Screenwriter James Ivory criticises the lack of full-frontal nudity in ‘Call Me By Your Name’
The Oscar-winning screenwriter claims Armie Hammer and Timothée Chalamet's contracts banned nude scenes
Call Me By Your Name’s Oscar-winning screenwriter has revealed he’s “disappointed” at the lack of full-frontal nudity in the film.
James Ivory’s screenplay, an adaptation of André Aciman’s novel of the same name, originally featured full-frontal nude scenes from characters Elio (Timothée Chalamet) and Oliver (Armie Hammer) during intimate sex scenes.
However, the nudity was pulled from the film due to clauses in the actors’ contracts. Meanwhile, director Luca Guadagnino claimed he had never wanted to include sex scenes, saying it would have changed the film’s tone.
In an interview with The Guardian, James Ivory called Guadagnino’s excuse “totally untrue”.
He said: “When Luca says he never thought of putting nudity in, that is totally untrue. He sat in this very room where I am sitting now, talking about how he would do it, so when he says that it was a conscious aesthetic decision not to – well, that’s just bullsh*t.”
“When people are wondering around before or after making love, and they’re decorously covered with sheets, it’s always seemed phoney to me. I never liked doing that. And I don’t do it, as you know.”
Touching on his 1987 film Maurice, where Ivory depicted male nudity in an explicit gay sex scene, he said: “The two guys have had sex and they get up and you certainly see everything there is to be seen.
“To me, that’s a more natural way of doing things than to hide them, or to do what Luca did, which is to pan the camera out of the window toward some trees.”
Meanwhile, Guadagnino has revealed he’s already working on a sequel to the film, which was pulled from the Beijing Film Festival lineup this week.