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Richard Armitage
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Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Obsession’ On Netflix, Where An Acclaimed Surgeon Is Having A Kinky Affair With His Son’s Girlfriend
You’ll never look at hotel pillows the same after Netflix’s Obsession.
Based on Josephine Hart’s novel Damage, the seductive four-part series tells the story of a young woman Anna (Charlie Murphy) who embarks on a kinky affair with her fiance’s father, William (Richard Armitage).
In the second episode, William follows Anna to Paris for a few quick trysts while she is on vacation with his son. The older man’s obsession with Anna grows, and after the couple checks out of their hotel, he checks into the same room.
Like a hound dog, William tears apart the bed, sniffing all of the pillows – one of which, a blue decorative cushion, manages to satisfy his wants. After emotionally caressing the pillow, he presses his face against it and masturbates.
This scene left viewers thinking “WTF?” and expressing that they have been “traumatized” by the man’s unhinged behavior. One viewer tweeted, “That pillow scene in Obsession on Netflix was exactly what I needed to turn my laptop off and never watch that fucking show again.”
Another wrote, “Nah because Obsession on Netflix is not real, like this guy really flew to Paris for a 10 second shag with his son’s girlfriend? He then books the same room they had after they leave and shags the pillow that smells like her while crying.”
A third called the scene “much less sexy than it looks…”
Armitage has commented on the erotic pillow scene, revealing that it was improvised because the original plan fell through. “There was a tissue with her imprint of her lipstick on which we didn’t feel necessarily worked,” he told Metro in an interview.
“I was really conscious that it shouldn’t be in any way comedic so we sort of left it quite open and it was a bit of an improvisation actually,” Armitage continued.
The actor also revealed that Murphy, who played Anna, “sprayed her scent that she’d been wearing throughout the shoot into different parts of the bed.” He said, “That’s where the scene just opened.”
The intimacy coordinator for the production, Adelaide Waldrop, also offered her two cents in an interview with Cosmopolitan. “Filming that scene came quite far along our production schedule. Richard clearly felt comfortable enough with the closed set and the process to just fully commit to this sensual, but also kind of grotesque and tragic, painful scene. It’s an incredible moment of storytelling of the obsession that his character is experiencing,” she said.
Well, at least we can say it’s a scene that we’ll never forget.
