Thomas Maier's Blog

   Here's an article from USA Today's Ann Oldenburg based on an interview with the charming and wonderfully talented director John Madden. I agree with John that while 'Masters' begins in the 1950s, it's really an eternal story about what makes men and women tick. Stay tuned...
USA TODAY: Sheen's 'Masters of Sex' melds House, Don Draper Imagine Mad Men but with even more hanky panky.
Michael Sheen is ready to go!That is what might be heading to Showtime soon if the cable channel picks up the pilot to Masters of Sex, starring Michael Sheen (Twilight, Frost/Nixon) and Lizzy Caplan (127 Hours, TV's New Girl) as '60s human sexuality researchers William Masters and Virginia Johnson.John Madden, the British director behind Shakespeare in Love and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (which opens Friday), shot the show in and around New York City."You couldn't do this on regular TV," he says. "It is somewhere between House and Mad Men. It has the period feel, but mainly the pair have such an extraordinary journey and it's their exciting relationship that is the heart of the story. "He says of his cast, "Michael is amazing and Lizzy is in a very different role than what she has played before. Caitlin Fitzgerald is Masters' wife. And Beau Bridges plays the chancellor of the university where they started doing their work. "So what Mad Men is to advertising, Masters of Sex is to, well, sex? "It absolutely is," Madden assures. "It is very interesting when you are setting up a world and you don't obviously know yet whether it will get picked up. But I think it will."

John Madden, with his new hit film, also talked about the making of "Masters of Sex" and indicates that he'll have a continuing role with the production if Showtime greenlights the series:What attracted you to directing the pilot for the Showtime drama series Masters of Sex?Madden:  Well, the answer is that it came to me as a script, and the script was really terrific.  I thought it was very, very interesting. [William] Masters and [Virginia] Johnson were part of my past.  It took me 30 pages to realize that’s what it was about.  I kept seeing the word “Masters,” and then seeing the word “Johnson,” and I thought, “Oh, hang on!”  I think I was a prurient schoolboy whenHuman Sexual Response was published in the mid-60′s, and we all rushed to get it, thinking it was going to be erotically interesting, but it wasn’t at all.  It was all maps and graphs and data.  But, it’s a very interesting story because the personalities and the relationship between those two characters is very interesting, nevermind the whole idea of demystifying sex, which is essentially what they did.[Alfred] Kinsey began that journey, but his studies were all based on documentary interviews.  They witnessed it quite literally because their studies were clinical and aimed to understand the physiology of sex, but some of the processes that were involved in doing that were outrageous and extraordinary, from a modern perspective.  They were funny and interesting and, obviously, erotic.  It just seemed like a very interesting project.  I also admire American television, particularly cable television.  They seem to be able to do things that movies can’t do.  Masters is a complex character, who is not always sympathetic and not always doing things that you would ever allow a character to do in a movie because you can’t let people fall out of love with the people they’re watching.  The longer form allows you to investigate things in really interesting ways.Will you continue to be involved with the show, past the pilot?Madden:  I’ll have an ongoing relationship with the project, if it gets taken up.  I think it’s looking promising.  It’s really good.And, it’s got a really great cast of actors.Madden:  Yes, Michael Sheen and Lizzy Caplan are great [as Masters and Johnson].

    Director John Madden is interviewed and asked about "Masters of Sex" and tells about his "raw" experience.


You just shot a pilot here in New York — Masters of Sex with Lizzy Caplan and Michael Sheen. How did that go?
I've never shot in New York before, and I was really relishing that opportunity, but we ended up only shooting one scene in Manhattan, at the Union Theological Seminary, which is part of Columbia, because a huge amount of the story takes place at a hospital. We found this decommissioned hospital out in Queens, a former tubercular hospital, and we built a set there. We knocked down one floor and rebuilt it. And we had a bunch of shooting on Long Island. So it wasn't the kind of raw New York experience I had hoped to have. But the show is certainly raw, in another way! [Laughs.]

The Chicago Tribune's Redeye.com just interviewed Lizzy Caplan and managed to ask her about "Masters of Sex," the upcoming "Showtime" project. I just hope the Tribune remembers how nice they were to this book. TRIBUNE'S REDYE: A lot of people are interested in Showtime's "Masters of Sex" coming up, in which you play renowned researcher Virginia Johnson. What do you think society would be like without the research she and William Masters (Michael Sheen) contributed?There's two ways of thinking about it. On the one hand, I think that it would be radically different because they created a ripple effect that we're still seeing today. They changed the public's view of sexuality. It was totally them doing that. People weren't using sex to sell things really before them. All of the changes that we see now—a woman's magazine was about cooking and cleaning, it wasn't about like how many orgasms can you have. It just wasn't. And while I think the culture was changing around the time that they were becoming famous, I think the trajectory would have been slightly different had they not been around. The woman's movement was already starting to happen, but in terms of women claiming their sexuality for the first time, that was all Masters and Johnson. And so as a woman, I look back at what they did and I know every part of my life was affected by what they did. Everything we see on TV, every show I go out for, has so much to do with these two, seemingly buttoned-up Midwestern researchers that managed to do something that nobody else was willing to do. Nobody wanted to touch this kind of research. TRIBUNE'S REDYE: These days somebody going for the title "Master of Sex" probably isn't doing a lot of research.[Laughs.] Well, that's the title of the book that it's based on. We'll see if that title sticks. Because while I understand you sort of need to be very titillating to sell a book, I think our show—I don't know if that [laughs] helps or hurts our show that it's called "Masters of Sex." Even though they were, in fact, masters of sex.

From The Hollywood Reporter Cover Story: Showtime's growth under David Nevins, How He Signed "Masters of Sex" While Up in the Air: "Also in contention for a slot on Showtime's 2013 schedule is Masters of Sex, adapted from Thomas Maier's book about the intriguing lives and unusual relationship of married professor William Masters and his former assistant Virginia Johnson, 1950s era pioneers of the science of human sexuality. This project, too, plays into Nevins' desire to offer what the other networks cannot with both its explicit language and many sex scenes, including an early one in which Masters observes a prostitute and her client having intercourse."I've been leery of doing period fare, but I think the subject is so specific, so provocative and so contemporary that I got over it," explains Nevins, who was urged to read the Maier book when he bumped into producer and longtime friend Sarah Timberman on a plane ride to New York shortly after taking the gig. "By the time the plane landed, I said, 'Yes, we have to do this,' and she said, 'I think I can get [The Pacific writer] Michelle Ashford, who both of us have known for a very long time,'" he recalls, adding of the New York-based project starring Lizzy Caplan and Michael Sheen, "It was at the top of the list from that moment on." He has spent multiple days on the set of both pilots, one of the perks of working in cable, where far fewer projects are in production at any given time (Showtime typically has three to four projects going, with plans to expand). That freedom to be hands-on, as he was for nearly a decade at Imagine -- where he produced such series as Friday Night Lights, Arrested Development and Parenthood -- is chief among the reasons Nevins agreed to take the gig. (Although this time around, he sits before the bank of cameras with a headset dangling from his neck taking stock of what the producers have gathered, since he has been off running the network.)"Bonus Mystery Question: What Other Well-Known Theatrical Figure Was Seen Wearing Headsets on the Set During Filming of "Masters of Sex" Pilot? Stay Tuned for Answer.

Beau Bridges and Margo Martindale Join Michael Sheen in Showtime Pilot "Masters of Sex"

By Michael Gioia
March 1, 2012

Emmy Award winners Beau Bridges and Margo Martindale will join Frost/Nixon's Michael Sheen in Showtime's drama pilot "Masters of Sex," according to The Hollywood Reporter.
As previously reported, Sheen will star as 1960s human sexuality pioneer William Masters in the project that is written by Michelle Ashford and directed by John Madden.
The Showtime drama, which is adapted from Thomas Maier's book "Masters of Sex: The Life And Times Of William Masters And Virginia Johnson, The Couple Who Taught America How To Love," will chronicle the lives and romance of Masters (Sheen) and Johnson, who will be played by Lizzy Caplan ("Mean Girls," "127 Hours").
Bridges will play Masters' boss, Barton Scully, and Martindale will guest star as Masters' secretary, Miss Horchow.
Sheen and his manager Tammy Rosen will serve as producers on the show that is scheduled to begin production in March in New York.
Bridges, who currently stars as J.B. Biggley in the Broadway revival of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, has also been seen on Broadway in Who's Who in Hell and Where's Daddy? He won Emmy Awards for HBO's "The Second Civil War," "The Positively True Adventures of the Alleged Texas Cheerleader-Murdering Mom" and "Without Warning: The James Brady Story."
Martindale was nominated for a Tony Award for her performance in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. She won an Emmy Award for her work on "Justified" and has also been seen in "The Hours" and "Million Dollar Baby," among others. The performer will also co-star in the upcoming ABC pilot "Counter Culture."

Knock, knock: What's well-dressed, clean-shaven, and attending a formal affair in no larger than a 44Regular suit? Haha, that sure sounds like the set-up for a joke with a number of funny replies. But actually, it's the casting ad for a scene from "Masters from Sex", the Showtime pilot starring Michael Sheen and Lizzy Caplan. It looks like Showtime will be shooting March 7 and/or 8th here in New York. Early on, there's a scene in the pilot with a formal affair involving Dr. Masters that comes right out of the book. Hopefully, everyone will run out and buy the book to read before they air it on Showtime!


Here's the casting ad description:
Non AFTRA Men | Male | Caucasian | Age: 25 - 70 | Role Type: Background
Must be only Non-Union. Talent to portray patrons and waitstaff for upscale formal event scene. Suit Size: NO larger than a 44R and should have short hair (will be cut into the mid 50's style), clean shaven. NOTE: Please indicate in your cover note true suit size. Must be available for fittings on Thurs., 2/23 or Fri., 2/24 in Brooklyn.

Delighted to hear the big Showtime news out of Hollywood: Michael Sheen and Lizzy Caplan are going to play Masters and Johnson in the upcoming pilot.

Over the weekend, we all learned Paul Bettany will play Dr. William Masters in Showtime's "Masters of Sex" pilot based on my biography of them. I'm delighted to see Paul join the cast and I think he'll be fantastic.

Paul will bring the kind of smartness and sizzle needed for this role, especially in portraying Masters' relationship with the vivacious Virginia Johnson character. I'm also delighted to see director John Madden, whose "Shakespeare in Love" won the Oscar in 1998, agreeing to oversee this project. As with that film, Madden is sure to bring out the humor as well as the dramatic tension between these two very enigmatic characters.

I've read the script by Michelle Ashford (Emmy winner for HBO's "John Adams" and nominee for last years's "The Pacific") and it's wonderful, the kind of adaptation that a book writer can only dream about. It's humorous (almost in the style of the old Oscar winner "Tom Jones" film) but also filled with the tension that surrounded Masters and Johnson's work. I'm looking forward to seeing this production sometime next year.

People who write books say the process is sort of like having a baby. Months and months go by until -- voila! -- there's your little gift to the world! In this sense, having a TV program made from your book then is sort of like having twins. Twice the effort but twice the fun!

So with fatherly delight, I'm delighted to see the following announcement from Showtime. Stay tuned to see who might be the actors, the directors and when this series might appear in the future. But for now, the management of this website is tickled pink to see our baby up in show lights.

Here's what The Hollywood Reporter said:

Showtime's entertainment chief David Nevins continues to put his stamp on the premium cable network's lineup, giving the go-ahead to three new pilots.

The first of the trio is Masters of Sex, an adaptation of Thomas Maier's book of the same name. The one-hour drama, from Sony Pictures TV, centers on the lives and unusual relationship between influential sexual education researchers William Masters and Virginia Johnson. Masters, which in its title alone offers a premium-cable skew, is being written by Michelle Ashford (The Pacific, John Adams). Ashford is also set to executive produce with Sarah Timberman and Carl Beverly (Justified, A Gifted Man).

Congratulations to Sarah and Michelle. Can't wait to see this drama on Showtime!