House Of The Dragon Star Olivia Cooke Speaks Out On Sex Scene Mistreatment

House of the Dragon star Olivia Cooke has spoken out about female actors being called “a b—-h” and “difficult” for advocating for themselves while filming intimate scenes. House of the Dragon is a prequel series to Game of Thrones, an HBO series that notoriously featured many sex scenes.

An extremely accomplished actor, joining House of the Dragon’s cast isn’t Cooke’s only claim to fame. Cooke has also starred in shows like Bates Motel and Slow Horses on top of headlining movies like Ouija, Ready Player One, and Sound of Metal. As a Hollywood veteran and the star of a show that is a critical hit, Cooke has worked on many film and television sets.

Cooke spoke to The i Paper to promote her movie, The Girlfriend. During that discussion, the celebrated actor spoke about how women have been treated after filming sex scenes. She explained to the outlet that women can be mistreated for having boundaries when they film sex scenes.

Cooke also stated that filming sex scenes can put women in “really precarious and vulnerable situations”. Still, she argued that filming those scenes is an integral part of telling stories. Cooke then underlined the importance of women not feeling like “a chunk of yourself has been taken” after filming those scenes.

Those who are just starting out and don’t have the vocabulary to say what they’re not comfortable with. And for women, who’ll often get labelled ‘difficult’ or ‘a b—-h’ for speaking up

While Cooke is clearly bothered by how women can still be treated in the entertainment industry, she also brought up one major improvement. The House of the Dragon actor praised the adoption of productions employing intimacy coordinators. In fact, she expressed exasperation that sex scenes ever had to be filmed without professionals like that to advocate for actors.

“It’s amazing to me that people had to just fudge their way through those scenes before those people existed.”

What This Means For The Entertainment Industry

Even though Cooke is an accomplished actor, her film and television career only began in the early-2010s. That means that she has only experienced what it is like in the entertainment industry over the last 15 years. The fact that Cooke is still speaking out about women being mistreated while filming sex scenes shows that the issue remains prevalent and more changes need to be made.

Cooke’s breakout role came on playing Emma Decody on Bates Motel for five seasons.

There is still a small silver lining to the comments that Cooke made. The fact that she praised the work of intimacy coordinators shows that they are serving their proposed purpose. Still, the actor’s comments also make it clear that hiring intimacy coordinators wasn’t a perfect fix.

Olivia Cooke looking to the side on the red carpet

Cooke discussed the backlash that women can receive based on how they handle filming sex scenes. With her comments in mind, it sadly seems very likely that the actor could also be labeled in many of the same ways for speaking out on the issue.

There is no doubt that Cooke would have recognized that she could face consequences for being outspoken. Despite that, the actor cared enough about speaking out for other women that she did so anyway. Olivia Cooke deserves to be praised for that act of courage, even though it is sad that there was any need for her to speak out.