Amanda Seyfried’s views on sex scenes onscreen have evolved in recent years, to the point where she even turned down a TV project for requiring too much intimacy and “being naked with a stranger.”
The revelation came in a sit-down panel between the “The Housemaid” star and Alec Baldwin at the Hamptons International Film Festival earlier this month. She didn’t share additional details of the project she turned down, but added that it “doesn’t matter” who the scene would be with — she doesn’t want to do onscreen sex scenes at this stage of her career.
“I passed on a show where I would have to have sex all the time because of the sex,” she said. “Doesn’t matter [who it’s with] … I don’t wanna do it. I’m uncomfortable with it. I’m not into it right now.”
But just as her stance on sex scenes have changed over the years — she’s done quite revealing work previously in “Chloe” (2009), “Lovelace” (2013) and last year’s “The Testament of Ann Lee” (2025), among others — she kept the door open to revisit onscreen intimacy in future projects.
“Maybe if [the project] came along again [at a later point], maybe I’d be in a different space,” she admitted. “But I don’t wanna deal with being naked with a stranger.”
Seyfried, who’s 40, further explained that acting “gets weirder” as she has gotten older and had to fake intimate relationships with her co-stars — often essential strangers.
“We have to be romantic with people that we’re not romantic with. Sometimes it’s great. Sometimes it’s really uncomfortable,” she said. “But I can’t believe back in the day I was just like, ‘We gotta make out. Great! This is awesome. I know how to make out.’ And it used to be so fun. It was a non-thing. It was like, ‘I get to make out with a hot person today … And they’re paying me.’”
The actress in part credited being a mother to a 9- and 7-year-old to her newfound ability to set boundaries with what she agrees to do for a role.
“I have kids now who are paying attention to what I do, and so I have to be less of a pushover,” she told Baldwin. “The other day — this is so silly — but Nina, my daughter, and I were walking across the street [in Manhattan] … and a person on our side of the street asked for a picture, and I looked at my daughter, and I said, ‘No, I’m sorry.’ And then we walked across the street and I was like, ‘How was that for you, Nina? Was that OK?’ She’s like, ‘I’m very proud of you, mama,’ And then we go to the coffee shop, and the coffee shop barista was like, ‘Can I have a picture?’ And I was like, ‘No, I’ll come back later.’ My daughter’s like, ‘I’m so proud of you for saying no.’ And I was, ‘What the f–k? She shouldn’t be saying this to me. I should be saying no.’”
People first reported on the Oct. 4 Hamptons International Film Festival panel.
