Jessica Chastain revealed in a recent interview that nudity in American films bothers her.
Chastain told Vulture the following when discussing nudity:
I have no issues with nudity, especially in a lot of European cinema that I adore, but I find that in American cinema, the idea of nudity has always bothered me. I realized why: For me, I’m uncomfortable with nudity when it feels like it’s not the person’s decision to be naked, when it’s something that has been put upon them. In a way, I see that as like a victimization. It trains an audience that exploiting someone in their body should be normal for nudity, when I think the opposite. When people are completely in control of their decisions, that is a really exciting thing. I love the human form — male nudity, female nudity, I’m all about it. I had to get to that place where, for me, it was my decision.
This is pure insanity in a quote. Last time I checked, nudity is almost always negotiated into contracts between actors, directors and producers. It’s not like a woman shows up on set on a random day and get told they’ll be doing a massive sex scene with full-frontal nudity. That’s not how that works at all.
Actresses and actors sign contracts that give them money in exchange for their talents. Contracts explicitly lay out what is expected, and any agent worth a penny isn’t going to allow a contract to have open-ended demands like random nudity in a film. You know exactly what you’re getting into when you put the pen to paper and start cashing massive Hollywood checks.
She literally says she doesn’t like it “when it feels like it’s not the person’s decision to be naked.” What is she talking about? It is always the actresses decision. If she doesn’t like it then don’t have it put in the contract or walk off the set if they try to pressure you. This is the problem with the #MeToo era. You can now claim to be a victim over anything. As Chastain points out, American films are “victimization” when it comes to nudity. Give me a break. Nobody is holding a gun to the heads of these people as they sign contracts for millions of dollars. Don’t want to do nudity? That’s fine. Just sign contracts that don’t allow it or don’t do movies with nudity in them. Not hard to figure out.