Before it went home with the best picture Oscar, Anora had been courting controversy in Hollywood — not so much for having a sex worker as its title character, but because it didn’t have a specialist on set to help with the racier scenes.
Such “intimacy co-ordinators” have become more common on film and TV shoots since 2017’s #MeToo movement and its widespread accounts of on-set harassment. They’re meant, among other tasks, to prevent abuse and coercion.
But despite being endorsed by producers, unions and many performers, what is perhaps Hollywood’s newest profession is not its most loved.
“We’re our own intimacy co-ordinators,” Anora director Sean Baker said in 2024, responding to the then-swirling controversy, which was largely centred on social media.
Baker wasn’t alone. Star Mikey Madison earlier told Variety‘s Actors on Actors she and others on set requested to work without one.
“We decided it would be best to keep it small… to streamline it, shoot it really quickly,” she said.
Independent film Anora, whose producer is from Vancouver, racked up five wins at the Academy Awards on Sunday. Crystal Laderas from sex worker advocacy group SWAN Vancouver says the director of Anora’s call for the decriminalization of sex work is a positive sign for workers in precarious situations.
Her reasons echo other concerns voiced by actors, even as the role becomes an established aspect of Hollywood filmmaking.
The job also involves co-ordination with actors, costumers, special effects and crew regarding how much skin will be shown. Intimacy co-ordinators discuss, identify and comfort those on set potentially triggered by displays of traumatic sexual activity. They discuss and confirm who touches what — and what remains off-limits — between performers, making sure everyone is prepared and on-board with the director’s vision.
“The way I describe it, is often in parallel to a stunt co-ordinator,” said intimacy co-ordinator Jessica Steinrock. Both make it look like something powerfully physical is happening, “like a fist is coming into contact with someone’s face.”
Likewise for an intimacy co-ordinator, she said. “Those titles are paralleled for this reason.”
Some producers, like HBO, require intimacy co-ordinators for all productions with intimate or sexual scenes, while Netflix made them part of its series Bridgerton and The Witcher.
In SAG-AFTRA’s standards and protocols, the acting union states it “believes” intimacy co-ordinators should be used in scenes involving nudity or simulated sex, or when actors request one. In its most recent contract, the union stated producers must put in their “best efforts” to work with one, and “consider in good faith” actors’ requests to have an intimacy co-ordinator.
And many performers who have worked with them have come to think of intimacy co-ordinators as vital to their craft — allowing them to express intimate feelings without being affected by potentially associated trauma.
“The feeling that we’re trying to give in a real way without feeling, you know, invaded upon,” said actor L.A. Sweeney. She has worked with intimacy co-ordinators since 2022, when she appeared in ABC’s Last Resort. There, and since, she says, co-ordinators were vital to protect a potentially difficult process of expressing intimacy in front of a camera.
“Because it’s not about harming ourselves. It’s just about doing the story justice in whatever breadth that we can,” she said.
Still, the position isn’t mandatory industry-wide — and has its critics.
Pros and cons
Hereditary‘s Toni Collette has said intimacy co-ordinators make her anxious as they interrupt the trust she builds with her cast and crew, and has asked them to leave set in the past. Sean Bean (Game of Thrones) said they “spoil the spontaneity” of sex scenes, and Michael Douglas said intimacy co-ordinators are an unnecessary barrier between actors and directors that “take control away from filmmakers.”
But some some professionals say the decision of whether to use an intimacy co-ordinator should rest with more people.
Speaking to Variety, a handful of intimacy co-ordinators said that misses concerns that others on the set may hold. They said background actors and crew members should also be taken into consideration.
“These actors felt comfortable with their director — that’s great,” intimacy co-ordinator Kiele DeLeon told the trade magazine, referring to the stars of Anora. “But I think we leave out a lot of other people when we focus on the people who have the most power.”
Steinrock echoes that sentiment. She says intimacy co-ordinators should be as baked into the fabric of filmmaking and actor protection as stunt co-ordination is — a position that SAG-AFTRA mandates for films with hazardous stunts.
By now, stunt co-ordination is “deeply ingrained” in the industry because people “recognize the real safety benefits,” she says. And if an actor doesn’t like working with a particular stunt person, they suggest getting a better one — not that the job shouldn’t exist.
From a director’s standpoint, the issue can be nuanced. Canadian filmmaker Sook-Yin Lee has been working in the industry for years and her films (Shortbus, Year of the Carnivore and more) often deal with sexually charged content.
But her most recent movie — Paying For It, about a man who employs sex workers — was her first to employ intimacy co-ordinators.
Though they are still new, she says they’ve quickly become vital for her.
“The way I see it is, they’re part of the team,” she said. “They’re as important as the boom op, as the cinematographer — as any of the key people on set.”
That said, given the option, she wouldn’t have wanted an intimacy co-ordinator in her earlier work.
“I can stand by all of the work that I’ve done, and I can stand by the good camaraderie and goodwill on set,” she said.
The small sets and interpersonal connection governed how intimacy was depicted and choreographed, and she can’t imagine “retroactively imagine plunking” in “another professional.”
Her outlook has and will continue to change, she says. But the industry’s adoption of intimacy co-ordinators isn’t so simple.
“At this point in time, it’s just a new development. And I also appreciate that too — the intimacy co-ordinator,” she said. “But I also know that it’s not just as simple as, like, good or bad.”
