I have a great guest on my global radio show today at 5pm Los Angeles time. Gerri Knilans from Trade Press Services. Great information for any business operating B2B. I’m on a flight today to Australia for a week, mostly business meetings unfortunately.
LEmily Meade who plays a porn star on HBO’s “The Deuce,” was about to film a graphic sequence in which she had to simulate oral sex. She was concerned about the act of doing it, which is vulnerable and potentially embarrassing, especially with the Internet, where there’s going to be images of her topless, appearing to give oral sex forever.
With the rise of the #MeToo and Time’s Up movements, however, structural changes in Hollywood are underfoot, as the industry shifts from the old, problematic phrase “that’s just how things are” to facing issues of consent, harassment and sexual assault head on. Those changes have found their way onto sets, which are increasingly staffed with intimacy coordinators — movement coaches who help choreograph intimate scenes with a focus on the actors’ safety.
One wonders what experience you need to become an intimacy coordinator?
This in an industry where actors hireability is based on their willingness to do whatever it takes. That’s just how the industry is. If you don’t do it, there are a thousand people behind you, and that’s just how it goes. In the past, you were going to be harassed, mistreated, mishandled. You simply had to accept it.
HBO declared inOctober that it would require intimacy coordinators for all shows containing intimate scenes. Coordinators can also be found on sets for Netflix’s “Sex Education”and Amazon’s “Electric Dreams,” and Showtime employs them on a case-by-case basis, including on “The Affair.” Much of the current discussion around intimacy coordinators began with “The Deuce,” a show that doesn’t back down from the reality of its subject matter: the prostitution and porn worlds of 1970s New York City.
Intimacy coordinators handle both the physical and the emotional aspects of the job. One role intimacy coordinators play is helping choreograph scenes with the actors’ boundaries at the forefront. That can mean anything, such as monitoring actors’ hand placements, ensuring they have certain types of genital barriers and guaranteeing that no one is pressured into nudity that wasn’t previously agreed upon.
They also speak with actors, crew members and directors to guarantee no one is emotionally hurt by a scene. For example, if someone has past trauma related to sexual assault, an intimacy coordinator will talk through the scene to make sure it isn’t triggering.
Many Intimacy coordinators began as movement or combat choreographers. If there were issues with sex scenes, particularly those containing sexual violence, or even a kiss, a fondle, a grope who better to do so than the person already working with the motions of actors’ bodies?
When there’s a child on set, a chaperone is required. Ditto a handler for an animal. And when there is a stunt of any kind, even if it’s tiny, even if it’s crossing the street while a car is driving, there needs to be a stunt coordinator. Yet with sexuality, there has been at most a ‘closed set,’ which means only the necessary crew members are allowed on set. But that is very subjective and often isn’t strictly paid attention to. So,it was decided there should be an ambassador of sorts for sex and nude scenes, someone to ensure everything runs smoothly and give a voice to the actors.
It makes perfect sense…and obviously about time.
Silence doesn’t mean your sexual performance left her speechless.