Amanda Seyfried Says No to Sex Scenes: 'I Don't Want to Be Naked With a Stranger'

Amanda Seyfried has stopped saying yes to sex scenes. Speaking with Alec Baldwin at the Hamptons International Film Festival, the Oscar nominee revealed she turned down a television series because of its sexual content.

"I passed on a show where I would have to have sex all the time because of the sex," Seyfried said, in comments reported by People. "Doesn't matter [who it's with] … I don't wanna do it. I'm uncomfortable with it. I'm not into it right now."

She did not rule out a change of heart later. "Maybe if [the project] came along again [at a later point], maybe I'd be in a different space," she said. "But I don't wanna deal with being naked with a stranger."

Why is acting 'getting weirder' for Seyfried?

Seyfried, 39, told Baldwin that the profession feels stranger as she ages. "Being an actor gets weirder as you get older because we have to be romantic with people that we're not romantic with," she said. "Sometimes it's great. Sometimes it's really uncomfortable."

She contrasted that with her early career, when kissing scenes carried no weight at all. "I can't believe back in the day I was just like, 'We gotta make out. Great! This is awesome. I know how to make out.' And it used to be so fun," she said. "It was a non-thing. It was like, 'I get to make out with a hot person today … And they're paying me.'"

What did Seyfried say about her teenage years on set?

The Hamptons remarks echo what Seyfried previously told Porter magazine: she wishes intimacy coordinators had existed when she was a teenage actor. She recounted letting herself be uncomfortable because she believed it was the only way to keep working.

"Being 19, walking around without my underwear on – like, are you kidding me? How did I let that happen?" Seyfried told Porter. "Oh, I know why: I was 19 and I didn't want to upset anybody and I wanted to keep my job. That's why."

Intimacy coordinators, now standard on many film and television sets, choreograph and supervise nude and sexual scenes. Seyfried's generation of actors entered the industry before the practice became widespread.

How is she setting boundaries off screen?

Seyfried told Baldwin she now builds firmer limits in her work and her public life, driven in part by motherhood.

"I have kids now who are paying attention to what I do, and so I have to be less of a pushover," she said.

She described a recent walk in Manhattan with her daughter Nina, during which she declined two fan photo requests in quick succession. After the first refusal, Nina told her: "I'm very proud of you, mama." After the second, at a coffee shop, the child said: "I'm so proud of you for saying no."

Seyfried's response to her daughter was blunt: "What the fuck? She shouldn't be saying this to me. I should be saying no."

Her new rule is simple. When she is with her children, she will not stop for fan photographs, because "whatever [they are] going through is more important than what I'm going through."

What is Seyfried working on now?

The actor is coming off one of the biggest commercial successes of her career. "The Housemaid," her winter blockbuster, grossed $400 million worldwide.

She is currently touring the festival circuit with her latest indie drama, "The Life and Deaths of Wilson Shedd." She also voices Cinderella in Netflix's upcoming animated film "Steps."

With her comments at Hamptons, Seyfried joins a growing group of established actors — including several of her generation — who publicly refuse simulated sex on camera, a shift that continues to pressure casting practices and script development across the industry.