Titles?
Intimacy Choreographer?
Intimacy Director?
Intimacy Coordinator?
Intimacy Professional?

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?

Intimacy Choreographer: A collaborative member of a live performance production team, typically in theatre, who supports the staging of intimate content through a consent-based process. Tonia Sina’s 2006 graduate thesis, Intimate Encounters: Staging Intimacy and Sensuality, helped articulate this work as a distinct discipline by establishing its place in American theatre and academia.

Intimacy Director: A title largely synonymous with intimacy choreographer that developed as the discipline evolved. Both titles describe practitioners who collaborate on the staging of intimate content in live performance.

Intimacy Coordinator: A practitioner who supports the preparation and filming of intimate content for film and television. Before the title gained recognition in 2018, other production professionals often handled aspects of this work, including women in stunt coordination and wardrobe or costume departments. Much like a stunt coordinator, an intimacy coordinator’s responsibilities extend beyond physical choreography to include preparation, documentation, and cross-department collaboration for scenes involving simulated intimacy and nudity. An intimacy coordinator does not serve as an intimacy double or perform intimate actions in an actor’s place.

Intimacy Professional: An umbrella term encompassing intimacy choreographers, directors, and coordinators. It does not indicate that someone is qualified to work in every medium. The term is primarily used within the performing arts; outside the industry, additional context may be needed to distinguish it from other kinds of intimacy work.

Intimacy Consultant: A practitioner engaged to advise on staging or filming intimate content. Depending on the scope of the engagement, a consultant may offer recommendations to the creative or production team without working directly with performers or choreographing the scene.

These titles describe an evolving discipline, and their use and scope can vary across organizations and productions. In live performance, ask practitioners which title they use and clarify their responsibilities when contracting them. In film and television, intimacy coordinator is the standard title.