Sydney Sweeney Sets The Record Straight About Her Eyebrow-Raising Euphoria Comments
With the amount of nudity, sexual content and drug use on display in a high school drama, "Euphoria" Season 2 is known for its salacious content. As one review for The Indian Express described it, "[T]he colours are oversaturated, the camera is perpetually coked-out and characters have a tendency of casually saying things like, 'It's just heroin.'" It's not surprising, then, that when star Sydney Sweeney told The Independent in January that she had creative control over her character's nude scenes, viewers took her words to mean that she was opposed to them.
Speaking to the UK outlet, Sweeney — who reportedly just got engaged to boyfriend Jonathan Davino – said of her character Cassie's topless scenes, "There are moments where Cassie was supposed to be shirtless and I would tell Sam [Levinson, 'Euphoria' screenwriter and director], 'I don't really think that's necessary here.' He was like, 'OK, we don't need it.'" Sweeney even added, "I've never felt like Sam has pushed it on me or was trying to get a nude scene into an HBO show. When I didn't want to do it, he didn't make me." Nothing scandalous here... right? Twitter said, "wrong," with users blasting Levinson with comments such as, "Sam Levinson punishing Sydney Sweeney for not wanting to do topless scenes by writing in a puking-in-the-hot-tub scene instead."
This erroneous misconception ran so wild that Sweeney recently felt compelled to set the record straight.
Sydney Sweeney didn't need Twitter white-knighting
How did Sydney Sweeney's words get so twisted? That's probably what the "Euphoria" star was wondering when she clarified her comments about series director and screenwriter Sam Levinson with Teen Vogue in March. As Sweeney explained, she only publicly noted her creative suggestion about selective nudity to praise Levinson for being respectful and collaborative. "I never asked him to cut any scenes," Sweeney pointed out. "It got twisted and turned and it became its own beast, and I was like, 'Oh, my God.'" She then praised Levinson again, saying, "It was more how respectful Sam is and how incredible of a director he is, that he would never make me do something I didn't feel comfortable with."
Due to her character Cassie's ongoing love triangle being focal to her story, Sweeney added, "Cassie's body is a different form of communication for her." She clarified, "There's a purpose to what that character is going through. That's the character. We all get naked in real life. We show this character's life and what they're going through."
After a "Euphoria" fan account tweeted Sweeney's explanation, some on Twitter attacked those among its ranks who previously criticized Levinson. "whos surprised that twitter twists her words," one user rhetorically asked, while another noted Sweeney didn't need any white-knighting, writing, "these people claim to wanna protect Sydney (a grown adult) and end up overlooking her work that she's said she's very proud of."