Featured Image Credit: Randy Shropshire/Variety via Getty Images / Columbia Pictures/Getty Images
Topics: Film and TV, Celebrity, Brooke Shields
Niamh Shackleton
Topics: Film and TV, Celebrity, Brooke Shields
Brooke Shields has reflected on some of the uncomfortable things she had to do as a 14-year-old actress.
Shields, now 58, made her acting debut at the age of just 11 in 1978 film, Pretty Baby, playing the role of prostitute Violet and having to take part in intimate scenes.
Shields later starred in The Blue Lagoon in 1980, which was also of a racy nature.
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The film's synopsis reads: "In the Victorian era, two kids, Emmeline and Richard are shipwrecked on a tropical island in the South Pacific. The two live a simple life, unaware that in due course, sexual maturity will intervene."
Emmeline (Shields) and Richard (Christopher Atkins) were cousins and go on to have a baby together.
Decades on from the controversial movie, Shields has reflected on her role in The Blue Lagoon and the things she had to do.
Speaking on her Now What? With Brooke Shields podcast with her former co-star Atkins (who is four years her senior), she said: "Never again will a movie be made like that ever. I mean, it wouldn't be allowed."
Atkins went on to allege that the nude scenes in the film were 'important' to director Randal Kleiser.
The young actors were also encouraged to have tans, with production even setting up 'little thatched areas' so they could get tanned without tan lines.
Atkins continued: "There were scenes where I was butt naked with you, if you remember, sliding down that slide and things like that.
"And that was a little awkward, but it was kind of funny for me because at this point in time I would just do it. But your reaction was: 'Ugh, oh god.'"
Shields went on to claim that, while she had a body double for nude scenes, she was encouraged to pursue a real-life romance with her co-star.
"They wanted us so desperately to fall in love with each other," she said. "I did not react well being forced into feeling anything. I hadn't even kissed anybody by that age."
Shields has spoken out about The Blue Lagoon on a handful occasions and, in her documentary that was released earlier this year, she hit out at the film's director for wanting to exploit her ‘sexual awakening’.
"They wanted to sell my actual sexual awakening," Shields said. "The irony was, I wasn’t in touch with any of my own sexuality."
Kleiser is said to have tried to contact Shields, but the 58-year-old has opted to avoid answering his calls.
“I don't feel like bringing any of it back up again,” she said of her decision.