Director reveals exactly how The Housemaid’s steamiest scenes were actually filmed

The Housemaid has plenty of dark twists, but it’s the sexual tension that’s really got people talking, and now, director Paul Feig has explained exactly how he approached filming the movie’s more explicit scenes, like the hotel scene.

The thriller, starring Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried, blends suspense with a twisted, dark sense of humour. Because of that, Feig said he had to strike a careful balance between making the scenes in The Housemaid feel intimate without pushing them too far.

In an interview with Slash Film, Feig made it clear that comfort on set came first. “First of all, you need two people in front of the camera who are comfortable with it. And that’s my biggest concern. I never want anybody to do anything they’re not comfortable with.”

To make sure that happened, an intimacy coordinator was involved throughout filming. “We had a great intimacy coordinator, Lizzie [Talbot], who was just great, but our actors were just really free.”

Rather than focusing on graphic moments, Feig said the key was keeping things subtle. According to him, filming sex scenes isn’t about showing everything. “It’s more about details. It’s not big wide shots of the act. It’s the details of hands, of faces, of mouths, that kind of thing that makes it much more intimate and erotic without being male gaze-y.” In other words, less spectacle and more feeling.

A lot of what ends up in the final cut comes down to trial and error

via Lionsgate

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Director Paul Feig also revealed that those scenes took the most work in the editing room. Multiple versions were filmed, then adjusted based on audience reactions during test screenings. “You shoot a lot of stuff and you could go anyway, but also the audience when you do your test screenings kind of tells you. Like, ‘Okay, that’s too much.’”

Because of that, Feig said the intimate moments were the ones they fine-tuned the most. “That was probably the one we played with the most, those two scenes, but I’m really happy with how they came out and people feel very comfortable watching them.”

Overall, Feig’s approach was all about trust, detail and knowing when to pull back. And judging by the reaction so far, his method seems to have worked.