Variance of Experience and Masters of Sex

It’s no coincidence that two of the most striking recent depictions of sex on television have been overseen by women. Whereas in Lena Dunham’s Girls the awkwardness of sex itself is played up to uncomfortable levels, in Masters of Sex, developed by Michelle Ashford, a detached voyeurism rules the day. The series, which fictionalizes the early days of the partnership between legendary sex researchers William Masters and Virginia Johnson, manages not only to create an original exploration of sexuality, but also fascinating examination of gender roles.

On the show Masters (Michael Sheen) himself feels most at home in closets, behind glass windows, clipboard in hand, documenting the literal ins-and-outs of sex. In his chilliness he’s almost asexual. In fact, were he not married, one would wonder if he has ever been in a relationship.

This leads to some fascinating interplay between Masters and the women in his life. Virginia Johnson (Lizzy Caplan), a former singer turned secretary, brings much-needed humanity to his overly clinical approach to research and to the show. When she seduces someone you feel that she’s genuinely doing it for herself, and not because she feels she has to or because she’s empty. Caplan wisely plays Johnson not as a trailblazer seeking to subvert societal conventions, but simply as a woman thoroughly comfortable with herself.

Johnson is very much akin to Betty (Annaleigh Ashford), a prostitute and Masters' first subject, in her willingness to use her attributes to get by in a society not built for her. The series deftly places both of them in occasional positions of power, forcing a reluctant Masters to give in to their needs.

Further complicating gender relations here is Libby Masters (Caitlin Fitzgerald), the doctor's neglected wife. If Johnson is the proto-modern woman, then Libby is the one that it was. Fitzgerald steals the screen in every scene as she struggles to make life appear simpler than it is. If her husband's a voyeur she's willing to play along, if their struggling to have kids she'll seek fertility treatment. Libby provides a fine counterpoint to the other, perhaps, anachronistically liberated women of the series.

What the show gets right, though, is the variance of experience and relationship of its participants to sex. Its refreshing to see the subject shown for what it is: beautiful, awful, enticing, incomprehensible. Where else on television do we find the unbridled ecstasy of one woman’s orgasm countered by the over-the-top theatricality of a sex worker’s performance? Or a childless wife desiring only to please her husband while a single mother seeks her own fulfillment?  If the show is at all transgressive, it’s in its nuance. Not every woman is a portrayed as slut or a virgin, nor is every man is a horn dog.