"Pretty much every actor I speak to — and I come into contact with many every day — have a story of either their own experience, or someone that they were in a show with, that ranges from the uncomfortable to the downright abusive."

Claire Warden is a frequent confidante due to her work: she specialises in intimacy and sex scenes for stage and screen productions.

"I've heard of full, actual, physical, sexual assaults as part of filming … I've heard of many people getting physically hurt, as well as emotionally and psychologically hurt; of directors deciding that they would take off their clothes and play the part of the actor with young actors," she tells ABC's Stop Everything!

The New York-based British theatre practitioner is what is known as an "intimacy director" (or in the screen industry, "intimacy coordinator").

It's a role that involves not only choreographing simulated sex scenes, but ensuring safe spaces for actors to perform these scenes — which sometimes include depictions of sexual assault and violence.

It isn't a new profession — but unsurprisingly, demand for this work is rising in the wake of #MeToo.