Clothes fall, cameras roll: Intimacy coordinators make reel sex realistic, safe

When headed to a film set, Aastha Khanna Bhardwaj, an intimacy coordinator, always carries her toolbox. That toolbox contains nipple patches, strapless thongs, pubic wigs, non-arousal barriers and hygiene products. As films in India become more realistic, they try to capture the moment between the sheets as realistically as possible. That is exactly where Aastha steps in.
She got it right in Gehraiyaan, which had a number of steamy scenes between Deepika Padukone and Siddhant Chaturvedi. Anyone who has watched Gehraiyaan would agree that the film would have fallen flat had Aastha failed to get the Deepika-Siddhant chemistry right. Other than Gehraiyaan, Astha has worked as an intimacy coordinator on several other projects.
As a stunt director is a must-have for those stunning action sequences, an intimacy coordinator has become the go-to professional for those steamy scenes, which are integral to a film’s storyline.
The concept of an intimacy coordinator, also referred to as intimacy director, is rather new to Indian cinema.
In the 70s and 80s, Indian films depicted intimacy on screen through kissing flowers. Then came the 90s and the early 2000s, when films started showing kissing scenes. One such example is the Aamir Khan- and Karisma Kapoor-starrer Raja Hindustani (1996), which was the talk of the town for a rather long kiss scene.
However, that was the time when filmmakers were coy, and there was hardly any discussion about sex scenes that were to be shot. Sex scenes were on the mind, but not on the lips. It was mostly left to the actors in the intimate sequence to figure out how they would go about it. That needed to change as filmmakers attempted to make movies as real as possible.
Just as a film set requires a stunt director for action scenes, lightmen for good lighting, and production designers for sets, intimacy coordinators are needed to capture the intimate scenes as realistically as possible while creating a safe and comfortable working environment for the actors.
That’s where intimacy coordinators like Aastha and their toolbox come in.
Though they do not hijack the director’s role, intimacy coordinators take the lead when it comes to shooting the sex scenes. They make the actors feel safe and comfortable, giving them the opportunity to explore an intimate moment, which results in more realistic scenes.
As a conversation around sex is needed to keep teenagers safe, so is the need to have a discussion on sex scenes with actors on the set.
Intimacy coordinators help in establishing clear boundaries and expectations for all parties involved in the scene. This includes discussing the nature of the scene, the level of physical intimacy required, and any concerns or limitations that the actors might have.
Laura Rikard, a filmmaker and intimacy coordinator for popular theatre projects like Tally’s Folly and Stick Fly, told India Today Digital that an intimacy expert needn’t be a mandatory part of a film crew but should be utilised as and when needed.
“A good intimacy coordinator helps clarify what the actor is being asked to do and offers extra support in helping the actor ask for what they need to without fear,” Rikard tells India Today Digital.
Aastha Khanna Bhardwaj says that an intimacy coordinator takes the load off filmmakers too.
“An intimacy coordinator creates a comfortable environment for discussions and acting, and also allows filmmakers, directors and producers to feel confident that they are not creating an environment that could potentially be risky,” Aastha tells India Today Digital.
Most intimacy coordinators prefer use of desexualised and gender-free words on the sets. For example, upper chest and backside, instead of breasts and butt, are used in conversation.

Two actors perform an intimate scene on a film set. (Photo: Aastha Khanna Bhardwaj)

Not just the discussions, the intimacy coordinators also take care of filling in holes in contracts.
“For producers, it’s very helpful because a lot of the paperwork involving the scenes of intimacy, a lot of stop-gaps that involve understanding, consent, and upholding those boundaries gets delineated to the intimacy coordinator who takes the onus and responsibility of executing those scenes,” explains Aastha.
For each actor, there is a nudity rider or an intimacy rider that is created and defined in the contracts.
“The contract has details about everything regarding the intimate shot. If there is a storyboard in place, that storyboard will be attached, and each of these pages are made for each of the scenes of intimacy so that one understands that one has consented to doing something that has been discussed. When an actor turns around and says, ‘I am okay to kiss my co-actor in scene 32’, he/she does not mean that they are okay with you suddenly adding it in scene 76 as well,” she explains.
She emphasises how such intimacy contracts are steadily being adopted in India.
The contracts come in handy as intimacy coordinators help to ensure that intimate scenes are filmed professionally and respectfully, resulting in a higher-quality product.
If intimacy coordinators or experts are so integral to the filming process, how did film industries, including Hollywood and Bollywood, function without them till now?
US-based Laura Rikard, an intimacy coordinator and founder of Theatrical Intimacy Education, tells India Today Digital that people did work informally as intimacy coordinators before it became a full-fledged profession.
“The intimacy discipline existed long before film sets started requesting intimacy experts, and many wardrobe crew members, and female stunt coordinators have been doing the work for years on sets,” says Rikard.
Intimacy coordinator Aastha, who worked as an assistant director in her earlier avatar, reveals how even kissing scenes weren’t discussed and left for the very end.
“I’ve had situations where an actor has been told 5-10 minutes before they have to kiss another actor that they’re were to shoot such a scene,” recounts Aastha.
The director would tell the actors that there was an intimate scene to be shot, and that he was just going to roll the camera, and the actors could do whatever they wanted to.
“The actors would work to decide their own boundaries and their own comfort levels because the director was unable to give them the right kind of clarity on what they wanted,” she says.
Though Hollywood had film crew members playing the role of intimacy experts, the MeToo movement changed everything.
The #MeToo movement of 2018 and the fall of Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein exposed how sex abuse and harassment were rampant in the film industry.
“The work [of intimacy coordinators] was out there, it took the #MeToo movement to make the industry take an interest and acknowledge the title of intimacy coordinator,” says US-based Laura Rikard.
“With #MeToo, women started coming forward and finding power in their voices. So, Hollywood suddenly thought ‘We’re going to get sued. We have not protected our actors like we should’,” Nedra Constance Gallegos, intimacy coordinator and instructor at the New York Film Academy, tells India Today Digital.
The fear of widespread lawsuits is really what spurred the idea of intimacy coordinators, adds Gallegos.
Back home in India, the Hema Committee Report on sex abuse in the Malayalam film industry has also revealed how rampant sex abuse is. The report also cited an example of how an actress had to work with a person whom she had accused of sexual assault.
“…On the next day, she had to work with the same man as husband and wife, hugging each other. That was terrible. Because of what was done to her during the shooting, her resentment and hatred had reflected on her face, during shooting. Seventeen retakes had to be taken for just one shot. The director criticised her for the situation,” the Hema Commission report stated.
“There’s always been a need [for intimacy coordinators], but the conversation has now begun. It is actually great that people understand that experts are available who can create environments that are going to be safer, environments that are going to have rules, regulations, guidelines and standards that are followed internationally,” says Aastha.
What does a workday of an intimacy coordinator on a film involve?
The intimacy coordinators told India Today Digital that on the day of the shoot, they remind the actors of what had already been discussed, what the scene and choreography is going to be like, and what modesty garments and anti-arousal barriers would be used.
“Modesty garments are there for scenes of nudity, barriers are there for scenes involving simulated sex. There are permutations and combinations of a lot of different tools that are used in order to execute these scenes, which are a part of an intimacy coordinator’s kit. And that’s what’s kind of figured out on the day on the film set,” says Aastha.

Deepika Padukone and Siddhant Chaturvedi in Gehraiyaan, where Aastha worked as an intimacy coordinator.

Most of the intimate scenes are shot in a closed set with a minimal crew, actors, director and the intimacy coordinator.
“Then we go into the closed set and do a dry rehearsal to see what the flow of the scene is going to look like. We do a camera-blocking rehearsal, which is just to know where actors are supposed to travel in a scene, where the camera is going to be, where we are going to catch light, and so on,” adds Aastha.
On every set, Aastha carries with her a toolbox, which contains three different categories of equipment — modesty garments, non-arousal barriers and hygiene products.
“There are nipple patches, body tape, adhesive underwear, strapless thongs. Essentially, that’s modesty garments,” she tells India Today Digital.
“The second category is barriers and prosthetics. Barriers are used to avoid a situation of arousal non-concordance, that is, to prevent the genitalia of the actors from coming in contact, and to ensure that there is no actual genital touch between two people,” she adds.

The quintessential toolbox of an intimacy coordinator. (Photo: Aastha Khanna Bhardwaj)

Apart from these, you will find hygiene products like alcohol wipes, coconut oil, sanitary wear, shaving creams, razors, nail cutters, filers, scissors, tape, mouthwash, toothpaste, mint, body roll-on, perfume, in the toolbox.
She then spoke about prosthetics. It isn’t a part of the toolbox, but an intimacy coordinator needs to have them handy. “Prosthetics are used when an actor doesn’t want to show their skin on camera but is comfortable with the idea of nudity,” Aastha says.
She cited the example of actor Kubbra Sait, who wore prosthetic genitals in Sacred Games. Actors in House of Dragons and Game of Thrones, too, have worn pubic wigs or some form of prosthetic coverage to make a scene look real on screen.
With sex scenes becoming integral to storylines, intimacy coordinators like Aastha and their toolbox are slowly going mainstream in the Indian film industry. Because they help in making sex scenes more realistic by turning the sets safer.