Topics: US News, Sydney Sweeney, Euphoria, Film and TV
Adult film star Maitland Ward has criticized one aspect of Sydney Sweeney's character arc in the latest season of Euphoria.
The hit HBO drama has long been known for its frank and sometimes uncomfortable depictions of sex and addiction, but the newest third season has been heavily criticized over one plot line in particular.
Previous seasons have focussed on the characters at high school, but the third has now picked their stories up again five years after the events of season two, and now the characters are trying to build lives for themselves as adults.
Among the careers in sex work and drug dealing, it's the arc of Cassie, played by Sydney Sweeney, which has drawn the most criticism, particularly where she starts an OnlyFans to help pay for her wedding.
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The plot line has seen Sweeney dressing up as a dog and being held on a leash, while another even saw her dressed like a baby, with her hair in pigtails and a pacifier in her mouth.
These scenes have previously been criticized, but now, adult star Maitland Ward has joined several adult actors and real life OnlyFans models concerned about how the story portrays sex workers and sex work.
Ward is herself a very successful creator on OnlyFans, with an account that brings in six figures every month.
The former actress explained that the baby costume scene in particular plays into stereotypes of sex workers as immoral and willing to do anything.
“In the climate we’re in, that they dressed her up as a baby to make pornographic OnlyFans content was beyond troubling and again serves to perpetuate stereotypes that sex workers have no moral compass and that they will do anything for money," said Ward.
Ward went on to say that it also perpetuates other negative stereotypes about sex work.
"And there’s always this untrue stigma that somehow sex work is synonymous with sex trafficking and abuse," she said. "And they just said, let’s make a joke of it. That is so funny. I’m not laughing.”
She added: "It’s just the guys in the writer’s room coming up with their fantasies. To take someone so traditionally blonde and beautiful with the biggest boobs and dress her up as a dog and baby is really bizarre, but at the same time so expected in Hollywood.”
Ward was not the only OnlyFans creator to slam how her work is portrayed in Euphoria.
Sydney Leathers has worked on the platform since 2017, and pointed out that some of the things Cassie does for her account wouldn't be permitted anyway, and that credit card providers have 'very strict rules'.
“There’s so much that they have her doing that is not even allowed on OnlyFans, and that alone is infuriating: the age-play stuff where she’s dressed as a baby in a diaper, for example," she said.
The show's creator Sam Levinson has previously spoken about the plot line to The Hollywood Reporter, saying: “[Cassie] has got her dog house and her little dog ears and the nose, and that has its own humor, but what makes the scene is the fact that her housekeeper is the one filming it.
“What we wanted to always find is the other layer of absurdity that we’re able to tie into it so that we’re not too inside of her fantasy or illusion — the gag is to jump out, to break the wall.”
New episodes of Euphoria season three are available to stream on HBO Max, as well as Sky and Now TV.
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