Todd Farmer On Sex, Violence & 3-D Male Nudity (Or "Shut Up & Take Your Pants Off")

We (and when I say we I mean us ‘mericans) are a little bit nuts.  What is our hang up with T&A?   Seriously.  From the moment we go sexually sentient, that is ALL we think about.  Yet nothing will get you an NC-17 faster than T&A.  What am I missing?

How is violence somehow more tolerable than a properly maintained wrack?  And don’t get me wrong.  I love violence.  I pay my bills with violence.  But I love T&A more.  Way more.  And so do you.  For instance, if your wife, girlfriend, date or hookup drops her pants…Yay!  If you wife, girlfriend, date or hookup pulls a gun…Whoa!  What are you doing?!

Our personal opinions are completely opposite our public options.   Show of hands.  How many here would willingly take part in some nookie in the Oval Office?  Of course you would. Yet publicly we’ll impeach a president for it.  Hello?  Are we insane?  If there’s anyone on the planet we should WANT to make sure stays properly laid and chilled out, it’s the Leader of the Free World with access to the big red button. 

I’m not saying sex and nudity should run rampant through the streets of our movies and TV but I’d certainly like to see a little more balance.  For whatever reason T&A is forced to follow a harsher set of guidelines.  Why?  Sex is a part of life.  The first part.  So why is it somehow dirty?  As a storyteller, I can apparently knife, shoot, and blow you up but if I take my time and bring you to a proper orgasm I’m getting an NC-17.  Why?!  I love orgasms.  So do you.  We all do.  I wish I was orgasming right now.  So do you.  We all do.

Again, I do love violence.  I saw a fella slap his girl at a Rite Aid one night and proceeded to verbally belittle him until he took a swing so that I might properly and legally punch him in the forehead.  You see there is a place for everything. Sex, drugs rock-n-roll, religion, politics, love, hate…they all make up the fascinating thing we call us.  As a storyteller those are my tools.   But the only tool I’m not allowed to use freely is the T&A tool.  Why?

I started out writing horror back when horror was still considered a lower class citizen.  Executives would literally look down their nose at you and with a superior chuckle proclaim, “Yes, we don’t make those sort of films here at Big Sony.”  You had New Line with Jason and Dimension with Freddy and Michael.  Each year had one or two outsiders here and there.  Then Kevin wrote Scream and single handedly turned the movie biz on its head and horror into a legitimate business.  Now every studio and producing entity has a genre wing.  And that’s great because with horror you get the three constants.  Scares, Tits and Ass.  Yet through this massive resurgence we saw violence go places no one ever expected (for better or worse) while T&A remained tucked safely within bra, undies and boxers.

I’m not just a bunch of hot air ranting from anonymity.  My identity is public and I have been in the T&A trenches.  I have put my butt where my mouth is (that sounds utterly wrong but I am sticking with it). 

My good friend, Patrick Lussier, called a few months before production.  He told me Lions Gate wanted to hire a local for Frank.  I sighed.  Look, I’m sure there’s some outstanding actors in Pittsburgh but Frank was a pretty demanding role and would only pay scale.  I ranted.  FX work is time consuming.  For the pick in the head gag you get one shot with the rig.  You screw it up you blow the shot and there’s no second try.  Then there’s the nudity.  Nudity in front of the whole crew!  And sex!  Yes, yes the reason we’re all here is because we love sex but we’re talking about sex in front of twenty union workers!  If the local freaked out, if there were problems…arrgg.  Patrick said, “I know.  Will you do it?”

I asked my wife.  “Frank?  You mean Frank the Trucker?  The sex Frank?”  I nodded.  She considered then said, “That’s rock star!”

So I did it.  You know how in most movies when you cut back to the couple after sex and the guy is pulling up his pants and you just get that tiny glimpse of his bottom?  Yeah.  I didn’t do that.  I left the butt out there.  I let it hang.  In the wonderful world of 3D.

Now get this.  And it'll likely make you gigglesnort.  When it came time for the rating, it wasn’t the blood.  It wasn’t the pickaxe with the eyeball on the tip bursting out into the audience.  It wasn’t Tom Atkins jawing with the crowd.  No.  It was the T&A that got us an NC-17.  Only after half the sex scene was removed were we deemed decent enough to get an R.  

And THAT, my friends, is why I will keep taking my pants off.  I do it for me.  I do it for my family.  I do it for you.

Do you understand?  You sleep safer at night because I’m out there.  Standing on a wall.  Naked.  I have joined the elite.  The few.  The brave.  Bruce Willis.  Viggo Mortensen.  Nathan Fillion.  My cause is just.  My course is clear.  Ewan McGregor.  Mel Gibson.  A blue CGI penis.  You are not alone ladies.  While female nudity is still 100 to 1 with males, we are all fighting the same battle.  Equality.  Daniel Radcliffe.  Neal Patrick Harris.  Jim Carrey.  Our fight is just getting started.  We’ve a long road ahead.  So I want you to get up now.  I want all of you to get up out of your chairs.  I want you to get up right now and go to the window.  Open it, and stick your head out and yell.  “I’M MAD AS HECK AND I’M NOT GOING TO WEAR PANTS ANYMORE!”