Jennifer Henry

La La Land

SBU270.77

Summer 2020

Professor Dr. Giunta

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Abstract

La La Land follows the story of aspiring actress, Mia, and aspiring jazz musician,

Sebastian, and the cross-roads journey the two of them take to create their lives. Mia, who

currently works as a barista, and Sebastian, who works as a free-lance musician, struggle to

follow their dreams in such competitive markets. Through gender stereotyping and rewards

discrimination, both Mia and Sebastian fight their California job market to attempt at succeeding

in their careers. Mia and Sebastian meet at unlikely circumstances and begin a relationship

together. Unfortunately, in the end, the two decide their careers are more important than their

relationships and break up. This paper follows the gender issues found in the movie, as well as

paralleling those to the Catholic Social Teaching principles. Mia and Sebastian are both prone to

following their gender’s stereotype, however, it is their workplace’s discrimination that brings

light to this paper.

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Introduction

La La Land (2016) takes place in a fictional mix of the 1950’s and today in Los Angeles,

California. The film follows two main gender-issues in the workplace; gender stereotyping and

total rewards discrimination. The film starts with Mia Dolan, an aspiring actress who currently

works as a barista, who is denied several acting roles from arrogant and rude male casting

directors. Sebastian Wilder is a struggling jazz pianist who works as a freelance musician. The two

meet at a party that Sebastian is playing at, and go back and forth with banter, but clearly have

chemistry together. Later, Sebastian arrives at Mia’s workplace, and the two have a conversation

about their goals in life; Mia as an actress, and Sebastian opening his own club. After several failed

auditions, Mia decides to write her own one-woman play. Sebastian gets a gig as a keyboardist in

his friend’s jazz band, in which he would get a steady income but has to travel. After frustrations of

touring, the two have an argument over how neither can achieve their dreams, and they end on a

pretty sour note. Later on, Sebastian misses Mia’s play for a photoshoot, and Mia hears several

dismissive comments about her performance. They break up. Shortly after, Mia gets a casting call

that Sebastian encourages her to attend. They decide to stay broken up, but will always love each

other, despite them never having a future together. The film then fast forwards five years later,

where Mia is a mom and married, as well as a successful, famous actress. One night, her and her

husband go to a jazz club, the jazz club that Sebastian had recently opened. Sebastian plays their

song on the piano once he sees her, and Mia has a dream sequence where she imagines her life if

she married Sebastian. She then smiles at him and leaves with her husband.
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Gender Issue in the Workplace 1; Gender Stereotyping

One of La La Land’s gender issue in the workplace is the issue of gender stereotyping -

including Gender-based Job stereotyping and socialization at work. Sebastian’s drive and

dedication are more textured and visible than Mia’s, and it is a reoccurring theme through the

film to denote particularly important moments in their relationship. He is the one to make the

first move of their relationship: he approaches her at work to ask her out. Despite the fact that

she is the actor and supposed “cinephile” since she was a child, he takes her to see Rebel Without

a Cause.  To make money to open his club, and to show Mia he can hold down a real job,

Sebastian joins a jazz fusion band, signing on to a cynical cycle of recording and touring. While

he is the breadwinner, Mia stays home slaving over her one-woman show, and shutters at the

suggestion that she accompany her boyfriend on the road to make their relationship work. After

their fight about how neither can achieve their dreams, Sebastian ends up missing Mia’s one-

woman performance because of a photoshoot for his new band. The movie almost paints it as

Sebastian, who is succeeding in his career as a typical male, and Mia, who is not succeeding, but

seen almost as a female “muse,” as most actresses in the performance industry are as well.

US Culture Objective

This kind of behavioral relationship is not unique to just Sebastian and Mia. Evaluating

the ways in which place and culture shape each other for the US culture objective, though “the

average woman completes more education than the average man, across the country women earn

less money than, choose to participate less often in the labor force than, and do not achieve the

same level of career success as men,” (Jackson, 2019, Milken Institute). Mia, although writing

her one-woman show, does not have the same drive as Sebastian does for a career. She is

dedicated to living her dream, but it is not a practical career choice for their family. Sebastian
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gives up his dream of the nightclub to make sure that him and Mia have a practical way of

earning for their future. This clearly is not what Mia wants, and they end their relationship.

Sebastian is contributing most of his time to working and earning a living, but this is not unusual

to him either; “High Earners (though not the highest) work the most,” (Giunta, 2020, Module 5).

After Mia insists that Sebastian needs to make enough to support them and their future family is

when he decides to leave free-lance piano playing and join the jazz band. Although it takes him

away from Mia for touring and recording, he is able to make a decent amount of money. In the

end, we see that it was enough for him to open his jazz club, but he loses Mia. What Mia exhibits

throughout the movie is what Powell calls, “The Paradox of the Contented Female Worker.”

Powell describes it as, “If women expect less objective career success than men, perhaps they

will be just as satisfied as men are when their expectations are met,” (Powell, 199, Retrieved

from Kindle). Although Mia has big dreams for her goals, after being rejected so many times she

has just accepted where she mediocrely landed in the career field as a barista. The whole film

centers on Mia attempting to raise her expectations of herself to achieve more in life. Mia has

this internal conflict of not wanting to be the Paradox of the Contented Female Worker but does

occasionally fall victim to accepting her barista life.

Catholic Social Teaching – The Dignity of Work

Although Mia struggles to make ends meet with her dream job, she still strives to make it

better. As she tries to write her one-woman show, she is also still going to auditions. Mia

exemplifies the Dignity of Work Catholic Social Teaching because she recognizes the need to

work and the ability to have a decent wage. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops

describes the principle as “work is more than a way to make a living; it is a form of contributing

to God’s creation,” (Seven Themes of Catholic Social Teaching, USCCB). Mia knows that her
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work is supposed to be meaning for people and recognizes that she needs to contribute

something to society. Although she may be doing this for her own fame and reason, it is the

tenant of Catholic Social Teaching.

Gender Issue in the Workplace 2; Total Rewards Discrimination

The second gender workplace theme Two La La Land displays is Total Rewards

Discrimination. Mia and Sebastian, who both hold rather unexciting jobs, are both accustomed to

total rewards discrimination. Towards the climax of the movie, they fall into a fight. Mia accuses

Sebastian of abandoning his dreams, while Sebastian claims Mia liked him more when he was

unsuccessful. While they fight, you definitely see the trend of total rewards discrimination.

Gender stereotypes are generalized beliefs that a specific gender holds certain characteristics, as

we see with Mia who expects Sebastian to earn money for their family. They have an expectation

of what the other wants from them, as Mia wants him to be the breadwinner. Sebastian wants

Mia to love him for who he is, not for the money he makes. They both have an unrealistic

expectation of the other, and in the end, it destroys their relationship.

US Culture Objective

Meeting the US culture credit in which we evaluate how place and culture shapes us, both

Mia and Sebastian work in the performance industry, which alone does not necessarily have a

guaranteed job. Their relationship clearly exemplifies how the pressure of working can affect

family life. Mia wants Sebastian to be the breadwinner, but Sebastian also has the expectation

that Mia will work as well. Although this is clearly a miscommunication, only “42% of mothers

are the sole or primary breadwinners…22.4% were co-breadwinners,” (Giunta, 2020, Module 5

Lecture). Sebastian was not completely wrong in his assumption of Mia not wanting to work, but

Mia just did not want to work as a barista anymore, she wanted to achieve her dreams. On the
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contrary, it is wrong for Mia to assume that Sebastian wants to work all the time. Sebastian

seemed to be overwork and struggled balancing work and family, but “employers are lagging

when it comes to supporting them with policies that promote better work/life balance,” (Ramsey,

2014). Mia should have supported him in the workplace and allowed him to better balance his

life, rather than forcing him to commit all his time to working a job he barely wanted in the first

place.

Sebastian and Mia should have recognized they could have had the best of both worlds,

overall, “50% of employers report that job demands interfere with their personal

responsibilities,” (Morin, 2014). What Mia and Sebastian exhibited during the movie was

nothing that is unknown to parents now-a-days. The issue of finding a balance in the workplace

and with home life is natural, but no one was there to tell them that. Mia and Sebastian clearly

don’t know what total rewards they want out of their relationship, as well as each other. In the

end, their inability to communicate their needs and wants of their careers destroys their

relationship.

Catholic Social Teaching – Call to Family

Mia and Sebastian’s fight over who is the bread winner proved to be detrimental to their

relationship. The final nail in the coffin was Sebastian’s absence at her one-woman play because

he had a photoshoot for his own career. This scene is parallel to the Catholic Social Teaching of

Call to Family, in which “Marriage and Family are central social institutions that must be

supported and strengthened,” (Seven Themes of Catholic Social Teaching, USCCB). Although

Mia and Sebastian are not married, their relationship still proves to fail in upholding their values.

Both Mia and Sebastian are guilty of placing their work first and their relationship second. If

they were married, this would be considered an unsuccessful marriage for their failure to uphold
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their vows. This proved to be the demise of their relationship in the end, the failure to put one

another first instead of their work.

Conclusion

La La Land exhibits several examples of gender issues in the workplace, but the most

prominent would be gender stereotyping as well as total rewards discrimination. Mia and

Sebastian both come from the performance industry that is male favored naturally, as well as the

factor that neither is really succeeding in their career at the beginning of the film. In the end,

their workplace took favor over their relationship, ending what they had. This film also showed

the principles of two Catholic Social Teachings, Dignity of Work and Call to Family. Mia and

Sebastian both ended up in their desired career, but at the cost of their relationship.
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Works Cited

Chazelle, D., Berger, F., Horowitz, J., Gilbert, G., Platt, M., Gosling, R., Stone, E., Lions Gate

Entertainment (Firm). (2016). La La Land.

Giunta, Catherine (2020). Family Issues Lecture.

Jackson, Jessica (January 2019). Women in the workforce: How California measures up. Page 3.

Retrieved from:

https://milkeninstitute.org/sites/default/files/reports-pdf/Women-in-the-Workforce-How-

California-Measures-Up-FINAL.pdf

Morin, Amy. (2014, January 20). The Five Things Successful Working Parents Give Up to

Reach a Work-Life Balance. Forbes.com. Retrieved from

https://www.forbes.com/sites/amymorin/2014/01/20/the-five-things-successful-working-

parents-give-up-to-reach-a-work-life-balance/#a9055a757eae

Powell, Gary N. (2019). Women and men in management (5th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE

Publications, Inc. Retrieved from Kindle.

Ramsey, Mike. (2014, November 1). Men need work/life balance, too. SHRM. Retrieved from:

www.shrm.org/hr-today/news/hr-magazine/Pages/1114-paternity-leave.aspx.

Seven Themes of Catholic Social Teaching. United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Retrieved from: http://www.usccb.org/beliefs-and-teachings/what-we-believe/catholic-

social-teaching/seven-themes-of-catholic-social-teaching.cfm