Blog Posts

Vanity Fair: The Naked Truth: Inside Normal People’s Explicit Sex Scenes

13/5/2020

BY ABIGAIL GLASGOW

That’s where Normal People’s intimacy coordinator Ita O’Brien comes in. Like a stunt coordinator, she brings technique and skill to the movement via open communication and transparency. Her role is more comprehensive than simply determining the physical choreography of a scene; she helps actors understand their characters even in phases of script study; she works in tandem with the entire crew—directors, producers, wardrobe, assistants—through the entirety of the rehearsal process up until intimate content is shot on a closed set. The intimacy coordinator is helping to reshape—from rehearsal to audience—the infamously abusive relationship the industry has with sex.

Here, O’Brien—whose credits include Sex Education and Humans—talks the details of onscreen sex, the challenges of a simple kiss, and how a masturbation montage can change lives.

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Today FM Dermot & Dave: Interview with Ita O'Brien

12/5/2020

ABC: Sarah Macdonald interviews Ita O'Brien about her work on Normal People

12/5/2020

RTE Radio 1: Brendan O'Connor interviews Ita O'Brien

10/5/2020

India Times Post: Normal People's Paul Mescal admits he had no qualms with stripping off for racy sex scenes

9/5/2020

Paul also confessed that he was so proud of the show he sat down with his entire family to watch it, though he did choose to warn them ahead of some of the show’s raunchiest moments.

To ensure Normal People portrayed its sex scenes as accurately as possible, producers called in the help of intimacy co-ordinator Ita O’Brien.

Normal People has been praised for its ‘realistic’, ‘consensual’ and ‘communicative’ sex scenes between the two lead characters, especially during the first intimate encounter where Connell says: ‘If you want to stop, or anything, we can stop.’

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Irish Mirror: Lenny Abrahamson admits he was nervous directing intimate sex scenes with young actors in Normal People

9/5/2020

By Eoin Murphy

“The intimacy between the two lead characters is such a big part of the book, it is something we really wanted to get right,” he told the Irish Mirror.

“Because it is such a wonderful part of the book and one of the reasons we were so keen to make it.

“In the point of view of the actors and the crew we needed a way of making sure that it is done in a way that is positive for everybody.

“We thought about it and we were guided by Sally’s writing in what we wanted to achieve and then we worked with Ita O’Brien who is this wonderful intimacy coordinator - she worked on Netflix’s Sex Education.

“She has developed a wonderful way of talking about and walking towards scenes which in the past which would have been awkward, difficult and borderline scary for people on both sides of the camera.

“Her way of working is making sure that everyone has a language in which to talk about it, like it is direct and simple.

“She turns these scenes into something that maybe a choreographer wouldn’t do.

“It gives everybody from filmmakers to actors a way of talking about a sex scene and creates a consent and active participation in the creative process.

“And it worked really well”.

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The Hindu: ‘Normal People’ review: A masterclass in understanding the different facets of intimacy

9/5/2020

By Navmi Krishna

Watching Normal People is an exercise in understanding the different facets of intimacy. There is no escaping the intensity of it, with the camera often zooming in on the actors until it is difficult to separate the viewer and the characters. The sex (of which there is a lot) is passionate, raw and imperfect, and wildly different from the cinematic intercourse that we are used to. There is a lot of fumbling and giggles, eagerness, and clarity of consent. “When I hear the phrase ‘sex scene,’ I think about a dialogue scene,” Rooney says in an interview, and that translates onscreen (It helps that Rooney co-wrote the screenplay with Alice Birch and Mark O’Rowe). With the help of intimacy coordinator Ita O’Brien, each scene is a conversation, pregnant with meaning, signalling subtle shifts in the dynamics of the relationship.

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GQ: How Normal People, the Sexiest Show on TV, Gets the Details Right

7/5/2020

BY STEPHANIE TALMADGE

Sex as depicted on Normal People is unlike the sex we normally see on TV. Where often intimate scenes are hurried, frantic shots of flailing limbs and searching mouths, here they are languorous, drenched in soft afternoon light. There is a beginning, middle, and end. There’s consent-affirming dialogue throughout. Sometimes there are hiccups—like a stubborn bra clasp or a wrong word uttered that shatters the whole mood. There’s almost always naked lounging afterwards. Ultimately, these scenes just feel real, which is not something anyone’s ever said about Westworld or Game of Thrones. Part of that is of course owed to Rooney’s writing in the book, but the work of Ita O’Brien, the show’s intimacy coordinator, is what brought those scenes to life. While still a little-known field, the intimacy coordinator is becoming increasingly in-demand on sets (O’Brien’s other credits include Netflix’s Sex Education and HBO’s Watchmen) in recent years. “When Weinstein and the Time’s Up movement happened,” O’Brien says, “the industry started going, ‘Okay we have to do better, we can’t tolerate predatory behavior.’”

Somewhat counterintuitively, to achieve the naturalistic feel of the scenes between Marianne and Connell, O’Brien actually choreographed all their movements, down to every thrust. “The choreography brings a real safety and structure, so that everything is known,” O’Brien says, which then enables the actors to relax and really embody the character, rather than worrying about where arms and legs and other body parts need to go. “That’s where you get scenes like you’ve got in Normal People.”

Below, O’Brien talks in detail about producing the steamy scenes between Marianne and Connell, how consent should always come from a place of care, and the importance of PDA.

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Vogue: How Do Sex Scenes On Film Actually Work? Normal People’s Intimacy Co-ordinator Shares All

7/5/2020

BY RADHIKA SETH

Having worked as a dancer, actor and movement director for over a decade, O’Brien began developing best practice for intimate scenes, sexual content and nudity across film, TV and theatre six years ago. “I started looking at how we can keep actors safe and what we need to put in place to help them enter into the work and also leave at the end of the day in a good place,” she says. Her role, she adds, is akin to that of a stunt coordinator, encompassing risk assessments, rehearsals and on-set supervision to ensure performers have a clear structure within which to experiment.

As the show’s popularity soars — it has already been watched 16.2m times on BBC iPlayer — we spoke to O’Brien via Zoom to discuss planning productions around menstrual cycles, workshops that look at animal mating rituals and how intimacy coordinators are changing the industry.

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The Guardian: Sex has as much meaning as words: how Normal People handles intimacy

6/5/2020

By Zoe Williams

The sex, though, was its own conundrum, televisually speaking, and much was made of the hiring of an intimacy coordinator, Ita O’Brien (she’s the best in the business, apparently – which comes across a bit droll, if you didn’t realise that was a business). How do you tell the story of two characters whose entire journey is sexual, without just making a soft-porn film? These two questions – how do you present a story so clear without telling it too simply? How do you put the sex in the centre, without making it the point? – are in fact the same question. I only realised that when I saw this quote of Rooney’s: “When I hear the phrase ‘sex scene’, I think about a dialogue scene.” There is no such thing as some sex that just happens, it is as freighted with meaning as words are. The characters are saying something important to one another, something that will propel them forward. If sitcom characters chat and characters in drama talk, then by extension, in the Rooney school, sitcom characters shag, and these characters, well, they do something other than shagging. I wouldn’t say “make love”, so let’s just say “fuck” and let its Anglo-Saxonness transmit the vitality of that. I found their first sex scene really moving, and not especially erotic. I wouldn’t write off anyone else finding it erotic – and there have been some complaints about the volume of sex scenes – but I think I’d defy anyone not to be moved by it.

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