EXCLUSIVE Sleazy truth about what REALLY happens in TV sex scenes: I had to do degrading kisses, talk dirty in front of TV execs and meet my 'rapist' for the first time on set while starring in everything from Byker Grove to Casualty By Holly Matthews Published: 12:18 EDT, 18 June 2024 | Updated: 12:25 EDT, 18 June 2024 e-mail 7 View comments My third audition for a film role as a young shop girl. There are ten people in the room, only one is a woman. At this stage in the process the bigwigs who approve the budget get their say-so too.
The scene I am reading contains a certain amount of sexual tension, but still I feel a jolt of shock when the casting director tells me to put down the script and instead improvise a monologue. He wants me to 'talk dirty' – in front of everyone. I flush bright red.
But I do it. Not because I want to, but because I feel as though I have to. Then he asks me to do it again, and again, to ad lib sexual banter in a room full of strangers.
I am 22 years old. I do not get the part. No matter how it appears on screen, the mechanics of kissing for the camera is never sexy, says Holly Matthews In Waterloo Road, Holly had to perform a drunken striptease, then lift up another girl's shirt A young Holly with co-stars Ant McPartlin and Declan Donnelly in children's show Byker Grove That was two decades ago, and some people might think it crossed a line, even edged close to abuse.
It's why the latest debate in Hollywood about the mistreatment of actors i.