It’s no surprise to hear from different actors that doing sex scenes comes with a healthy dose of awkwardness. Bridgerton’s Yerin Ha didn’t seem to love having to disrobe first thing in the morning for a full day of fake whoopee, and it sounds like Game of Thrones was a “frenzied mess” for Gemma Whelan without intimacy directors. Of all the behind-the-scenes stories I’ve heard, though, I wasn’t ready for Emilia Clarke talking about breaking a rib while filming sex scenes for Ponies.
New to the 2026 TV schedule, Ponies stars Emilia Clarke and Haley Lu Richardson, who go undercover after their CIA operative husbands die under mysterious circumstances. For Clarke’s character Bea, that apparently involved getting close to a few guys, because while the actress laughed as she admitted she “really made out a bunch,” she also told The Wrap:
Three men, in a number of hours. Just keep bringing it — I’m going to sit on this thing, you’re going to bring them in, we’re going to pretend to have sex. I broke a rib that day. Sex with three boys broke my rib.
Wow, guys. Just wow. For one thing, I know sex scenes can be approached like stunt scenes, but I’d hope the risk of injury was far lower. I also hadn’t considered a filming schedule like that, where you just knock out all your sex scenes in one fell swoop. What a day at the office!
I also didn’t think Ponies was going to be up there with the most sexually explicit movies you can stream on Peacock, but it sounds like Emilia Clarke was really giving it her all. No other details regarding the “who” or “how” of the injury were disclosed, but Haley Lu Richardson confirmed it happened, saying:
She really did. She’s such a tiny little sensitive body, meant she broke a rib.
What a thing to have to tell the doctor. The Game of Thrones alum said she was straightforward with her physician when they asked how she broke the rib, saying:
Sex! Times three!
I mean, I guess that’ll do it.
When the White Lotus actress asked for a status update on how Emilia Clarke is healing, Clarke digressed to say it wasn’t all that bad, assuring her co-star:
It didn’t like, fully break, it just popped out a little bit.
Nooooo, now any mental picture I might have had of what that day looked like for Emilia Clarke and her three suitors has been replaced by images of ribs popping out. Thanks, guys.
Ponies, which is available to stream now with a Peacock subscription, has gotten an overwhelmingly positive response from critics, holding a Certified Fresh 95% on Rotten Tomatoes, as of this writing.
All eight episodes of its first season dropped at one time and, given the cliffhanger ending, many are already calling for more of Bea and Twila’s adventures. Hopefully, Emilia Clarke won’t have to sacrifice her ribcage again if that does happen.
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