Thursday, December 05, 2019
Broadway Intimacy Director Talks About Sex Onstage
Variety: The craft of intimacy direction is taking Broadway by storm — and on the latest episode of Variety’s Stagecraft, Broadway’s first intimacy director explains why, and breaks down the ways in which she’s helping to revolutionize how actors get intimate onstage.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
I have been really happy lately to see the increase in the awareness of the necessity and importance of the role of intimacy coordinator in theatre. I really like the correlation in considering the intimacy coordinator on a level similar to that of a stage combat coordinator because both of the roles revolve around ensuring the safety of all of those involved in the production. It is just so valuable to have someone separate from the director of the show to ensure there is no breakdown of communication of the people participating in the scene and the director. I think the discussion of not being there to make the actors comfortable is something I had not thought of before with having an intimacy coordinator. It does make sense in the way it was framed it, what their doing is pretty inherently uncomfortable and no matter how many people involved you can’t really change that fact. Regardless the support offered by the position is really crucial in creating a structure where even if the actors can’t really feel comfortable they at least feel supported and that there is not any danger in any form in what their doing and that should be priority.
It’s wonderful to see a new job in the theatre industry blossoming up so rapidly. I was always told as a kid “50% of the jobs you’ll get as an adult don’t exist yet” and I never really thought that but it is really amazing to see this role be born before our eyes and have CMU be part of the leading folks in the movement. Intimacy direction is so important because just like fight scenes, not all directors can or should direct those scenes. The director is typically focused on the big picture whereas specialty directors are able to come in with laser focus and attention to the participants. I really like how she described her process as no trying to make the actors comfortable because what we do is uncomfortable. Rather, the intent of intimacy direction is to create crafted scenes and safe environments for everyone involved with the process.
Thinking of working on intimate scene on the stage, without someone really knows and has experience of what is going on can be way more dangerous than we expected. Comparing to stage combat we have multiple positions and specialties of monitoring that, the same level of physical interaction such as sex has nearly no precaution to prevent harm to both actors and audience. This is the first time I have heard about intimacy director as a position, and it stunned me how I neglect the impact of a sexual scene might effect people related to the production. I would say it is such a big improvement of the industry to introduce this kind of protection and professionalism into our practices. And through bringing more attention to intimacy on the stage we can set a good example of how people should treat each other whether in reality or on stage. This is kind of the actions I want to see as a believer of we can definitely make positive impact to the real world.
Post a Comment