Blair Underwood: New Show Makes ‘Sex and the City’ ‘Look Like Child’s Play’

Apparently viewers should buckle up for a wild ride when Three Women airs in September — according to star Blair Underwood, things get steamy.

The Starz show, which is based on the 2019 book of the same name by Lisa Taddeo and follows writer Gia (Shailene Woodley) as she convinces three women to share personal stories, navigates polyamory.

“Oh, man, it’s sexually explicit,” Underwood said on a new episode of SiriusXM’s The Jess Cagle Show with Julia Cunningham. “There are things I’m doing on camera I’ve never done before. I say what we did on this show made whatever I did on Sex and the City years ago look like child’s play.”

The Longlegs actor said he expressed some reticence with executive producers Laura Easton and Taddeo about tackling the role, in fact — even going so far as saying this show “was harder to say yes to than anything I’ve ever done.” Ultimately, the producers made him feel safe on set, he said.

“Everything they said the experience would be like, it actually was,” he admitted. “I will tell you that this project was 95 percent all female-driven. All of the directors were female. I think almost all the writers were female, and our producing team were female, so it’s very well done. It’s very classy in how it’s all done.”

In the series, Underwood plays Richard, who is married to a much younger woman named Sloane (DeWanda Wise), whom the actor describes as “very fluid” and “loves having sex and relationships with men and women.” Richard, however, is a little more on the fence.

“We would call ’em ‘swingers’ back in the day, now called ‘polyamorous,’ but the one rule Richard has is you can be with whoever you want to be, but I have to watch and or be a part of it,” he said of his character. “Get involved if I so choose, but that’s up to me and anything outside that is a betrayal. Of course, there’s drama.”

Underwood, who is married to Josie Hart in real life, said getting into the role was interesting because he could not personally relate to it.

“It was fascinating because, you know, I don’t understand the polyamory,” he said. “I don’t like to share. My wife doesn’t like to share, so that’s not happening, but it was interesting just doing the research and seeing how many people are really into this lifestyle and opening up to this lifestyle. I found it absolutely fascinating.”

Three Women, which also stars Betty Gilpin, Gabrielle Creevy, and John Patrick Amedori, is released on Friday, Sept. 13 on the Starz app and airs at 10 p.m. ET/PT that night on the cable channel.

Source: Entertainment Weekly