Ben Chaplin describes watching his own sex scenes back with a partner

Actor described intimacy scenes as a ‘weird’ thing to do

Ben Chaplin has revealed what it’s like as an actor to watch your own sex scenes back with a partner.

The star has filmed many intimate scenes, most famously in the 2017 drama Apple Tree Yard, in which he played the adulterous Mark Costley opposite Emily Watson’s Dr Yvonne Carmichael.

“I’ve had all the reactions,” he told The Times, recalling watching back the scenes with his partners over the years. “I have had, ‘You look like you’re enjoying that,’ and I’m, like, ‘Thank you.’

“It’s a weird thing to do: ‘I went to work, I got off with someone, I went home.’ But I have been doing it for so long it doesn’t even feel that weird anymore.”

Chaplin said he often wonders about how other actors feel about sex scenes, particularly those who claim to be unfazed by them. “Are they just being really professional and are they hurting quietly?” he said. “You can’t win. I always say, ‘I was doing it when I met you.’ I was getting off with other people before I met you and getting paid for it.”

Chaplin’s next role is in The Nevers as a detective named Frank Mundi who uses old-fashioned police work to solve alien crimes in Victorian London.

The Nevers begins on Sky Atlantic and Now on 17 May.