training | OLD

What is an Intimacy Coordinator?

An Intimacy Coordinator (IC) works across multiple departments on a production to facilitate, manage, and choreograph intimate content for screen. “Intimate Content” is a wide umbrella term that includes: simulated sex, nudity & partial nudity, kissing, simulated sexual assault and non-consensual action, medical scenes, childbirth, bodily functions, and more. An IC works with a rigorous consent-based practice to help to ensure the well-being of creatives involved in the shooting of these scenes. An IC is a creative professional who collaborates with other members of the team from pre-production through to broadcast to realise moments that best serve the characters and the story.

Intimacy Coordinators’ Recommended Skills

There are certain skills that Intimacy Coordinators typically have that ensure best practice.
Intimacy Coordinators having these skills allows them to engage in the work effectively.

Empathy
Active listener
Considerate
Emotional Literacy
An aptitude for collaboration
Ability to hold conflict
Creativity
Quick problem-solving
Self-reflective
Ability to interrogate own prejudices and assumptions
Ability to anticipate issues
A comfortability working with various types of intimate content
Ability to speak frankly about sex and bodies
A passion for working with physical, embodied storytelling
An enthusiasm for consent-work

Current Intimacy Coordinators in the UK have come from a range of backgrounds, including:

Whatever your background, we recommend aspiring ICs are to possess previous qualifications and/or recognisable experience in the following areas: movement, directing and/or acting or an equivalent creative role. Additionally, knowledge and/or experience of on-set etiquette and processes is desirable.

Why do you need to undergo training and/or mentorship to be an IC?

An Intimacy Coordinator is a health and safety role, with significant responsibility and liability for what happens on set during the filming of intimate scenes. It is essential that anyone walking on set in this capacity is qualified to undertake those responsibilities. There are many areas of expertise an IC needs to have, and pathways to obtaining that training are evolving and varied – the one thing the entire industry agrees on is that ICs need to be properly trained.

When someone who isn’t properly trained works on set as an IC, they put themselves at risk, as well as the actors and the production. By doing so, they also jeopardize the integrity and reputation of the IC role in the wider industry, leading to misconceptions about the work and a loss of respect for the role.

The Bectu Intimacy Coordinator Registry (beginning 2023) is designed to promote high safety standards and industry-wide competence regarding Intimacy work. There are a number of experience and qualification requirements that ICs must have in order to be accepted onto the Registry.

Basic Expectations from Training Providers

Your course should include the following:

Opportunities for engagement with various Intimacy practitioners and related professionals. ICs have many different skills and backgrounds, so courses should embrace that there is no singular methodology or practice when it comes to Intimacy Coordination.
Courses should charge reasonable fees for training undertaken, or should ideally offer flexible payment options (e.g. instalments). Financing should be transparent.
Courses should have a curriculum that is clearly sent out in advance.
Courses and/or training providers should have testimonials.
Courses should have a clear end-point, so trainees can see their roadmap for finishing their training.

Reach out to Bectu if you have concerns.

For more information on becoming an IC, or if you're an experienced Intimacy Coordinator considering becoming a Mentor or Training provider, see page 9 of Bectu's Guidance for Shooting Intimacy: