Sexual consent, identity and power in spotlight on Neighbours – and beyond

Her niche is “working on intimacy that intersects with cultural specificity, like race, gender, body size, nationality or religion”.

The role of intimacy co-ordinator came into existence after #MeToo exposed widespread sexual mistreatment of female actors in Hollywood.

Now, productions are going a step further and consulting on the depiction and wellbeing of diverse groups. Productions also consult men, whose concerns around intimacy have often been overlooked, Turner says.

“We find that men are having their own forms of distress around not wanting to hurt anybody … men are very vulnerable because they’re not necessarily part of the conversation in the way we expect women to be.”

Although consent is a society-wide issue, “there are no other jobs on the planet where part of your job is to simulate relationships”.

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Fiona McCormack, who lobbied for affirmative consent laws in Victoria, says by focusing on how intimacy is depicted, Neighbours was “demonstrating how it can be done”.

“It’s brilliant that this kind of effort is being made,” says McCormack, the Victims of Crime Commissioner, formerly the chief executive at Domestic Violence Victoria.

“I’ve often been asked by people from a range of backgrounds about what they could do about issues of violence against women – well, here’s a fantastic example of the role the movie and television industry can play in really influencing positive change.”

Education about things like consent can come in many formats, McCormack says, “none so powerful as on our screens. In a way, it’s a tacit message that this is the new norm.”

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Stovall, who will appear later this month in the Melbourne Theatre Company’s first all-black production, Is God Is, says these changes in approach “increase the likelihood that the ‘diverse’ actor is not at the bottom of a power ladder looking up at people who all represent something they’re not”.

“When I see a person with an intersecting identity to mine on TV, but her hair is straightened, and she’s surrounded by people not like her, and she’s only a one-dimensional character, it reinforces the idea that my skin is a novelty, but everything else should be just like the status quo.”

Jason Herbison, the Neighbours executive producer of nearly a decade, says he would like to see more diverse people on production teams.

“I would love to see more writers from diverse backgrounds coming through our training programs and working on the show,” he says. “The more diversity we can get in the writers’ room, the more authentic the stories will be on screen.”

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