When somebody enters a 12-step program to deal with addiction, it's meant to be an all-encompassing, life-changing process — and one we don't always hear about.
But in Stuart Blumberg's romantic comedy Thanks for Sharing, which hits theaters this weekend, the 12-step program is front and center. In this case it's for people struggling day to day with sex addiction, forging bonds with their fellow addicts and sponsors.
And, in the case of the character played by Mark Ruffalo, with a new girlfriend (Gwyneth Paltrow). Indeed, the film's central storyline is about what happens when someone with an addiction tries to connect — to open up to — someone who doesn't share that burden.
"One of the really tough parts about this addiction is, sex becomes a drug," Blumberg says. "It doesn't become, necessarily, an avenue for exploring intimacy. And ostensibly, you want sex to be exciting and fun and thrilling, but you also want the ability to share tender feelings. And in the stories I heard [while doing research], the thing that was most challenging for a lot of people was recombining those two things."
Sex is everywhere at the movies, of course, but it's often sex for sex's sake, presented because it's time to show someone's body. But Blumberg, who was one of the writers behind The Kids Are All Right and The Girl Next Door, says that in Hollywood stories, sex is "not often looked [at] with an unflinching eye."
Blumberg talked with All Things Considered host Audie Cornish about making a movie about topics, and relationships, that are typically, and often intentionally, very private.
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