The birds and the bees
Sex Education is back for a third season, and as star Emma Mackey and creator Laurie Nunn explain, this time it’s tackling some of its biggest questions yet. By Amy Campbell.
Sex Education is back for a third season, and as star Emma Mackey and creator Laurie Nunn explain, this time it’s tackling some of its biggest questions yet.
Emma Mackey doesn’t remember her high-school sex education classes. “It was that forgettable,” says the French-born actress and star of Netflix sensation Sex Education. “Actually, no. I do remember doing some lessons, and they were very biological,” she adds. “Man and women; penis and vagina; insemination and impregnation. It was a very simplistic, black and white – or pink and blue – way of seeing it.”
Laurie Nunn, the creator of Sex Education, has similar recollections. “The classes were usually taught by, like, a substitute geography teacher. There was no focus on any type of inclusivity, we didn’t learn about gender or LGBTQI issues, and we definitely didn’t learn about female pleasure, or desire,” says the showrunner. “It was all about how not to get pregnant, or how not to get an STI. It was very fear-based, really.”
Listening to both their experiences, you’d be forgiven for thinking they went to the same school. But Mackey attended high school in France and Nunn completed junior school in the UK before moving to Melbourne with her Australian mother at 14. Mackey even graduated 10 years after Nunn did. All of this is to say: high-school-level sex education was pretty bad everywhere.
“I’m sure there are some alternative schools out there, where people are a little bit more open-minded,” muses Mackey, who plays Maeve in Sex Education. “But … mine was all biology and genitalia. Which is a shame, really. Because I’m 25 now and I’m only just understanding how a lot of this stuff works.”
It’s these big questions – and the distinct lack of answers available – that give Sex Education its locomotion. The first season of the acclaimed television series premiered in early 2019, with the plot revolving around two unlikely teenage friends who decide to launch an unauthorised sex therapy service at their high school to help their horny and confused classmates. The first of those friends is Maeve, a bright but wry 17-year-old who, in the words of Nunn, has “been through some shit”. The second is Otis, a gangly, slightly awkward boy played by Asa Butterfield, whose knowledge of the birds and the bees is savant-like. Of course, he’s got his sex therapist mother Jean, portrayed rather brilliantly by Gillian Anderson, to thank for that.
Season one saw Maeve and Otis go into business, while in season two their fictional high school, Moordale, is rocked by an outbreak of chlamydia. In season three, the chlamydia has been exorcised and there’s a spunky new head teacher in town. Her name is Hope Haddon, and, in news that will tickle fans of the HBO series Girls, she’s played by Jemima Kirke. “She’s cool. Teachers aren’t supposed to be cool,” whispers Eric (Ncuti Gatwa), Otis’s best friend, as Ms Haddon dances her way to the lectern in an early episode. All seems rosy from the outset. But it shortly becomes clear that the third season of Sex Education will be dealing with some complex and slightly more murky themes than it has in seasons past.
“Hope Haddon is young, she’s cool, she seems to have her head screwed on, which is impressive,” acknowledges Mackey. “But you get the sense there’s something a bit … dodgy about her. And Jemima toes that line so well. She’s crafted this character that’s a bit ambiv –” Mackey pauses, then repeats the word in her native French, “– ambivalent! She’s playing with good versus evil; she makes the character not so binary, or clear cut.”
But Hope’s arrival isn’t all that’s bound to stir up chaos at Moordale. A big theme this season is shame, reveals Nunn. Namely, how the emotion can be used as a weapon against people to “keep them inside their boxes”.
“The thing about shame, as it’s attached to experiences that you have in your teenage years, is that it travels with you into your adult life, and it can cause a lot of issues,” observes the showrunner. “In this season, we explore how shame can make you feel othered and scared about your identity, which can be a really dangerous thing.”
In many ways, it feels like season three of Sex Education couldn’t air sooner. This year, schools all over Australia have been rocked by allegations of sexual assault made by students against fellow students, and the fallout has laid bare just how
inadequate the curriculums dealing with relationships, sex and consent really are. In March, an online petition started by former Sydney schoolgirl Chanel Contos highlighted the experiences of thousands of young women, who shared stories of the shame they felt burdened with after a sexual encounter, whether consensual or otherwise.
Though Nunn says “the show, at its heart, is about open communication, honesty and trying to encourage those things”, she admits that, as the show’s writer and creator, there’s a fine line between focusing on her characters’ arcs, and being too sucked into broader cultural and political conversations. “I find that quite stifling,” she says. “I mean, what’s happening in the wider world does affect my writing – when the #MeToo movement happened, for example, there was a storyline around sexual assault I’d been thinking about and wanting to write about, and it sort of gave me the confidence to go: this is important and I think it’s something other people have experienced and will want to watch.
“But it comes from personal experience, too,” she offers. “With Aimee’s storyline in season two, for example, that really came from my own experience. I was sexually assaulted on my local bus and it was something I knew I wanted to write about and explore in a cathartic way.” Nunn did. And naturally, it struck a chord with young women and men everywhere.
The success of Sex Education, arguably the first series of its kind to show teenagers having frank and honest conversations about sex while maintaining a goofy, lighthearted tone, begs the question: just how much pressure is on the cast and crew to get it right? It’s something Mackey has thought a lot about. The actress has gone through the motions of shrugging off those expectations – “it’s not what the show’s about” – to now understanding the power of the series as a conversation starter. “There was a lot of pressure at the beginning, because it was really one of a kind. And because most of us were quite young and it was our first job, there was this expectation to be an orator, a politician. You have to be witty and intelligent, and you have to make sense and be PC … there are so many things you have to be good at, and when you’re on a show like this, it’s tenfold,” she explains. “But I feel less responsibility now, in that sense. Because I’ve been able to realise that this isn’t a show for everyone, and not everyone is going to like it, and that’s fine. We have a duty, yes, but it’s also just a show. And if it can bring something to people, and educate people, and it can be a helpful tool, great. It should have potency in that respect.”
When speaking on responsibility, Nunn also selects her words thoughtfully. After a long “hmmm”, she concedes: “I do feel a lot of responsibility. I mean, it’s in the name – it’s called Sex Education – so we do have a responsibility as a series to be putting forward healthy and helpful information. And when we’re writing it, that’s constantly the line we’re having to walk. Because you want it to be as fun and funny and entertaining as possible, but you also know that you’re dealing with a sensitive subject matter.”
“You need to be portraying it in a way that’s healing, and which is opening conversations, not setting them back,” she continues. “But at the same time, certain people aren’t going to relate to everything. There’s always going to be a cross-section of people who might say: ‘That wasn’t true to my experience, so it doesn’t speak to me.’ But you can’t write for everyone. You’re speaking to these characters, not a whole generation of teenagers.”
Remarkably, the diverse dilemmas of the kids at Moordale have struck chords universally, which is a triumph not many series today can claim. However, in the two-and-a-bit years since Sex Education premiered, the ‘young adult’ genre has evolved significantly, with authentic portrayals of sex and intimacy by series such as Normal People, based on the book by Irish author Sally Rooney, and the Zendaya-starring Euphoria taking some of the ‘responsibility’ load off Sex Education.
Still, there’s one burning question that Nunn continues to return to, when sitting down to pen each new season of her BAFTA-winning show: Am I normal? “If I’m honest, it’s the question I still want to know now – and I’m 35!” the showrunner says, laughing. “It’s the eternal question, I think. And you continue to carry it with you your whole life. But when you’re a teenager, it’s particularly intense. And that’s what the show is about.” Season three of Sex Education will stream on Netflix from September 17.
“You want it to be as fun and funny and entertaining as possible, but you also know that you’re dealing with a sensitive subject matter”