Sex Symbol Henry Cavill Does Not Like Sex Scenes: “Sometimes They’re Overused These Days”

Henry Cavill isn’t bringing sexy (scenes) back if he can help it.

The Argylle star fleshed out the topic of sex scenes alongside director Matthew Vaughn, the latter of whom claimed that sex scenes are something that he “can’t get [his] head around,” per CNN.

“It’s just something I don’t understand!” he exclaimed on Josh Horowitz’s Happy Sad Confused podcast.

Cavill shared Vaughn’s sentiment, noting that he’s “not a fan” of them.

Vaughn said he “feel[s] quite awkward about them” as a director, and ultimately raised the question of if they are considered “really acting.”

However, Cavill ultimately clarified that he “think[s] there are circumstances where a sex scene actually is beneficial to a movie rather than just the audience,” but that “sometimes they’re overused these days.”

“It’s when you have a sense that you’re going, ‘Is this really necessary or is it people just with less clothing on?’” he continued. “And that’s where you start to get more uncomfortable and you’re thinking, ‘There’s not a performance here, there’s not a piece which is going to carry through into the rest of the movie.’”

Eventually reiterating that sex scenes “can be great in a movie,” he highlighted that “most of the time, the human imagination is going to trump it.”

“And so I think it can be a little bit of a cop out if a TV show or a movie is just filled with gyrating bodies and you’re going, ‘OK, but what is this doing for us apart from the idea of, oh naked person, great?'” he said.

Many actors have come forward and addressed (or rather, undressed) their personal feelings and approaches toward filming sex scenes. Michael Douglas, who deemed himself the “expert on sex scenes” at a Cannes Film Festival panel last May, revealed the “secret” to a successful sex scene is “rehearsal,” noting that you pull off a scene if it’s “very well choreographed.”

As for Cavill’s argument of needing “circumstances” for a sex scenes to be “beneficial,” Poor Things director Yorgos Lanthimos summed this idea up very nicely with respect to Emma Stone‘s numerous sex scenes in his award-winning film while answering Decider’s question at a press conference held last September, arguing the sex scenes are “a very important part of her [character’s] journey.”

“I felt that we shouldn’t shy away from it,” he explained. “It would feel very disingenuous to tell this story about this character, who’s so free and so open, and then be [a] prude about the sexual aspect of it.”

Argylle is now in theaters. Watch the trailer above.