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‘I Touch Myself’: The Divinyls hit that took the shame out of female masturbation

Used in Netflix’s ‘Sex Education’ and covered by everyone from Tori Amos to Pink, the 1990 song spoke truth to a culture in denial, writes Helen Brown

Wednesday 26 February 2020 07:43 GMT

Raunchy riffing: Divinyls frontwoman Chrissy Amphlett performs on stage in 2007 (Getty)

Sex Education, one of the best and most popular shows on Netflix last year, returned for a second series early this year. The opening scenes celebrated the show’s smart and loveable 16-year-old hero, Otis, finally overcoming his neuroses and learning to masturbate. The comic montage had the perfect soundtrack: Scala & Kolacny Brothers’ euphoric choral cover of Divinyls’ 1990 hit “I Touch Myself”.

The Australian rock band were formed in 1980 by singer Chrissy Amphlett and guitarist Mark McEntee. Born in the industrial port city of Geelong, Victoria (also the birthplace of Neighbours theme tune crooner Barry Crocker), Amphlett was a pioneering punk provocateur who said: “My idols had always been the unsafe, the dangerous, the edgy, like the punks, Iggy Pop, Keith Richards, Debbie Harry and Jerry Lee Lewis.” She busked her way around France and Spain in her early teens, sleeping on the streets when her options ran out.

Back on the Australian pub-rock circuit, she performed in fishnets and a schoolgirl’s outfit, using the stage to express both her volatile sexuality and her “ugly side”. Her habit of squatting to sing gave rise to the urban myth that she urinated on stage. Off stage, she “spat out friends, lovers and associates like stale chewing gum”, according to Melbourne newspaper The Age. Her stormy romance with McEntee was the key to Divinyls’ electricity.

The band got their first break on the soundtrack to the 1982 film Monkey Grip, based on Helen Garner’s sexually frank and feminist debut novel. But by the end of the 1980s, second-wave feminism had migrated from punk to pop culture. Cyndi Lauper sang – albeit obliquely – about female masturbation on 1984’s “She Bop”. In May 1990, Madonna defied the Toronto police and kept the auto-erotic dance section accompanying “Like a Virgin” in her Blond Ambition show.

Around this time, Amphlett and McEntee hooked up with American songwriting duo Billy Steinberg (mostly lyrics) and Tom Kelly (mostly music), who had written “Like a Virgin”, “True Colours” for Lauper and “Eternal Flame” for The Bangles. They liked to say the reason they wrote for women was because Kelly’s voice was high, so his melodies came pitched in keys better suited to the female range. But the emotional directness of Steinberg’s lyrics appealed to women seeking to speak truth to a culture in denial.

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

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1/21The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Jon Hamm and Kristen Wiig – Bridesmaids (2011)

Bridesmaids opens on a booty call between Kristen Wiig’s character and Jon Hamm’s, and involves Wiig getting thrown around a lot by the six-foot-two actor. “I am not a small human being,” he told Playboy in 2012. “I weigh at least 200 pounds… and Wiig is a twig, she’s a skinny little thing. I told her, ‘Just punch me in the side if I’m hurting you.”

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio – Revolutionary Road (2008)

Sex scenes are awkward enough without adding the fact that your partner is the director. In this case, Kate Winslet’s then-husband Sam Mendes was instructing her and her co-star Leonardo DiCaprio. “I just kept saying, ‘This is too weird,’” she told The Telegraph. “And Leo was like, ‘Oh get over it.’ And I’m going, ‘Yeah a little reminder. You’re my best friend. He’s my husband. This is a bit weird.’” Hopefully Winslet now feels it was worth it, as she won a Golden Globe award for Best Actress for her performance.

Getty Images

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan – Fifty Shades of Grey (2015)

Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan had a notorious lack of chemistry in the critically loathed Fifty Shades series, but maybe it can be blamed on the torturous hours they had to spend simulating sex. “It’s pretty tedious,” Johnson told Interview magazine. “We’re not having actual sex. But I’ve been simulating sex for seven hours straight right now, and I’m over it.”

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Robert Pattinson and Julianne Moore – Map to the Stars (2014)

Sex scenes are supposed to be hot and steamy, but things got a little too hot for Robert Pattinson while he was filming with Julianne Moore for Map to the Stars. “It was so hot in Toronto [where the movie was filmed] and she’s one of these people – she doesn’t sweat at all,” Pattinson told Heat magazine. “I sweat a lot. I was literally trying to catch drops of sweat to stop them hitting her back! Afterwards she was like, ‘Are you having a panic attack?’ It was so embarrassing.”

AFP/Getty Images

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Sienna Miller and Ben Affleck – Live by Night (2017)

When you’re shooting a sex scene with someone you view as a brother or sister figure, it’s bound to feel a little awkward. For Sienna Miller, working on the crime drama Live by Night with Ben Stiller was fine until it came to the bedroom scenes. “It’s hysterical,” she told E! News. “There was a lot of stupid giggling. He was very professional – I am not, but he is. Obviously by the time nine hours of it has gone past, I was shaking with tears running down my face. You have to laugh.”

Getty Images for Veuve Clicquot

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Christopher Mintz-Plasse – Superbad (2007)

Those awkward teenage years provide the backdrop for Judd Apatow’s hit comedy Superbad, but it’s unlikely actor Christopher Mintz-Plasse thought it would result in an awkward moment of his own. Because he was underage when he played McLovin, his mother had to accompany him on set – including for a scene where his character loses his virginity. “I had to fake intercourse in front of her,” he told GQ. Yikes.

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Jason Momoa and Emilia Clarke – Game of Thrones (2011)

Game of Thrones drew a lot of criticism for its portrayals of sex, but it sounds like the cast had fun filming at least a few of them. Emilia Clarke, who is now firm friends with her former co-star Jason Momoa, went into hysterics when he decided to switch a normal modesty sock for a fluffy pink one.

HBO

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Ryan Reynolds and Olivia Wilde – The Change-Up (2011)

Ryan Reynolds admitted to Jay Leno that he accidentally removed co-star Olivia Wilde’s nipple pasties while shooting The Change-Up, then tried to put them back on again. “She has those pasties on, but she’s drawn those adorable little smiley faces on them,” he said. “And I forget every line in the scene – not just from this movie but from every other movie I’ve done. At some point she takes my hands and puts them on her breasts… I take my hands away and I look down at my hands and there’s two frickin’ smiley faces on them and I have no idea what to do. And I, reflexively, like an idiot, just put my hands right back on her breasts.”

(Photo credit should read ANGELA WEISS/AFP/Getty Images)

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Gucci Mane – Spring Breakers (2013)

While most actors would worry about getting “over-excited”, Gucci Mane had the opposite problem. The rapper, who was so tired by the time he arrived on set from a concert in St Petersburg, he fell asleep during a sex scene. Director Harmony Korine told Vulture he blamed it on the weed Mane and his entourage had been smoking all day. “I’d never in my life filmed a sex scene when the dude was sleeping… and she was on top of him for a good 45 minutes,” he said.

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The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Henry Cavill – The Tudors (2007)

One of the most talked-about sex scene mishaps emerged when Henry Cavill admitted he got “over-excited” while shooting a scene for The Tudors. He told Men’s Fitness: “A girl had to be on top of me, and I hadn’t rearranged my ‘stuff’ into a harmless position. She’s basically rubbing herself all over me and um, it got a bit hard. I had to apologise profusely afterward. It’s not great when you’re in a professional acting environment and somebody gets [excited] is it? No, not acceptable.”

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The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Anne Hathaway and Jake Gyllenhaal – Love & Other Drugs (2010)

Anne Hathaway experienced one of her most embarrassing moments while shooting Love & Other drugs with Jake Gyllenhaal when she accidentally flashed the entire crew. “I have to remove my trench coat and be nude underneath,” she told Hollywood Life. “And I thought we were filming, but it turned out we were just rehearsing and I got unnecessarily [unclothed] in front of a lot of people!”

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The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Jesse Metcalfe and Eva Longoria – Desparate Housewives (2012)

Jesse Metcalfe revealed he got a little overexcited in his gardener's first ever sex scene with Eva Longoria’s character. “We were rehearsing," he told radio station 106.5 Sacramento, "and then the director was like, 'OK, get out of bed, we have to reset the set,’ and I was like, 'I need a minute.'"

ABC

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Kristen Schaal and Will Forte (2015)

There’s nothing like a fart to ruin the mood, and no one knows that better than Kristen Schaal who let one rip on Will Forte. "Carol is aggressively and sexually talking to Phil – that's a lot of diaphragm work, which is also in the danger zone of where the beans are,” she revealed on Late Night with Seth Meyers. "Finally, I just looked at Will and I was like, 'I’m gonna fart on you.' And I did. If you fart on your scene partner it's the most intimate you can get."

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Allison Janney and Michael Lerner – Life During Wartime (2010)

Allison Janney’s first ever sex scene was with Michael Lerner and it led to the latter being taken to hospital. “We had to have sex up against a wall and they started spraying us with glistening stuff to make us look sweaty, but no one seemed to realise that we were standing on a marble floor,” she told People. “They said action and he… pulled me up against the wall and his feet slipped out from under him and he went crashing down on the floor.”

AFP/Getty

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Margot Robbie and Leonardo DiCaprio – Wolf of Wall Street (2014)

Having sex on a pile of money, as Margot Robbie discovered, can really do some damage to your back. Recalling a scene she filmed with Leonardo DiCaprio, she told The Daily Beast: “I got a million paper cuts on my back from all that money! It’s not as glamorous as it sounds… when I got up off the bed, I turned around to get my robe and everyone gasped. I said, ‘What is it?’ And they said, ‘You look like you’ve been whipped a million times. Your back is covered in a thousand red scratches.’”

Paramount

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt – Passengers (2016)

When Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt went in for their characters’ first kiss, their bulky spacesuit chest plates got in the way a little. "We didn't know that was going to happen,” Lawrence told USA Today. “So they called 'Action’ and we went to kiss. And it was like, Donk! Donk! Our heads couldn’t reach each other. We had a good laugh about it, and we incorporated it into the movie."

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Paul Rudd and Aisling Brea – Living With Yourself (2019)

A slight wardrobe mishap made an intimate scene between Aisling Bea and Paul Rudd pretty awkward. "We had a very funny moment when the nipple covers I was wearing slipped off mid-way through a sex scene.” Bea told Sunday World magazine. “I guess they were just a bit sweaty, and I looked down and they were gone.”

CHRIS DELMAS/AFP via Getty Images

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Margot Robbie and Alexander Skarsgard – The Legend of Tarzan (2016)

Director David Yates revealed that Margot Robbie – who played Jane opposite Alexander Skarsgård's Tarzan – may have got a bit carried away during the filming of a sex scene. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, he said he asked Robbie to slap Skarsgård while their characters were making love. “The only bruise he picked up during the entire shoot was probably that punch from Margot. Which says a lot about her feistiness."

Courtesy Everett Collection/REX/Shutterstock

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Ashton Kutcher and Natalie Portman – No Strings Attached (2011)

A slight wardrobe mishap made an intimate scene between Aisling Bea and Paul Rudd pretty awkward. "We had a very funny moment when the nipple covers I was wearing slipped off mid-way through a sex scene.” Bea told Sunday World magazine. “I guess they were just a bit sweaty, and I looked down and they were gone.”

Getty Images

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Dave Franco and Halston Stage – Bad Neighbors (2014)

Unfortunately for Dave Franco, the morning of his sex scene with Halston Stage he woke up with a spotty bottom. "I had a giant pimple on my ass... It sucks, right?” he told E! News. “I had to go to the makeup artist and be like, 'Can we go in the other room and you'll put makeup literally on my ass?' So that was that."

Getty

The 21 most awkward sex scene mishaps

Adam Brody and Kristen Bell – House of Lies (2012)

Kristen Bell was pregnant when filming her sex scenes with Adam Brody, an experience the latter found very “awkward”. He told E! News: "It was very, very, very awkward for, I would say, about five minutes and then it was awkward in how normal it was. We were sandwiching her child in-between our stomachs."

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Steinberg met Amphlett in a Hollywood club where, he says, “I nervously pulled out my notebook and allowed her to look through the lyrics.” One of the songs in there was “I Touch Myself”. “I had written the first verse and the chorus lyric and that’s the one she liked best.”

Although the title line is directly sexual, the verses clearly link the physical to an emotional connection between lovers: “I love myself, I want you to love me/ When I feel down I want you above me/ I search myself, I want you to find me/ I forget myself, I want you to remind me.”

The sexual tension is ramped up to 11 by McEntee’s raunchy riffing and Amphlett’s vocal, which crescendos from a series of questioning “oohs” to an orgasmic “Ahhh-ah-ah-ah!” with each abandoned syllable still hitting the beat.

The video – shot in a convent – was banned in Australia but proved an MTV smash. The song paved the way for musicians such as Tori Amos, Pink, Pussycat Dolls, Nicki Minaj, Beyoncé and Carly Rae Jepsen to sing about female masturbation without shame.

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Amos and Pink are among the many artists to deliver slower and more sultry covers of the song. There was also a horrifying cover by convicted paedophile Rolf Harris, which nobody should have to hear ever again. The best reworking is definitely the Scala & Kolacny Brothers’ version recorded in 2003.

Tackling the topic happily together as a young and unbefishnetted collective, the fresh-faced Belgian choir remove the lingering sense that self-love is an act of rock’n’roll rebellion only available to the gorgeous, reckless Amphletts of this world.

When Amphlett was diagnosed with terminal breast cancer, she repurposed the song to encourage other women to examine their bodies for lumps. She died in 2013, aged just 53. The following year, the Cancer Council NSW launched the breast cancer awareness project “I Touch Myself”, with a sobering video and emotive acoustic cover featuring 10 leading female Australian artists, including Olivia Newton-John and Sarah Blasko. The line “Think I would die if you were to ignore me,” is revised as: “Think I would die if I were to ignore you.”

In 2020, there are women who owe Amphlett not just for kicking her stilettos through centuries of sexual taboos, but for their lives.

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