The Deuce

The relationship between Candy and Harvey Wasserman developed after Maggie Gyllenhaal and David Krumholtz enjoyed working together on set. The writers saw their chemistry and incorporated it into the series.

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Creator David Simon said of the series' accuracy: "Some of it happened. Some of it didn't. Some of it could have. But all of it could have. That's the only rule: all of it could have." (NYT, August 24, 2017).

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Normally on film and TV sets, when an actor signs a nudity waiver as part of their contract, they cannot back out on the day of the scene if they suddenly become uncomfortable. For this series, the producers honored the actors' feelings if they changed their minds on the day they were required to do nudity, even if they had previously signed a nudity waiver. Actor/producer Maggie Gyllenhaal compared this to sexual consent in a Vanity Fair video, explaining: "If you go out to dinner with someone and you think, 'Yes, I want to sleep with them,' you go back to their apartment and you say, 'Actually, no,' then it's actually no. The same applies on our set."

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By 1971, Dunham Coach in Boonton, New Jersey, was producing pimp cars, which in those years were a status symbol for pimps.

DEEPER MEANING · SOURCED

Daniel Sauli (Tommy Longo) said he felt ready to get into his character while watching O Que Restou Das Flores (2010), which starred actor and singer Gustavo Goulart.

CHARACTERS & CAST · SOURCED

The scene in the hotel bar set in 2019 in the series finale was originally going to be the opening scene of the series and a massive flashback for the story, but the producers decided not to do it that way because sustaining that narrative over several seasons would have been difficult.

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There was no improvisation on set. The scripts were followed exactly, and any possible changes were discussed with George Pelecanos and David Simon first.

BEHIND THE SCENES · SOURCED

Candy was initially going to be a producer rather than a director, but the writers changed their minds going into the second season after a suggestion from Maggie Gyllenhaal.

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Megan Fox was offered the role of Lori Madison but turned it down because of the nudity the role involved.

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Lawrence Gilliard Jr., Anwan Glover, Chris Bauer, Clifford "Method Man" Smith, Gbenga Akinnagbe, Domenick Lombardozzi, Genevieve Hudson-Price and Michael Kostroff appeared in both "The Wire" and "The Deuce."

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The producers tried to bring Gbenga Akinnagbe back for the third season, even for a single episode, but he was in the middle of a theater tour and the schedules did not line up.

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Nine of the series' 12 directors were women, an unusually high proportion for the industry. They directed 15 of the 25 episodes: Roxann Dawson (3 episodes), Uta Briesewitz (2), Michelle MacLaren (2), Tanya Hamilton (2), Susanna White (2), Tricia Brock (1), Zetna Fuentes (1), Steph Green (1) and Minkie Spiro (1). This is consistent with the series' feminist agenda.

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Bringing an "intimacy coordinator" into the series was a relatively new concept, with consultant Alicia Rodis ready to handle potentially uncomfortable sexually intimate scenes, particularly for the actresses. Rodis is a co-founder of Intimacy Directors International (IDI).

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There are multiple scenes showing an advertisement for Mello Yello, but the beverage was not released until 1979.

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Actress Andrea-Rachel Parker plays "Bernice," a newly arrived prostitute traded to Rodney, who is played by rapper Method Man. Parker also plays Mama Ganja, a co-worker of Shotgun, in the Hulu series Wu-Tang: An American Saga, in which Shotgun is a biographical portrayal of Method Man played by rapper Dave East.

CHARACTERS & CAST · SOURCED

In the 2019 segment of the final episode, all the characters Vincent (James Franco) sees or encounters are "ghosts," characters who died during or after the series. The only character besides Vincent who is alive was Abby (Margarita Levieva), who literally appears in the final shot on the telephone.

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Maggie Gyllenhaal spoke with porn star Annie Sprinkle to research her character. Gyllenhaal also read Tina Russell's book "Porno Star" to do further research for the role.

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It includes Larisa Polonsky's first nude scene.

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Chris Bauer (Bobby Dwyer) and Jim Parrack (Russell) appeared in HBO's True Blood.

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