HBO Max’s new series Minx, the story of the creation of a feminist women’s magazine that also features male centerfolds, has a lot going for it: a great cast, a groovy ’70s So-Cal backdrop, and tons of full frontal nudity. Starring Ophelia Lovibond and Jake Johnson as unlikely business partners, the show follows the pair as they create a a magazine unlike any other that has appeared on newsstands.
But was Minx ever a real magazine, and is the series Minx based on a true story?
What is Minx about?
Minx, which is set in 1971, stars Lovibond as Joyce, a second-wave feminist inspired by the likes of Gloria Steinem (who gets a name drop and appears in a fantasy sequence in the show), who desperately wants to create an earnest, serious feminist magazine. The only person who will support her ideas though, is Doug Renetti (Johnson), a publisher with a successful fleet of fetish magazines geared to men, who sees the potential in opening up to a female audience. The caveat is that Doug insists that Joyce’s serious magazine also contain some male nudity to expand the audience. Joyce resists, and then realizes that if she wants to get her magazine off the ground, she has to be open to things like nudity and ads featuring sex toys.
Is Minx based on a true story?
Minx was written and created by Ellen Rapoport and executive produced by Paul Feig, and is not a true story, in that Joyce is not based on any one person and Minx itself (initially called The Matriarchy Awakens in the pilot, before it’s given a more marketable name) never existed. But the early 1970s did see the creation of several magazines made for women during that decade that combined a feminist perspective with erotica, including Playgirl and Viva. Rapoport told The Hollywood Reporter that the idea for the show came to her when she discovered the feminist angle to those publications. “I read something about one of these magazines and it struck me immediately: these magazines in the 1970s were feminist magazines, which I’d had no idea about. It was a workplace that was populated by feminists and pornographers.”
While Minx wasn’t a real magazine, there are plenty of details in the show that are drawn from reality, like that famous Burt Reynolds centerfold in Cosmopolitan. The show takes some liberties with the timing of that, however, as the show takes place in 1971, and Reynolds didn’t appear in Cosmo until the April 1972 issue. And while Doug Renetti isn’t a real person, there are definitely similarities between Doug and magazine publisher Bob Guccione, whose titles included Penthouse and Viva. Viva featured not only male nudity, but also featured articles by writers like Anaïs Nin, one of Joyce’s personal favorites on the show. Viva‘s run didn’t last long (the magazine ceased circulation in 1980), though Playgirl had a longer run, publishing its last issue in 2016. Joyce would probably be thrilled to know that Ms. magazine, which was co-created by Steinem and never featured male centerfolds (and which seems much more in keeping with Joyce’s original vision for The Matriarchy Awakens), is still thriving after its own 1971 debut.
