Towards a Marxist Porno: Make Me a Pizza’s Talia Shea Levin and Kara Grace Miller Talk Intimacy Coordination

It’s almost shocking that intimacy coordination as a discipline and as a distinct role on film sets was a somewhat rare occurrence prior to 2017. That there was no regulatory framework for protecting actors from violations or providing them a space to express their hesitations. In the wake of the MeToo movement it was quickly adopted as standard practice and is now a matter of legal compliance—an intimacy coordinator must be there as a buffer for the actors, the official the advocate and liaison on set for all matters relating to intimate scene work. It is often quite the intimate role itself—fulfilling a kind of therapist’s role for the actors, oftentimes on call outside of set hours. And it is now often the intimacy coordinator, not solely the director, who oversees the blocking of an intimate scene.

The short film Make Me a Pizza, which was featured in this year’s SXSW Midnight Shorts, is on its surface very silly. A nod to ‘80s and ‘90s porn, it’s shot on video, with gloriously campy music and costumes, and plays on a well-known trope of the bored housewife and the pizza delivery man. The foreplay and the climactic sex scene are, to put it mildly, over the top. They’re the type of scenes that just look like a fun romp for the actors and crew—you can almost hear the laughter on set. But director Talia Shea Levin and producer Kara Grace Miller approached the preparation and filming of these comedic scenes seriously and methodically. I sat down with Levin and Miller to discuss the importance of intimacy coordination to the project, their set protocol philosophies, and the deeper themes hiding under the film’s absurd veneer. 

The following interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Hyperreal Film Club (HFC): : How did you approach directing a film with sex scenes? Did you have any prior experience with intimacy coordination?

Talia Shea Levin (TSL): I took intimacy coordination classes to get ready. I realized that if I want to do this, I have to study this new discipline and be able to talk about it and understand the language used, the same way that if I were to do a big action movie, I would meet with stunt coordinators and take a stunt class. You have to know how it works. You have to be that kind of dilettante as a director.

Kara Grace Miller (KGM): And setting all that up, for us, was less fear-based. We wanted to set it up in an intentional way from the start, so that we’d be able to just focus on the joy and the fun of collaboration once we got to shooting. We wanted to shake away the fear of sex scenes. Because it's not a fun place to work from. 

TSL: We went to a panel on the future of sex scenes here at SXSW. I arrived kind of ready to be up in arms, but I was really pleasantly surprised that the women on the panel—it was also refreshing that they were all women—were expressing a lot of the same thoughts I have. It was a really nice change in voice, because a lot of those things can be very fear-based. Sometimes you feel like people on these [similar] panels almost hate sex and sex in movies, but the mood for this was, “How do we do more of it and do it in a way that is constructive and artistically valid?” And they were all referencing the same movies I love. I love erotic thrillers, and those have mostly been made by men and there are problematic aspects to them but it was approached from the perspective that while maybe different people should be making these films, that doesn't mean there’s nothing to take away or that the genre needs to die.

KGM: It doesn’t mean we have to make Puritan content for the rest of our lives. 

TSL: There’s this idea that Gen Z doesn’t like sex, but that’s reductive. They don't like the tropes, they don't like heteronormative content, so show them new things. The conversation was really good. Our intimacy coordinator was there and she had been trained by the woman who was the intimacy coordinator on the panel, who started the SAG-recognized branch of intimacy coordinators, and she actually came to our screening. We’ve gotten surprising recognition from intimacy coordinators. 

HFC: Can you speak specifically to the approach of your intimacy coordinator with you and your actor in preparation and on set? Did you have insight into that process or was it more private with the actors?

TSL: There was definitely an element that was private with the actors. She was their main liaison. It's like that confidence that makeup artists have with actors. That's their safe haven. 
I've made a lot of dance films, and this film has such a heavy movement element, so when we were interviewing intimacy coordinators, a big part of that process was finding someone who spoke the movement language as well. Because a lot of the intimacy coordinator role is legal in nature, a lot of it involves talking about boundaries. And that is extremely important, but we also needed someone who was also going to help with the choreography, like a stunt coordinator would do, as well as monitor the physical safety of the actors, because we’re working with all this goop and people can slip and things like that. 
I had a pretty specific idea of what needed to happen in the sex scene, storytelling-wise, but we had a lot of rehearsals with the actors. I would set up what I wanted to happen and kind of talk everyone through it, and then the intimacy coordinator would come in and be like, “You put your leg here, there is a yoga ball here. You make the movement like this.” Very precise, so that they know what function that moment is serving for the story, but they also know the choreography. And once you have the choreography, then you can play. But you have that structure, which I think is great, because I've been on set for sex scenes that are kind of just like, “And now you just go at it." No one should have to be thinking about what they're supposed to be doing in that moment.
So we got that choreography dialed in, and we already had all the shots we wanted at that point, so it was very technical. And for me it was so technical that it wasn't really until the edit that I was like, “Oh my god, we made a sex movie and it’s kind of hot.”
HFC: It’s so important for there to be choreography and structure because on those sets where it’s just like, “And then they have sex,” that’s where there’s room for people to be uncomfortable, or have another actor unknowingly cross a line. If it’s choreography, then you are just doing a dance. 
TSL: Dance also allows for so much of that performance, too. I’ve seen dances that are hotter than a sex scene. And plenty of those dances are between people who aren't even attracted to the same gender as the person they’re dancing with. It’s also performance and that gives space for the movement to guide the performance rather than having to just perform “sex.”
But then there is an element of this film that is about performative sexualities. So that allowed for some freedom because we were leaning into a porn trope. And that was always something delicate, because we had to determine: When are they really emotionally connecting? Are they performing as these archetypal versions of themselves and projecting on each other and not really having any connection? From a story element that was fun to play with. 
There's a lot of heady stuff about the way we constructed it, and all the stuff behind creating the world of the film that is not apparent on its surface, and if people get it great, but if not, they're just like, “Cool, a sexy pizza movie,” that’s also okay. 
I don't do anything half-assed, so this was not just a comedy sketch for me. It was important to me to provide justification for everything I was doing. I sent people screenshots of philosophy quotes so that they could have background and I don’t know if it was useful, but I wanted all of my collaborators to know what I’ve read that informs what I’m doing.
KGM: We sent Marxist theory to the poster designer. I don't know how much that informed what he did, but we felt like, “You need to know, this is where this started.”
In terms of the performances in the sex scene, even though it's all up to perception, even though they look like a heteronormative pair having heteronormative sex, it was created by a team whose sexual orientations and gender identities are not necessarily prioritized in media. And so even when you have this heteronormative presenting pair on screen, there is still something we hope that shows that it is not approached in the same way. 
And we have gotten good feedback that [the sex scene] feels a little more equal and that it feels queer-coded. I think that comes from having an entire team behind the film whose perspectives on sex and gender performance have not been the prioritized version. It was a chance for all of us to make a sex scene that felt how we wanted one to feel. And Talia was coming from a not totally unserious place of wanting to make a porn. 
TSL: Oh, yeah, a genuine aspect to the motivation for this was that I was feeling very disillusioned with the industry, and I was like, “I should just make a feminist porn.” And then I talked to Woody Coyote, my lead actor, and he was open and he became my co-writer.
But then I had to go deeper and examine why I wanted to do it and what more there might be to the idea. I love action movies. I love sci-fi. I love crazy thrillers and I love the erotic thriller. And I think that we're so used to action and violence as metaphor and as a way of getting closer to characters. But sex is either this exalted, glowing, perfect thing that happens in a movie, or it's very trauma-based. And I think that there is so much more to play with when it comes to representing sex on screen. Most of us can relate a lot more to sex on screen than we can to murder on screen. 
HFC: Sex is often dealt with so callously as a plot device. It’s the ultimate goal or it’s the tragic backstory. It is the thing that makes her wounded—almost always “her.”

I'm interested to know what literature you sent to your crew.
TSL: So it did start as a Marxist porno, but it quickly got deeper than that. Marxism can be a punchline in a lot of left-leaning stuff. It can be reduced very quickly. We were working with the idea of people becoming commodities. That was the central theme—would they be able to relate to each other better as a commodity? Instead of trying to be people, what if they were just pizza? Maybe they could understand each other better as pizza. I don't know who you are, really, but I know that we both know what a pizza is.
But that took us pretty quickly to Lacanian ideology, which is much more about humans relating to each other or their inability to relate to each other. And ideas of desire, and that desire is actually never just between two people. There's like a capital O other that is always present in your interaction with another person. Because your desire is the desire of the Other. Whether it's the idea of the mother or the father or something else, you’re projecting something onto the other person from your own experience and not really relating to them as themselves. And so we thought, “Oh, well the Other here is pizza as a cultural signifier and as a commodity.” And it’s all filtered through an absurdist lens, because the idea is absurd. 
KGM: We also realized it made sense to filter some of this existing imagery through a Marxist lens. Pizza advertising on TV has always been very sexualized. The ‘70s Pizza Hut commercials are so sexual. So the commodification of sex and pizza is right there for us to explore. I think the combination and the dissonance of those two things, the right potential crew members saw how they married.
HFC: I feel like a project like this probably attracts people who are very down to do it.
TSL: I don't think I want to work any other way again, except for with people who are enthusiastically on board. 
The stuff that I learned about the philosophy of intimacy coordination was very akin to what I know from theater. It's not new. And [with theater] it is really about community because you’re developing it and working on it together for so long. It becomes very intimate. We applied that model of consent and boundaries to this short. Anything other than an enthusiastic “yes” is a “no”. And that applied to everything from, “Will you work on this project?” to “What are your dietary restrictions?” You have to be all in. And it creates this excitement and this dedication that is just very real. 
I want everyone to feel supported in saying, “Hey, I think this should actually be this way,” or "Hey, I tried to do this, but I couldn't do it. I'm going to do it this way instead,” or “I've been on set for five hours, I haven't gone to the bathroom, can I go to the bathroom before we shoot?” It’s crazy to think the answer to that ever wouldn’t be yes, but I've been on so many sets where you feel uncomfortable speaking up for your needs.
KGM: We sent out community agreements to the entire cast and crew with the call sheet. Sort of a conduct contract that said, “If you love me, you have to tell me. If you’re mad at me, you have to tell me. State your needs. We are all working towards the same goal. Always assume best intentions.” When you come in on a project like this, there is a vulnerability that has to happen just as a baseline for what you're shooting. And so I think It was important to establish not only that we had acknowledged how vulnerable the situation was, but we were proactive about it.
And people brought up the agreement all the time. They were like, “I’m stating my needs!” And we were like, “Yes, absolutely, state your needs!”
I feel like it gave everyone permission to feel comfortable in conflict, because there's an inherent conflict that happens while making art. But it does not have to be a negative thing.
TSL: Conflict is good, conflict is okay. 
KGM: And when you bring up two opposing sides, you usually find the correct way forward somewhere in the middle. And I feel like giving everybody that language was one of the most important things I've learned.
TSL: The big thing that they talk about in intimacy coordination is that comfort is not the goal. You're not supposed to be comfortable making art. You’re supposed to be challenging yourself. You do have to feel safe, physically and mentally, and you do have to be able to state your needs and feel supported. You do deserve to be heard. But you don't need to be comfortable. And that's okay. And you can be safe within your discomfort.
We talk a lot about the notion of shame. Because shame always comes up when you’re dealing with sex. And sometimes the reaction to that is to suppress that shame or to just react with fear. And it's like, no, encounter the shame. It's okay, be embarrassed, blush a little bit, acknowledge it, and then move past it. As long as none of it is crossing a real boundary.
KGM: Of course we’ll encounter shame and shyness as we do this. That's how we've all been taught to feel about sexual content. How glorious that I get to feel that shame and be like, “Oh, I'm actually okay feeling the shame.” To make something that is a response to that shame. I definitely had to shed my former Evangelical shame, and I did by the time we got on set.
TSL: A lot of people were concerned with whether or how to talk to their parents about this project. We thought about making a poster that had review quotes from all of our parents. Woody’s mom said, “Wow, so original.” And my dad’s was, “I’m glad she wasn’t in it.”
But we never wanted this to go down easy. Films like this kind of naturally filter out their audience. I really respect the auteurs who do that: John Waters, Paul Verhoeven, Cronenberg, Lynch. But it’s all deeply considered and specific. We’re catching the big fish together.
KGM: To quote David Lynch’s meditation guide. Shoutout David Lynch.

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