Let’s get physical.
Penn Badgley made headlines in 2023 when the “Gossip Girl” alum, 38, spoke out against sex scenes and revealed he’d asked the “You” creators to cut back on them.
However, in the fifth and final season, which is now streaming, his character, Joe Goldberg, steams up the screen several times.
Penn Badgley attends Netflix’s “You” Season 5 New York Screening at the Plaza Hotel on April 23, 2025, in New York City. Getty Images
“I had to throw that out the window,” Badgley told People in an interview published Thursday.
Badgley explained, “That was the question again. All right, what am I willing to do? And as I always said, I said, my desire is that least as possible, but if it’s necessary, that’s the show we all sign up to make. So, let’s make sure it’s vital, let’s make sure it’s important, it’s deliberate. And we did.”
The Netflix thriller “You” follows Goldberg, a man who thinks of himself as a bookish and sensitive romantic, but he’s really a killer.
In the fifth and final season — spoiler alert — he has an affair with a bookish woman named Bronte (Madeline Brewer). She ultimately helps bring about his downfall after the two have several steamy bedroom intervals.
In 2023 when “You” Season 4 was airing, Badgley said on the Podcrushed podcast, “I asked Sera Gamble, [the] creator, ‘Can I just do no more intimacy scenes?’”
Madeline Brewer as Bronte, Penn Badgley as Joe Goldberg in “You” Season 5. CLIFTON PRESCOD/NETFLIX
Domino Kirke, left, and Penn Badgley attend a special screening of the fifth season of Netflix’s “You” at the Plaza Hotel on Wednesday, April 23, 2025. Charles Sykes/Invision/AP
He added, “This was actually a decision I had made before I took the show. I don’t think I’ve ever mentioned it publicly, but one of the main things is, ‘Do I want to put myself back on a career path where I’m always [the] romantic lead?’”
Badgley married his wife, Domino Kirke, 41, in 2017. The singer is the sister of “Girls” star Jemima Kirke, 39, and actress Lola Kirke, 34. Badgley is the stepfather of Domino’s son Cassius, 16, who is from a previous relationship.
Badgley and Kirke also have a son named James, 4, and she’s currently pregnant with twins, due in the summer.
Penn Badgley as Joe Goldberg in “You.” CLIFTON PRESCOD/NETFLIX
“Fidelity in every relationship, and especially my marriage, is really important to me. It just got to a point where I don’t want to do that,” Badgley said in 2023, referring to sex scenes.
“It got to a point where [I thought], ‘I don’t want to do that,’ so I said to Sera, like, ‘My desire would be zero [intimate scenes], to go from 100 to zero.’”
For his part, “Outlander” star Sam Heughan, who has tangled in the sheets on-screen many times, told The Post in January that sex scenes are “just a part of the story.”
Penn Badgley as Joe Goldberg, Charlotte Ritchie as Kate in “You.” Courtesy of Netflix
Griffin Matthews, from left, Madeline Brewer, Penn Badgley, Charlotte Ritchie, and Anna Camp attend a special screening of the fifth season of Netflix’s “You” at the Plaza Hotel on Wednesday, April 23, 2025, in New York. Charles Sykes/Invision/AP
However, Badgley turned his back on that “no sex scenes” mandate for the last season of “You.”
The actor told People that he felt like the show “really had to return to form,” with Joe being seen as “a romantic icon” in the final season.
“He’s been a profound experience for me. He’s not a real person. So what have I been doing? I’ve been engaging in this … my entire 30s,” Badgley explained of his character. “I was 30 when I took the role. I’m going to be 39 this year. Even though the show, the way it came out, it’s actually been closer to seven years. For me, it’s like my 30s.”
He added that Joe “taught” him a lot about “what it is to be a man by knowing what it is not.”
The former “John Tucker Must Die” star quipped, “And I don’t mean the obvious things like, oh, don’t murder, that’s bad. That’s very clear.”
