Nothing is off limits in Gwyneth Paltrow’s new Netflix series Sex, Love & Goop
She has no problem talking about taboo subjects. Now, Gwyneth Paltrow has returned armed with experts to talk about the ins and outs of sex.
Felieitas and Rama married eight months after they met in 2006. Now they share two children – an 11-year-old daughter and a six-year-old son – and a marriage that has lost its spark.
“I felt burnt out,” Felieitas says after revealing she’s on the cusp of wanting a divorce in the first episode of the Netflix sensation Sex, Love & Goop. “By family life, by my responsibilities … I didn’t feel excited about sex anymore.”
Sitting across from the couple are Gwyneth Paltrow and intimacy expert Michaela Boehm on the set of Paltrow’s latest wellness reality show. Moments before Felieitas’ admission, Paltrow regaled the pair, who are joined by the show’s five other couples, on her experience with therapy. “I once had a therapist who said, ‘Your intimate relationship is a meditation into everything that’s wrong with you,’ and I thought that was a really good way of looking at it,” she says laughing.
“It’s so interesting that the problems that arise in a relationship are such amazing opportunities, it’s like the universe saying ‘Hey, knock knock. You’re not perfect. You have some growing to do. You have some learning to do about yourself’.”
It’s then left to Boehm to dispense her advice to Felieitas and Rama, who are about to have a series of private sessions with the intimacy expert. “How I often start out (each session) is what I call diagnostics,” she explains. “It’s a little bit like bringing your car to the mechanic to find out what’s working and what’s not working.”
From then on, the couple participate in intensive one-on-one counselling with Boehm, who is considered the go-to expert enlisted to help couples struggling to reignite their sexual spark.
According to Boehm, people around the world share the same concerns when it comes to sex. “They want to know if they can have the kind of relationship they want as well as the exciting and fulfilling sex life they want, but that doesn’t always goes hand-in-hand,” she says.
Following on from the success of Paltrow’s first Netflix series The Goop Lab, a miniseries that dived into her wellness company Goop’s wildest treatments – from ice bathing and snowga (yoga in the snow) – Sex, Love & Goop follows six real-life couples seeking counselling from Paltrow and her team of experts, which includes a Sexological Bodyworker, a Tantra and Sacred Intimacy coach and an Erotic Wellness coach, on everything from having good sex, bad sex and what to do to help couples find deeper intimacy together.
For Boehm, the decision to shadow Paltrow on the show didn’t just stem from being her personal intimacy counsellor, but rather her appreciation of Paltrow’s “views on how to have the discussion about female pleasure”.
“Opening up a conversation about areas that are still considered somewhat taboo, or things that are not talked about but are really important, because we all want better relationships and better sex … is one of the amazing things about Gwen,” Boehm explains. “She’s willing to stick her head out there and have the conversations other people don’t want to have. But it does change something when people engage, and that can only be a good thing.”
Boehm has been refining her expertise for 25 years, accumulating “vast experiences” from conducting more than 31,000 one-on-one sessions. She teaches classes and workshops around the world and works closely with a number of A-listers, including Will Smith, on their relationship issues. “I’ve developed a very specific and distinct style of working with people. The way I work and the way I teach includes things people can do that show immediate results.”
Sex, Love & Goop has opened a door into a world of therapy that’s seldom explored. It joins a raft of cutting-edge shows from Netflix that have turned the “sex” genre on its head.
Audiences have watched Sex Education deal with the complexity of teenage sexual angst and the murky issues that permeate all types of relationships.
They have also tuned into the steamy hit series Sex/Life, where the protagonist deals with the imbalance of living the perfect life without the perfect sex life.
In Sex, Love & Goop, how little couples know about their partner’s sexual preference – which usually remains uncharted territory – is laid bare, while problems ranging from body image issues and rekindling lost sparks are confronted head on.
Yet Boehm believes a “proper education” on sex, relationships, pleasure and engagement is still uncommon unless it’s sought out. “We don’t get exposed to new ways of dealing with things. It’s all very ‘hush hush’ and swept under the carpet,” Boehm says.
Sex, Love & Goop sends out an important message of “engaging and being vulnerable” with a partner, which is what the couples involved on the show set out to achieve. “There’s a very wonderful disclosing quality and willingness to actually learn and grow with each other,” she explains. “That is a very inspirational thing to see – that people who have ended up in less than favourable situations can change things.”
As for Felieitas and Rama, you’ll have to get to the end of the six-part series to find out.
Sex, Love & Goop is streaming now on Netflix.