In the Queen’s Gambit fandom, the consensus seems to be that after New York, Beth and Benny’s relationship was an undefined, amorphous thing. That their relationship could be one of of a million things, from a one time hook-up to friends with benefits to chess partners to a situation they both deliberately left hanging. I disagree.
I believe that, when Beth left for Paris, Beth and Benny were in a conscious, committed, romantic relationship. And I believe this is confirmed by their phone calls.
1) Post-Paris Loss.
“I can come pick you up.”/ “I’m going back to Lexington.” This clearly shows that, when Beth left, both Beth and Benny took it as a given that she would be returning to New York. Why? Beth does not live in New York. She has a house in Lexington. Benny’s offer was explicitly to train her for five weeks before Paris. She has spent seven weeks living out of the suitcase she packed for the US Championship. Why on Earth would either one of them assume that she would go back to New York rather than Kentucky? Even if they agreed on more training, you’d think she would at least want to go home long enough to get some fresh clothes.
“I need to be alone.”/ “That is the opposite of what you need. Beth, please, come to New York. We can talk it out.” We know that Benny is right, and as much as Beth wants to be alone, what she needs is a support system. But how does Benny know that? They’ve only met a handful of times before New York, and we were only shown them talking about chess. But this implies a level of openness from Beth that goes beyond her chess friendships. Even when sleeping with Harry, she was closed off, and only stuck to chess. Yet Benny knows enough about her to plead for her to come to New York, to him.
“You shouldn’t be by yourself. You know what happens.”/“Maybe that’s what I want.”/“What, to get drunk?”/ “Yeah, good and drunk. Fucking bombed. And maybe high too.” Again, how does Benny know this? The only time he’s seen her drink is at the bar in Ohio, where she drinks a tad too much. It’s a concern, and he clocks it, but that is a far cry from having the intimate knowledge of Beth’s drinking and her pills that this exchange shows. he could only know if Beth told him herself. And you don’t tell your casual chess trainer secrets you barely admit to yourself.
“You wouldn’t if you were with me.”/“I know.”/ “What I said ‘Ok, go ahead and get drunk.’? Would you come then?” Benny has enough emotional pull on Beth that his presence alone will keep her from drinking, and she knows it, and more importantly, he knows it. He originally banned her from drinking as a condition of training her, but notice what this conversation has none of? References to training. Instead, he pleads with her to come to New York, offering to enable her addictions despite his knowledge of what happens when she does. That is not something a mentor or trainer would do. That is what you do when a loved one is spiraling, and you hope that if you enable them to spiral around you, they won’t spiral as badly.
“Benny, I don’t know what I’m doing. Or going to do.” At this point, Beth isn’t even sure if she’s going to Moscow, which would theoretically end her relationship with Benny— who was only training her to face Borgov again. Yet, she lets it linger, and they continue to talk, proving their relationship has some place beyond professional.
All in all, the post-Paris call proves that Benny has a far more intimate knowledge of Beth than anyone, including her previous lovers, and said knowledge could only have come from Beth willingly telling him things (unlike Harry, who has to piece together her drinking on his own.) It also shows that they both planned on Beth returning to New York after Paris, despite the impracticality. Both of these point to a relationship far more serious than chess partners or casual hookups. Also please note the complete lack of any chess in that conversation.
2) Career Advice.
“Take the money. They’re loaded.” The first part of this call is just completely innocuous. It is legitimately just Beth asking Benny on if she should take Christian Crusade’s money, and Benny offering his perspective. This is something you’d ask a trainer. Except that this is Beth Harmon. She doesn’t ask advice. She derides the opinions of others. The episode literally opens with her mother telling her not to let men tell her what to do, and to do things her own way. And yet she has enough trust in Benny to ask him what she should do.
“If you ask them, they’ll fly me out there with you. Separate rooms, of course, considering their views.” Yes, Benny, of course separate rooms! This is the 60s, yes, but the early 60s. Free love has not yet happened. This was an era in which respectable people of opposite genders only shared rooms if they were parent/child or married. Engaged couples traveling together would book separate rooms! Even if Beth was a man, people would presume that he and his trainer would still each want their own room. Separate rooms would absolutely be the default assumption for literally anyone but married couples and family. Yet Benny feels the need to clarify that he and Beth would be given separate rooms by Christian Crusade. That is not something you would feel compelled to point out to a friend with benefits or ambiguous situationship, because they would obviously already know that. The only conceivable reason that Benny would feel a need to state that they would be in separate rooms is if they would otherwise share one, ie being in a serious romantic relationship, but need to keep up “respectable” appearances.
“Are you, uh, coming to New York?”/ “I have to stay in Kentucky a bit longer.” Again, why would Beth go back to New York? She has a home! That she pays a mortgage on! Yet, the phrasing here from both of them indicates that her coming to New York would not be for a visit, but a relocation. That “a bit longer” is not how you describe going from your residence to a trip. That’s going from a trip to a permanent residence. We also see her taking the effort to reassure Benny that she is not drinking.
“I’m managing. I, uh, I miss you.” Ugh, Benny breaks my heart here. This is the language of someone who is missing an expected presence. “Managing” is what you say when your live-in partner asks how you’re doing without them. And the “I miss you”? That is not causal, friendly “I miss hanging out, we should get together sometime.” That is “You are someone that I can usually count on being here, and your absence is leaving a hole in my life”. Which, again, given that the one thing he knew is that he had offered to train Beth for Paris for five weeks, is odd phrasing.
The second call indicates a level of expected permanence in Beth and Benny’s relationship. That they both take it as a given that if she comes to New York, it would be her new base. That if they travelled together, they would share a room unless they socially couldn’t. That they share a level of trust and companionship that goes beyond either of their other chess-based relationships. They bout count on each other in a way that goes far beyond casual or undefined.
3) Spurning the Crusade.
“You’re out of your fucking mind”/ “maybe, but I did it.” Beth is prickly and defensive, as a rule. She doesn’t like when others look down at her. Yet she takes no offense at Benny casting some serious judgement at her, showing that he has earned the right, in her book, to call her out, something she allows few others.
“I was wondering if-“/“I don’t have it.” The look on Benny’s face here. He is embarrassed he doesn’t have the money. he feels like he has let her down by not having it. Which is not something one would feel about a pupil who made their own questionable decision but is something you would feel about a serious girlfriend. Especially given that this is the 60s and men are supposed to be the providers. Furthermore, Beth asking about Benny gambling provides an excellent parallel: Benny was needed to keep Beth from her addiction, and apparently without Beth, Benny started gambling again. And I say “started again” because for him to have had the money— which he did because Beth knew he’d had it— he would have had to stop gambling for a time. But just as the distance helped push Beth of the wagon, it did so for Benny too. That is not something you can or will do for your chess something.
“Are You kidding me? First you don’t come back to New York, and you basically tell me you’d rather be a drunk than be with me, and now you pull this crap? You can fucking well go alone.” So much is in this line. First, the explicit confirmation that Beth and Benny had both planned on Beth returning to New York after Paris, despite, as stated previously, this making no goddamn sense. Then, Beth choosing alcohol over Benny. Despite what Benny said in the first call, he and Beth both know that he would have kept Beth on the wagon, and that is part of why Beth went back to Kentucky. But choosing that over Benny? There would have been no expectation for that to have even been a choice if he was just her trainer with benefits. Or even if they had something casual and undefined. For Beth to have had that choice, and for Benny to feel hurt by it means that their relationship had to have serious meaning to both of them, and both of them had to have known that.
“Don’t call me anymore.” This is Benny breaking up with Beth. She had already pulled the plug by choosing to remain in Lexington, this is Benny simply deciding he won’t wait around for her anymore.
Throughout this whole talk, Beth isn’t surprised or confused, she knows what Benny means, especially the choosing booze over him. And that only makes sense if, when she had left, it had been with the agreement that they were a committed couple, and Beth would be coming back to him, only to choose drinking after her loss. This is too intense, too personal, for them to have been anything other than a serious relationship that they both understood and committed to being serious. You don’t get this raw with your trainer, or your hookup, or your amorphous situationship, and if you do, you don’t expect them to be on the same page as you emotionally. But Beth and Benny do, and are, because they are none of those things. And they both knew that.
Bonus:
4) Russia
“If he goes for the knight, hit him with the king rook pawn”/“Benny?” You know what’s unusual about this conversation compared to their others? They are talking about chess. Two world class chess players, whose relationship is supposedly based solely on chess, and this is the only phone call where they talk about chess. Beth is somewhat thrown when Benny opens right with the chess, despite that being how most of their in person talks started. And she doesn’t fully shift into chess mode until he reveals he’s not alone. They talk about a lot of things, but rarely chess. Because they are much more than chess to each other.
