What is Intimacy Choreography and Coordination?

You can find Theatrical Intimacy Education’s current working definitions here.

Please note that our definition has expanded to become more inclusive and not all intimacy professionals will define their work by the same scope.

What is an Intimacy Choreographer, Director, or Coordinator?

An intimacy choreographer or intimacy director (the titles are largely, if not entirely, synonymous) has historically staged stories with content of an intimate, sexual nature for theatre, dance, opera, or other styles of live performance. In addition to staging sexual content, we have expanded the narrow definition of intimacy beyond sex to include leveraging an artist’s characteristics to stage heightened race, gender, pregnancy, disability, religion, national origin, or age-related content.

An intimacy coordinator stages intimacy, but for film and television.

As with any role, there is more to it, but the important thing to know is that the roles in both theatre and film are evolving. While there is overlap between the venues, not all intimacy choreographers are intimacy coordinators and vice versa. 

Intimacy choreography and coordination does not, and cannot, exist in a vacuum. For an intimacy choreographer to be successful, a producing organization must actively support a culture of consent from season selection to casting, through production. That is not inherently the responsibility of the intimacy choreographer. As an additional responsibility, an intimacy choreographer may also be contracted to serve as a consent or policy consultant for an organization or production.

Current definition developed in collaboration with Bliss Griffin (Actors’ Equity Association), Ann James (Intimacy Coordinators of Color), and TIE Co-Founders Chelsea Pace and Laura Rikard.

Updated May 31, 2021