interview summary from the intimacy coordinator of #TheEarlySpring, how she designed intimate scenes, how many and how she created demo versions of the scenes with real actors before sharing them with #JingBoran and #SunQian as references. The amount of thought and preparation that went into this is honestly insane.
she dont like kabedon (the female lead getting pinned against a wall first thing) bcs it's like the feeling of a woman being trapped.
there are also scenes where luan nian, instead of using their height difference, he actually crouches down to kiss her. she shared because the male lead is already in a position of superiority in the workplace. So when they start dating, there’s already an imbalance in their power dynamic. If we then put him physically above her as well, or have him in a position where he can physically restrain her, as a woman, that wouldn’t feel particularly good to watch. she wouldn’t want to be treated that way either. So they deliberately avoided that kind of height difference and anything that feels restrictive. That’s why his kisses usually come from an equal level, or even slightly from below.
Jing Boran mentioned in interviews that after having an intimacy coordinator, he actually became more aware of each other’s boundaries. And because he knows those boundaries, he can put more of his energy into the actual acting. Because on screen, besides the physical intimacy, there’s actually another very important thing: emotion. He can really focus on acting out the emotion. Because if you don’t have clear boundaries, you don’t know where the boundaries are, so you don’t know what you’re supposed to do.
Sun Qian’s character was also interesting. because her eyes have that really innocent, silly-sweet look. She naturally has a very pure and innocent face. She looks quite young in the face, but then she’s also very tall and slender. It’s a pretty unique combination.
there was one scene showing Jing Boran’s back. to make the scene happened, his nutritionist and fitness trainer got involved and jingbao exercising on set all the time. They were specifically training him for that scene. He actually spent about a month getting into shape for it. They focused on making his muscle definition more prominent. They even controlled his diet and had him dehydrate before the shoot. He and the team put in a huge amount of effort for that shot.
Jing Boran actually brought an entire shipping container full of clothes. There were clothes from his stylist, and clothes borrowed directly from brands. Some of them were shipped directly from fashion shows while they were filming. So whatever was the newest and strongest look at the time was brought directly onto the set for him. He really put a lot of effort into the fashion side of the character. And honestly, clothes coming straight from a runway still need to be altered. And the brands were willing to let the production alter them, which was impressive.
for intimate scene, there were around 40–50 intimate scenes. no body double or fake scene. The kisses were real kisses. The physical contact was real contact but they had clear boundaries. Since there were so many scenes, the first thing she considered was what stage of their relationship they were in. Because their romance spans ten years. So their emotional and physical states at the beginning and at the end have to be different. And their power dynamic also changes over time. So that was the first direction we researched. Then, even when they used similar actions or types of intimacy, they tried not to repeat them too much. They wanted each scene to have a slightly different emotional state and physical dynamic.
And then there was the director’s perspective. His approach was different from her. The director has a different visual language when filming the man and the woman. The color tones and camera angles are basically different. The male side tends to be colder and sharper. The female side is warmer. So when those two sides come together, she also had to design their interactions differently depending on the situation.
She created a document of around thirty-something pages. It included concepts, why she designed things that way, and the specific movements she wanted. Then she asked Taiwanese actors in Taipei to perform the movements first. she wanted to see how she imagined the scene being presented, so we filmed it. Then she gave the recording to the director and actors as a reference. It showed the kind of movement and overall physical dynamic I was envisioning.
Actually, her research team had around 4–6 people, working together. Each person contributed their own ideas. also deliberately included someone from Northeast China in the group bcs there are certain expressions or cultural details in the script that they weren't sure about.
She also share her story with Jiang Jizheng the director. Because he came from cinematography. So when they went to the set, he was constantly saying, “I want to show you this location”. He saw the fish tank in Luan Nian's home and could talk about it for half an hour. He had so many ideas about that fish tank. He had a very specific vision for that fish tank. A lot of the iconic shots and lines later came through that fish tank.