Back in the day, you had to go hunting for a penis on TV or at the cinema – I lost track of how many times I rewound Betty Blue for a flash of French love sword.
I thanked my love of Indie every time a new Ewan McGregor project was released in the 90s & early noughties – the most likely hope of copping an eyeful of manhood.
And nodded appraisingly when along came Michael Fassbender with no reason to feel any Shame showing all his art on the big screen.
But until fairly recently, it was a rare treat (mostly a treat) to catch sight of a penis on screen – now you can’t turn on your TV without one demanding your attention.
But that also brings with it the question: prosthetic or not? Social media is engorged with people sharing their theories on which are faux or flesh. In the name of research…
Oliver Quick-steps with his penis in Saltburn
Saltburn: a fantastic black comedy thriller currently doing the rounds in the cinema and on Prime, which should make us all think long and hard about privilege, social mobility and psychopaths.
But, thanks to the closing scene, all I could think about was Barry Keoghan’s manhood and whether it was all natural as he swung it round to the strains of Murder on the Dancefloor (it is – wow).
Barry, 31, said to Entertainment Weekly of the scene in question: “The initial thing was about me having no clothes on. I’m a bit, ehhh. But after take one, I was ready to go. I was like, ‘Let’s go again. Let’s go again.’
“You kind of forget, because there’s such a comfortable environment created, and it gives you that licence to go, ‘All right, this is about the story now.’
“It totally felt right. It’s ownership. This is my place. It’s full confidence in, ‘I can do what I want in this manor. I can strip to my barest and waltz around because this is mine.’ Yeah, it was fun.”
Tommy Lee’s talking penis in Pam & Tommy
Similarly, when Pam & Tommy landed on Disney+ in 2022, Tommy Lee’s talking penis stole the show.
Yes, you read that right. The rocker (played by Stan Sebastian) has a full-on full-frontal conversation with his sizeable snake in episode 2.
The mini-series charts the relationship between the bad boy musician and Baywatch babe Pamela Anderson from their wild first meeting through to the theft of their notorious sex tape.
Soon after meeting, Pamela (played by Lily James) and Tommy end up back at her hotel room after a night out dancing, drinking and doing drugs.
And while Tommy’s ‘draining his main vein’ in the bathroom he starts to talk to his penis (so far, not that strange) about Pammy being The One.
But his rhythm stick has different ideas as he ‘tells’ Tommy he’s just got divorced and needs to play the field – or get on the pussy train, to quote verbatim.
Special mention should be given to the shapes Tommy’s knob manages to throw while simultaneously talking, too. Must be all that yoga.
It should be needless to say, but the penis we see definitely does not belong to Stan – it’s an animatronic prop that the actor wore like pants and was controlled by no less than four men.
Harry’s ready-for-action tackle in And Just Like That
Sex and the City sequel And Just Like That was pretty light on sex and nudity for most of season one, so it came as a shock when Charlotte got on her knees to gobble husband Harry in the bathroom – with the door unlocked. While their teenage kids were in the apartment.
When their daughter walked in as Charlotte was about the blow the whistle, Harry’s penis came flying out of his pants as his wife moved like lightning to slam the door closed – with viewers getting a shocking eyeful.
Actor Evan Handler swerved questions about whether it was real on Twitter, quipping: “A common topic of discussion back in my single years.”
However, show runner Michael Patrick King confirmed it was a prosthetic.
Cal’s peeing penis in Euphoria
In 2022, fans of the HBO series saw Cal have a breakdown in front of his family, peeing all over the foyer of his home as his wife and sons watched. And there was a lot of hose pipe, but actor Eric Dane has fessed up to it being fake.
“I had absolute control over the penis. Because it was supposed to be mine. I approved it. I said, ‘This looks like a nice penis. Let’s use this one,'” he told Men’s Health.
Good taste.
Sex/Life
Netflix drama Sex/Life was crammed full of sex and nudity – as the title clearly hints at – but viewers’ jaws dropped when lead actor Adam Demos turned to face the camera and we caught sight of his humungous aubergine.
Read more: The raunchiest, ‘nudiest’ streaming TV shows
Was he wearing a prosthetic? That’s the million dollar question. When asked exactly that, show runner Stacy Rukeyser said: “I can tell you what Adam Demos says about it which is: ‘a gentleman never tells.’
“So we are leaving that up to the viewer’s imagination.”
That’ll be a yes, then. (Or we truly pray for his real-life lovers.)
Saltburn introduces the latest penis to become a TV talking point – what do you think about male nudity on screen?
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