Love Me’s intimacy coordinator Amy Cater reveals the intricacies of filming a sex scene
As sex scenes become more mainstream, film and television producers are enlisting the help of intimacy coordinators to ensure what goes on behind the scenes covers all the bases.
Fair few people bother watching film credits but read more closely and among the list of director, producer, cinematographer and cast you are likely to see the title intimacy coordinator, or to decode it, sex scene coach.
Intimacy coordinator’s have become commonplace on the sets of the biggest film productions and the hottest television series’ out there. And with sex scenes becoming more mainstream than ever before, the field is now booming.
“The conversation around intimacy has gained momentum,” says Amy Cater, an Australian intimacy coordinator credited for her work on Love Me, the new six-part comedy romance from Binge.
“I walk on set now and everybody knows what an intimacy coordinator is, whereas three years ago, we would need to explain the role. That in itself tells me that there’s been a huge shift in awareness about onset practice.”
Cater is qualified in sexual embodiment, consent and professional intimacy and has close to 20 years experience working with sexuality and holding workspaces for performative intimacy. She is one of few practitioners in Australia and has previously worked on the set of TV show Five Bedrooms and the 2021 independent feature film Slant. She calls Ita O’Brien, the founder of Intimacy on Set in the UK, her close-working mentor and has rightly become a touchpoint for the up-and-comers in the field.
She says since the watershed moment of the #MeToo movement the industry has become committed to hiring intimacy coordinators to choreograph the scenes involving nudity and sexual content, ensuring actors “feel empowered to make informed decisions on what they’re comfortable doing”.
“We invest the time early on in the rehearsal stages so the actors are well prepared for when it comes to shooting on set. We work cohesively with all of the departments in production making it a really safe space for actors to then deep dive into their character development,” explains Cater.
With its tender exploration of love and grief, Love Me, starring Australian stalwarts Hugo Weaving and Heather Mitchell alongside Bojana Novakovic (Instinct) under the direction of Emma Freeman, has emerged with refreshingly unforced and nuanced sex scenes. It joins hit television dramas like I May Destroy You (2020), Normal People (2020) and It’s a Sin (2021) - all with O’Brien at the helm - in its move to make simulated sex more relatable, consensual and educational.
Cater says the messy, nonlinear love between Love Me’s complex characters, who are “doing their best to find happiness with what they have”, was “beautiful” to work with.
“There are these lightbulb moments of compassion and realisation for these characters that they’re beautifully flawed in their own ways, and they’re all saying the same thing. And I think that thing is true for most people, it’s to love and to be loved,” she says.
“That was the thread that influenced our decisions in these intimate scenes. I asked questions like ‘how capable is this character to accept love right now and how can we physically and emotionally show the complexity and struggle of that capacity?’ And the outcome was more than I could ever have hoped for. Every actor brought so much integrity to these scenes.”
Discussing sex in an informed and relaxed way takes any of the potential awkwardness out of the situation, Cater explains, no matter the actors previous working background.
Featuring both industry heavyweights and a new-generation of homegrown talent, Cater worked with the show’s cast to showcase love and intimacy at all ages across multiple generations - starting with basic conversations around sex.
“I can discuss sex in an informed and relaxed way, hopefully taking away some of the potential awkwardness out of situation. No matter what your previous working background is, talking frankly and clearly with compassionate warmth is so important in this role,” she says.
With the actors bringing with them varying levels of lived and acting experience, she says bringing standardised safe practice to set meant “everyone has equal voice, regardless of their experience”.
Film and television producers have become committed to instating intimacy coordinators since 2017. The majority of scripted programs that dominate nominations during awards seasons, including Euphoria and Succession, all have credited intimacy coordinators in their ranks.
In the earliest stages of this work people in the industry took time to make adjustments to this role. Cater says with any new thing, there was a teething stage where showrunners had to see the role in action.
“You have to hear the feedback from the actors on what they are now experiencing on set. If you get one single actor coming by going, ‘I feel incredible. I feel empowered, I feel so much safer on set’, then that in itself speaks volumes.”
As to why the position wasn’t around before, Cater says now the industry simply knows better and continues to strive to do better.
“For the most part, everybody was doing the best that they could with the resources and knowledge that they had. Now there’s just some more structure to it,” she says.
“There’s been a huge shift in awareness about on set practice. My job is to bring a shared language to set that allows creatives to work from the same play book.”
Love Me, streaming on Binge.
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