Ladies who lunch is a phrase often used to describe well-off, well-dressed women who meet for social luncheons, usually during theworking week. Typically, the women involved aremarried and non-working. Normally the lunch is in a high-classrestaurant, but could also take place in adepartment store during ashopping trip. Sometimes the lunch takes place under the pretext of raising money forcharity.
The origins of the phrase are disputed. Some claim it was coined byWomen's Wear Daily publisherJohn Fairchild in the 1960s,[1][2] others that it was first introduced in the January 19, 1970, issue ofNew York magazine by the writerMerle Rubine,[3]
"Anyone with a fair figure, ready cash, fashion savvy and a safecracker's nerve can buy the best that Fifth Avenue has to offer on Seventh Avenue at half the price. The girls atCondé Nast andHarper's Bazaar have known this for years. Likewise theladies who lunch at Restaurant X, although they'd rather be banished from the banquette than admit they got their Beenes and Blasses on a bargain basis."
The phrase was later popularized by asong of the same name inStephen Sondheim's 1970 musicalCompany. The character Joanne, played byElaine Stritch, a rich, cynical, middle-aged woman, makes a drunken toast to her peer group inThe Ladies Who Lunch. The lyrics offer a sardonic toast to rich women, including herself, who fill their time with frivolous things like luncheons and parties. The song has given the phrase "ladies who lunch" a negative connotation.[4] Joanne's condemnation of women who are "off to the gym, then to a fitting, claiming they're fat" does not paint these women in a generous light. Ladies who lunch are often seen as lacking substance.
“Ladies Who Lunch” was the title of a sketch on the Season 36 premiere ofSaturday Night Live hosted byAmy Poehler. In the sketch, four upper-class women, played by Amy Poehler,Kristen Wiig,Vanessa Bayer andAbby Elliott, eat lunch at the fictional restaurant Chez Henri. Sylvia (Wiig's character) is constantly upstaged by Trish (Poehler's character). Bayer's character and Elliott's character fawn over Trish's tiny hats. Sylvia gets jealous and also attempts to wear small hats, but Trish pulls crazy stunts and is always able to upstage Sylvia. At the end, Trish pulls the biggest stunt of all and fakes her own death, winning the approval and amusement of her friends and causing Sylvia to realize that she cannot best Trish.[5] The title alludes to the frivolity of the lives of socialites. The women only seem to care about the next trend in fashion and little about their actual friends.
TheABCtelevision seriesDesperate Housewives featured an episode entitled "The Ladies Who Lunch". The show has named several episodes after songs by Stephen Sondheim. It was originally aired as Episode 16 on March 27, 2005.
InArrested Development,The Balboa Bay Window, which is a fictitious high-culture magazine made up for the purpose of the show, features the byline "The Magazine of The American Society of Ladies Who Lunch - A Lot."
The novelThe Ladies Who Lunch: A Middle Aged Women's Guide to Modern Morality by Ruth L. Kern tells the story of a group of glamorous middle-aged women in the upper echelons of society.[6]
The song ‘Ladies Who Lunch With Me’ by British-Korean band Wooze details the class aspirations and unwritten social conventions of upper class women.