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NetflixIt’s getting hot in here…
Netflix’s Sex Education is a hot bed of sexuality and in true British rom-com spirit, Lolz. The 8-part comedy drama explores the sexual agony we all go through, and continue to go through, from school and beyond.
By creating an in-school sex clinic, Otis gives a platform for everyone to discuss their sexual problems from LGBT+ issues to, quite simply, how to not vomit when giving a blow job. Yes. Really.
The show is a revolution in the way we represent teenage life and discuss sex on screen and in our everyday lives. Here GLAMOUR meets the break-out stars of Sex Education, who reveal a IRL education on sex is seriously needed, and STAT…
Emma Mackey: “There is so much stigma around the clit – it’s not that hard!”
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“I’m not scared of anything, dickwad.” - Maeve Wiley
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Emma steals the show as Mauve, the rather savage business partner of Otis. She may suffer from her self-imposed exile from popularity, but everyone at school secretly wants to be – or have – a bit for her.
"The one thing I would want to change about sex education in school is it’s actually fundamentally about pleasure. We’re often taught in school that sex is just for reproduction and women are baby-making machines. The way we are going to bring down the patriarchal system is with sex education.
"We are told this is when we ovulate, this is when we have our period, this is semen, this is how it works, boom boom boom, baby! Sex is not just penetration, there’s a whole spectrum that you can explore, and sex is ultimately for pleasure. Most people our age are not having sex to have babies anymore. I think it’s beautiful to find intimacy in this ridiculously insane world, that’s crashing and burning around us, and we should celebrate that.
"For instance, there is so much stigma around the clit and I cannot express it is very simple: there’s this little magic thing that is on us that gives pleasure and it’s really not that hard to find it!"
Asa Butterfield: “I’m going to film my grandparent’s reaction to the sex scenes - like Googlebox!”
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“She touched my eyebrows and now I have an erection.” - Otis Milburn
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Asa, the child star of 'The Boy in The Stripped Pyjamas' takes the lead, playing Otis who lives at home with his single mum, who just so happens to be a sex therapist. Using his own mother’s skills, Otis starts a side line project at school: becoming the school’s resident sex therapist.
"I think Sex Education shows it’s ok to be an outsider, be different, have these hang ups or these fetishes. All of these things are normal and what make you who you are - you need to embrace that, celebrate that and not shy away from it or try and conform to being like everyone else. Everyone in the show is flawed and it’s about them trying to fix those flaws then coming to terms with them and accepting them.
"I didn’t feel a lot of pressure coming into this, being a 'child star.' I don’t know whether it’s because I’ve done it for a long time and those nerves aren’t there anymore or that everyone was so f**king great to work with. I was excited coming in and inspired to do my best because everyone was working so hard."
Ncuti Gatwa:” It broadens our view of what 'masculine' means”
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“This is a new frontier, my sexually repressed friend.” - Eric Effiong
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Ncuti takes on the role of Otis’ openly gay best friend who craves popularity as much he does respect for his sexuality. However, his love of playing the French Horn stands in his way.
"I really wish that we had this show when I was a teenager. It’s very diverse and it gives a lot of voices to people that haven’t felt represented before. In terms of teenage dramas, a lot of the time you see a really glamourised depiction of what it’s like to be a teenager and we’ve tried not to do that. We’ve tried to open up discussions and have frank conversations.
"It also broadens our view of what masculinity is. I think we’ve got a very two-dimensional view of what masculinity is, of what strength is, what a guy needs to do. We just see such a range of different male characters in this show. You see their vulnerability and it flips the dynamic of teen dramas flipped as the guys are wanting and pining after these girls.
Aimee-Lou Wood: “My first TV show appearance was a sex scene - I might as well do it with a bang and get my tits out. It was terrifying but then it was the most liberating thing ever!”
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Aimee is the LOLz extraordinaire who plays the somewhat ditzy Aimee, who unceremoniously dumps her on-off boyfriend, Adam, because he just can’t do the deed and supply the goods. We hear ya, gurl.
"This was my first job on TV and within the first 20 seconds I am riding a man, in a sex scene – it was a baptism of fire. I might as well do it with a bang and get my tits out. It was terrifying but then it was the most liberating thing ever. I never thought I would be able to do it and then having like the intimacy director there – which is the first time a show has had one – made it so much easier as it became a routine. I know a lot of older actresses who said they would have killed for that. They spent years thrown into these situations with no support. Intimacy directors are going to be everywhere but it’s going to be the same as a stunt or a fight director.
"The effects of the #MeToo movement meant I wasn’t fearful like going into those sex scenes - I, there was that confidence of knowing I would be safe. There was still that emboldened feeling of, no one can f**k with us at the moment.
"Growing up, everything we heard about sex was crude, stupid, boy humour. As a young girl growing up, I wanted to watch something which wasn’t just all these boys getting laid, finding out who they were sexually, discussing which girl they going to have sex with. II don’t ever see me on screen, I don’t see my story and the insecurities battles I was going through reflected. What’s so great about the show: it’s not just the stereotypical stories that you hear, it’s everyone."
Kedar Williams-Stirling “Just stop watching so much porn, kids!”
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“I’m talking transcendental-level shagging.” - Jackson Marchetti
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Kedar plays the all-swimming, 100 percent hot head boy who has all the popularity but can’t get the girl. The gal in question? Maeve.
“'Just stop watching so much porn, kids' would be my message to young adults. What are we doing? Keep watching porn like that and we’re not treating women right. It’s not the way you have sex. There’s no respect involved. It’s all about disrespect, degrading women and plays into the patriarchy and all that sh*t that is attached to being masculine
"I think sex as a topic is so taboo and the conversation around it isn’t healthy. In Sex Education we show that sex isn’t this red-hot thing and that you don’t have to get right all the time. That goes against what porn has taught us. There’s such a Western ideology of what sex is but there’s a whole other area, like the Karma Sutra, that we don’t really learn about unless you really independently research it. That needs to change.
"There’s so much porn out there right now as well, at the click of a button. Kids are 12, 11 years-old watching this sh*t. I remember when I was younger, I got porn on my little Nokia phone, and I was gassed and then it’s like that’s how it starts. That’s literally how it starts.”
Connor Swindells: “I’ve had struggles with masculinity the whole of my life”
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“I wish I could be a normal kid. With a normal dad. And a normal dick.” - Adam Groff
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Connor plays the school bully, Adam, whose got a major chip on his shoulder - not only about being the headmaster’s son but also because of his “whale size dick.” He may have the goods, but his on-off girlfriend isn’t interested. Alas.
“I’ve had struggles with masculinity the whole of my life as well. When you look at Adam, he shows it’s hard for boys when you don’t have a male role model. We all know people who we went to school with that didn’t have a dad or had a dad who wasn’t there. Because Adam’s Dad isn’t there, he has a jagged view of what it means to be a man, so he projects that onto everyone around him and that’s what breeds a bully. I have to be the alpha male, I have to push everyone else away, I have to live alone and that just stems his sexuality, too."
Sex Education season one is available on Netflix now
Original story published by Glamour. Read the article here.
