Let’s face it: there’s nothing sexy about coronavirus. And of the many ways the pandemic has upturned everyday life, the weirdest has to be on TV and film sets, where producers have taken to shooting intimate scenes with mannequins.

Among them is CBS soap opera The Bold and Beautiful, where lifeless mannequins have been used in place of actors when shooting intimate scenes and hospital scenes from a distance.

“At first, we took out the love scenes, and the show was falling a little flat because we’re all about romance and family interactions,” Bradley Bell, the executive producer of the show, told the Independent. “One of the first ideas we had was to bring in mannequins for the intimate scenes and hospital scenes, and it’s working quite well – we’re shooting it from a great distance or in a way you can’t see the form is inanimate.”

Also considering mannequins are producers on TV shows like Riverdale, The L Word: Generation Q, and Dynasty, who are planning on a mix of safety protocols and narrative tricks. These include quarantining cast and crew, strict testing measurements, on-set medical professionals, clever camera-work, and innuendo-filled scripts. Presumably mannequins will also come into play.

The protocols are in line with The Safe Way Forward, a lengthy document written and agreed by four major Hollywood unions: SAG-AFTRA, the Directors Guild of America, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, and the Teamsters. It suggests a “zoned” approach to production that limits the numbers of people on set where PPE is not possible. 

The document also calls for a capping of work days at ten hours to allow for cleaning protocols, and COVID-19 testing for all cast and crew, with some rapid tests (results of which are delivered in less than 12 hours) available for actors performing intimate scenes.

“We’ll definitely see an increase in specially trained professionals on set,” Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, the chief operating officer and general counsel of SAG-AFTRA, told the Independent.