Obsession's Charlie Murphy opens up on sex scenes which have left Netflix viewers cringing

Charlie Murphy has opened up about the sex scenes in Netflix's new erotic drama Obsession amid a mixed reception from viewers online.

Watch the trailer below:

The four-part drama follows the intense, S&M affair between William Farrow (Richard Armitage), a talented surgeon, and Anna Barton (Charlie Murphy), his son’s fiancée. The official Netflix synopsis teases how the affair 'spirals into a dangerous, all-consuming obsession, with devastating consequences for the whole family'.

The cast also includes Indira Varma as William's wife Ingrid Farrow, Rish Shah as Anna's fiancé Jay Farrow, Pippa Bennett-Warner as Anna’s best friend Peggy, Sonera Angel as Sally Farrow, Anil Goutam as Ingrid’s father Edward, and Marion Bailey as Anna’s mother Elizabeth.

So far, viewers have given the show's sex scenes a mixed review. Writing on Twitter, one Netflix subscriber quipped: "Why are the sex scenes in obsession so cringe?? putting me off having an affair."

Twitter

Another viewer tweeted: "Obsession on Netflix- painful to watch."

A third wrote: "Cringe!!! I still can't believe the storyline."

The series has a poor 22 percent audience score rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with a slightly better 43 percent approval rating from critics

With that said, Obsession is trending number one on the Netflix TV list.

So, how did the sex scenes come together? The two main stars kept their distance from each other after their first meeting at the table read in a bid to emulate the relationship between their characters, who don’t know much about each other.

“He fed me a few olives and then we shook hands and said goodbye,” she said during an interview with The Independent.

After the actors spent a week filming their intimate scenes together, Murphy said ‘it was a nice parallel’ as they had ‘experienced [their] world already’.

Murphy and Armitage worked with intimacy coordinator Adelaide Waldrop, who also worked on You and the 34-year-old said Waldrop’s work helped to make her feel comfortable. “It has given me more bravery to know that I have an armour on in some way, even if I’m fully nude,” Murphy said.

Netflix

Obsession is based on Josephine Hart’s 1991 novel Damage. Morgan Lloyd Malcolm adapted the novel this time around after the book was previously adapted into a film of the same name in 1992 starring Jeremy Irons, Juliette Binoche, Miranda Richardson, Rupert Graves and Ian Bannen.

Obsession is out on Netflix now.