Episode 03: Healing Hollywood

Amanda Blumenthal

Illustration by Alexander Bustamante

In episode three, Maytal chats with Amanda Blumenthal, one of the first ever intimacy coordinators in Hollywood. Amanda’s impressive resume includes working on shows like How to Get Away with Murder, Euphoria, and The L Word Generation Q. Amanda is also the founder of the Intimacy Professionals Association (IPA), where she trains intimacy coordinators around the globe. In this conversation, you’ll learn about the ways Amanda brought healing to Hollywood in a period of reckoning, following the Harvey Weinstein scandal and the uprise of the Me Too movement.

[Note: Some content in this interview discusses Andrew Cuomo and allegations of sexual harassment. This interview was recorded in the Spring of 2021, prior to the resignation of Andrew Cuomo.]

TRANSCRIPT:

Maytal: Hi, I'm Maytal and welcome to Heal With It, a podcast about healing and it's many, and sometimes unexpected forms.

[Music Interlude]

Maytal: In today’s world, the process of healing tends to fall on individuals. If you’re feeling sad, or depressed, or anxious as hell, then the messaging you’ll probably get at some point or another is: something’s wrong with you, so go figure it out. As a psychologist, I’ve always had a problem with this. What this messaging implies, is that if you’re struggling, then you must be broken. But what if it’s not you that is broken? What if it’s the world around you -  the systems around you - that are failing?

A question I’ve been fumbling around with for years is, what if healing was less focused on fixing the individual, and moreso, focused on fixing our broken systems?

That question is part of the reason why I started this podcast. I wanted to find people around the world who were approaching healing not just differently, but from the perspective of the system, rather than the individual. 

And so when I learned about Amanda Blumenthal, I was stoked. 

[Music Interlude]

Amanda works in Hollywood. She’s not an actor, or a producer, or a director. She’s an intimacy coordinator. To explain what that is, let me take a step back to four years ago. 

In year 2017, we saw Tarana Burke’s “Me Too” coalesce into a national movement. The collective confrontation of Harvey Weinstein’s sexual abuse unearthed a larger phenomenon occurring in Hollywood: that sexual misconduct and inequitable power dynamics were more common then previously thought across TV and Film. It was a pivotal moment for Hollywood; one that forced the industry to look at itself in the mirror and confront its deepest demons. The system of Hollywood needed to change, and it needed to heal. 

And so, that’s where Amanda came in. She was hired to work as an intimacy coordinator for HBO. As one of the first official intimacy coordinators ever, she had a big task at hand: to figure out how to transform a Hollywood set into a place that felt safe for performers. 

Today, when you ask Amanda what an intimacy coordinator is, she explains it as a multi-faceted role.

Amanda Blumenthal: The role of an intimacy coordinator is to help create a safer environment for performers on set whenever they're performing in scenes of nudity, simulated sex, and other types of intimate content. We’re also there to help the director with telling their creative vision. So we're there for all parties involved. Some of the main roles and responsibilities include things like advocating for actors, and that includes LGBTQ plus cast members. It includes things like acting as a liaison between performers and production. And by doing that, it helps to interrupt the power dynamic that is often present between performers and producers and performers and directors. We are also there to help make sure that proper protocols are being enforced. And that includes things like the union guidelines related to nudity and simulated sex. It means making sure that the set is properly closed, so that performers have privacy when they're performing these types of scenes. It also means making sure that performers are wearing the appropriate type of modesty garments to cover their genitals, that they're using barriers during simulated sex, if that's what they both want. And we're also able to choreograph the scene if that's something that the director asks for help with.

Maytal: You can hear Amanda speaking in the plural “we.” That’s because today, intimacy coordinators are becoming more and more commonplace across sets, and networks like HBO Max, have made their presence mandatory. 

Amanda: The profession has basically skyrocketed, it's basically commonplace on most sets at this point because most  people are like, why did we not think of this sooner? [laugher]

Maytal: Thanks to Amanda, and other pioneers of the field, intimacy coordination is contributing to transforming Hollywood into a safer, more sex-positive, and more trauma-informed climate. Its an example for us all, of how healing can be groundbreaking, and mend an entire system.

My interview with Amanda today takes many different paths. She talks about accountability, perfectionism, and how getting this field off the ground wasn’t always easy. 

So without any further adieu, let’s dive in. 

[Music Interlude]

Maytal: How do you feel like the landscape of film and TV has shifted as a result of people like you coming on to set? Like how have things shifted maybe for the betterment of actors the relationship between actors and producers, stuff like that?

Amanda: I think that people are a lot more cognizant now of how the power that they hold impacts others, particularly positional power that producers and directors have just by virtue of having a certain job title. And I think that's a really big improvement, um, in the industry, but at the same time, you know, not, not everyone's gotten on the bandwagon and there's still some people who are like, “But I'm the most, I'm the most relatable, like nicest director, producer, whatever, fill in the blank out there. There's no way that someone would feel intimidated by me and wouldn't feel safe speaking up.” And so there's still a bit of a disconnect that's there, but I think a lot more people are more cognizant of the power dynamic issues that have plagued the film industry since the beginning of, of the entertainment industry. And I think that just having an intimacy coordinator helps to open up a lot of conversations around those sorts of things and also safety on set and consent and making sure that performers are fully informed about what's being expected of them and that they have the ability to say no. And they have someone on set that they can say no to who's more than happy to hear them say no, and then go and advocate for them if the performer doesn't feel comfortable having that conversation.

Maytal: What’s kind of an example of a time this happened where you were either engaging in the mediation role or you were informing the performers about what they were doing around consent? I feel like I learned the best from examples or stories of what your work looks like.

Amanda: Sure. Yeah. So, sometimes we have situations and I have to kind of obviously like de-identify everything. Um, but we have, you know, we'll have situations where a director will say, “Oh, it's really important to me that the performer do frontal above the waist nudity, including nipples,” or something like that. And in layman's speak, that's just, you know, topless, nudity and a performer may say, “I feel comfortable showing my breasts, but I don't want to show my nipples,” but they may not feel comfortable having that conversation for whatever reason with the director. So I would have that conversation with the director on behalf of the performer. And I think also just to, to kind of help clarify the process, typically the way it works is that once I read a script, I do a breakdown and then I have a meeting with the director and we talk about all those scenes and the director tells me what their creative vision is for the scene. 

So like how much nudity do they want? What type of simulated sex positions do they have in mind? What's the tone of the scene? How are they going to shoot it, those kinds of things. And then I have a private conversation with each of the performers involved in the scene so that if they have any questions or concerns, we have a private place to have those conversations without there being any sort of pressure to say yes from the director or anything like that after those conversations happen, if there's something that the director is looking for, but the performer doesn't feel comfortable with and the performer doesn't want to voice that themselves. That's when I go back to the director and have that conversation for them. So, you know, that can happen in relation to all sorts of things. Sometimes performers are like, “Oh, I don't want to do that simulated sex position because it'll make this body part look bad.” Or, “I don't want to show my butt crack on camera. I don't want to show my nipples on camera. I only want to show my butt from the side. I don't want a camera directly behind my butt. I don't want my pubic hair on camera.” Like there's all sorts of stuff that performers are like, I don't want this particular thing to happen. And then as an intimacy coordinator we’re there, you know, to help advocate for the performers boundaries and make sure that none of those get crossed.

Maytal: That's amazing. Cause I imagine before you would come on set before intimacy coordinator was a thing, there would just be sort of ideas floating around in the director's head and then performers would have to put up the boundary themselves, which was probably really intimidating. And they probably just wouldn't be able to half the time.

Amanda: Oh, absolutely. And, and the other thing is that before this process, a lot of directors wouldn't even talk about the scenes with the performer until you got there on the day to shoot it, they would be like naked wearing a robe and they'd be like, okay, so this is what we're doing now. And that doesn't give you any time to think about how does this sit with me? How do I feel about this? It doesn't give you, you know, a whole lot of time to do anything. And some directors, you know, their approach would be, oh, just, just go for it. Just the two of you, figure it out between yourselves, which is not a very safe way to go about filming intimacy. I also just want to also acknowledge that there are directors who have basically been doing some of the pieces of the intimacy coordinator role for years and years and years. And they're incredibly sensitive to the situation that performers are in when they're doing hyper exposed work. And there are directors who are just incredible with performers and not every director is, is the one who's like, just go off and figure it out or surprise you're getting naked today. But you know, both of those exist in the film industry.

Maytal: That makes sense. I think just the fact that there's a set process now is a way to reduce trauma. I mean, that's what I think of trauma informed care work. It's walking in having guidelines, having open conversations, advocating, and it just sounds really trauma informed to me. That’s awesome.

Amanda: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. And I think having a process is one of the biggest improvements that comes with just intimacy coordination in general is that we try and minimize any surprises that performers are going to face on the day. And we also obviously try and mitigate any like pressuring or coercion happening or anything like that. And the nice thing about having a process is it gives people time to sit and think about, is this the right thing for me? Or is it not? 

Maytal: Yeah, that's amazing. Have you noticed, or do you think there's a shift mental health wise since intimacy coordination came on or have you noticed within your own work, like sort of shifts in mental health on sets? 

Amanda: I think what's been really interesting is that people come up to me and want to talk about their personal lives [laughter], which is, which is really interesting, I think because you know, it, maybe it makes a little bit of sense with me because of my background, because I trained as a sex and relationship coach. And so people find that out and then they're like, “Let's talk about my sex life.” I'm like, “But we’re at work. But okay, if you really want to, I don't have a problem with it.” So that sometimes happens [laughter]. But I think what's really is it gives us also the opportunity to relate to one another and talk about consent and talk about challenges that people have had. And, and sometimes it opens up into really interesting conversations. Like I was on set last week, talking with the director, we had a really interesting conversation about accountability. And what do you do when you've harmed someone and how do you come back from that and how do you repair? And so it's just really cool to like, be able to have those kinds of conversations with people who have a really big impact on how the entire production runs and you know, how they approach their work. 

Maytal: What did y'all land on? Like how do you repair once that sort of rupture has occurred? That's really interesting. 

Amanda: Well, his opening question to me was [laughter] so, so what are your thoughts on the, uh, governor Cuomo situation? And I was like, you know, I haven't been following it super closely, but I think the interesting about the situation is that, you know, his position is denied, denied, denied. He's just like nothing ever happened. Despite the fact that there's mounting numbers of, of people coming out saying that he harassed them. And, and what we talked about is that our society does not incentivize people to be honest, which is a really big problem when it comes to accountability, no one wants to be held accountable because there is no process for accountability because right now either you have the facade of being a perfect human being and you do everything perfectly and there's no problems, but if you make a mistake and if you make a really big mistake, like sexually harassing someone, there is no path to coming back from that as a public figure. 

It's the same thing in like, I see it in sex, positive communities as well. Like let's say that someone's boundaries are violated at a sex party or a king party or whatever type of, you know, a community event. There is no recourse in terms of coming back from that kind of incident. And oftentimes those people are ostracized from the community because everyone's like, well, they're obviously a bad person cause they violated someone's consent. And it's like, we all violate consent. Like at some point you cannot live your life as a human being without violating someone's consent and your consent will also be violated. And that's part of being human. And instead of just saying, oh, you're out, we have to come up with processes for how, how do we give the person the opportunity to learn and to make amends. If, if the person who has been harmed is, is open to that and how do we give them the opportunity to come back from that? 

So for example, with Governor Cuomo, as unless they're like a video or audio gets leaked, that is hard evidence of what happened as long as it's just, uh, you know, he said, she said situation, there is no incentive for him to own up to anything he may have done. And that's because we live in cancel culture. So it's, you know, I think that us,as a society continuing to live that way, doesn't it, it doesn't actually do a whole lot for us. And it's just the complete wrong incentives in terms of us moving towards a more inclusive open and, and compassionate and empathetic society. 

Maytal: I think that is so brilliantly sad, especially the idea that because there's no room for reforming, then there's no room for owning up to mistakes and changing, and then people are inevitably going to lie. And it just makes me wonder, like how do we change as a culture? How do we shift away from this paradigm of shame and punishment towards one of honesty and accountability? 

Amanda: Well, there's a whole mentality shift that has to happen even like, so we're talking about a macro level of change, right? We're talking about a societal level, but part of the problem we're in right now is that we don't even have these skills on a micro level, um, like human to human, just like within our own relationship, I feel like there's so many family relationships and friend relationships and things like that, and over, you know, sometimes ridiculous things, because people don't have the ability to repair. They don't have the ability to admit that they did something wrong and hold space and listen to the person that's been harmed and empathize with where they're coming from. And I think a lot of that is just skills. It's building skills around being able to empathize. And we also live in a society where you're not supposed to admit that you've ever really done something wrong, so there's a whole cultural shift that has to happen around that. But going back to what I was just saying, no one's taught those skills. And part of those skills is also doing your own inner work to work on your own wounding from childhood, your own inner child stuff. Like all that kind of stuff has to happen so that you can be present with another person in their pain. And we don't talk about that. And that's not something that we do as a society. So I think that the movement for restorative justice and stuff like that is really great. And that's like a macro level change that we're seeing now, that is kind of, I think, an example of how we as a society can move more towards culture of accountability rather than cancel culture. But I think it's, you know, it's going to take awhile. 

Maytal: Definitely. It's, it's interesting because I'm a therapist and inevitably I make mistakes when I'm working with clients. I mean, I'm human. That's just what happens. But what I'm trained to do is to directly address it, like talk about it with my client and heal from it. We call it rupture and repair. And it just makes me think like, what if this was the norm for all of our micro encounters? What if anytime mistakes were made the go-to was just talking about it and admitting to the mistake and using that mistake as a mechanism of strengthening a relationship or growing. It just, yeah, I really agree with what you're saying that if we could all do this on a micro level, it would then totally ripple out into the macro. 

Amanda: Yeah. And I think it does translate. And I think it's one of those things where it's kind of like, uh, something that has to happen from like a bottom up approach, where it starts in communities and then kind of trickles out to the rest of society. And there are communities that are having these conversations. And I think the sex positive community has done a really good job with setting up frameworks and stuff with like accountability, pods and things where, you know, you, you create a group of people who hold you accountable for taking the steps that you need to take in order to carry out the healing process with the person that's been harmed and things like that. And those kinds of processes come out of necessity because you know, when you have spaces where people are engaging in sex acts and things like that, someone inevitably is going to feel like their boundaries or their consent has been violated. And in order to continue to have those communities be vibrant and have the level of trust that you need to have, there has to be accountability. 

Maytal: I think that’s what's so revolutionary about creating an intimacy coordinator position - is it inherently acknowledges that these things will occur because they are human and because they are inevitable. And so let's have someone around who can help with us and let's have someone around who is aware of this. 

Amanda: Yeah. And what's also interesting though about the job is a lot of studios see it as being kind of like a form of insurance. So they see it as, oh, we have an intimacy coordinator, so everything's just going to go, right, right. Like there's going to be no issues because they're doing all the steps in the process. But the thing is, is like, we're all human. Even if you do your job and you do it well, there are going to be mistakes at some point. Cause there's, there's things that you just can't account for. And there's human differences that you just can't account for. I've had conversations with people recently about how I feel like people in this profession are held to such a high bar of perfection that it's just not reasonable, but when it comes to preventing harm, that's what people want. And it's understandable. But at the same time, you're not going to be perfect all the time. And we don't expect this of any other profession. So why should it be expected of ours? 

Maytal: How do you deal with being put in such a precarious position like that? Like how do you manage that? 

Amanda: Oh, it's awful [laughter]. I think, uh, I think a lot of it comes down to making sure that you have the proper support systems in place and in order to process that kind of pressure. And so that means for some folks, peer supervision and support groups and things like that. And, and we're a very small and tight knit community and we all talk to one another and I think that's an incredibly important piece of it. And also, you know, doing your own inner work of understanding that you're not going to be perfect because you're human being and, and just taking a lot of time for self care and self empathy. What sucks though, is that like, sometimes, like if you make one mistake, you'll get fired for it. I also don't think that's very fair. And I see that all the time with people they're like, “Oh, the intimacy coordinator made one mistake. They clearly are just completely don't know what they're doing, let's fire them.” And it's like, that's actually not true, but it's, it's just interesting. It's like we're held to a completely different bar because of the type of profession that it is. 

Maytal: Yeah. I mean, it's kind of reminding me that notion that you make one mistake and you're out, which ties back to what we were talking about earlier that in this society right now, you can't be a flawed person who makes mistakes. You just have to be perfect or you need to lie about being perfect. 

Amanda: Yep, exactly. Yeah. It's, you know, it's a reflection of society. 

Maytal: I think, uh, now's a good time for a break. So we'll take a quick one and we'll be back soon. 

[Music Interlude]

Maytal: So from my understanding, you're kind of like a pioneer in this field. I mean, you were one of the first intimacy coordinators, which I think is so incredible because I'm guessing you probably had to figure out so much on your own. And I think what's even cooler is that now you're teaching people how to do this work. So I'm just curious, like how has that process been sort of taking everything you've learned and teaching it to folks and creating this larger community of intimacy coordinators?

Amanda: I started doing this work in 2018 and at the time I was the only intimacy coordinator in Los Angeles. And I was the only person there for a while. It was in early 2019, is when I was like, okay, we need more people because I'm getting more calls for this work than I can possibly take. I had people at that point already reaching out to me who were interested in training and there were three people that I decided to train and give it a go and see how it went. So I started training folks in early 2019. The first group was really just like figuring it out because when I had started working, we were still working on like, what are the protocols like to do this job? And so by the time I started training people -, like I would never recommend anyone start training other people with the amount of experience that I had when I started training people.  But I think that the landscape was very different than because I was literally one of three or four people in the world who were doing the work at the time. And now it's, it's a very different landscape and there's many, many people out there and we know a whole lot more than we did back then. We were still figuring it out.

I started training people and I basically had to just develop my own curriculum and reading list and exercises. And it was a lot of trial and error and figuring out what worked and what didn't work. And then by the end of summer of 2019, I started a second group with a couple of folks in Los Angeles. That group was much more formalized and I had a lot more curriculum and stuff figured out. And then I did a third group in 2020 during the pandemic.And I'm now on my fourth group. And so at this point - and I've also had some different studios hire me to do like customized private one-on-one trainings to train intimacy coordinators in locations that need them, like Japan and France and Hawaii. But, um, unfortunately did not get to go to those location, but because of the pandemic [laughter], but it's been fun. It's been fun getting to train people all over the world. And, and my, my 2020 group was, uh, incredibly geographically diverse. We had people from seven different countries in that group. It's just been, it's been really amazing getting to, to spread this work internationally. And I think including my current group, my 2021 group were at like 49 people, something like that. So, yeah. 

Maytal: Wow. I think what I'm, so awe of  is that you were figuring this out at the beginning of this profession. So just, what as that like, like, I mean, holding onto just so much ambiguity, so much unknown, so much - no structure. Like you had to be making that structure, like, how did you do that? How was that for you?

Amanda: Well, I would go to work every day and tell myself, no one knows if I'm doing anything wrong because no one knows what's happening. So that's how I got away with it at the beginning, because like literally no one knows what's going on. So, and we're just like, flying by the seam of our pants making it up. It's one of those things where I look back on my first couple of projects and it's a little cringey because there are things that I did then that I absolutely would not do now because I realized that there are better ways to do those things. And, you know, we, we develop better practices and stuff like that. So I, I feel bad for the performers who had to go through all the trial and error process of figuring this out with me. And I feel pretty good about the process that we have at this point. 

It's kind of funny because like, looking back, I didn't actually feel like that much pressure at the time, because it was such an unknown profession everywhere I'd go. People were like, “What the fuck is that?” They'd be like, “I don't know what this is” [laughter]. But like, I literally had an experience early on where I was doing a job in Montreal and I was going through Canadian customs and, um, they, they were like, uh, and I had to get, you know, like a work permit and stuff. And they were like, why are you here? And I said, oh, I'm an intimacy coordinator for film and TV. And I kid you not, the person literally looked at me and said, “That's not a job.” And I was like, “Yeah it is.” So, you know, for a long time, people were like, I don't know what that is. Does that, is that actually a thing or are you just making it up and does that actually exist? And it's one of those things that I was like, I'm just not going to let that get to me. I was like, whatever. So the other thing is I think being, being naive works to your advantage [laughter]. So at the time there is a lot of, uh, naiveness playing into me, just kind of not thinking about everything that was happening and looking back, I'm like, oh, we actually did a lot. 

Maytal: I also think there's probably a lot of like intelligence and strength on your end that you could pull through and figure all these things out. And what you said about looking back and things being cringy, I just think that's the ultimate sign of growth. Like if we looked back and didn't cringe it ourselves and what we were doing five years ago, then have we grown at all?

Amanda: Right. And, and I think I also - compared to some other people in the field - I had a bit of an advantage over others because I come from a family of filmmakers and both my parents worked in the industry. And so they were an indispensable resource for me as we were developing this profession. So without that, I don't think I would have been able to do what I did. 

Maytal: Yeah. That totally makes sense. How do you feel like the field is going to evolve or, or let's, let's start with you, how do you think your role is going to evolve? Like what do you imagine yourself doing and like 15 to 20 years? 

Amanda: Well, in 15 to 20 years, I hope to be living in a Chateau in rural France [laughter]. But other than that, uh, I hope to be living in Chateau, in rural France with my five children. Um, but right now, one of the things that I'm working on is developing online educational tools that are accessible for actors all over the world so that they can learn the skills that they need in order to do intimacy work safely, even if they don't have access an intimacy coordinator, because there's so much that performers don't know about their rights, even in countries that have unions like the U.S. and Canada, that we have amazing unions for performers here that have so many protections, but a lot of performances don't even know what those are. A lot of performers also, aren't taught how to do intimacy work. Like that's not something you learned in drama school. So right now I'm working on creating some courses and resources for performers through my company because intimacy coordination is expanding. But the unfortunate fact of the matter is that in some countries consent and boundaries and, and agency are not values that are prioritized. And it's going to take a really long time before intimacy coordination is common on sets in some places, and it's expensive for productions, you know, and also for productions in places that aren't major production hubs, that typically don't want to fly in people from other places. So I think it's really important to give performers the skills and tools that they need to advocate and protect themselves whenever intimacy coordinators aren't available. 

Maytal: Do you think there will be a point where this is an absolute requirement on all sets? 

Amanda: Yeah. I think that at least in the U.S. and probably Canada, as well, I think that we're moving in that direction. I mean, we're, we're working towards eventually unionizing with SAG-AFTRA and our hope is that that's going to happen in 2023, but, you know, there's a lot of different political forces at play and things like that that could make it not possible, but I don't think that it will become a requirement until we are union members. And I think only after that is when it could be mandated fingers crossed 2023 is the year for unionizing for us [laughter], but in order for that to happen. And also in order, in order for it to become mandated on sets, we have to have enough intimacy coordinators to go around. And so the profession is still growing and we're getting there. And, and what really sucks is that there's kind of this awkward growth phase that we're in, where right now it's completely voluntary for productions from any studio except for HBO. And because of that, they're in some markets, the number of people who have trained to become intimacy coordinators has outpaced the demand and in other markets, it hasn't kept up. And so we have this weird growth phase right now of if it was all of a sudden become mandated, we probably wouldn't have enough people, but there's too many people for the productions that it's optional for. So we really want to unionize sooner rather than later, because as I'm sure you understand with economics when supply exceeds demand prices go down. So we're trying really hard to, to keep the prices up until, for this work and not devalue it because that's the worst thing that could possibly happen. It's a profession that has a lot of emotional labor and emotional labor is not something that is often valued. 

Maytal: Definitely. I can deeply understand that being a therapist. What other mental health resources or ideas do you think would benefit TV and film sets beyond intimacy coordinators? Like what else do you think would be helpful that doesn't exist right now? 

Amanda: It's something that we're slowly starting to see more of. And I think this will be more popular in probably like five years or so, is cultural consultants who are able to do like sensitivity readings and scripts and things like that. And some of them also act as onset support for performers. So like, let's say you have a project that is depicting black performers in a storyline that has slavery or something like that. That could be incredibly triggering for someone, uh, making sure that the performers, you know, have a support system available to them to help them process and get through those kinds of storylines, I think is really important. And it's also not something that's often even recognized or, you know, like there could be a storyline with a black performer whose character has some kind of run-in with the police or something like that. Like that could be a really triggering storyline for a performer, uh, same thing for the performers, from indigenous communities in projects about, uh, colonization. We could go on and on with examples, right. But, but there's a lot of situations that could be incredibly triggering based on the content. So I think that productions providing mental health resources for performers who are giving their all for those kinds of stories is really important and something that's not often talked about. I think also projects that deal with violence and sexual assault. Some projects are a bit more up to speed in terms of providing mental health resources for performers and crew who were involved in that. Cause it can also be really traumatizing for crew members who are watching a performer over and over again, go through doing a scene of sexual violence. One project that actually did a really good job with this was, um, 13 reasons why, which is on Netflix. They went above and beyond in terms of making sure that there were mental health resources available for their performers and their crew, because that show, specifically, for anyone who's not familiar, dealt with sexual assault and suicide in high schoolers. 

Maytal: So did they have basically therapists on set that could meet with anyone and kind of process it and is that what a cultural consultant would do partially? 

Amanda: Yeah, so I think in their case, what they did was they had a psychotherapist who met with the cast beforehand and also was consulting I think, on the project to make sure that the mental health aspect portrayal of it. Cause I think there were, there were healthcare professionals who were portrayed in the storyline, making sure that it was accurate given what they were trying to portray. One of the things that film and television is really guilty for is getting things wrong. But especially when you have writers who don't have lived experience in a particular area and they're like, oh, I think this is how this conversation would go. And then people from that community are like, “What are you talking about? That is not how that happens” [laughter]. Um, and so, yeah, I just think it's, you know, it's really important that, that that kind of consulting work happens. And also there's a particularly violent scene in that project where - spoiler alert - there's a, there's a male performer whose character is Annalee raped by a broom by a group of boys in a bathroom, which is, and it's an incredibly upsetting scene to watch it's very graphic. And so in that situation, I think this, that was also the project that had on the day that they were shooting those scenes, they brought in puppies as like support animals for the cast and crew. 

Maytal: That’s awesome. That's amazing. So if people want to learn more about what you're doing, about you, about this like amazing online course you're doing, or like are interested in becoming an intimacy coordinator and training with you, where do they go to learn more about you and the work that you do? 

Amanda: I have a company called intimacy professionals association. We refer to it as IPA. Um, and we have a website, has lots of information on it. And, um, the website is https://www.intimacycoordinator.com/ . 

Maytal: Thank you so much for making the time to talk.

Amanda: Thank you!