Overview
- Dame Helen Mirren offered a pollination hack on The Tonight Show, telling host Jimmy Fallon that tomatoes are “bisexual” and showing how to gently tremble their flowers.
- The studio audience reacted with audible gasps and laughter as Fallon awkwardly responded to the trembling demonstration.
- Botanists define tomato blooms as complete flowers containing both stamens and pistils, making Mirren’s claim technically accurate.
- Tomatoes typically self-pollinate through wind or insects, though growers often assist by lightly jostling the flowers.
- Coverage cautioned that using human sexual analogies for plant reproduction can mislead, suggesting “intersex” might be a more precise analogy and noting limited verification of the finger-trembling method.