Maggie Gyllenhaal might just be our new life-affirming heroine, after she insisted that a realistic depiction of a female orgasm should be shown in her series The Deuce.
HBO's The Deuce, which tells the story of the porn industry in the 1970s, features "lots of transactional sex [and] lots of fake orgasms" – but Maggie wanted more than that.
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter about the drama, Maggie recalled how she told the show's creator that she wanted to be able to highlight the difference between a 'genuine' orgasm and one that is performative, which is often all we see on TV and in film.
"I said to David Simon, 'I think you need to see a real feminine orgasm'. In order to show the contrast and to show that these are performative..."
Pointing out that a lot of performative orgasms are supposed to be real, Maggie said her idea was all about 'getting down to the real' and illuminating "the misogyny and the performance" of the trope of the female orgasm.
"I was like, 'This orgasm needs to be the realest orgasm ever. This needs to be one that takes 30 seconds, that's very quiet, that's super internal, that's just about her,'" she explained.
"I think that's very vulnerable. That's way more vulnerable than the orgasm that's the performance."
The Deuce was picked up by HBO for a second season last September. Sky Atlantic airs the show in the UK.
