Alicia Vikander Recalls Not Feeling 'Protected' on Set While Filming a Nude Scene: 'It's Never Easy'

"I should have been looked after," she said about feeling like she wasn't protected filming a nude scene once

Alicia Vikander
Alicia Vikander. Photo: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty

Alicia Vikander counts filming intimate scenes as one of the "worst" parts of the job.

The 33-year-old Oscar winner shared her experience with on-set nudity and sex scenes in an interview with Harper's Bazaar, saying, "The only thing that can't be improvised is an intimate scene — you have to make choreography and stick to it. It's the worst thing ever to do those scenes. I am very comfortable with my body and I've done quite a bit of nudity and sex scenes, but it's never easy."

Vikander recalled an instance when she didn't feel "protected" while filming: "Everyone was busy doing their own thing and, in the middle, you have an actor who sits there naked for a couple of hours. And someone is supposed to arrive with a robe, and they don't. It comes afterwards, [the knowledge that] that was not right. I should have been looked after."

The star added that intimacy coordinators (experts who advocate for the actors on set to make sure everyone is comfortable) "should have existed at the beginning" of her career.

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In 2019, Vikander opened up to Harper's Bazaar U.K. about her approach to sex scenes. "I probably did my first sex scene at 20 and it's always been technical, as it should be," she said at the time. "It should never be anything but technical."

She added that she implements a personal rule to ensure the cast and crew are focused on efficiency while filming.

"I tell the crew it's a one-taker," she said, "that way, everybody on set is on point because you have to get it done in one take. ... I think that's the way to do it because then everyone feels comfortable and then hopefully — although it is super strange and uncomfortable — a little magic comes through a lens and people will be convinced."

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