Alice Levine acknowledges that no matter how many times she sees or hears people having sex for her Sex Actually series, she can’t help but laugh at how awful it is.
She is returning to do it all again after peeping behind the curtain of how families throughout the country approached sex, relationships, and intimacy during the first season of her show in 2021.
This time, her current three-part series digs into the role of technology in people’s sex lives, how’relationship anarchy’ is upending monogamy, and what precisely feedism is.
There will be plenty of jaw-dropping moments for those who tune in, including Alice donning VR goggles to have a virtual blow job, serving as an assistant to help clean out a sex doll coated in body fluids, attending a sex party, and being cast in a fetish movie.
While it’s all part of her job today, Alice confesses that there are occasions when what she’s seeing (or hearing) catches her off guard.
‘I think what was nice about all of the people who have taken part in both series is that they are very aware people and don’t think what they are doing is run of the mill and know that generally they are unusual,’ she told Metro.co.uk.
‘Hearing people having sex, there is something funny about it though and I haven’t done this enough to be desensitised to it,’ she added.
‘That will always be a strange feeling when I am sat at the end of someone’s bed, or they are up in a room above me having sex.’
Alice is pleased to embrace the giggles at times, explaining that she doesn’t think it will ever be ‘natural’ for her as a presenter to be close in people’s personal moments.
‘I believe the best thing to do is to be honest about it and confront it,’ she says.
Nonetheless, Alice claimed that part of the reason she couldn’t perform in some of the more shocking sequences was due to her “personal prudishness or hang-ups or training.”
‘We all have this programming about sex that we react in different ways, so I am also bringing that throughout,’ she explained.
Nonetheless, referring to the age-old adage that humour can help break through boundaries and address important issues, Alice stated that making the show as respectful to the people bold enough to be recorded was top of mind.
‘I like to think that humour runs throughout, and we are enjoying the experience with the people we are talking to, but I don’t think we are ever laughing at anybody,’ she said.
She did, however, add that’sex can be incredibly amusing, and it’s okay to laugh at it.
She admits that filming the first season was a learning experience.
‘Last season, I felt little underprepared for how shocking some of it would be, but it definitely gave me a crash course in what to anticipate,’ she chuckled.
While she admitted that discussing people’s sex lives was “always going to be intimate and embarrassing to a certain level,” those involved went out of their way to make her feel at ease.
‘I’ve been lucky, because in both seasons, the contributors have been incredibly generous and concerned with my comfort funnily enough, even though I’m not the one being vulnerable or exposed, literally or metaphorically,’ she said.
‘They kind of held my hand through it. It’s been a very warm and inviting environment.’
Sex Actually with Alice Levine starts on Monday, February 27 at 10pm on Channel 4 and will then be available to stream on All 4.
Source My Celebrity Life.