HBO’s new teen melodrama, Euphoria, is the premium cable network’s first big “please don’t unsubscribe now that Game of Thrones is over” swing. The shallow dive into the lives of the young, attractive, and addled is technically a remake of an Israeli drama, but it’s essentially what would happen if Gaspar Noé rebooted Skins with a luxurious budget. I like it! And because it was meticulously designed to generate hype about how edgy it is, Euphoria has been generating hype about how edgy it is. It isn’t nearly as outré as it wants people to think—Kids was far more disturbing a quarter-century ago, and Euphoria actually likes its characters—but still, the show may have broken some graphic new ground in its second outing, “Stuntin’ Like My Daddy.” The episode features a potentially record-setting amount of full-front male nudity, which The Hollywood Reporter described as “close to 30 penises.”
When THR published its story—a good 11 days before the episode aired—it sounded like a comically large number of members. There are probably a ton of pornographic scenes that’d make Euphoria look like Sesame Street, but in mainstream entertainment, a single unclothed male crotch is a rare sighting. When an actor does one scene of full frontal, like Jason Segel in Forgetting Sarah Marshall or Chris Pine in Outlaw King, it is still unusual enough to trigger a lightly scandalized news cycle. The lopsided cultural hangup about weiners was the impetus for College Humor’s 2013 video “HBO Should Show Dongs,” and why actor Kevin Bacon recorded a mock-PSA demanding more male nudity in 2015. Even HBO, which is known for nudity, raised concerns with the volume of Euphoria dong shots; creator Sam Levinson wanted “like, 80 more” dicks in the locker room scene, but the network persuaded him to trim it down, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Despite the volume of male full frontal, the locker room scene is actually one of the more wholesome snippets of the new show, which has already depicted an overdose, statutory rape, nonconsensual strangling during intercourse, revenge porn, and aggravated assault in its first two hours. The cheeky montage of boys nonchalantly waggling their bits around was a lighthearted change of pace, one clearly meant to wink at the idea that male nudity is inherently more salacious than female nudity. The scene wasn’t as depraved as it was hyped up to be, which left The Ringer wondering whether it was even as record-breakingly gratuitous as it’d seemed.
Was that the most dicks ever on screen in a single movie or TV scene?
The Ringer reached out to HBO, which wanted nothing to do with the question. Likewise, the Guinness Book of World Records did not respond to The Ringer’s inquiries, and does not currently have a public list of television episodes or movies that featured the most penises in a single scene.
Next, The Ringer consulted two other groups that are well-known for paying extremely close attention to how many genitals appear onscreen: the Motion Picture Association of America and the TV Parental Guidelines Monitoring Board. Since both of these entities assess and grade film and television based on how explicit the content is, it seemed at least possible that they could have some sort of list of programming with the highest instances of full-frontal male nudity. This was decidedly not the case. “We don’t track that,” the MPAA’s very patient spokesperson said, noting that it would be “impossible” to do so. Furthermore: “We have a limited budget. That’s not really in our mission.” Meanwhile, the TV Parental Guidelines Board did not have a response at the time of deadline. Alas.
The most dicks on film The Ringer could find without outside guidance was the delightful dick-drawing scene in Superbad. However, those were animated and thus ineligible from competition. Stymied by traditional authorities, The Ringer consulted our last hope, the internet’s true expert on cinematic nudity: Mr. Skin. For the unfamiliar, Mr. Skin is a website (NSFW) that details all instances of female nudity in film and television. The company now operates a companion site, Mr. Man, which does the same accounting with a focus on male nudity. It has a very specific function, and it fulfills this function exceedingly well. Founder and CEO Jim McBride asked his staff to review footage of Euphoria to determine whether it did, in fact, show the most dicks ever. “Our official count is 21 penises,” McBride responded in an email.
But was it the most penises?
Nope!
“It’s the highest tally since the 0:40 minute mark of 2004’s EuroTrip, which featured a record 28 male members in one scene!” McBride explained with excitement. He also cited the 1979 Richard Gere film Yanks as another notable moment in full-frontal nudity, as it features a scene with 13 separate male members. “I hope this helps.”
It did help, because now we know: Euphoria did show the most dicks ever in one scene on a television show, but it did not show the most dicks ever in one scene besides porn, because EuroTrip exists. The competition, as it turns out, was stiffer than expected.
In the end, it’s appropriate that Euphoria didn’t actually smash any records with its sheer quantity of penis. Male full-frontal has been sensationalized into an extreme, audacious thing, but this scene is proof that the mere presence of dicks doesn’t make something automatically lurid or depraved. As much as Euphoria has been hyped up as this messed-up, hardcore, raw drama, at its core it is simply a show about teen issues, with an arch tone and really good cinematography.
Disclosure: HBO is an initial investor in The Ringer.
