It’s all about building intimacy…<\/p>[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”credit-name” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”Black Han Sans|||on|||||” text_text_color=”#000000″ header_4_font=”|||on|||||” header_4_text_align=”center” text_orientation=”center” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]
Words by Alice Hall<\/strong><\/p>[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2025\/06\/GettyImages-1223864110-1-scaled.jpg” alt=”Jennifer Aniston” title_text=”Happy young couple lying in bed” force_fullwidth=”on” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”] We\u2019re always being told about new ways to improve our sex lives. But if there\u2019s anyone whose advice we should be taking, it\u2019s an intimacy coordinator \u2013 someone who works with on-screen sex day in and day out.<\/p>\n Intimacy coordinators are a relatively new concept. They are trained professionals who are bought in to work on film and television sets to ensure that scenes involving nudity, simulated sex, or other intimate physical contact are conducted safely and with clear consent from everyone involved. Over the last decade, intimacy coordinators have become more common, particularly in #MeToo era.<\/p>\n But they can help us off-screen too. Britain\u2019s first intimacy coordinator Ita O\u2019Brien has used her years of film experience to pen a book on helpful tips on how we can improve our own sex lives, while respecting each other\u2019s boundaries. In Intimacy: A Field Guide to Finding Connection and Feeling Your Deep Desires, O\u2019Brien provides helpful tips and guided exercises for readers to try at home, while also breaking down myths and misconceptions about what having great sex means.<\/p>\n When it comes to this stuff, O\u2019Brien has a wealth of experience under her belt. She worked as an intimacy coordinator on the BBC\u2019s hugely popular adaption of Normal People, alongside I May Destroy You and Netflix\u2019s Sex Education. All these shows started huge off-screen conversations about topics such as consent and female pleasure thanks to their sex scenes.<\/p>\n However, in a previous interview with The Metro, O\u2019Brien stated that it\u2019s a common misconception that intimacy coordinators are sex experts. \u2018What we are experts at is supporting the actor-director process. And we\u2019re experts in choreography, body knowledge and anatomy, and in supporting that choreography telling the right character story. I am not an expert in sexual content at all \u2013 that\u2019s what I will research. I\u2019ve got my books,\u2019 she told the outlet.\u2019 When I did Gentleman Jack, I had to go and research. When I did It\u2019s a Sin, I talked to people from that community, as any actor would with any subjects that they\u2019re asked to do.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”custom-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_font=”Libre Bodoni|||on|||||” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#333333″ header_2_font_size=”40px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″] As for O\u2019Brien\u2019s book, it has a whole host of important sex advice for couples to get to grips with. One of these is the idea of \u2018Tuesday sex.\u2019 Like the name implies, this is sex that feels \u2018part of your routine\u2019 and is the opposite to \u2018Disney World sex\u2019, which is things like sexy lingerie or getting intimate after a steamy date night.<\/p>\n In her book, O\u2019Brien writes that getting comfortable with sex that strips back the \u2018bells and whistles\u2019 is key to \u2018cementing a regular connection and strengthening emotional ties\u2019 for couples in long-term relationships. According to Ita, some of the most ‘damaging’ ways in which sex is portrayed on-screen include the lack of lubrication and the speed of the female orgasm, as she acknowledged that many ‘don’t have an orgasm via penetration in any case’.<\/p>\n How does O\u2019Brien get such amazing realistic results from the sex scenes she choregraphs? It\u2019s all about making things as sexy as possible while respecting the actor\u2019s boundaries. In a 2022 interview with The Guardian, O\u2019Brien explained how, on set of Normal People, \u2018Daisy, Paul and I would talk through where they could touch each other, where they could kiss each other \u2013 as an example, in the early scenes Daisy had to wear a wig, so she had a rule about Paul not running fingers through her hair.\u2019 She added \u2018While that might sound banal, it is really important because an actor doesn\u2019t want to have to worry about that while filming sex, they want to be relaxed.\u2019<\/p>\n While it may seem like everyone is having amazing sex (thanks, Hollywood) statistics tell a different story. A 2018 survey by Gransnet and Mumsnet, in association with Relate, found that over a quarter of the platform\u2019s users said that their relationship is \u2018sexless’ (no sex at all in the past year, or fewer than ten times in the past year). Then, 20% said they\u2019ve had sex fewer than 10 times and 8% said they\u2019ve had no sex at all over the previous 12 months.<\/p>\n So how can we apply O\u2019Brien\u2019s life to our own sex lives off-screen? Staying present is key. According to O\u2019Brien\u2019s book, self-esteem and self-love are crucial for a healthy sex life, particularly when it comes to maintaining intimacy in a long-term marriage. Some of her advice in her new book includes looking into a mirror and saying \u2018I choose to love myself. I am enough. I believe in myself.\u2019 You can also look into the eyes of your partner for a minute, while \u2018sharing your wonderings.\u2019 As O\u2019Brien says, it\u2019s \u2018possible to have intimacy without sex, and sex without intimacy.\u2019<\/p>\n The bottom line is that, in O\u2019Brien\u2019s world, good sex doesn\u2019t have to be complicated. After all, isn\u2019t the whole point of sex pleasure \u2013 not pressure?<\/p>\n Ita O\u2019Brien 2025. Extracted from Intimacy: A Field Guide to Finding Connection and Feeling Your Deep Desires by Ita O\u2019Brien (Ebury \u00a316.99), published on June 5.<\/em><\/p>[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ divider_position=”center” divider_weight=”2px” module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”0px||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”0px||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text module_class=”credit-texts” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|||on|||||” text_orientation=”center” global_colors_info=”{}”] Photo: <\/b>Getty<\/p>[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Would you try it?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":11207,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-feature","category-news"],"acf":[],"modified_by":"guestgrazia","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11203"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11203\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11222,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11203\/revisions\/11222"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11207"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Self-esteem and self-love are crucial for a healthy sex life<\/h2>[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]
Meanwhile, Hollywood Sex is the type we\u2019re more likely to see portrayed on screen. In an excerpt from Intimacy, as quoted in the MailOnline, Ita explained how Hollywood is obsessed with ‘Disney World sex’ that is often based on ‘super fantasies about what is supposed to happen’ during intercourse.<\/p>\n