‘Dying for Sex’ Review: Michelle Williams Comes Alive in FX’s Rousing, Bighearted Weeper
When people make movies and TV shows about dying, they tend to really be movies and TV shows about living. Sure, one could argue that every story is about death — some are just better at hiding it than others — but death is still a massive bummer. No one wants to think about the agonizing, beat by beat breakdown of our bodies’ breaking down, so if we have to get into it, why not do so in a way that inspires the living to live better lives?
Typically, these kind of stories see dying characters thrust into the fight of their life, for their life. Or they set out to right whatever wrongs they’ve committed (before it’s too late). Or, free from the burden of protecting a future they won’t get to see, they turn inward to discover who they actually are.
“Dying for Sex,” Kim Rosenstock and Elizabeth Meriwether’s limited series about a 40-year-old woman diagnosed with terminal cancer, lands very much in the latter camp. While there’s some peripheral acknowledgement of death’s practical difficulties (financial imperatives, bureaucratic time-sucks, unpredictable mental and physical changes), the eight episodes don’t let the weight of those debilitating details disrupt the frothy tenor its platonic rom-com prioritizes instead. “Dying for Sex” isn’t morbidly fixated on death, like some may fear given its title and subject matter (and others may expect, given those same components). Instead, it’s chronically devoted to life, what makes it worth living, who you should live it with, and why our greatest obstacle to happiness is so often ourselves.
Fittingly enough, “Dying for Sex” begins with the bad news: During a couples therapy session with Steve (Jay Duplass), her husband, Molly (Michelle Williams) gets a call from her doctor informing her a recent biopsy on her hip came back cancerous. The disease has already metastasized to her bones, which makes it inoperable and thus incurable. She is going to die. There’s no trial drug they can put her on, no emergency procedure that can prolong her life. Molly has less than five years to live, likely much less, and the show doesn’t entertain any other possible endings.
So what does she do? First, she abandons her therapy session, calls her best friend, Nikki (Jenny Slate), to come pick her up, and buys a sickly-green bottle of off-brand diet soda from the convenience store across the street. These actions are carried out automatically, without thinking, but they’re also revealing. When given an accelerated countdown on your remaining days, some people’s impulses may lead them to rash decisions. But Molly’s instincts are dead on: Her immediate reaction is a microcosm of the rest of the show — illustrating what she needs, who she needs, and why she needs them.
1.) After leaving Steve with their counselor, she leaves Steve for good. Their marriage has devolved into a sexless space somewhere above mutual disdain but beneath mutual attraction. He’s a great caretaker — he proved as much two years prior, during Molly’s first bout with cancer — but he clings to that role like a life preserver. When Molly tells Steve her cancer is back, his face conveys a mixture of relief and excitement. It’s as if he’s thinking, “Finally, no more couples therapy. No more complaints about our nonexistent sex life. No more made-up issues — we’ve got a real crisis to deal with!” But Molly is desperate to be seen as a person, not a patient, so that’s it with Steve.
2.) After asking Nikki to come get her, she asks Nikki to stay by her side. “I told [Steve] I don’t want to die with him,” Molly says to her. “I want to die with you.” As sad as that may sound, what Molly’s really saying is that she wants to spend whatever time she has left with the person she actually loves the most, not the person society says she’s supposed to love the most. Nikki means more to Molly than anyone else in the world, and even though she’s “a beautiful flake” — disorganized, undependable, and generally unfit to be trusted with serious matters like her best friend’s death — the risks of being looked after by a lesser nurse pale in comparison to the risks of delegating those duties to someone she doesn’t want to spend that much time with.
3.) Then there’s the ominous green beverage. Typically, buying bottom-shelf soda from a nameless corner store doesn’t represent sound judgment, and when Steve sees her sipping it, he acts like she’s slurping up literal poison. But Molly isn’t trying to hurt herself. (If that was the case, she would’ve been slamming Four Lokos.) No, Molly is trying to find out what she likes. Something buried deep within her told her to go into that shop, to buy that dubious drink, and to keep drinking it even when the aftertaste proves “unbelievably bad.” The quality isn’t what matters here. It’s Molly’s willingness to listen to what her body tells her it wants, no matter how scary it may seem (and how unpleasant it proves to be).
In the moment, Molly’s body wanted a Good Value Diet Soda, but in the long run (or, as long as she’s going to get), what Molly’s body really wants is an orgasm. Most of “Dying for Sex” is dedicated to her quest to climax with another person — she’s never done it before, in large part because she’s never been brave enough to discover what she wants, what she likes, and why. To do so now, with the freedom bestowed by her prognosis, means dating apps, random hook-ups, and lots of experimentation. It means clubs and parties, support groups, and sharing the thoughts you’re barely brave enough to think. (Molly’s inner monologue plays out in selective voiceover, which mostly works.) It means listening to her extremely progressive palliative care social worker, Sonya (Esco Jouléy), who’s super eager to help Molly discover her intimate interests.
To say “Dying for Sex” is sex-positive would be an understatement. It draws a direct line between pure physical pleasure and authentic self-actualization; between knowing what you want and understanding who you are. What keeps us from reaching our richest selves, however, isn’t as clean-cut. There are basic, universal hurdles to sexual fulfillment — personal and societal shame tend to loom largest — but there are also individual challenges requiring a more targeted psychological excavation. Maybe you were raised by a religion that taught you sex was wrong outside the confines of marriage. Maybe you were raised by toxic male role models. Maybe you were the victim of toxic male role models.
Which brings us back to Molly and how the opening scene of “Dying for Sex” sets up the whole show. In recapping to Nikki how she found out she was dying, Molly doesn’t remember why or when she decided to do anything that led her to sitting on some empty crates outside a bodega, sipping Good Value Diet Soda from an non-recyclable plastic jug. Instead, she remembers seeing herself as a 7-year-old girl, dancing in a pink leotard. The adolescent version of Molly was making fun of the adult Molly for wasting her life, which helps explain her sudden urgency to make the most of what she has left.
But there’s another reason Molly sees herself at that particular age. That was when her mother’s boyfriend abused her. Molly’s first sexual experience was a violation of trust and a manipulation of love. She blames him for knowingly taking joy away from her, and she sees him — a vague body with a blurred face — whenever her sexual experiences venture toward vulnerable, loving territory.
If all this sounds like a lot for eight half-hour episodes to juggle, Rosenstock and Meriwether make it look easy. While their preference to punctuate difficult dramatic scenes with silly comedic gags may rub some viewers the wrong way — for instance, one particularly painful recollection ends on a fart joke — but A) the most serious moments are given enough space to resolve on their own, and B) the humor works as a grounding force that keeps the show from discordantly drifting between tones.
Williams deserves a hefty portion of the credit for holding so many emotions together herself. As Molly, she has to perform an interpretive dance that conveys her deepest traumas. She’s tasked with make-or-break lines like, “I don’t want this virgin on my cancer journey,” and “Oh my god, did I just pretend my vagina has a Scottish accent?” She’s sick and sad, ebullient and euphoric, questioning and clear-minded for the first time in her life, and all that’s on top of the eclectic sex scenes spanning everything from flippant furry fantasies to achingly earnest love-making. Williams roots Molly’s years-long saga in vivid, life-affirming, human characteristics that naturally emphasize the story’s central thesis: that getting off together isn’t just what makes life worth living; it is life.
Her supporting cast is an embarrassment of riches, starting with Slate, whose screentime and depth nearly make Nikki a co-lead. At ease providing comic support yet just as steadily holding a simmering sadness for her dying friend, Slate’s performance slots in nicely next to Williams. Never once do you question their bond, nor how it could’ve been forged in the years before we meet each friend.
Sissy Spacek swoops in for a daunting confrontation with her daughter. Rob Delaney, flexing his comically curt “Catastrophe” muscles without overpowering his co-stars, exudes slovenly charisma as Molly’s unnamed “neighbor guy.” Duplass makes for a pitch-perfect know-it-all Brooklynite, just as David Rasche impeccably plays a well-intentioned doctor whose wanting bedside manner improves along with his affection for Molly. That the finale brings in an absolute ringer for a delicate monologue about death (delivered with the giddiness of a kid on Christmas morning) is the cherry on top of casting director Jeannie Bacharach’s sundae.
At times, “Dying for Sex” may mirror various cancer-centered stories that came before it, from broad comedies like “The Bucket List” to Sundance breakouts like “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl,” not to mention other classic (“Terms of Endearment”) and contemporary weepers (“We Live in Time”). (For me, “50/50” kept coming to mind.) But unlike many of the movies I just mentioned, Molly’s femininity isn’t filtered through a bereft boyfriend’s point of view. (Her break-up with Steve could even be read as taking deliberate distance from such stories.) It’s not even open to their typical wallowing.
“No cancer pity face!” Molly thinks to herself during the premiere, not-speaking her disdain for politeness on autopilot into existence. She doesn’t have time for that shit. She’s got a mission to accomplish, and her journey toward shared satisfaction gives “Dying for Sex” a driving focus. Toss in a few subtle critiques of outdated approaches to end-of-life care and societal prejudice against women, and “Dying for Sex” does more than enough to distinguish itself. Like a life well-lived, it acts as exuberant encouragement for the rest of us to follow Molly’s lead — while we still can.
Grade: A-
“Dying for Sex” premieres Friday, April 4 on Hulu. All eight episodes will be released at once.
You may also like
