Ewan McGregor says he was given intimacy coordinator for sex scenes with his wife

McGregor and wife Mary Elizabeth Winstead had intimate scene choreographed by a professional

Ewan McGregor has praised having an intimacy coordinator on set for sex scenes with his wife, Mary Elizabeth Winstead.

The Scottish actor, 52, will soon star in the Paramount Plus drama A Gentleman in Moscow with Winstead, whom he married in 2022.

In the series, the characters played by the actors have an intimate moment.

Despite McGregor and Winstead’s familiarity with one another, there was still an intimacy coordinator on set to oversee the exact workings of their scene – an inclusion that the Moulin Rouge star welcomed.

“It’s still necessary, because it’s also about the crew, and it’s odd to be naked in front of people, it’s odd to be intimate in front of the camera,” McGregor told the Radio Times in a new interview.

“If you were doing a dance scene, you’d have a choreographer. It’s an important part of the work now, because it’s somebody that the director and actors meet in the middle.”

Intimacy coordinators have been an industry standard in recent years, following the uprising of the #MeToo movement in 2017. TV programmes such as Normal People (2020) were key in popularising the practice as a way of ensuring that all participating parties are comfortable during a potentially vulnerable moment.

Mary Elizabeth Winstead and Ewan McGregor (Getty Images)

McGregor went on to note his appreciation for intimacy coordinators in relation to his daughter Esther, whom he shares with his first wife, French production designer Eve Mavrakis. With Esther also an actor, McGregor sees having someone in a position of authority while shooting intimate scenes as a form of protection.

“My daughter [Esther] is 22. If an older, famous director goes to a 22-year-old and says, ‘I want you to be naked in this scene,’ that actress might feel, ‘Oh, my God, I’ve got to do it, my career might depend on it,’” he explained.

“And then five years after that, she could look back and go, ‘I wish I hadn’t. Why am I naked in that scene? It’s unnecessary.’ Now there’s somebody she talks to whose career doesn’t rest on the shoulders of this person.”

Ewan McGregor and Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Getty Images for Paramount+)

McGregor has previously shared his thoughts on filming sex scenes, and admitted as early as 2011 that he found them “awkward” to shoot.

Speaking during an appearance on The Graham Norton Show, the actor said: “I don’t like them very much. They are awkward because it is a strange and bizarre thing to be doing. It’s not a normal situation, I am 40 now, and the actresses get younger and younger.”

McGregor and Winstead met while filming the FX series Fargo in 2016, in which they played mutual love interests.

McGregor ended his relationship with his first wife Mavrakis the following year, and married Winstead in 2022. They share a son, Laurie, born in 2021.