“How do you have sex onstage?” That’s the central question of “Good Sex,” an unconventional play that spotlights intimacy coordinators. Here’s the unorthodox part: The show pairs together two unacquainted actors who have never rehearsed — or read — the material before performing live for the first time.
“Good Sex” features a new couple each night of the four-performance engagement, which runs from Nov. 5 through Nov. 8 at Brooklyn’s Powerhouse Arts. John Cameron Mitchell (“Hedwig and the Angry Inch”) and Elliot Page (“Juno,” “The Umbrella Academy”) are the first announced pair for the limited run on Nov. 6; Morgan Spector (“The Gilded Age”) and Constance Wu (“Crazy Rich Asians”) on Nov. 7; and Brandon Flynn (“13 Reasons Why”) and Chris Perfetti (“Abbott Elementary”) on Nov. 8. A yet-to-be announced pairing will lead the Nov. 5 performance.
The cast of rotating actors won’t be flying totally blind on stage, however. They will be joined by an intimacy coordinator: a growing role in Hollywood that’s designed to ensure the safety and comfort of actors during sex scenes. In attempting to answer that aforementioned question — about how to have sex on stage — “each night, two brand new performers tell a story of desire, betrayal and loneliness. They are strangers. But they are not alone — to help and guide them, they are joined on stage by an intimacy director, trained in the art of teaching people how to touch. So, you can rest assured that the sex will be safe. It will be consensual. And it will be good,” according to the official press release.
“Good Sex” hails from Irish theater company Dead Centre through a collaboration with novelist and essayist Emilie Pine. Born out of the COVID pandemic, when touching was a “transgressive act and our bodies were sites of sickness,” as a press release explains, “Good Sex” is described as a “love story for a loveless age.” It premiered in 2022 as part of Dublin Theatre Festival and was funded by the Arts Council of Ireland.
“Good Sex” is programmed as part of Powerhouse: International, a new arts festival produced by producer and Brooklyn Academy of Music’s former artistic director David Binder.
