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Jill Soloway: 'My movie makes men uncomfortable' Jill Soloway: 'My movie makes men uncomfortable'
(10 days later)
In her 2006 memoir, Tiny Ladies In Shiny Pants, Jill Soloway wrote that the sexual content of her work wasn't solely intended to shock. "My original intent," she wrote, "was something much nobler: inciting feminist revolution." Nevertheless, she knew how to grab attention. Plays such as The Miss Vagina Pageant and Not Without My Nipples helped her move into TV, and a short story, Courteney Cox's Asshole (it involves anal bleaching) amused Six Feet Under's Alan Ball, who hired her for the show.In her 2006 memoir, Tiny Ladies In Shiny Pants, Jill Soloway wrote that the sexual content of her work wasn't solely intended to shock. "My original intent," she wrote, "was something much nobler: inciting feminist revolution." Nevertheless, she knew how to grab attention. Plays such as The Miss Vagina Pageant and Not Without My Nipples helped her move into TV, and a short story, Courteney Cox's Asshole (it involves anal bleaching) amused Six Feet Under's Alan Ball, who hired her for the show.
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Afternoon Delight, which she wrote and directed, is her first film, and while sex is still at the forefront, it's tackled with maturity and nuance. Kathryn Hahn plays Rachel, a well-to-do mum who doesn't quite know what to do with herself now that her kid is at school. Sex has slipped away, as has her sense of self, and when a female friend suggests she and her husband Jeff (Josh Radnor) go to a strip club to spice things up, Jeff buys her a lapdance. Feeling a muddled connection with the stripper (Juno Temple), Rachel later invites her to move in with them. In a film as funny as it is incisive, she is sent on an unplanned voyage of sexual rediscovery.Afternoon Delight, which she wrote and directed, is her first film, and while sex is still at the forefront, it's tackled with maturity and nuance. Kathryn Hahn plays Rachel, a well-to-do mum who doesn't quite know what to do with herself now that her kid is at school. Sex has slipped away, as has her sense of self, and when a female friend suggests she and her husband Jeff (Josh Radnor) go to a strip club to spice things up, Jeff buys her a lapdance. Feeling a muddled connection with the stripper (Juno Temple), Rachel later invites her to move in with them. In a film as funny as it is incisive, she is sent on an unplanned voyage of sexual rediscovery.
"I think it's a reasonable question for any person to ask: does it damage your soul to get paid to have sex?" says Soloway. A decade ago she and some friends went to a strip club "ironically", and while having a lapdance, she was overcome by a desire to rescue her stripper. Subsequent research told her this was a common impulse, especially with men; strippers call such clients "Captain Save-A-Ho". Soloway is straight but has forever been intrigued by sex workers, whom she's called "war reporters" for women. "I've met a lot of sex workers over the years," she says. "Strippers, cam-girls … every single one of them is as different as we are as people. There are some that need to be rescued and there are some that are perfectly happy.""I think it's a reasonable question for any person to ask: does it damage your soul to get paid to have sex?" says Soloway. A decade ago she and some friends went to a strip club "ironically", and while having a lapdance, she was overcome by a desire to rescue her stripper. Subsequent research told her this was a common impulse, especially with men; strippers call such clients "Captain Save-A-Ho". Soloway is straight but has forever been intrigued by sex workers, whom she's called "war reporters" for women. "I've met a lot of sex workers over the years," she says. "Strippers, cam-girls … every single one of them is as different as we are as people. There are some that need to be rescued and there are some that are perfectly happy."
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Female characters in TV and cinema are, she notes, invariably punished for their sexuality. She wanted to avoid that, and indeed Afternoon Delight's stripper McKenna is a perfectly comfortable human being. Soloway wanted to "just let her be a person. That simple act makes the movie feel different to what we're used to." She says she's trying to repair "the divided feminine, to fill the spaces between the good girl and the bad girl, the mum and the slut, the Madonna and the whore. All women are many women." She's found it a struggle to get to the place she's at now, fighting her way through a male-dominated industry. Does she often despair at female characters portrayed poorly by male writers? "I don't think they can help it," she says. "Often it's about a sort of yearning for a world they wish they lived in."Female characters in TV and cinema are, she notes, invariably punished for their sexuality. She wanted to avoid that, and indeed Afternoon Delight's stripper McKenna is a perfectly comfortable human being. Soloway wanted to "just let her be a person. That simple act makes the movie feel different to what we're used to." She says she's trying to repair "the divided feminine, to fill the spaces between the good girl and the bad girl, the mum and the slut, the Madonna and the whore. All women are many women." She's found it a struggle to get to the place she's at now, fighting her way through a male-dominated industry. Does she often despair at female characters portrayed poorly by male writers? "I don't think they can help it," she says. "Often it's about a sort of yearning for a world they wish they lived in."
I mention my admiration of two men writing great female characters – American Horror Story's Ryan Murphy and Crystal Fairy's Sebastián Silva – and the fact that I subsequently remembered they were both gay. "Yeah. They don't have the need for the female to behave a certain way to reinforce their sense of masculinity or their sexual power," she says. "Sometimes I think that dividing women into good girls and sluts serves straight men's ability to be turned on. To be blatantly and frighteningly honest, I think women taking control of protagonists is a boner-killer."I mention my admiration of two men writing great female characters – American Horror Story's Ryan Murphy and Crystal Fairy's Sebastián Silva – and the fact that I subsequently remembered they were both gay. "Yeah. They don't have the need for the female to behave a certain way to reinforce their sense of masculinity or their sexual power," she says. "Sometimes I think that dividing women into good girls and sluts serves straight men's ability to be turned on. To be blatantly and frighteningly honest, I think women taking control of protagonists is a boner-killer."
One struggle Afternoon Delight struggle faced was with the MPAA, American cinema's censorship police, who had her trim various sexual moments in order to get an R rating. She was especially annoyed after discovering the amount of lewder content in The Wolf Of Wall Street, also rated R. Female pleasure, she believes, is uncomfortable to the censors. "The MPAA clarified to me: 'We're trying to make it so that parents understand what they're going to see if they take their kids.' And I think their argument would be that when you see The Wolf Of Wall Street you know exactly what to expect – misogyny – and misogyny is as American as apple pie. I think my movie does make people uncomfortable. It particularly makes men uncomfortable. People prefer stories that empower the white male."One struggle Afternoon Delight struggle faced was with the MPAA, American cinema's censorship police, who had her trim various sexual moments in order to get an R rating. She was especially annoyed after discovering the amount of lewder content in The Wolf Of Wall Street, also rated R. Female pleasure, she believes, is uncomfortable to the censors. "The MPAA clarified to me: 'We're trying to make it so that parents understand what they're going to see if they take their kids.' And I think their argument would be that when you see The Wolf Of Wall Street you know exactly what to expect – misogyny – and misogyny is as American as apple pie. I think my movie does make people uncomfortable. It particularly makes men uncomfortable. People prefer stories that empower the white male."
Things are improving, she notes – especially on television, with the likes of Girls and Orange Is The New Black – and Soloway is now heading up her own series. Called Transparent, it concerns a patriarch (Jeffrey Tambor) coming out as transgender, and the effect it has on his children, who are struggling with their sexual identities more than he is. This, she says, is what all of her work is about: stories about all of us. We just need a healthier variety of voices to balance out the testosterone.Things are improving, she notes – especially on television, with the likes of Girls and Orange Is The New Black – and Soloway is now heading up her own series. Called Transparent, it concerns a patriarch (Jeffrey Tambor) coming out as transgender, and the effect it has on his children, who are struggling with their sexual identities more than he is. This, she says, is what all of her work is about: stories about all of us. We just need a healthier variety of voices to balance out the testosterone.
Afternoon Delight is in UK cinemas nowAfternoon Delight is in UK cinemas now