Michelle Williams Shares About Intimate ‘Dying For Sex’ Scenes
Power play. Online porn. Premature ejaculation. Hallucinatory flying penises. There’s something for nearly every proclivity in the new FX series Dying for Sex, which stars Michelle Williams as a woman exploring her sexuality after receiving a terminal cancer diagnosis.
The eight-episode limited series is based on the real-life story of Molly Kochan, who along with friend Nikki Boyer (played by Jenny Slate in the series), created the podcast Dying for Sex to chronicle Molly’s journey leaving her husband of 15 years (played by Jay Duplass) to re-discover herself and what excites her. The podcast, which debuted in 2020 following Molly’s death, was pivotal in convincing Michelle to take on the role.
“I was so moved by the podcast—it just absolutely hooked my heart, and I couldn’t ignore it. I was a puddle on the floor,” Michelle tells Women’s Health. “I couldn’t really articulate why it had moved me so deeply. I listened to it again; a puddle on the floor again. There was a connection there that I needed to honor.”
Sex may be a central theme of the show, but Dying for Sex is a far cry from the typical rom-com fare of woman seeking man—and that’s something that Michelle, who is also an executive producer, found so appealing about the script.
“It’s talking about the passionate, dimensional love that exists in a best friendship, which I hadn’t really seen foregrounded before,” Michelle says. “It’s always kind of in the service of one of them getting the guy. So I was excited to see something that I’ve had experience with in my personal life, in my relationship with my own best friend, be the central love story.”
In addition to the podcast, Molly’s posthumously published memoir Screw Cancer: Becoming Whole was a powerful research tool for Michelle as she prepared to portray its author.
“The book goes very deeply into her childhood, into her past,” Michelle says. “That was a very valuable guide for me. She talks about her bodily experience with her cancer and her bodily experience with her sexual desire, in equal parts, and how both of them surprise her.”
Portraying Molly’s sexual desires, and the many ways they manifested, required a three-way partnership with Michelle, her scene partner, and the production’s intimacy coordinator—an individual whose job is to make sure that scenes involving nudity or sex are done in an ethical, respectful, and consensual manner. Michelle likens the experience to “welcoming another person into the dance.”
“When you have an intimacy coordinator, she has private conversations with everyone who’s participating in this intimate scene,” Michelle explains. “I don’t know what the conversation is that she’s having with the other actors. I don’t know what’s brought them here today. I don’t know what their journey is. I don’t know what their pain is. I don’t know what their comfort level is, but this intimacy coordinator does, and so she’s putting these protections in place.”
Ultimately, the intimacy coordinator helps actors feel comfortable in a situation where they otherwise might not—and helps them advocate for themselves too.
“I know that the people that I’m working with are safe, and that whatever journey has brought them here today, they are in an environment that respects them and honors their process,” Michelle says. “And that’s really what I find the most useful in an intimacy coordinator, is that they are keeping people safe inside of a scene.”
Even when that scene involves disembodied flying penises.
All eight episodes of Dying for Sex are available on Hulu on Friday, April 4.
Amy Wilkinson is a contributing entertainment editor at Women’s Health, where she edits the magazine’s celebrity cover stories and writes health features. She has previously held editor titles at Entertainment Weekly and MTV News. In 2021, Amy completed her 600-hour teacher-training at Core Pilates NYC to become a comprehensively trained Pilates instructor.
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