Starz's P-Valley achieves that rarest of balancing acts, elevating pole-dancing to a feminist feat of artistry and athleticism

The Washington Post

The Starz drama set in a strip club created by Katori Hall, based on her 2015 play Pussy Valley, "is a thoughtful immersion into an overlooked culture and community — in this case, the economically strapped, predominantly Black 'Dirty South' of broken dreams, gospel truths and palpable prejudices," says Hank Stuever. "The show excels at both tawdry entertainment and meaningful moments of character study — a reminder that premium cable can toggle between romp and reflection, recalling the better, earlier seasons of HBO’s True Blood and the stylistic intent of films such as Craig Brewer’s Hustle & Flow and Steven Soderbergh’s Magic Mike." Stuever adds: "P-Valley succeeds the way any good new show does — it has a vision of what it wants to be (and what it wants to say, if perhaps subtextually) and then ferociously sets about bringing that vision to light. A viewer is never confused about tone or intent; it’s a sexy, quick-paced drama with just enough tricks up its . . . well, there aren’t a lot of sleeves seen here, but the surprises are what really keep the show bouncing along."

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• P-Valley enters a debate over Black sexuality, propriety and sex work that’s been unfolding for years: "Rather than hand down judgment from on high, or collapse strippers into irredeemably broken women, P-Valley provides a rare opportunity for the Black women who engage in such work to define themselves, while illustrating how their jobs fit into the larger fabric of their lives," says Soraya Nadia McDonald. "Dancers at the Pynk, like nearly all strippers, are independent contractors, with no benefits, no collective bargaining and certainly no employer-subsidized health care. The characters of P-Valley are savvy and aware of the ways they capitalize on their bodies, especially the acid-tongued Mercedes, who intends to retire from stripping at age 25 to open her own gym and dance studio. She’s basically the character Beyoncé sings about in '6 Inch' from Lemonade."
• P-Valley is the kind of series so variously accomplished you don't know what to praise first: "Like last year's Hustlers, P-Valley is largely a drama about day-to-day existence within the club: the economic ecosystem, the uneasy but real sisterhood, the untraditional and sometimes compromised motherhood and most of all the always-underappreciated labor of stripping," says Inkoo Kang. "But the series is also about a small town under encroachment by corporate powers, the racism and colorism that still determine too many fates and the confidence and vulnerability that come with 'booty money' — all from the point of view of Black working-class women and queer men."
• P-Valley finds its rhythm in unpacking the nuances and particularities of Black womanhood: The Starz series is "immediately distinctive because of its realism," says Aramide Tinubu. "Like current popular dramas Hollywood or Little Fires Everywhere, the audience doesn’t simply serve as a voyeur to the surface-level glitz and glamour of this world; one is drawn into all angles of these women’s lives—even the painful parts. In the pilot, (24-year-old director Karena) Evans is careful to set the tone, showcasing her actors in blue and purple lights, while stripping away the hyper-sexualization that Black women have endured on-screen for centuries. When Mercedes takes the stage, Hall captures the pure athleticism that she and the other women possess. As Mercedes climbs the pole, the music fades out. The audience only hears her pants and groans as she exerts herself to reach the ceiling before daringly dropping to the bottom—headfirst. It’s stunning and terrifying. The series also highlights the richness and history of the community that surrounds the strip club. The stifling Mississippi heat emanates off the screen, as P-Valley digs its heels into the South’s cadence. From the Black cowboys to the dilapidated surrounding businesses to the gold-tooth-wearing men like patron and aspiring rapper Lil’ Murda (J. Alphonse Nicholson), The Pynk is just one component of this compelling but rarely seen ecosystem."
• P-Valley understands the dreams and challenges of its captivating characters the way an exotic dancer knows the physics of her own body: Katori Hall's Starz series "is a lot of show, a noir melodrama about struggle and secrets, family strife and business machinations," says James Poniewozik. "But above all, it’s a confident and lyrical story with an intimate understanding of the sort of characters who are too often used as decoration in the Bada Bings of antihero drama. Here these women, most of them Black, get to be subjects, not objects. And they demand notice...The camera’s point of view is the dancers’, not the customers’. It puts you on the stage, looking over their shoulders, taking in the faces of the watching clientele. When it does view the dancers from the crowd, it’s not leering but admiring, as if appreciating a fellow artist’s technique. It sees them as whole, not as parts. It captures exertion and musculature, vertiginously following the women like astronauts in zero gravity."
• Unlike Hustlers, P-Valley views dancing as work and art: "P-Valley, co-written by Hall and almost entirely female writing staff, each episode directed by one of eight different women, resets the classic TV trope of a beloved joint to the deep south," says Adrian Horton. "As told almost entirely by Black female and queer characters, it’s one of the year’s best new television series. Like Hustlers, last year’s hit film on New York City strippers-turned-con artists under the strain of the recession whose female director, Lorene Scafaria, focused on the competitive, expansive friendships between the dancers, P-Valley navigates the humming ecosystem of the club. It’s a swirl of business acumen required in selling fantasy for cash, the strategy of working the floor, stripping as an economic and mental game of navigating social hierarchy and the line between performance and intimacy. But whereas Hustlers’ arc hinges on one long ruse – the one-last-job fleecing of unsympathetic finance bros – P-Valley instead views dancing as work and art, its signature Pynk Club as a home base worth fighting for rather than escape."
• P-Valley is one of the best new shows of the year: "P-Valley blends the profane, the sacred, and the politics of the almighty dollar to tell sharp, wildly engrossing stories about Black women on the margins who use their bodies to keep families and whole communities afloat," says Malcolm Venable, adding: "P-Valley is an unadulterated, unfiltered work that pours light into a specific slice of the Black experience — one that, from the outset, may not seem particularly artful or elegant — and turns it into an achingly beautiful song. It shines a light on women who some might consider the 'least of these,' giving them agency, understanding, and love. Bring a stack of bills to throw at the screen."
• It’s a vibe show more than a story show: Although "the plot is a familiar stew made up of shady land deals, stolen identities, and extramarital affairs," the "vibe borders on hypnotic," says Alan Sepinwall. "The Pynk and the people who work there feel real, and desperate, and all kinds of complicated." Sepinwall adds: "Strip clubs have been a ubiquitous prestige-TV locale going back to The Sopranos. The HBO mob drama used the Bada Bing for verisimilitude (where else would wiseguys want to hang out?) and as a sign of how casually and cruelly Tony and friends exploited people without better options. Too many cable and streaming series that followed, though, seemed to view strippers and other naked women as an expected perk that came with the cost of admission. Starz in particular has an embarrassing history with gratuitous nudity, with some dramas like Boss and Magic City at times feeling like exposed breasts were the real point, rather than those pesky stories and characters. There have been exceptions — if nothing else, Spartacus and Outlander have been equal-opportunity flesh peddlers — but the channel’s porn-iness has so often verged on self-parody, it’s a wonder it took until 2020 for a Starz show to arrive that is specifically about strippers. But with Hall as showrunner, and an all-female lineup of directors — including Karena Evans, Kimberly Peirce, Millicent Shelton, and Tamra Davis — P-Valley‘s gaze is never a leering one."
• Katori Hall blames cable companies for P-Valley title: “The problem came up when Starz reached out preemptively to the carriers — Comcast, Time Warner — and asked them about placing the show on their platform," she says. "What came back was a resounding, No, we are not putting no show that got pussy in the title on our platform. So, it ended up being a business decision. We did not want to create this amazing show that was breaking all these barriers and representing Black women in a unique and nuanced way to not be seen. I felt some type of way about it, but I did not want to block access to what I think is a groundbreaking show.“
• Why P-Valley is described as "Trap music meets film noir": “I embrace the juxtaposition of light and shadow, and I always knew that I wanted to have a visual nod towards noir, but the unfortunate thing about noir is that Black folks haven’t really existed in noir,” says Hall. “And if we do, or if any POC does, it’s very peripheral or it’s a stereotype, and I really wanted to basically take that genre and smash it and use it to my own specific purposes. So just using the tropes of noir and subverting them was so fun and something that makes the show super unique.”
• Hall explains why P-Valley needed to have an all-female creative team: “I just knew that this show needed a laying on of hands that only women can do,” says Hall. “I had this deep desire to have a show that pulses with the female gaze.” Hall also credits Susan Lewis, the senior vice president of original programming at Starz, for wanting to avoid another show that used exotic dancers as props. “Working with somebody who really understands the world and really had a great respect for the women doing the work was the right way to go,” she says.
• Hall recalls the idea for a show about Black strippers being taboo in 2015: "Some people wouldn’t even hear my pitch or even allow me in the room because, back in 2015, the subject matter was still largely taboo," she says. "But these women are human beings, just like you and me. Sex work is work — you may not agree with the work, but it’s putting food in their families’ mouths, putting these people through school. It is saving lives. I think the world is now ready to hear their stories in a more respectful way." What’s changed over these past few years? A few things. Pole fitness has gotten more respect as a real sport. I started writing the play after I took a class and almost vomited — like, this is some hard work, this is art, this is a craft, this deserves to be an Olympic sport. And the explosion of Cardi B: this stripper-turned-rapper and her kind of unapologetic personality brought people a new perspective on who these women are. She has no shame that she used to dance, and even claimed respect for it in hip-hop, a predominantly male space. And even though there were many movies already — The Players Club, Striptease, Showgirls, Magic Mike — Hustlers centered the perspective of these women; they weren’t being used as props in someone else’s story. I mean, J.Lo was on a pole during the Super Bowl! That’s the biggest sign of how far strip club culture has come, from these seedy places to a stadium."