the final episode of season 2, on Fleabag’s dad's wedding day, the Hot Priest delivers a speech about love and how it can be so tragically beautiful, while his eyes linger on Fleabag.
“Love is awful! It’s awful. It’s painful. It’s frightening, it makes you doubt yourself, judge yourself, distance yourself from other people in your life. Makes you selfish. Makes you creepy. It makes you obsessed with your hair. Makes you cruel. Makes you say and do things you never thought you would do.”
“I was taught that if we’re born with love, then life is about choosing the right place to put it. People talk about that a lot. It ‘feeling right’. ‘When it feels right, it’s easy.’ But I’m not sure that’s true. It takes strength to know what’s right.”
“And love isn’t something that weak people do. Being a romantic takes a hell of a lot of hope. I think what they mean is … When you find somebody that you love … It feels like hope.” - Hot Priest
And at that moment, we know, he knows, and Fleabag knows, that the Hot Priest is saying his goodbye to the love they share. It’s God that he finally chooses.
Once again, the power of dialogue and monologue in Fleabag. This, along with the Before trilogy, and Bojack Horseman’s Free Churror episode, have the most powerful and painful monologues and dialogues I’ve ever seen.
The wedding is over, and the final moment of the show happens.
Fleabag and Hot Priest sit next to each other at the bus station
“It’s God, isn’t it?” - Fleabag
“Yeah.” - Priest
Fleabag smiles and nods.
“You know the worst thing is … That I fucking love you.” - Fleabag
“I love you…No no, don’t, let’s just leave that out there for a second on its own ” - Fleabag
“I love you.” - Fleabag
They sit with the words.
She looks at him.
He takes her hand.
“It’ll pass.” - Priest
She smiles.
In one interview with Andrew Scott, the actor who plays The Hot Priest, he believes that every story is a love story. Self-love, romantic love, familial love, whatever. It’s about how we conceal love, how we express love, and how we deny love. How you love someone so much, but you have to let them go. It was for the best, and it happened to most of us.
Sometimes, I think about the wedding scene of my two favorite characters having a happy endings in movies. There’s something that I didn’t understand at first. I mean people cry and all when they watch those scenes, and I never understand why. But a little while ago, I found myself crying when I saw the wedding scene of Jake Peralta and Amy Santiago from Brooklyn 99. It almost feels like people either see themselves, picture themselves with their significant other in those wedding scenes, or they can’t. No significant other. Not anymore. Just them, all alone.
Another interpretation of Fleabag and Hot Priest's relationship maybe is infatuation, between two alike, aloof, and alienated people. And especially, their forbidden relationship makes it more compelling and regretful. And the fact that Fleabag doesn’t have a father figure around, while the Priest is a symbol of paternal relationship and life guidance, implies daddy issues and struggles between Fleabag and her father. Fleabag woos affectionate, and accepting, and loves so much from her father.
Another pattern I observe about Phoebe Waller-Bridge through her other works, Killing Eve and Crashing, is the question ‘who attracted to whom’ and ‘why is that happening’ are often being brought to the table. People are chasing a fleeting image of someone else, an important one, from their past. In Killing Eve, Villanelle, one of the two women main protagonists, is strongly attracted to older, unpolished, middle-aged women, with short, dark, curly hair, which resembles her mother’s hair. While in Crashing, a comedy series also starring and written by Phoebe Waller-Bridge, is full of odd and contradicting couples such as a young and sexy woman who is attracted to a sad old grumble man, because he looks just like her father.
Though I think the theme of parental fetish is overused in movies and books, to the extent of ridiculous, I can’t deny the magnificent and realistic PWB writes about and execute this theme in her shows.
Existentialism and Absurdism in Fleabag
When it comes to existentialism, the core idea is life is meaningless. The universe doesn't give humans any hints to live a life, what to do, or what to believe in. All meaning, within this existence, is invented by humans. We are defined by our own choices, responsibilities, and actions.
“We live according to our own beliefs, that we insert meaning into the acts that we do, not finding meaning from what other people say. We should no live in regard to what other people think or say, because this would also push us into bad faith.” - Jean-Paul Sartre
And the three big themes that occupied existentialism, are death, alienation, and authentication. And Fleabag deals directly with these themes, throughout the death of her mom and her best friend, being an outcast in society’s norms, lonely, lost, and trying to figure out what to do with her life. All of these make Fleabag an existentialism work.
Fleabag is also about hope, love, acceptance, and desire to find meaning in this great grand scheme of things through actions and taking responsibility. At the end of the show, she accepts that the Hot Priest can not reciprocate her love. She nods and smiles at him. And finally, she looks at the camera, looks at us, for the last time, and walks away. She’s saying goodbye to her secret friends, to her getaway gate, and finally facing problems in her world. She comes to embrace the meaningless and the absurdity of life.
She lives exactly according to the philosophy of absurdism, founded by Albert Camus, that life is absurd. It bears no meaning, nothing, just a big, endless void. And nothing really matters in this great grand scheme of things. Camus also suggests three ways out for escaping the absurdity:
- Suicide (non-recommend)
- Denial
- If you are narcissistic, or self-delusional enough, and you can not accept the fact that nothing matters, that your existence is simply insignificant at best in this universe, then you can be in denial of the absurdity of life.
3. Accept
- This, for Camus, is the only right way to escape. We accept the insignificance of our existence to the universe, live to the fullest, and create meanings of our own. We are aware of our limitations, rather than dwelling in apathy or completely detaching from life and responsibility, is what I’m saying.
I love this ending so much, cause it’s very realistic. The world will never stop for us, and we can’t get what we want all the time. Life is absurd, and everything will come to dust eventually. So what should we do? We accept it, live our life to the fullest moment, enjoy it while things last, and keep going, and moving on. That’s the way of living Fleabag chooses.
Ending
What I love most about Fleabag, is that everything is so realistic, and moreover, what it’s like to be a human being. To be deeply flawed, twisted, and complex, but still desire love, acceptance, and greatness. We human are so multi-dimensional, and every choice we make reflect what we are capable of doing at that moment. We can be great and beautiful, but at the same time, we are despicable and petty.
The pessimism is portrayed along with the whimsical, comical and brilliant performance of Phoebe-Waller Bridge, other with interesting supporting characters: Passive aggressive, backhanded compliment Godmother, uptight Claire, ridiculous Martin, whisky-drinking Hot Priest, awkward-manner, and emotionally unavailable Dad create a dynamic, realistic modern world inside this small show. Everything is just so perfect, and so beautiful. And Fleabag gives herself a chance of being happy, of living life the right way. That is acceptance, and keep moving forward. That’s the best thing we can do in this meaningless and absurd universe.
