In most rom-coms, a romantic gesture looks like running through an airport to make one last declaration of love, or writing a yearning letter every day for a year. In Adults, it looks like saying “cunt” on every man-on-the-street interview show you can find.
The gesture in question comes in Season 2, episode 7, titled “C Alert.” In the episode, Anton (Owen Thiele) mistakenly talks to his co-workers the way he talks to his friends, saying “cunt alert!” in a company meeting. He doesn’t mean it as an insult, drawing instead on its positive meaning rooted in the queer ballroom scene. That meaning has led to a wider resurgence of the term, including in online spaces, but it’s still viewed as unforgivably rude in some places, including Anton’s office, which skews older, and likely less queer.
In an effort to help save Anton’s job, his housemate and yearning love interest Paul Baker (Jack Innanen) decides to try normalizing saying “cunt” in the workplace by dropping it into as many viral interview shows as he can.
It’s a moment Adults co-creator Ben Kronengold describes as an “ugly sweet” step in Anton and Paul Baker’s romance. While the pair obviously care about one another, any attempts to be together have stalled due to a house-wide rule forbidding dating within the friend group.
“What we tasked ourselves with in the writers’ room was how could they show that care for each other in ways that feel really true to them and specific and platonic?” Kronengold told Mashable.
“It would be easy to have Paul Baker show up in the rain with a bouquet of flowers,” added Adults co-creator Rebecca Shaw. “But it feels much more true to our ridiculous housemates that he would instead say the c-word — a word he hates more than anything in the world — on a series of talk shows for the whole world to see because he thinks there’s a chance that it could make Anton’s life a little easier.”
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“Paul Baker, thank you.”
Credit: FX
It’s a clear escalation from the pair’s prior romantic gestures, like Anton bringing glow sticks to Paul Baker’s green card wedding, or Paul Baker waiting on a fancy meal for Anton and his sister Talia (Raven-Symoné). It’s also the riskiest, social taboo-wise, even if it comes with sweeter intentions.
“Something that our executive producer Nick Kroll is so masterful at is making edgy, raunchy moments incredibly meaningful and sweet, and on the flip side, making sweet, emotional moments heightened and comedic,” Shaw said. “We always try to follow in his footsteps. Never give a pure romantic moment, never give a pure comedic moment.”
Paul Baker’s reveal of his swear-y side quest does result in one of the most adorable Paul Baker and Anton moments of the season: a very heartfelt “Paul Baker, thank you” from Anton, complete with some seriously yearning eye contact that leaves everyone else in the scene knowing exactly how much the two care for one another.
Of course, there’s one last little twist.
“We were really tickled by the idea that Paul Baker did this whole big gesture when, in fact, Anton’s job was already saved,” said Kronengold.
“Nobody had the heart to tell him,” added Shaw.
But hey, it’s the thought that counts, right?
Adults Season 2 is now streaming on Hulu.
