There’s a moment in “The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives,” the hotly anticipated Hulu tell-all about a group of Utah influencers, when one of the women declares herself “a 9 out of 10 on the Mormon scale.” To which a fellow group member immediately responds, “You’re joking.” Adds a third: “I can fully see your nipple right now.”
The original speaker is undeterred. “What,” she asks, “does that have to do with being Mormon?” For some members of the influencer supergroup known as #MomTok (and, critically, their husbands), the answer is: everything.
For those unfamiliar with #MomTok, a quick summary: Starting in 2020, an ever-growing crew of long-haired, impossibly thin Latter-day Saint moms banded together to create videos poking fun at their faith (cue the jokes about being “sister wives”). The clips, fueled by their sexy-meets-pious flavor, blew up, and with them each influencer’s follower count. That is, until a 2022 “soft swinging” scandal cut short the operation.
(Pamela Littky | Disney) Taylor Frankie Paul, the founder of #MomTok, nearly brought the influencer supergroup to its knees in 2022, when she acknowledged going too far while "soft swinging" with a friend's husband. "No one is innocent," Paul said in a TikTok at the time. "Everyone has hooked up with everyone in this situation."
Since the launch of the trailer for the series, which premieres Sept. 6, Latter-day Saints have been working overtime to distance themselves and their faith from the show, which they say is not representative of the church and its members.
Even The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints itself issued a rare “commentary” — without naming any specific show — denouncing the distortions of the faith in the “entertainment industry.”
Turns out, this debate over who can assert the “Mormon” identity represents a major — if not primary — theme of “Secret Lives,” driving wedges and plot far more than questions of who soft (or just, you know, normal) swung with whom.
The Salt Lake Tribune sat down with four of the eight cast members — none of whom had yet seen the final product — to ask them what they thought of these tensions, the position of women in the faith and whether #MomTok has impacted their own relationship with the church.
The answers below have been edited for brevity and clarity.
What has been the response to the news of the show from fellow Latter-day Saints online and within your circle of family and friends?
Taylor Frankie Paul • My family is supportive. Nervous, as I think anyone would be in this situation. Definitely some judgment from members who are hesitant after seeing the trailer. But they’re just going to have to wait and see it before making a final judgment.
Jessi Ngatikaura • Our immediate families have been super supportive, but our community’s been a little bit harsh on us. We expected that, but it has been crazy to see the judgment before the show’s out. I hope people watch it and realize we’re just real women showing our struggles and our sins and that we’re doing that so other people can relate to us.
(Pamela Littky | Disney) Jessi Ngatikaura explains that, while she no longer attends church, her name is still on the church's rolls. "That counts for something," she says, "even if I’m not currently active."
Mayci Neeley • My family is very active in the church, and they’re very supportive of me in the show. They know my intentions. They know who I am. So they’re like, “Ignore the haters and the judgmental Mormons.” And we are Mormon so it’s just kind of crazy we have to do that.
Whitney Leavitt • If anything, it’s just been support and love from my family. Unfortunately, the negative things that we have heard, it’s more so from the Mormon community. Maybe to them it feels like they’re defending the church. But they’re only seeing a snippet when they watch the trailer. Once they watch the show, I think they’re going to have a completely different perspective.
In the show, cast members are often ranking each other’s religiosity and devotion. Who do you think can claim the term “Mormon,” and do you identify as a Latter-day Saint at this point?
Paul • I do. I go to church, and my son is going to be blessed here soon. It’s really nobody’s place to tell me that I can’t go to church because I sin. It’s something between the church and me. And it hasn’t come to me, so I’m going to keep going to church until it says otherwise.
Ngatikaura • Most of us on the show are either Mormon currently or raised Mormon. I still have my records in the church. I think that counts for something even if I’m not currently active.
Leavitt • If you believe that you’re a Mormon and you want to be Mormon, there you go. It’s just like how members of other religious sects all live their religion a little bit differently. In #MomTok, we are all Utah Mormons and Utah Mormons tend to be very devout and live a certain way and have a certain culture. And that’s where we’re getting the most heat from, Mormons in Utah.
Neeley • We allow investigators to come to church, and we hope that they can become a Mormon and so it’s interesting to see people saying, “We don’t claim them. These aren’t Mormons.”
(Pamela Littky | Disney) Mayci Neeley counts herself one of the more devout members of #MomTok. Her family, she says, has been nothing of supportive of her decision to be on the show, and have encouraged her to "ignore the haters and the judgmental Mormons."
Why do you think there is this impulse to police the boundary of who’s in and who’s out when it comes to the Latter-day Saint, or “Mormon,” community?
Ngatikaura • Our church focuses a lot, especially in Utah, on image. It’s always like keeping up with the Joneses. Who has the better testimony or the better house? When you start to expose things like we are, it breaks down that wall and people start to worry that their secrets are going to be revealed. But we all sin, just in different ways. We’re just being honest about our lives.
Paul • And maybe people who do live very by the book don’t want us to be depicted as representing them. We’re not.
Another through line in the show is the question of whether the church empowers or disempowers women, particularly in the context of their relationships with their husbands and work. What do you think?
Ngatikaura • We are all modern Mormons in the sense that we’re trying to break the mold, and most of us are the breadwinners and the gender roles are a little bit reversed. The church has, I would say, a little bit of a problem with promoting partnerships between couples because only the men can have the priesthood and women often don’t have as big of a voice in the church. That was something I did feel growing up in it.
Paul • Everything she said. A man is not going to tell me what to do, what to wear or what to say. And in our religion, it’s true men hold the priesthood. I feel like it is evolving and changing a little bit more, and that’s part of what we’re trying to show in this series.
Leavitt • If you were to look at our parents and our grandparents, they lived a certain way culturally within the Mormon religion where you have the matriarchy and the patriarchy, and they have certain jobs they do in the home to create a home unit. But, culturally, it’s changing as more and more women and moms work, regardless of religion.
(Pamela Littky | Disney) Whitney Leavitt, a weekly church attender, believes the label "Mormon" is available to anyone who chooses it. "If you believe that you’re a Mormon and you want to be Mormon, there you go," she says. "It’s just like how members of other religious sects all live their religion a little bit differently."
Neeley • Growing up in Young Women, we were learning to sew and cook while the Young Men were out having adventures. That’s changing with the times.
How has your relationship with the church evolved, if at all, in the course of #MomTok?
Leavitt • I don’t feel like mine ever changed. There may be moments in the season where I definitely leaned into [God] a little bit more. But if anything, I don’t feel like my faith was hindered. I was sharing what I’ve already been living and continue to live.
Neeley • Yeah, I would say mine hasn’t changed at all. It’s always kind of been in the middle.
A final message for viewers?
Ngatikaura • People are sensitive when it comes to their religion, which I understand. I completely understand the backlash. But I think the show is about all of us sharing these journeys, and I hope we can be responsive to that.
Leavitt • I hope when people watch it they can separate the human from the church. I hope that they don’t look at us and say, “Oh, all Mormons are like this.” That’s not the case.
Neeley • We’re not trying to be mouthpieces for the church. My hope is that people can watch the show and relate to us in some capacity wherever they are on their journey with the religion, and help women feel like they are enough and can come to church and feel accepted.
Paul • These are our stories, and we’re still Mormon, whether you like it or not.
Editor’s note • This story is available to Salt Lake Tribune subscribers only. Thank you for supporting local journalism.