The summer comedy Girls Trip has already proven to be a box office success, as well as a critic and fan approved favorite. One of the movie's most memorable scenes comes from breakout actress Tiffany Haddish, who teaches Jada Pinkett Smith's character how to give a expert-level blowjob with the assistance of a grapefruit. It's an uproarious moment and solidifies Haddish's talked-about performance.
But Haddish did not invent the kooky sex technique herself — that intellectual property belongs to Illinois sex expert Auntie Angel, who famously demonstrated her technique in a 2012 viral video. She's actually been teaching and lecturing as a sexpert since 2003 and the short clip is part of one of her instructional DVDs. The grapefruit technique video was first posted to Worldstar Hip Hop and immediately became internet legend.
"I never thought it would be this big," she told me in a recent phone call. "I knew it wasn't something other people were doing but the trend is not going anywhere."
In the interview below, Auntie Angel explains the method's origins and what she thought of Haddish's performance in Girls Trip.
Auntie Angel: Back in 1997, I had just started dating after getting out of my first marriage. We moved in together and I had never given a blowjob before. I just didn't think that it was something pretty girls did, I was like, Isn't that an ugly thing? So because I wasn't comfortable with it, I stated watching adult films to know how to do it. This one girl had a handful of fruit, like berries and cherries, and she was going to town. The guy looked like he was in absolute heaven. I didn't have any berries and cherries, but I had an orange and a grapefruit. I cut [the orange] up, put a hole in it, and tried to masturbate him with it, but he was so well-endowed that it actually exploded. [The] grapefruit was bigger and I did the same thing that I did with the orange, in my mind what a man would like. He was like, "Oh my god, it feels like you're having sex with me and giving me head at the same time." I'm a nail tech, and since 1997 I've been telling everyone who had ears about the grapefruit technique.
A lot of people have been asking me did [the makers of Girls Trip] consult me, did I know it was going to be in the movie? No, I did not. I found out like everyone else. At first I was kind of upset, like, Wow, it was in a movie and no one reached out. But then I thought, Wow, what an honor because they chose something I put on the internet and I was actually excited about it. I went to a screening of it the Thursday before it came out and I thought the movie was hilarious. The young lady Tiffany Haddish who did the grapefruit in the movie, I thought she did a really, really good job. I knew it was a comedy, but she did do it well enough that it was portrayed as realistic. It didn't have the safety features that I tell people about. It was hilarious.
“I’ve heard grapefruits are sold out all over the country.”
That's the thing with it, with Jada, because there weren't any safety rules — in my video the grapefruit is part of a much bigger video. That was the 10th technique, and there are nine that weren't portrayed in my original YouTube video. Long story short, I teach women how to keep a condom [on] with their mouth. So when it comes to the grapefruit technique, I tell them that they should use a condom just for those purposes because some fluid could get inside the urethra if you're not doing it correctly. If you notice, Jada did not cut it correctly, the sides were missing and there was a bigger hole to accommodate him. Of course, that was true comedy and not realistic at all, but it was still very funny.
Also, I tell people that it should be done with someone you love, like your husband. The movie portrayed it as part of a wild weekend, but I do not recommend that. But I'm seeing on Twitter, some people who have started doing the technique, some correctly and some were not. It's hilarious and I've heard grapefruits are sold out all over the country. I know the produce people are happy.
I am not just the grapefruit lady, I am a sexpert. I have 50 different fellatio techniques. It's just the grapefruit does stand out — because...you use a fruit [laughs].
