'Mary & George' bosses say one of the biggest challenges was finding a period home that would allow them to shoot the premiere's orgy scene
Some homeowners of period houses didn't want sex scenes and orgies being shot at their properties, executive producer Liza Marshall told BI.
Starz
- "Mary & George," Starz's latest raunchy historical drama, premiered on April 5.
- Executive producer Liza Marshall told BI that they faced issues finding filming locations.
- Some owners of historic homes recoiled a the idea of orgy scenes being shot on their properties.
"Mary & George," tells the remarkable true story of how a 17th-century family of little means climbed their way to the top of British society by using sex to grasp power.
In the seven-part series, which premiered on Starz on Friday, audiences are introduced to the cunning Countess of Buckingham, Mary Villiers (Julianne Moore), and her preternaturally good-looking second son, George (Nicholas Galitzine), who schemed and seduced their way into the court of King James I (Tony Curran).
Despite being based on the historical account of the Villiers laid out in Benjamin Woolley's 2017 biography, "The King's Assassin: The Secret Plot to Murder James I," it turns out that the sex-fueled story of skullduggery was too scandalous for the owners of some historic houses in the UK.
Speaking to Business Insider, executive producer Liza Marshall revealed that the production struggled to find a period home to shoot a steamy scene that appears in the premiere episode of "Mary & George."
Starz
The cast and crew were refused entry to several historic homes they had approached for the series once the owners found out about the explicit nature of the show, according to Marshall.
"That genuinely was quite a big challenge," Marshall told BI, adding that the scene that the homeowners took issue with was the orgy that George accidentally walks into once he arrives in France.
"Quite a few stately homes were not into having us there to shoot a scene of that nature for whatever reason," she added.
BI also spoke to series creator D.C. Moore, who said that although toning down the show's intimate scenes would have made life easier for the team, it "would not be true" to the story of George's entry into the corrupt court of England.
Starz
"You could try to do that well-behaved, boxed-in, repressed approach, but it just isn't the era for that," Moore said.
"Everybody's trying to get into the king's bed literally, so we couldn't shy away from that," Marshall added. "That's what the show is about — sex is power."
Marshall noted that Galitzine, who recently told Entertainment Weekly that he shot four sex scenes with different actors in one day, is "very proud" of how they translated on-screen. They were guided by intimacy coordinator Robbie Taylor Hunt, who also worked with the actor on "Red, White & Royal Blue."
Marshall added: "It was treated with great care, but it never felt gratuitous for us because it is the point of the story."
"Mary & George" premiered Friday, April 5 at midnight on the Starz app and debuted on the Starz linear channel at 9 p.m. ET/PT. New episodes will drop every Friday.