Lisa Taddeo, in the introduction to her 2019 nonfiction bestseller, Three Women, writes that she “set out to register the heat and sting of female want” in three portraits that she wrote over eight years—a distillation of thousands of hours of in-person interviews and phone, email, and text exchanges. One subject, whom Taddeo calls “Lina,” is an Indiana housewife who, due to her husband’s sexual disinterest, embarks on a secret affair with her old high school boyfriend. Another interviewee, “Sloane,” is a married Rhode Island restaurant owner who has sex with men whom her spouse approves; at one point, their swinging lifestyle has unexpected and upsetting consequences. Taddeo’s third subject is a North Dakota woman named Maggie, who had a secret relationship with her English teacher when she was a 17-year-old high school student; at age 23, she reported his actions to the police, which led to a jury trial.
A new miniseries, starring Shailene Woodley, GLOW’s Betty Gilpin, She’s Gotta Have It’s DeWanda Wise, and Welsh actor Gabrielle Creevy makes a few changes to Taddeo’s text but shares some of its flaws, as well. It premieres on Starz on Sept. 13.
Taddeo writes that she’s “confident that these stories convey vital truths about women and desire,” but it’s hard to make a case that they have much to say about American women in general. After all, all three are white, unlike roughly 40% of women in the United States, and two of the three are Catholic, unlike 80%. None are in dire financial straits; indeed, Sloane is quite wealthy. These experiences are hardly universal.
The book’s portrayal of desire, on the other hand, is more complex. The stories of Lina and Sloane depict each woman’s pursuit of the sex they want as a liberating experience—one that reshapes how they view themselves and their places in the world. At the same time, Taddeo reveals how unruly desire can be, and how it can leave wreckage in its wake. Lina leaves her husband to pursue a relationship with a man who, she later realizes, is a shallow dolt who cares little for her; Sloane’s impulsive sexual relationship with a chef at her restaurant destroys her friendships with him and his wife.
Maggie’s story, though, sits uneasily next to the other two. It’s an account of female desire, as well, but it’s one in which the subject has no agency. She’s a teenager, a minor; the teacher is a grown man who, in Maggie’s account, even annotated her copy of her favorite book, Twilight, with love notes to emotionally manipulate her into sex acts. This isn’t a story of liberation at all; it’s a story of a despicable crime, and although it’s compellingly told, it’s never entirely clear why the author chose to include it with the others.
Taddeo, who created, executive produced, and co-wrote the miniseries, addresses this issue directly in one episode, as Woodley’s character—a clear stand-in for Taddeo herself, inexplicably renamed “Gia”—narrates: “And Maggie? Why name her desire at all? And wasn’t hers actually just trauma?” It’s a good question, but one that the show doesn’t satisfactorily answer.
The series is quite faithful to the text when it comes to Lina’s and Maggie’s stories. Gilpin, as Nina, wonderfully portrays Lina’s frustration, passion, and naïveté, sometimes in the space of a single scene, and Creevy, as Maggie, offers a performance that skillfully gets across her character’s vulnerability as a teen and her considerable strength as an adult.
There are a few changes, as well. The show addresses the book’s distinct lack of diversity , for instance, by casting Wise, a Black actor, as Sloane. Kirkus’ book review noted that “only in the epilogue does Taddeo mention race and its impacts on women’s experiences with sex and longing”; unfortunately, the series also gives this subject short shrift, while also changing some other details of Sloane’s story—an odd choice for a nonfiction work.
The most notable alteration, though, is the addition of Woodley’s Gia as a major character. Taddeo’s presence in her own book is slight; the only significant first-person sections appear at the beginning and end. Gia, however, has at least as much screentime as Lina, Sloane, or Maggie, if not more. Viewers see her meet with prickly author Gay Talese (played amusingly by James Naughton) as she struggles to write her book, and they tag along for travel montages as she crisscrosses the country in a van. They also witness, at length, her complicated, dysfunctional relationship with her on-again, off-again boyfriend. This all gives Woodley, the biggest name in the cast, more to do, of course, but it doesn’t reveal any “vital truths about women and desire”—or about the writing process, for that matter—and it results in a 10-episode miniseries that feels far too long. It’s an addition that’s simply unnecessary—and it pulls focus from the three women who, after all, give the book its title.
David Rapp is the senior Indie editor.