Setting the standard
Sex sells but in adult drama The Girlfriend Experience, escorts are more than just ladies of the night.
Forget sex workers standing on street corners wearing knee-length boots, fishnet tights and miniskirts. In adult drama series The Girlfriend Experience (2016- current, seasons 1 and 2 can be streamed on Showmax), the diversity of the industry is explored by a new breed of escort, one who goes undetected in the modern world. No one on campus gives messy-haired law student Christine (Riley Keough, the granddaughter of Elvis Presley) a second look as she tries to juggle her studies with her internship at a prominent law firm. But at night, Christine re-invents herself from head to toe, transforming into a high- class escort who’s raking in a small fortune giving rich old men their dreams. The physical change in Christine’s appearance is deliberate and tells a story on its own, explains costume designer Caroline Eselin-Schaefer: “Her outfits embody her lifestyle. Christine is eloquent and analytical. We wanted to create outfits that would make her invisible at her law firm, fitting in among the other interns. But then she’d put on a burgundy lipstick in the evening and fit in with the other escorts too.”
IN HER OWN LANE
Although Christine was introduced to the world of transactional relationships by her best friend Avery (Kate Lyn Sheil), she makes up her mind about who she goes home with, who she agrees to see and the extent of her relationships. She might be a pretty face but “she is completely in control,” warns Riley. “Christine is liberated. Here is a woman who’s allowed to have flaws and be a human being. I love playing her because she is self-assured,” explains the actress. The directors also push Christine and Avery’s characters to think out of the box as viewers don’t see their lives through the lenses of being mere sex workers. “They aren’t perfect. I was very interested in telling the story of a girl who ended up in sex work who wasn’t a victim,” says Riley. “Because that happens and that is something I didn’t know much about. I was like, ‘Really? People would decide to do this as their life career?’ You are watching more than a woman doing sex work. You are watching a woman trying to figure out who she is, doing all these weird things and sex work happens to be one of them.”
BURSTING AT THE SEAMS
Because these women are hanging out with affluent men, they package themselves in a certain manner: they walk with confidence to their steps, their make-up is up to date, they clean up their language and they are classy. “At the beginning, Christine wears high ponytails to show her modesty and innocence. She has a French bun at the law firm to give her this focused, determined look,” says Caroline. But as time goes by, Christine gets a sharp haircut to keep her clients in suspense and wanting more. “To me, I hear ‘prostitution’ and I think of a woman on the street with a pimp in a terrible situation getting abused. I wasn’t aware that there are ones who enjoy their job. I didn’t really know that was a thing,” explains Riley.
Like the new escorts Bria Jones (Carmen Ejogo) and Anna Garner (Louisa Krause) who are introduced in season 2, Christine is well-aware of her clientele, who they are and where they fit into the world and the escorts are on a mission to impress them by sounding intelligent yet sexy. It’s all in the appeal and mystery. The more mysterious and appealing the woman, the more they are able to wrap their clients around their fingers and pull their strings like puppetmasters, which Christine echoes in the show: “The easiest thing to do is convince a man that he’s in control.”