Mumbai4 hours agoWriters: Kiran Jain and Abhinav Tripathi
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Shooting intimate scenes in films is quite challenging. Intimacy coordinators are hired to ensure that the scenes are perfect and the actors feel safe. Deepika Padukone felt uncomfortable with intimate scenes in the film Gehraiyaan because there were a lot of people present on the set.
Birds fighting each other's beaks, two flowers meeting, milk boiling… in old movies, these scenes were inserted to show the intimacy between the hero and heroine. With time, there has been a lot of change in filming these intimate scenes. There is a competition to make the scenes look realistic and the challenge in front of the directors has become bigger. Shooting such scenes is neither easy for the actors nor for the director.
The biggest challenge is that along with making the scene look original, the stars also have to take care of each other's dignity. For this, the actors are rehearsed and sent to workshops so that they can control their emotions. This workshop is organised by the intimacy coordinator. In today's time, their role in the film industry has increased a lot.
In this episode of Reel to Real, we will understand the role of intimacy coordinator and their working process. For this, we spoke to the country's first intimacy coordinator Aastha Khanna, Neha Vyaso, actress-psychiatrist Dr. Aditi Govitrikar and psychiatrist Dr. Kersi Chavda.
Aastha told that Deepika Padukone was feeling a little uncomfortable about the intimate scenes in the film Gehraiyaan because there were a lot of people present on the set. Later, everyone except 4-5 people were removed from there. Even the cameraman was instructed to record the scene from a faraway bathroom.
Actors communicate their boundaries to the intimacy coordinator
During the workshop, the intimacy coordinator first discusses the wishes and limitations of the actors. They are first asked about the level of scenes they can shoot. The actors tell their boundaries to the intimacy coordinator. Then the actors are told how they have to react during the shoot. Where they can put their hands, there should be such perfection that the hands should not move up or down even a little.
Meanwhile, the actors are told that if they feel anything is wrong, they should say cut or freeze their body. Seeing this, the director himself will stop the scene.
After the workshop, the intimacy coordinator designs the scenes. Now here intimacy does not mean only romantic scenes. Sexual violence scenes like rape scenes, homosexual scenes, kissing scenes between minors and bathing scenes of actors are also shot under the supervision of the intimacy coordinator.
Intimate scenes are classified into three categories, actors are given special clothes
According to Neha Vyaso, the director of the film gives a brief to the intimacy coordinator about that particular scene. According to the brief, the intimacy coordinator breaks down the scenes into three different categories (red, yellow, green). There is more intimacy in the red category, a little less in yellow and very less in green. The coordinator then visualizes the scenes in his mind and then writes them down on paper.
After this, the actors are told how to perform those scenes. They are given some special kind of clothes. This is called intimacy kit. After this, the shooting of these scenes starts on a close set. Only 4 to 5 people are present during the shooting. These 4 to 5 people include the artist, director, intimacy coordinator and cameraman.
Aastha Khanna shared an anecdote from the shooting of the web show Saas Bahu Aur Flamingo. She said, 'There was a rape scene in this show. 5 boys together rape a girl in the desert.
I had to film that scene in such a way that it looked natural. I focused more on the faces of the five boys. They were told that the brutality should be visible on their faces. The actress had to be shown as if she looked like a living corpse. This scene was designed in such a way that it looked absolutely real.
Dimple Kapadia was kissed by her co-star, this scene was not in the script
Earlier, when intimacy coordinators didn't exist, there were many incidents on sets where artists would feel uncomfortable with the actions of their co-stars.
Aastha said, 'Once Dimple Kapadia told me that her co-star had kissed her during the shooting of a scene. Whereas Dimple was not even told about this and neither was this scene in the script. This incident was quite shocking for Dimple.'
Dimple made her debut in 1973. In the same year, she married Rajesh Khanna.
Radhika Apte was tickled by her co-star
Aastha also gave an example of Radhika Apte. She said, 'During the shooting, a co-star tickled Radhika Apte. Nothing like this was written in the script, the actor did it jokingly. Radhika could not react to this incident. Perhaps the status of the actor in front was very high.'
Radhika Apte has appeared in famous films like Andhadhun, Padman and Badlapur.
Item songs also come under the category of intimate scenes
Even item songs fall under the category of intimate scenes. During shooting, the camera mostly focuses on the heroine's body parts. In such a situation, proper workshops are organized so that they do not face any problem in doing this.
Although 200 to 300 people are present on the set during the shooting of item songs, only 4 to 5 people are involved in the original scene.
Intimate scenes were first seen in Hindi films in the 30s
It is not that filming of intimate scenes in Bollywood started only around 1990 or 2000. In 1929, actress Sita Devi gave a kissing scene with co-star Charu Roy in the silent film 'A Throw of Dice'. In the 1933 film Karma, Devika Rani had a 4-minute long kissing scene with her co-star Himansu Rai, which became a topic of discussion at that time.
Actress Devika Rani also married Himansu Rai.
After the Cinematography Act in 1952, such scenes were cut. Then love making scenes in films started being shown in a symbolic way. Later, Raj Kapoor started showing onscreen kissing in his films again in the 70s. In the 1990s, kissing was seen as lovemaking scenes. After 2000, the makers increased the scope of filming love making scenes.
Raj Kapoor started showing actresses as glamorous in his films. In the picture Simi Grewal (Film- Mera Naam Joker)
Now in the era of OTT, such scenes have become common. However, intimacy coordinators say that makers should not add such scenes just to attract attention. Such scenes should be shown only if the script demands it, otherwise it will take the form of vulgarity and art will be suppressed in front of it.