for so long, and now all of a sudden,

she is having this interaction with a man,

and I'm rooting for him to be that prince.

This is way more fun, by the way, than couple's therapy.

[Zach chuckles]

[Laura laughs]

I'm Laura Heck, I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist

and certified Gottman therapist

and co-host of Marriage Therapy Radio.

- I am Laura's co-host at Marriage Therapy Radio,

also a certified Gottman therapist

and couple's therapist in private practice in Seattle.

- And today, we're here with Vanity Fair

from our home offices and we're gonna be analyzing

some classic Disney relationships.

[melodic music]

- Anna is a princess whose parents

- Anna.

- Tragically died.

- Anna.

[Laura laughs]

You'll be corrected by every young girl

on the planet will correct you, it is not Anna.

- Sorry, Anna.

Anna is a princess whose parents tragically died.

She quickly becomes infatuated with Hans, a prince

and they bond over their lonely past.

Hans proposes to her the same day they meet,

which her older sister, Elsa, does not approve of.

Hans appears to be honest and kind

for most of the film but turns out

to be a cruel and calculating man in the end,

only using Anna to become king.

[air whooshing]

- This is awkward.

Not you're awkward, but just because we're, I'm awkward,

you're gorgeous, wait, what?

- What she nails is, now this is who I am,

this isn't a fake, false profile pic,

this is exactly who I am.

I'm clumsy, I'm weird, I'm late,

that's why I'm leaving.

- I better go, I have to go.

- Not because I'm scared and also,

I'm not a big deal, my sister's a big deal

and so you're immediately, enamored of her, or I am.

And of course we think he is, and why wouldn't he be?

- In this, it's kind of like, yeah you can be who you are,

you can be fumbly and you can be kind of awkward

and get caught up in your brain sometimes

and still, look there's this guy

who still finds you attractive.

And I think that I get pulled in quite easily with this.

- You can't marry a man you just met.

- You can if it's true love.

- Anna, what do you know about true love?

- More than you, all you know is how to shut people out.

- Yeah, so I mean, Elsa's a little bit of a jerk

but she puts her foot down, which I think

is really great boundary setting. [chuckles]

- Yeah, I feel like it's really important

to have those people in your life,

'cause often times, especially

in like the first couple of hours

of meeting someone, and they're interested in you

and they're so handsome, it's so easy to get

sucked up into all those hormones

where you're purposefully, I mean,

our bodies are literally pushing

us toward one another to procreate.

- Limerence is this idea that kind of the,

- Limerence?

- Limerence is like fueled by adrenaline,

and novelty and it's not based on any reality.

- Yeah.

- So, I get it, and I remember it.

- It is important to have that person,

that third party that knows you really well,

that can be that voice of reason.

'Cause clearly, your body and your brain

are not thinking logically at this point,

you're hopped up on all your chemical drugs

inside, that are saying, "procreate,

marry this person, lock 'em down."

I mean, there's a reason why they're so excited

or she's so excited, at this point.

- Well and you mentioned something

a little bit earlier that was sort of lost on me,

which is that she has spent most of her life alone.

Like, literally alone, not even,

not having a boyfriend but not having friends.

- Yeah, she's talking to pictures on the walls.

♪ I've started talking to ♪

♪ The pictures on the walls ♪

Hang in there, Joan

- Barely having a sister and so, I think

there is something about protecting

your own emotional intelligence

as you enter relationships and getting

the kind of feedback that you need,

whether that's from your sister who's kind of a jerk

or from your therapist, or from your social network

that she doesn't have anything about,

so one, but one person, anybody

comes in and busts that up, I can imagine

how addictive that would feel for her.

- Oh Anna, if only there were someone

out there who loved you.

- Harsh.

- All of us that were watching

this for the first time, we were feeling

this betrayal as, in a pretty significant way.

Mostly because, in a way, Disney betrayed us,

they did it for entertainment but, it was perfect,

it was the perfect moment.

- All that's left now is to kill Elsa

and bring back summer.

- It's like he's taken his mask off, right?

- Yeah.

- Like, he's had this mask, he's concealing,

don't feel, he's just like Elsa.

She puts the gloves on, she's concealing.

He puts the gloves on, he conceals who he really is,

he's been playing a part this whole time.

The glove comes off as the betrayal happens

and it's kind of a way of being like,

"this is who I really am, and this is the truth

behind it all."

- Strictly from a therapeutic perspective,

John Gottman is the scientist, and he doesn't,

he says that everything with precision,

'cause everything's based on research,

there's one sentence in all of his literature

that I've ever found, where he says something

that's absolute, and it's that every relationship

that is struggling, a 100% of them

are struggling because of betrayal.

And sometimes that betrayal is an infidelity,

sometimes it's a financial betrayal,

sometimes it's as simple as, "I've been wearing

this costume for long enough to get what I needed

and now I'm gonna show you my real face."

So in this way, I think it really invites

you to go, "oh okay, what is relationship about?"

And she ends up, you know, kind of exploring

that with this other guy, the reindeer guy,

what's his name?

Whatever, the reindeer guy.

- [Producer] Kristoff?

- Yeah, Kristoff, and then her sister too, right?

Her sister becomes kind of the true love story

and in this case, this betrayal is the end

of their relationship but if, for example,

he was just being foolish, or he was sleepwalking

or he was drunk, or whatever.

Where does repair then, have to come about?

And you know, it's just shattered in this case

but it's, I'm always looking for kind of

the moment of betrayal that turns

the relationship on its head.

And Disney never gave us the chance to do that before,

like, we never, young girls who were watching

princesses never had to ask that question before,

which I think is really cool about this particular

treatment in this particular film.

- Okay, so this is Snow White.

So, Snow White was born into a royal family

and then she meets the prince, when he happens

to walk by her and of course,

she's singing this lovely song and it gets his attention.

So then they start singing together and they fall in love.

And when her evil stepmother, of course it's a stepmother,

tries to kill her by feeding her a poisoned apple,

Snow White goes into a sleeping death

and of course, she's only woken from a kiss from the prince.

♪ My heart keeps singing ♪

♪ Of one love ♪

- I think this is where the trope got born, right?

This idea that love at first sight

and I'm gonna fall in love with you

because you're a good singer,

and this is the answer to all my problems,

and Disney's been recycling that for decades.

And I think it's given us the wrong idea

of what it takes to make a relationship work.

It doesn't happen like this.

I mean, I'm not a big fan of the idea

of the one, I think it takes some real choice

and choice is removed form this whole scenario

in part because there's no other choices,

except for these seven dwarfs and two,

she doesn't really have any agency.

Once he kisses her, she doesn't speaks again, right?

It bums me out that this is the way

that we've been training people

and especially girls, to expect

and hope for somebody to come and rescue them.

- Interestingly, like the very first

song that she's singing into the well

is talking about her prince coming along

and that's what she was wanting.

♪ I'm wishing ♪

♪ I'm wishing ♪

♪ For the one I love ♪

♪ To find me ♪

- Well, if he shows interest in me.

Now we have so many more choices.

I feel like women are in the game,

and they're the ones that are seeking

out relationships but with the very first

moment of her singing this song,

it just felt like, if he chooses me,

then I'll just go along with the flow

and that is definitely not what we're doing these days.

[melancholic music]

- So this is fast forward like 90 minutes, right?

'Cause they met in the garden and she goes

and does her thing with the dwarfs and the apples

and all that stuff, and this is,

I think this is the second time they meet.

[opera music]

And maybe I'm a feminist and it's, and again,

it's almost a 100 years later

after this movie was made, but I can't even fathom

that this relationship has any potential for success.

I mean, they've known each other

for less than three minutes?

She's better off marrying one of those guys.

[Laura laughs]

- Well, I mean, that part's true,

that these dwarfs are kind and they've been caring for her

and interested in her and there's been

an actual interaction between the two of them.

- Well they at least know who she is

and have experienced her in relationship.

This guy's just like kidnapped her basically.

- So often, we think, well because we have

this deep attraction to this person,

that that's just going to open all the doors

for us to have a great relationship

but in reality, if we have a deep friendship

with someone, like she had with the dwarfs,

that's probably a better foundation

for the two of 'em to have a relationship together.

- Yeah, 100%

- Well, I'm all for the friendships,

that she, should have all seven if she wants,

polygamy's in, polyamorous' in.

- Now, I'm super excited because we get to watch

the Little Mermaid and there's a fun fact,

I've seen this movie maybe 40 times.

And Les Poissons is my go-to karaoke song.