Surely this goes beyond acting

[SteveMonaro]

I feel like my relationship is falling apart. My wife (not actually married but together over 20 years) is starting to ask things that are, or should be, so far out of bounds it begs the question about what her motivation is.

So to paint the picture my wife found acting was her passion in her mid 30’s. It started with community theater but she was good, really good, and quickly got recommended for better roles in bigger productions. She found her niche and it was in erotic thrillers and that’s what has lead to my concerns now.

So we went through the times when she had to kiss other guys and women, I allowed that. Then there was full nudity. I wasn’t comfortable with that but she convinced me. Then it progressed further to having a scene with people licking her nipples. I said yes initially but really regretted it after. Now it’s on film forever. There’s been plenty of simulated sex scenes but I’m only concerned about the real stuff.

Now she has been cast in a really substantial role. It’s a massive achievement. It’s going to pay over two years worth of wages for a 6-8 week shoot. But the kicker here is that there is an oral sex scene with two men where the director demands it’s not simulated. Of course I said no way. My wife went back to them and they compromised, if you can even call it that, and they will allow the finish over her breasts instead of face. It’s still a no way from me.

I thought that would be it. Surely my feelings count. But I’m getting guilt tripped here. It’s the chance of a lifetime. Why would you stop me from being successful. It’s only acting. She begged me to at least think about it so I relented and said yes even though I knew I wouldn’t change my mind. Then I just happened to be speaking to one of the producers and they assured me there would be minimal people in the room but the biggest takeaway I took that blew me away was that depending on how it goes they might need to shoot the scene more than once.

There is no other way to look at it now. They want my wife, and she wants to as well, have oral sex with two men to completion, not once, but maybe two, three, four times, who knows. And to her it’s not cheating, it’s acting. Sorry, I can’t see the difference.

The latest I got from her was, “don’t make me do it without your permission”. What? Are you kidding me? We’ve been together 21 years and now it’s come down to letting my wife do this or walk away from our relationship and she’ll do it anyway. I don’t know how to save this and time is running out for her to back out of this role.

[Gebidozo]

Neither you nor your wife are wrong here.

She is right that what she’s been doing isn’t cheating, since you knew about that and agreed to that, reluctantly or not.

And you are right in that you are fully entitled to feel very uncomfortable about what she’s been doing.

Your mistake is that you didn’t make it clear to her from the beginning that her acting in erotic scenes was a dealbreaker to you.

Don’t spend your time and energy on being outraged. She has made her choice, she wants to do porn, and that is more important to her than you or your marriage.

I don’t say that by way of condemnation, I don’t think that what she is doing is unethical. But personally, I wouldn’t be okay with that, and clearly you aren’t okay with that either. It looks like breaking up with her might be the only option now.

Unless, of course, you find some way to be sincerely okay with what she’s doing.

[SteveMonaro]

38 minutes ago, Gebidozo said:

She has made her choice, she wants to do porn

Thanks for the reply. I agree with all you said but I wouldn't classify what she does as porn, not even close in fact.

I mean I focused on a few scenes here so it probably makes it sound bad but they are just once scene in a much longer movie where sometimes the rest of the movie has very little scenes of a sexual nature.

[ExpatInItaly]

1 hour ago, SteveMonaro said:

They want my wife, and she wants to as well, have oral sex with two men to completion, not once, but maybe two, three, four times, who knows. And to her it’s not cheating, it’s acting.

So it's porn. Right? 

Let's call a spade a spade here. 

[Gebidozo]

1 hour ago, SteveMonaro said:

I wouldn't classify what she does as porn, not even close in fact.

You can classify it as you like, but a video of non-simulated oral sex is porn. Hardcore porn, in fact.

Licking nipples is softporn, perhaps.

But any non-simulated sexual act performed for the camera is pornographic by definition. It doesn’t matter if the rest of the movie is dedicated to Schopenhauer’s philosophy or fine wines.

Anyway, definitions don’t matter here. You were feeling uncomfortable already when she was doing scenes with full nudity, which might have not necessarily been pornographic. You should have set the boundaries or break up right there and then.

It appears to me that you’re still trying to justify your wife’s behavior and downplay its content. You don’t need to. It’s not about the morality of what she’s been doing, it’s about you not being fine with it.

 

[FredEire]

Yeah in all honesty anything with a full non-simulated oral sex scene is porn. I'm not familiar with the genre but it sounds like something designed for people who aren't comfortable with themselves watching straight up porn so they watch this kind of packaged version "for the story".

I would not be comfortable with my partner doing this either. By the sounds of it there's really only one solution to this, because when that genie's out of the bottle it's very difficult to put back in. If you managed to talk her into quitting it would lead to resentment on her end, lingering suspicion on your end. If you gave in and let her go ahead and do it it would be you feeling the resentment. Either way nobody wins.

[MsJayne]

Does it really matter? I think once you reach that point where you decide you hate poverty more than you hate sin, and you're prepared to sacrifice certain things, and you make the decision to enter the sex industry, there's really no point differentiating between the different types of, (legal), porn in order to make yourself feel better about your choices. You clearly don't like that your partner is a sex worker, so you need to end it. 

[Sony12]

Any scene where they show a penis in her mouth is porn. Respectable films do have oral sex scenes in them as well but they generally aren't allowed to actually show an act that specific. Generally it will be a situation where the female character goes down below where the camera is focused and the camera will just show the man's reaction to what is supposedly going on.

There indeed is a lot of money for women in porn but but does your wife understand the target audience a film like this would be aiming for? 99% of the people who will watch this type of production will just skip through the remaining story and just watch the sex scenes. Does your wife understand that or does she legitimately think people will care about her performance outside of how she looks naked and how good of dick sucking skills she has?

If she understands that then it is her decision. But a woman performing oral sex onscreen isn't really acting. It's just having sex on screen. There is money in it but she is on the road to becoming a porn actress not a regular actress. Is that what she wants?

[FredEire]

The big issue here as I see it is that she has been pushing your boundaries for a long time, and since you haven't pushed back you are now at a point where you're in too deep.

You can see this in the fact that neither of you actually wants to call this what it is: sex work. That's because you're not comfortable with your partner being a sex worker, she knows this and its emotionally safe to keep labelling it as just "acting".

But when you look at the cold reality of it, what you both want at this stage is just fundamentally incompatible.