Bound (1996)
GRAMERCY PICTURES/COURTESY EVERETT COLLECTION
Lana and Lilly Wachowski’s stylish erotic debut may be more popular and beloved by lesbians or gay men.
The pairing of Gina Gershon as tough ex-con plumber Corky and Jennifer Tilly as Violet, a kind of lethal Betty Boop, is as lubricious as it gets.
“I’ll bet your car is 20 years old,” says Violet, sizing up Corky in her grease-smeared tank top. “Truck,” Corky corrects her, with a mouth fixed in a sneer.
Things really start to crackle between them once they hatch a plan to lift a $2-million mob stash and pin it on Violet’s money-laundering boyfriend.
The intimacy of the sex scenes adds passion and urgency to the thriller, while the often ludicrous, famously quotable dialogue offsets the violence with hint of camp.
Actresses Downed Tequila and Chocolates Before Filming Lesbian Love Scenes
Gina Gershon and Jennifer Tilly join THR’s ‘It Happened in Hollywood’ podcast to talk nervous agents and the early genius of the Wachowskis.
What’s the secret to Bound‘s steamy, same-sex love scenes? Tequila and truffles, it turns out.
Gina Gershon and Jennifer Tilly recently talked about the making of the 1996 noir — the pulpy, lesbian thriller that served as a debut for Lilly and Lana Wachowski, three years before The Matrix made the director siblings household names.
Its frank depictions of gay sex were considered risky at the time. “Gina knew right away that she wanted to do it,” says Tilly, who plays Violet, girlfriend to a mobster (Joey Pantoliano) who falls for Gershon’s Corky, an ex-con. “But I was trepidatious. The script was one of the best scripts you ever read. But then you think two first-time directors, Dino De Laurentiis as the producer — we could easily get into a Roger Corman sort of arena. I was a little bit nervous.”
“I get this tingly feeling sometimes when I’m in the presence of really great directors,” says Gershon of her first meeting with the Wachowskis, noting that she asked specific questions about how they intended to bring their own screenplay to life. “Their answers were so clever and so visionary and so different. I thought they were incredibly gifted and like secret geniuses.”
Gershon had just wrapped Showgirls, the hotly buzzed-about follow-up feature from Basic Instinct director Paul Verhoeven and screenwriter Joe Eszterhas.
Recalls Gershon, “I said, ‘Listen, [Showgirls] isn’t going to be what you think it’s going to be. You need to find me a movie right now that shows them a real actress.’ And so I wanted to go in on Bound just because I loved the writing.”
Over the protests of her agents, who thought the lesbian content would kill her career, she signed on to play Violet.
The pair had electrifying screen chemistry — and broke the ice with some booze.
“And chocolates!” adds Gershon, who remains close to Tilly almost 30 years later. “You always forget that I also brought you chocolates. I was the perfect date.”
