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Jul 21, 2023

The Revealing Truth About Filming Nude Scenes

Filming nude scenes for a movie must be sexy, right? You'd think that slipping under the covers next to an attractive co-star would be almost as good as doing it for real. Yet this couldn't be further

Filming nude scenes for a movie must be sexy, right? You'd think that slipping under the covers next to an attractive co-star would be almost as good as doing it for real. Yet this couldn't be further from the truth. Many actors insist that sex scenes are the most challenging or uncomfortable types of scenes to film, and actor John Turturro shared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert that they're less like making love and more like going to the dentist. And unless you're Bill Murray from "Little Shop of Horrors," there is nothing sexy about that.

Below we'll explore everything you always wanted to know about nudity in movies (but were afraid to ask), such as what specialized garments actors wear to prevent their uglies from bumping and what happens if an actor gets too excited. It turns out that a lot of careful planning must go into every single sequence that involves nudity. Even animated sex scenes are hard work!

Thanks to the accounts of countless actors who have bared it all about baring themselves, we can shed a little light on what happens behind-the-scenes every time a movie character strips down.

First off, it's worth noting that nude scenes are not necessarily the same as sex scenes. After all, nudity isn't inherently sexual. There are plenty of movie moments where characters are naked for reasons that have nothing to do with sex, such as the scene with the showering soldiers in "Starship Troopers." For that matter, there are plenty of sexually-charged scenes in movies where characters are fully clothed.

The association of nudity and sex is largely thanks to the Hays Code, a set of strict regulations that censored what could be shown in movies between 1934 and 1968. Under the Hays Code, any nudity (even non-sexual nudity) was a big no-no, so even after the Hays Code was dissolved, the public attitude towards nudity stuck.

But nudity can be used for far more than titillating audiences. Case in point: in the comedy "No Hard Feelings," Maddie (Jennifer Lawrence) goes skinny-dipping and then beats up the teenagers who try to steal her clothes. The sequence is fairly groundbreaking for a mainstream adult comedy, because it changes the way we look at nudity. Lawrence's breasts and butt are shown, but not for sex appeal; instead, these only contribute to the slapstick comedy of the scene.

Nevertheless, the most notorious nude scenes in cinematic history (and the ones that were the most complicated or awkward or hilarious to film) involve sex in some way, so we will mostly be examining movie sex scenes.

Let's clear this up right away. The Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (aka SAG-AFTRA) make it explicitly clear that actors cannot have sex while filming a sexually explicit scene. Actors should never be expected to film a scene that involves genitalia touching without some kind of physical barrier. This means any time you see movie characters involved in hanky-panky, it is actually simulated sex. These sequences are typically supervised by an intimacy coordinator, who is responsible for communicating the needs of the actor during scenes that involve sex and nudity, as well as organizing the shooting of these scenes so that they will not violate an actor's boundaries. An actor will outline those boundaries in a section of their contract called a nudity rider.

To maximize protection during sex scenes, an intimacy coordinator will often provide performers with an object they can place between them as a barrier. They might use a pillow or a vajoga, which is a padded mat designed exactly for this purpose. Meanwhile, "Bridgerton" actor Jonathan Bailey told Radio Times, "It's amazing what you can do with a half-inflated netball."

If actors start to become turned-on for real (because that happens sometimes), the crew needs to stop filming right away. "The worst thing you can do is carry on," explained intimacy coordinator David Thackeray in an interview with Backstage. He added, "Give them five minutes ... Then we come back into it when they're ready."

When it's time to film a nude scene, intimacy coordinators will bring a whole toolbox of garments that actors can use to cover themselves. For one, performers can use pasties to conceal their nipples. Actors will also likely put on a shibue or hibue, which are patches of adhesive fabric meant to be worn as a strapless thong. "We take a shibue, open it up, and put a silicone guard underneath so everyone becomes like a Barbie doll," explained intimacy coordinator Alicia Rodis (via Backstage). When the performers are done shooting, they need only to apply a little baby oil and the garment will peel right off. Those equipped with a penis may choose instead to use a little drawstring sock.

Sometimes actors will also wear elbow pads or knee pads. This is not particularly sexy, but it is sometimes necessary if the actors need to remain in awkward positions for multiple takes. Naturally, these garments are artfully omitted from the shot.

Intimacy coordinators may provide a performer with a merkin, which is essentially a wig for pubic hair. Alternatively, filmmakers might add the hair digitally in post-production, as cinematographer Seamus McGarvey did for "Fifty Shades of Grey." In an interview with The New York Times, McGarvey shared, "I wouldn't say it was one of the highlights of my career, but it certainly was one of the most surreal scenarios."

Intimacy coordinators are a Hollywood staple now, but before they became commonplace, many performers were expected to violate their boundaries for nude scenes. For example, Marlon Brando and Maria Schneider's notorious sex scene from "Last Tango in Paris" was not consensual. Although Brando and Schneider didn't have sex for real, director Bernardo Bertolucci deliberately withheld from Schneider that he wanted Brando to smear butter all over her, claiming that he wanted to capture her genuine humiliated reaction on-camera.

Meanwhile, another actress (who chose to remain anonymous) told Variety Australia about being pressured into doing uncomfortable things because she didn't have an intimacy coordinator protecting her. She recalled being asked to remove her panties during a shower scene, even though the camera would only show her from the waist up.

What's more, in the past Hollywood has placed the burden on actors to stop the spread of sexually-transmitted diseases (STDs). For instance, Rock Hudson wanted to tell his "Dynasty" co-star Linda Evans that he had HIV, but he was concerned that he might be fired if he announced his diagnosis. (This was, after all, the 1980s.) At the time, doctors were still figuring out how HIV was spread, so Hudson feared that he might transmit the disease to Evans during their kissing scene and felt incredibly guilty. Hoping to protect Evans, Hudson gargled mouthwash before their kiss, and Evans didn't find out until later why he seemed so reluctant to kiss her.

If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).

When it comes to shooting sex scenes, you'd think that actors would simply climb into bed and wing it. The truth is that this rarely happens, because with such delicate matters, nothing should be left to chance. Jake Gyllenhaal once compared shooting sex scenes to filming a fight sequence; both needed to be choreographed beat-by-beat, to make sure they ran smoothly.

Intimacy coordinators must talk with the actors to determine exactly what they feel comfortable doing. According to actress Desiree Akhavan (per Indiewire), intimacy coordinators need to know, "Tongue or no tongue? Where should hands go?" Actors always feel more at ease before a sex scene if they know there will be no surprises. Sometimes actors will practice first with their clothes on. Director John Krokidas explained to Vulture, "If we ... rehearsed it enough times with clothes on, there would be less time having to put two naked men in awkward positions ... that would make the actors feel self-conscious."

The camera crew also needs to rehearse, carefully planning the framing and motion of each shot before they begin shooting. Intimacy coordinators will occasionally use neon green tape on the actors' bodies to mark exactly where the camera is not allowed to go. Sarah Treem, a writer on the show "The Affair," summed it up for The New York Times: "We had to create sex scenes that looked like we weren't trying to cover body parts when we were."

Sometimes actors can film sex scenes without even touching their partners. For instance, "Nymphomaniac" hired real-life porn performers as body doubles for the actors and then used CGI to combine their bodies. Producer Louise Vesth told The Hollywood Reporter, "So above the waist it will be the star and the below the waist it will be the doubles." The actress Stacy Martin explained to MTV, "We would get little black dots on our bodies," adding that her movements were carefully choreographed to match that of her double.

Other filmmakers have found more low-tech solutions. John Turturro recalled on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert filming a sex scene between Kate Winslet and James Gandolfini for the movie "Romance and Cigarettes." Winslet had sprained her ankle, and Turturro realized that the scene simply wasn't working with Winslet trying to straddle Gandolfini. "They were going to be too inhibited," he explained. So instead, he had each of them film their parts separately. Gandolfini had to pretend that Winslet was on top of him, while Winslet bounced on an exercise ball (which was conveniently omitted from the shot).

Turturro told The New School that Winslet bounced so hard that she fell off the ball at the end of the shot. Still, Turturro wanted audiences to believe the pair were actually in the same room. He explained to Colbert, "So I took Kate's wig, and as James was having sex, I threw Kate's wig in front of the camera," and viewers were none the wiser.

Anytime you see a movie character in the throes of passion, that's clearly acting. However, that doesn't mean that actors won't occasionally become aroused behind the scenes. If they do, the shoot immediately becomes awkward.

"Tudors" star Henry Cavill admitted to Men's Journal that there was one time he didn't need to pretend to be turned on. He recalled filming a scene where an actress was "basically rubbing herself all over me and, um, it got a bit hard. I had to apologize profusely afterward." Meanwhile, Taraji P. Henson told The Angie Martinez Show that Terrence Howard got a little excited while filming a sex scene with her. According to Henson, Howard would talk to his "male member" to lighten the mood, saying, "No, don't [do that]. Taraji's going to punch me."

You'd think actors wouldn't get embarrassed about being turned on if they're filming with their real-life partners, like Kyra Sedgwick did with her husband Kevin Bacon for "Pyrates." Yet Sedgwick told Yahoo! that it was actually much harder than filming a sex scene with a stranger, insisting, "It's weird because we're always like, 'Is this real or is it not?'" She added that the situation felt very surreal. "As an actor, you sometimes have these dreams when you start a job where you're sleeping and they're filming you," said Sedgwick. "With 'Pyrates,' I was [sleeping] with my husband and they were filming it! It's like, 'This can't be real — I'm having a dream.'"

You would think that filming a sex scene in stop-motion animation would be easier, since there are no real people involved, and you can make the puppets do whatever you want. In reality, animating a sex scene is just as messy as filming one with live actors. Just look at "Anomalisa," an R-rated film that involves full frontal nudity and an extended sex scene. The sequence (which was filmed in one continuous shot, from when the couple lies down on the bed until they climax) took roughly two months to prepare and six months to animate.

The filmmakers started with the voice-over performance from actors David Thewlis and Jennifer Jason Leigh, which they used as a basis for the sequence. However, the voice work could only help them so much, because for significant sections of the scene, the actors were simply breathing or moaning. That's why the animators carefully choreographed the scene, using live actors for reference where necessary. Producer Rosa Tran explained that the crew needed to hair-punch each individual hair on the puppets, including in the crotch region. She added that the modeling department even kept a plastic bag full of spare male parts for the puppets.

So much care went into this sequence that, according to director Charlie Kaufman, many viewers said it was more realistic than any live-action sex scene they had ever seen.

Of course, there are still countless actors who choose not to film nude scenes for various reasons. Megan Fox has insisted that she won't film nude scenes anymore now that she's a mother, since she doesn't want her children to see her in those films, while Jessica Alba says she has avoided full nudity to avoid having an awkward conversation with her grandparents. Penn Badgley made it a point to limit his sex scenes in the Netflix series "You," explaining that he didn't want to be typecast as the romantic lead; he felt that it would be more respectful to his wife if he wasn't constantly expected to film sex scenes.

According to Entertainment Weekly, Isla Fisher pushed for her character to not appear nude in "Wedding Crashers," insisting, "If you see a character's breast, she's no longer funny." Unfortunately, the film's producers wouldn't listen to her; all Fisher could do was arrange to have body doubles in the film's nude scenes. Meanwhile, Mandy Moore shared in the DVD commentary for "Chasing Liberty" that she got a body double for the skinny-dipping scene because the river looked unsanitary.

Even "Sex and the City" star Sarah Jessica Parker had a clause in her contract stating that she never appear nude on the show, which goes to show that you can star in a series with lots of sex in it without needing to strip down.

It's no secret that the Motion Picture Association (MPA) is notoriously inconsistent when it comes to rating movies. But it's astonishing how wildly their policy toward nudity varies from film to film.

For one, male nudity is treated as more shocking than female nudity. While Kate Winslet's body was on full display in the PG-13 "Titanic," Michael Fassbender's full-frontal nudity in "Shame" earned the film an NC-17 rating. In fact, the MPA began including the content warning of "male nudity" to accompany its ratings, even though all instances of female nudity have been categorized as "nudity" without any gender-specific labels. In the eyes of a straight, cis male audience, a nude woman seems attractive, but a nude man is icky. Yet this assumption doesn't include every member of the audience.

Aside from revealing a clear double standard (it's okay for kids to look at naked women but not naked men?) and undermining the purported purpose of the rating (since the graphic content warning may tell hormonal teenagers exactly what they want to know), this policy also suggests a bias against queer couples.

In one of the few ways the MPA has behaved consistently, the organization has shown a tendency to give stricter ratings to movies with LGBTQ+ characters, regardless of the film's actual content. For instance, the film "Love is Strange," which features a middle-aged gay couple, received an R rating, despite having no sex or nudity.

COVID-19 changed the film industry forever, so naturally filmmakers needed to change the way they filmed nude scenes and sex scenes. Some studios used editing tricks to make it seem like two actors were embracing, even though the two actors weren't even in the same room together. Others arranged for the actors to film their sex scenes with romantic partners in real life to reduce the risk of transmitting COVID-19.

For actors who felt comfortable being within six feet of their co-star but were wary of kissing them on the lips, intimacy coordinators found other creative ways to evoke the same feeling, such as having the actor kiss the back of their co-star's neck. For scenes where it wouldn't have been safe for two actors to have such close contact, shows such as "The Bold and the Beautiful" replaced them with lifelike inflatable dolls. Piers Wenger from BBC Drama even proposed the idea that actors would kiss each other with a sheet of Perspex between them.

When all else failed, filmmakers needed to make do without any sex or nudity. To compensate for this, the creators of "Riverdale" substituted actual sex scenes with flirty dialogue loaded with innuendos. "Dynasty" showrunner Josh Reims told The New York Times, "The joke among the writers ... is that we will watch two characters say they want to have sex and then cut to them saying, 'That was some great sex.'"