Disclaimer: This Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed interview has been edited for brevity and clarity and contains plot spoilers for season one.
Tatiana Maslany has been beloved by her audience ever since she burst onto the scene playing multiple clone characters on Orphan Black. Now she is bringing to life another compelling protagonist, Paula, on the Apple TV+ series Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed.
Paula is a divorced fact-checker in New York City. Her ex-husband Karl (Jake Johnson) launches a massive custody battle alongside his new wife and affair partner, Mallory, who has been promoted to a job that would require a move to Boise, Idaho.
Feeling lonely and lacking free time to go searching in the dating pool, Paula has developed a regular correspondence with a camboy named Trevor. One night, Paula witnesses Trevor be attacked while on a video call. The police warn Paula that the incident is likely a scam. If Paula receives a ransom call, she should ignore it. The ransom call arrives, as predicted, but things take a turn when Paula discovers Trevor’s dead body.
What ensues next is a thrilling whirlwind of sleuthing, uneasy alliances, and a battle to stay alive to keep her daughter safe.
Tatiana Maslany does beautiful work in emoting the full range and depth of Paula. She is full of determination in her investigation of what’s really going on. All the while, the loving maternal relationship between Paula and her daughter Hazel is the heart of the story.
Season one ends with a cliffhanger — Paula receives a call initiating blackmail. She receives a text message of a surveillance video revealing that the ‘accidental’ death of her former neighbor in Portland might not have been an accident at all.
Thankfully, the series has now been renewed for a second season. Audiences are sure to have even more mayhem and investigative energy to enjoy if this next installment is anywhere near as gripping as season one.
LadyJenevia: Congratulations on the show. I am team Paula. The whole time, she did nothing wrong!
Maslany: [Laughs]
LadyJenevia: What did you know about what happened in Portland when you were playing Paula earlier in the season when she’s holding that secret?
Maslany: I knew pretty well, once we started filming, what had happened. There were still questions around the full details of it and how much it was an accident or not. That is my own little secret that I like to keep close to my chest. It’s definitely helpful as an actor to have this massive secret that you get to hold as a character.
LadyJenevia: You have a very memorable scene with a gun, and you said in another interview that there should be intimacy coordinators for scenes involving guns. I found that idea fascinating. Could you elaborate a bit on what you would want that person to offer to actors and why?
Maslany: I’m just curious about somebody who could give parameters around how we operate in those situations. Also, allow for [the] complexity of responses to having a gun on set, even though it’s obviously fake. We’re living in a time when that image is not just a cool movie thing. It’s very real, an upsetting image, and it should be upsetting. It shouldn’t be something that we casually do.
The main thing for me is that there should be aftercare. There should be conversation. There should be space to be on set or not be on set on a day when that’s happening. It’s just strange to me that sex is dealt with in a totally different way than this very real violence that we live with every day.
LadyJenevia: A lot of people in Paula’s life are manipulative and deceptive to her and she regularly gets demonized for honestly responding to that instead of feigning politeness. Do you see raw honesty as an intrinsic part of Paula or a reaction to the higher stress of her circumstances?
Maslany: I think it’s both. She’s a bit of a “reckless” person at core. That’s the stuff that her and Karl probably enjoyed in each other at a time when they were wilder and young. Now it doesn’t age as well from the outside, but I think it’s a beautiful part of her. It’s the thing that gets her in trouble, the thing that is her barometer of truth, and what makes her a compelling character to follow.
LadyJenevia: You have a monologue in episode 2 that’s done as an uninterrupted close-up. How aware are you of the show’s cinematography beforehand, and how does that impact your prep and performance?
Maslany: I don’t even know what scene that is…
LadyJenevia: It’s with the co-workers when she’s just trauma-dumping.
Maslany: Oh, yes! It’s such a delight to get writing like that because it’s rare in TV to have kind of a space where a character just talks. I remember it being difficult on the day, and I was struggling with it a little bit. Andrew Gottlieb, one of our writers, was behind the monitor, and he gave a note to allow for moments of humor in it. It cracked something open for me in Paula, too, that she doesn’t just feel sorry for herself. She’s actually got a lot of survival instincts, like humor.
That was one part of that scene. But then, I also love working with the camera and finding out what they’re focusing on, how they’re holding us in the frame, how we can inhabit their frame. All of that stuff is so interesting to me. It tells me so much about the point of view of the show, and what the show is interested in.
LadyJenevia: Thank you so much for your time, Tatiana. You are always a joy to watch. You are an incredible talent, and I really respect you for your principles. So, just thank you all around.
Maslany: Thank you so much. Thank you.
Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed is available to stream on Apple TV+.
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