"The first person I'd ever met who was poly, I met in 2005, so it's not conceptually passing strange to me and not really foreign territory," actress DeWanda Wise shared with me on "Salon Talks" while discussing playing a polyamorous character on the Starz series "Three Women."
The show, based on the Lisa Taddeo book of the same name, tells the stories of four different women — those alluded to in the title plus one narrator — through the lens of their complicated experiences with love and desire. They are misunderstood, mainly by the men in their lives and the inability to understand their many complexities.
Wise plays Sloane, a successful businesswoman who is in control of everything — her persona, her family, her nontraditional sex life. Sloane and her husband Richard, played by Blair Underwood, participate in an open marriage. From the surface, the couple appears to be very happy. However, the many rules and unchecked emotions that linger around multiple sex partners begin to poke holes in their happily ever after.
Wise, who played Nola Darling in the Spike Lee Netflix reboot of "She's Gotta Have It," was a fan of Taddeo's book prior to being considered for the role. She didn't personally identify with Sloane when reading, but was drawn in by how the book commands deep reflection about relationships.
In my conversation with Wise, she credits the emotional presence in her own marriage to fellow actor Alano Miller (whom she fell in love with and married after three months of dating). The couple has shared 15 years of marriage and Wise was ready to talk about the work it takes to be successful. Not the pretty pictures for social media, the red carpets, or fluffy profile pieces, but the beautiful struggle of learning how to love through the conflict — the kind of love and patience that Sloane may not possess.
“I still feel like he's a really f**king good husband. I'm a decent wife. He hates it when I say that, but I'm like, "I'm okay." I do my absolute best. And that's what it is, right?” Wise explained, “All it is is grappling with these terms. What is the role? What is the role of husband? What is the role of wife? And how can you, or do you subvert whatever those expectations are? You got to talk about the expectations. You got to talk about the invisible expectations.”
Watch my "Salon Talks" episode with Wise here or read a Q&A of our conversation below to hear more about "Three Women," her secrets for maintaining a healthy marriage, and why she wants her next role to be on stage.
The following conversation has been lightly edited for clarity and length.
Can you walk us into the world of “Three Women”?
Lisa Taddeo, the author, took this enormous ten-year road trip into the heart of America and really got into the lives of all these women to get to the core of the multifaceted nature of female desire. That's what this book is, it’s a non-fictional exploration of what makes us tick, what turns us on, what turns us off, what gets us on, what gets us off. And our series is the TV adaptation of that exploration.
Your involvement with “Three Women” began around you connecting with the book?
Yes. My TV agent at the time asked if I'd read the book, and I was like, "Who had not read the book?" And so I reread it in preparation of meeting Lisa. I was really moved by the book for sure.
The first time you read the book, did you feel a connection with your character, Sloane?
No. Not at all, no. Sloane's entire story, her mystique, and the idea that she's so self-constructed, it's something that I think people have more in common with than they think they do—this notion of what your brand is. To read about a woman who had been thinking that way before social media, if I tracked back, she would've been born in the early '70s. The way that she was thinking is very contemporary and I found that really fascinating.
Stepping from the book and going into the screenplay, when you first got a chance to read it — what did you think of her?
Every character I play, I love with the ferocity of a real person. Sloane superficially has everything, but she's still so hungry in every way. She's physically hungry because she's battling an eating disorder. She is materially hungry because she has that kind of ambition. She is sexually hungry because she's sexually hungry. This is who she is. And so she has a level of hunger and ambition that I don't really identify with. It's not who I am.
It's the beauty of the art though you get to play around with that.
It's the beauty of the art. You get to explore and understand and build even greater compassion and capacity for people with experiences outside of your own.
Sloane is a businesswoman. She has the perfect husband, they have the family, they have the house. She has it all, and I think people who dream of that see her and they say, "What can go wrong?"
Yeah, absolutely. It makes you go, "Well, what does that mean to me? What is having it all to me? And do I want that? Do I want what it costs?" And that's a big thing. I also think it's that simple notion, when you really get to know anybody you're like, "Oh, they poop like anybody." Everybody on social, you're like, "Oh, if I use the bathroom after them, it might smell." You know what I mean? That's what you get to underneath the facade and the veneer, you're like, "Oh, she has some things going on."
You’ve talked about how she has hunger and ambition, but you're personally more content and relaxed. Where do you draw from to create her on-screen character?
My friends, especially my New York friends. My very ambitious New York friends who I admire a lot. They're juggling everything, juggling careers and families, and still climbing. Our mutual friend [author Wayétu Moore], she's a Sloane in the best way, her fashion sense. My closest friends, shout out to them.
We had Blair Underwood on "Salon Talks," who plays your husband in the show. He noted being blown away, not just by your performance, but the idea of a poly lifestyle. What did you think of that?
This isn't my first [role that touches polyamory]. “She’s Gotta Have It” is very much an exploration into polyamory at the dating level. I think the first person I'd ever met who was poly, I met in 2005, so it's not conceptually passing strange to me and not really foreign territory. Now, especially with Gen Z, in the same way that sexuality and our language has evolved, I think our understanding of all the options available to us when it comes to relationships are all far more known and out there.
We were able to make some connections between Nola, your character in “She’s Gotta Have It”, and Sloane.
Absolutely. I call her her rich auntie cousin, or who she can grow to be.
Spike Lee has helped lay the groundwork for a whole lot of free-thinking, especially with our community. What was it like working with him on “She’s Gotta Have It”?
Crazy. We were by and large, very shared brain, in lockstep. He will never not be an indie filmmaker. Speaking of people who maintain that hunger and ambition and drive, he still operates like it's his first film. That is his energy level. That's how fast you move.
At moments he would be like, "Okay, we're going to go up and shoot here now," and it would not be on the schedule. I'd be like, "So we're just going to do it?" If anyone's ever come up in the indie film space, you'd be like, "All right, let's go steal the shot," which is code for we don't have permits to go and shoot here. Spike still operates like that. You got to be on for the ride.
I think “Three Women” is going to do a good job at teaching the world, especially men, on how we view and talk about and explore sexuality, especially regarding women. There's so much misinformation.
It's true. It's very true. I feel like it's only a disconnect. I read way too many news articles about relationships, but this conversation that's been growing just about the divide between men and women, especially in Millennials and Gen Z, it's only widening and only deepening. And I do hope that people keep talking about what they want, about what they don't want, about what they value, what they don't value, about how they envision their lives in a way that's separate from what other people have or what other people want.
Social [media]'s great. It's a really great tool, but I think part of the cost is this comparison that has unfortunately made a lot of people far more boring because there's no sense of a personal identity. You'll be in pursuit of something that you think you want because you've seen it, and then when you get it, it's not actually for you. That person's not for you. That job is not for you. That vacation spot is not for you.
The only way to bridge that is to continue to actually talk to the person in front of you and connect and allow the things that come up to be like, "Oh, something came up. I had an adverse reaction when that person was like, 'I want five kids.'" Whenever I'm telling a story that is the ultimate goal, to get people talking.
My Salon colleague Melanie McFarland called the show “the sexiest show on TV that isn't expressly about sex.” What kinds of conversations have you been hearing around the show?
A lot of gratitude, a lot of representing for complicated women, and all women are complicated. So just a ton of that. What I love about how we've been releasing the show, it's the first time I've been a part of a show since “Shots Fired” and “Underground” where it releases weekly instead of all at once. It's been really fun watching people take the ride with all of the women and have the time to process each story.
You've spoken openly about the work it takes to have a healthy marriage, but you get to show the dark side on camera of some of the things that don't always make it into the conversations when we talk about marriage and relationships. How difficult was that?
I think part of the reason why Blair and I connected so quickly and easily is because prior to his present marriage, he had been married for 27 years. Alano and I are on year 15, and he's the best, which is helpful. I still feel like he's a really f**king good husband. I'm a decent wife. He hates it when I say that, but I do my absolute best. And that's what it is, right? All it is is grappling with these terms. What is the role? What is the role of husband? What is the role of wife? Do you subvert whatever those expectations are? You got to talk about the expectations. You got to talk about the invisible expectations. The ones where you're like, "Oh, I thought that was going to go this way."
Alano and I just had this conversation. He moves very fast. He's very efficient. He's such an extrovert. If you saw his house checklist, it's insane. He'll start something and then he'll be like, "Oh, I wish you had been a part of it." And I was like, "We got to do better at talking about the invisible expectations or how you thought it was going to go in your head." So that I don't feel like a jerk because I'm not being helpful, and you don't feel alone.
How do you guys respond to conversations when people prop you up on that pedestal of relationship goals?
I think anyone who is on my Instagram [knows], we’ll post each other every once in a while, but we were together before Instagram existed. All we had was Facebook, and I think BlackPlanet was on its way out. We were a couple before hashtags, so I still have that boundary. Of all the things in my life, my marriage is the most precious thing and I am ferociously protective of it.
“Three Women” depicts different kinds of relationships. Has reading the book and playing in a television show evolved your idea of marriage and what love is?
When I think about Lena's story, played by the extraordinary Betty Gilpin, and this idea of being married to a man who doesn't love you – that storyline, both in the book and then in execution in our show, is utterly heartbreaking to me.
From the outside, for me, I go, "Leave. Don't put up with that shit. Go.” But then in the course of watching the show, you're like, “She has two young kids. She's in small town, Midwest, wherever she is, and she doesn't feel like she can. She doesn't feel like she has a way out. Everyone in that community knows her. It's a very Judeo-Christian community.” You get all of that when you're watching the series and you're like, "Oh, I understand why you feel trapped."
What's next for you?
Oh, what's next? My goodness. Probably a play because Hollywood is on time out. I'm just going to put that right to the camera. Hollywood is wilding right now. I don't know what these stories are, everything that's being developed.
Alano and I, we are always in the process of producing our own thing, so that's what I'm actually working on. When it comes to Hollywood proper and the opportunities coming out in the traditional studio system right now, it's tricky.
