An Intimacy Coordinator Criticized Millie Bobby Brown For Kissing A Scene Partner Without Consent

There’s been a lot of conversation lately about performers kissing their co-stars without prior consent. First, it was Margot Robbie and Brad Pitt in Babylon (“When else am I gonna get the chance to kiss Brad Pitt? I’m just gonna go for it,” the actress said before later clarifying that “we all established our boundaries before making this movie”). Now, Stranger Things star Millie Bobby Brown is being criticized by an intimacy coordinator for kissing Louis Partridge, who plays Lord Tewkesbury, while filming Enola Holmes 2.

“Right on the rehearsal I grabbed his face and kissed him and he was like…” the actress said in a TikTok posted to Netflix’s account (here’s her impression of his face). “It was so cute really seeing [Enola] take the lead. And also seeing a girl just make the first move is just really exciting.” Bobby Brown also discussed the scene in the movie where she repeatedly punches Partridge. “Because Louis is a good friend I just kept punching him, I wasn’t doing stunts, I really was hurting him,” she said. “By the end of it, he said, ‘Millie can you just fake punch me?’ I was fully just getting him right in the stomach.”

The TikTok was posted in November, but it recently caught the attention of intimacy coordinator Jessica Steinrock, who made a TikTok of her own in response. “Ooh no, I love Millie Bobby Brown, but this is not the cute story you think it is,” she said. “I’m sure she and her scene partner have a lot of rapport built up and a great amount of trust, but we should never be surprising anyone during a fight or intimate scene ever.”

Steinrock, whose credits include Yellowjackets and Never Have I Ever, added, “At the end of the day, this basically means she didn’t ask consent to kiss him. And when your scene partner reacts in surprise after you’ve kissed them that means the communication didn’t happen the way it really needs to.” You can watch the video below.