Margaret Qualley Enjoyed Her Drive-Away Dolls Sex Scenes For One Key Reason

In his feature film debut without his brother Joel, Ethan Coen gave the world a raucous, sharp queer road-trip comedy titled "Drive-Away Dolls" — and the director and his stars did not shy away from shooting explicit scenes. According to Margaret Qualley, performing those intimate moments for the camera didn't feel like such a big deal.

Eric Eisenberg at CinemaBlend got to speak to Qualley and her co-stars Geraldine Viswanathan and Beanie Feldstein, and apparently, Qualley felt really comfortable working on some of her raunchier scenes. Her character Jamie is particularly wild; she's best friends with Viswanathan's Marian, and as the movie opens, she and her soon-to-be ex-girlfriend Sukie (Feldstein) are splitting up because Jamie was unfaithful. From meeting strangers on her impromptu road trip with Marian to a moment where she makes full use of a briefcase's secret stash, Qualley goes for broke in this movie's sex scenes, and she said she was at ease because the scenes were played for laughs.

"I don't know, I feel like these were the most fun sex scenes I've ever shot because I guess a lot of times, sex scenes, the service is to be romantic, be hot, or something, you know?" Qualley said. "[B]ut my stuff is like silly and funny and it was it was just all about making a fool of yourself. And I think that's maybe something that women don't get to do as much in sex scenes typically, so I really enjoyed that."

"Drive-Away Dolls" is a huge step for Margaret Qualley's career — in that she and Geraldine Viswanathan are the two leads of the film, and Qualley typically steps into supporting roles — but she's actually been acting for quite some time. Qualley, the daughter of Hollywood legend Andie McDowell, earned acclaim for her role as Jill Garvey in the critically beloved HBO series "The Leftovers," which ran from 2014 to 2017. She also appeared in the television miniseries "Fosse/Verdon" in 2019 as real-life choreographer Ann Reinking, but her biggest television role yet is her leading turn as struggling single mother Alex Russell in the Netflix original series "Maid."

On the big screen, Qualley has shown up in projects like "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" (playing "Pussycat," a member of the murderous Manson family) and the Kristen Stewart-led biopic "Seberg," both of which came out in 2019. In 2022, she led "Stars at Noon" with Joe Alwyn and "Sanctuary" with Christopher Abbott. A year later, she and Abbott would both play supporting roles in the Best Picture nominee "Poor Things," which immediately made waves thanks to its stunning lead performance from Emma Stone. In 2024, Qualley has seemingly hit the ground running with "Drive-Away Dolls."