Sex Sells, but Intimacy Creates a Moment

The meteoric success of Heated Rivalry has proven what romance readers and writers have known for years: People want all forms of intimacy in love stories. And that includes sex.

But not just any sex. We want sex that matters. What we see in mainstream media tends to be love stories that omit the spicy times or scenes that are violent or there to titillate, and that is not what we see in Heated Rivalry.

Heated Rivalry is full of intimacy that tells the story as much as any other scenes do.

However, as the show has entered the most mainstream pop culture lore, I’ve started to see people talk about the show in one of two ways. They’ll either say “the sex is there to pull you in, but don’t worry, it’s really a love story” or “the show is very graphic.” Both of which flatten the show into something it’s not.

Because it’s all of it. It’s a love story; it’s explicit; the intimate scenes exist for your pleasure and because they absolutely must for the sake of the story.

Heated Rivalry feels different because each intimate scene is treated with such care, and many play out in almost real time.

Still from Episode 1

The first time the protagonists, Shane and Ilya, hook up, the audience is invited into the intimacy from the moment the door closes and they’re alone together until Ilya leaves again. We, the viewer, see the characters feel each other out and learn about each other and themselves. We see Ilya make the first move and back Shane into the wall to kiss him, but then we see Shane eagerly unbutton Ilya’s jeans and go to his knees.

It’s in all these small, specific moments where we learn so much about the characters that we just can’t in any other context.

As Chala Hunter, the intimacy coordinator of the series, told me, “So much of Shane and Ilya's relationship actually gets developed through their sexual encounters, through their physical connections. It’s via navigating physical intimacy that’s the primary way that they learn things about each other. There are, of course, conversations that occur around that intimacy, but the navigating of coming together in a physically intimate, sexual way is how so much of their personhoods actually are revealed to each other.”

Ilya may be the one to move first, but when Shane starts to feel more comfortable, he’s so down. (Literally on his knees.) We see this later in the scene when they’ve both removed all their clothes and are lying on the bed next to each other, unsure of what’s next. Ilya makes the first move again, turning on his side and asking if his touch is okay, and as Shane leans into the pleasure, he pushes Ilya onto his back and acts on his own desire. These moments of exploration of pleasure and of each other show us who Shane and Ilya are together. They’re co-creating the context for their relationship.

When do we ever get to see such moments in television?

We don’t. Sex scenes are usually not plot driven. They feature some music, some simulated sex and then we get back to the story. Here, every moment you see matters.

When I asked Chala—whose job is to not only ensure the technical aspects of intimate scenes are met but also to verify the intimacy matches where the characters are emotionally and the story beats—what you’d lose if you chose to skip the intimate scenes, she said, “Imagine taking out all of the intimacy from the series. Imagine watching episode one and taking out every intimate scene. What would you even have?”

The answer is nothing. Shane and Ilya meet up when they’re in the same place because they’re drawn to each other, and the only shared language they have is through their sexual encounters. “The other more emotional, I guess, conversational intimacy arises out of that initial physical way of connecting,” she continues. “Not because I don't think that they don't have an emotional or spiritual connection right off the bat, but the way that they engage with it is physical primarily.”

Which brings us to one of my favourite scenes of all time and a pivotal plot point: tuna melts.

This is the first time that Shane and Ilya experience a moment of domesticity. Shane goes to Ilya’s place for the first time, and they have more than an hour or two to see each other, which gives them time for Ilya to make Shane a tuna melt and for them to watch hockey on the couch. This leads to the most erotic moment of television I’ve ever seen.

Still from Episode 4

After a moment of connection when Shane asks how Ilya’s father is, Ilya pulls Shane to him and Shane leans into the touch. It starts as cuddling, which Shane soon turns into passionate frotting. The camera’s focus is on the men’s faces for most of this, making it explicit not in the way we generally think of—as genitals shown on screen—but in that we’re truly seeing the emotional intimacy.

We see on their faces how the characters are affected by this moment of sexual and emotional connection. It’s in this moment that they say each other’s first names for the first time. (Until this point, they’d called each other Hollander and Rozanov.) And it’s right after that when Shane stands abruptly and leaves while Ilya, confused, is reaching for another kiss. 

It’s a gut-wrenching scene.

It hurts us, the audience, because we’ve been taken on the journey with them. They’ve shown us how these characters have related to each other sexually to this point—in secret, in short bursts of time, often in hotel rooms—and then given us a sliver of what life could be like if they had more time.

There’s tenderness and awkwardness as they figure out how much emotional vulnerability to show and then we see the moments of intimacy that are so different from what we’ve seen to this point. Everything is slower, the kisses are lingering and give way to pressing their faces together and breathing into each other’s mouths and saying each other’s names, so when Shane gets up and leaves, we know something has gone terribly wrong. And this leads to Shane exploring what it would be like to have a girlfriend and understanding his sexuality.

Imagine not seeing all of that. How would you understand what happened? You wouldn’t.

As Chala told me, “It's a whole inner emotional landscape being reflected through that behaviour.”

This is evident in the way that the intimacy evolves over time.

We see many parallels in the series, like the first time Shane and Ilya hook up in the hotel room having the same initial blocking as the scene in the cottage after Shane shows Ilya to his room. Both have Ilya backing Shane up and kissing him against a wall. In both scenes, Ilya puts his hand on Shane’s jaw and deepens the kiss. Then, Shane goes to his knees and Ilya puts one hand on the wall to steady himself and one in Shane’s hair. But the two could not be further from each other emotionally. 

The contrast between episode 1 and episode 6.

For starters, the scenes take place about seven years and many life events apart. When Chala goes into scenes with similar blocking like this, she says she keeps context in mind. That’s time, where in the arc of the relationship they are, where each character is emotionally, the stakes, and the location—to name just a few elements she’s juggling. And we can see that through the acting and directing choices made.

Episode 1 Kiss (2009)

In the first scene, Shane and Ilya are in a dark hotel room. They’re both nineteen and pretty inexperienced. They’ve seen each other a handful of times and never acted on the chemistry they’ve felt. Ilya’s more experienced, and we see that he leads. He backs Shane into the wall, he kisses Shane first, he deepens the kiss. Shane is passive at first, letting Ilya kiss him before tentatively kissing him back. They both touch each other hesitantly but excitedly. Their touches brush over various body parts and they remove shirts. Ilya makes the first move and is more forceful when he grabs Shane’s jaw and kisses him, but Shane is the one who reaches into Ilya’s pants and sinks to his knees.

Episode 6 Kiss (2017)

In the second scene, seven years later, they’re at Shane’s cottage in the middle of nowhere after having been through a lot together. They’ve watched each other win championships and seen each other at their lows. They’ve hurt each other and they’ve shared more with each other than they probably ever imagined they would. Finally, after years of quick hookups, secret phone calls, and repressed feelings, they’re in a safe place. The first clue is that it’s light. The windows are open (and Ilya makes a point of keeping the blinds up). When he backs Shane into the wall, which is actually one huge pane of glass, they’re both smiling, looking into each other’s eyes and laughing. 

Ilya may be the one initiating/more dominant, but Shane’s hands are in Ilya’s hair too. No longer are they tentative teens learning each other’s bodies. They know what they like and are unapologetic about it. Ilya’s hand comes up to Shane’s jaw and Shane’s cradles Ilya’s head in his. Shane’s head bangs against the window as they make out. Their hands are all over each other. When Shane goes to his knees, he kisses his way down. Ilya doesn’t look shocked; he’s reverent. It’s passionate and reminiscent of a couple who’s been apart for a long time reuniting.

Even if they haven’t said it out loud at this point, we can tell from their actions, from how they reach for each other, how comfortable they are with each other, how they smile and let themselves have this moment in the light, just how in love they are.

The difference between these scenes is night and day (sorry, I had to) even though the blocking is pretty similar.

That’s because this kind of intimacy tells the story better than grand gestures or declarations of love.

Don’t get me wrong. Those are important too, and certainly, they exist beside the intimacy. But the reason Ilya’s steadfast support of Shane at his parents’ house is so heartwarming is because we’ve seen every moment that leads up to it. We’ve seen Shane and Ilya fumble their way through sex that was exciting and elicit to more emotional sex to declarations of love and lovemaking.

And what a joy and honour to be invited into the intimacy that we all desire: to be known and accepted and loved on all levels.

That is not possible without stories that depict sexual intimacy explicitly. It’s something more people are learning as they watch and read Heated Rivalry.

But, dear romance reader, this is something you and I have known for a long time, and I’m so glad we get to show people how wonderful that is.