One of the biggest critical hits – and certainly one of the most talked about – movies of the currently-happening Sundance Film Festival is the new Sophie Hyde film, Good Luck to You, Leo Grande, starring Thompson as a middle-aged widow who hires a male escort in an effort to experience her first orgasm. The film’s frank, confessional, and comedic take on adult sexuality called on Thompson to appear in a full-frontal nude scene. For the daring moment, the actress prepared in a rather unconventional way; Thompson, along with Daryl McCormack, her co-star, and Sophie Hyde, the film’s director, all rehearsed the scene… fully nude.
During a Sundance Cinema Cafe talk about the film, Thompson described how everything went down. "Sophie, Daryl, and I rehearsed entirely nude and talked about our bodies, talked about our relationship with our bodies, drew them, discussed the things that we find difficult about [them], things we like about them, described one another's bodies.”
“It’s very challenging to be nude at 62,” the two-time Oscar-winning (Best Actress in a Leading Role for 1992’s Howards End and Best Adapted Screenplay for 1995’s Sense and Sensibility) multi-hyphenate confessed. "I don't think I could've done it before the age that I am. And yet, of course, the age that I am makes it extremely challenging because we aren't used to seeing untreated bodies on the screen."
Thompson also discussed Hollywood’s lack of improvement regarding the expectations placed upon women’s bodies. "Nothing has changed in the dreadful demands made upon women in the real-world world, but also in acting," she said. "This thing of having to be thin is still the same as it ever was, and actually, in some ways, I think it's worse now."
Good Luck to You, Leo Grande was purchased by Lionsgate U.K. last fall, and its international sales and distribution will be handled by Cornerstone Films.
RELATED CONTENT:
Directors Behind 'Jeen-Yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy' Open Up About Kanye and Finding the Genius in Everyone
There's a Remake of 'The Bodyguard' in the Works—Here's Everything You Need to Know
Get Ready for 'Heat 2'—Michael Mann's New Novel
