The wonderful book to screen adaptation of author Casey McQuiston’s Red, White & Royal Blue, came to those with an Amazon Prime subscription recently, and thrilled many lovers of the best romantic comedies by bringing us all the feelings our sweet hearts desire. The film also brings us some delightfully hubba-hubba sex scenes, but one moment in particular led to the director having to decide on what to do about a lead’s hairy ass.
What Was The Hairy Ass Situation On The Set Of Red, White & Royal Blue?
Now, despite the fact that there are some sexytimes in the new rom-com (which is great for LGBTQ+ representation), I think it’s fair to say that many people probably wouldn’t call the film overly explicit, as there is actually very, very little nudity (leading the director to be shocked by its R rating). In fact, there’s only one posterior shot for one of the movie’s two leading men, with Taylor Zakhar Perez being the one to drop trou.
While speaking on The Jess Cagle Show, director Matthew López was applauded for letting the actors have their body hair, which led to a story about the naked butt scene. As López told it:
I get a phone call from my hair and makeup coordinator Karen, usually I just go straight to set, and she's like, 'Can you please meet me in Taylor's trailer?' And I'm like 'Uh Oh. Uh oh. Oh shit. Oh God. What's going on?' And I go into Taylor's trailer, we've been making this movie for like 5, 6 weeks at this point, and Karen looks at Taylor and she says, 'Alright, tell 'em what you told me.' And he goes, 'I don't know if I should shave or not.' And I'm like, 'Your face?' And he's like 'No, babe.' I'm like, 'Alright, well, what do you want to do about it?' And he goes, 'Just look, okay.' So I had (Karen) there as the chaperone because I didn't want my career to end before it began, and Taylor lowers his pants and (says) 'Look at my ass.' And I'm like, 'You're fine. You look great.'
As you may have guessed, this wasn’t a conversation dedicated to the star making sure his patootie was perky enough for said butt-baring scene. Oh, no. He was worried about whether or not his ass was simply too hairy to be acceptable in a fluffy, heartfelt rom-com. I don’t know what others who watched and thoroughly enjoyed Red, White & Royal Blue thought, but López definitely made the right decision, because I didn’t notice a single butt hair. And, that’s even with me watching the scene more than once, because it was assdorable…I mean, adorable! Yeah! Uh…nevermind.
Now, while Perez and his co-lead, Nicholas Galitzine, absolutely showed off some body hair (mostly via shirtless scenes), it’s not like either of them are hirsute in the extreme. It wasn't hard to find their limbs among all the flowing strands or swirls of curls, OK? But, as López noted, every little bit counts when it comes to expanding the wider definition of beauty, so I, for one, am glad he told Perez to “bring your hairy butt to set.”
