Who We Are

Intimacy Professionals Association is both an agency and an educational organization. It is the first agency in the world to solely specialize in representing intimacy professionals, including intimacy coordinators, trans consultants, expert topic consultants, and choreographers. As experts in the field of intimacy work, we are able to connect productions with professionals who are appropriately matched to their project. IPA’s clients are recognized experts in their chosen fields.

In addition, IPA is an educational organization and offers intimacy coordinator training programs. IPA-certified intimacy coordinators have undergone extensive training to acquire the necessary skills and knowledge to become an intimacy coordinator. Along with training intimacy coordinators, IPA also offers educational programming and consulting services for studios, production companies, and other industry groups.

IPA has been working in partnership with SAG-AFTRA on their initiative to standardize and codify guidelines for intimacy coordinators. IPA was a primary contributor to the SAG-AFTRA Standards and Protocols for the Use of Intimacy Coordinators, and continues to work closely with the union.

IPA was founded by Amanda Blumenthal, the first intimacy coordinator for film and television in Los Angeles. Amanda is an experienced intimacy professional and is passionate about creating safe spaces on set in which actors can do their best work.

Amanda is a sought-after expert and speaker on the topic of intimacy coordination due to her deep experience in the field both as an intimacy coordinator and a trainer of other intimacy coordinators. She works closely with corporate clients such as Netflix, Amazon, and Sony on intimacy coordinator training and implementation in the US and abroad and is a specialist in the Asia-Pacific region. Additionally, she has spoken at the Sundance Film Festival, Women in Film, Film Independent, American Film Market, Women’s Production Society, Diorama Film Festival, Ghetto Film School, the USC Peter Stark Production Program, and more. She also consulted with the Producer’s Guild of America (PGA) on developing materials for their Independent Production Safety Initiative (IPSI) program and was a contributor to the Time’s Up Guide to Working in Entertainment.

Prior to her career as an intimacy coordinator, she worked as a sex and relationship coach with private clients. Amanda completed advanced training in the Somatica method and provided clients with a unique therapeutic experience that combined verbal processing with somatic experiencing. She is a trauma-aware and kink-friendly professional and uses this expertise to inform her work as an intimacy coordinator.

Amanda has been actively involved with advocacy work related to sexuality since college, serving in leadership positions in groups such as Advocates for Survivors of Sexual Assault and Sex Positive Los Angeles. She graduated from the University of Southern California School of Gerontology with a degree in Human Development and Aging.

To learn more about Amanda, please visit her website www.intimacycoordinator.com

Ginny Nugent

Ginny Nugent is a former Senior Vice President, Production, for Home Box Office, Inc. She was responsible for supervising the schedules and budgets of HBO original series, films, and miniseries. Some of the productions she worked on during her time at HBO include the Emmy®-winning and Golden Globe®-winning Temple Grandin, The Normal Heart, Grey Gardens, Elizabeth I, and Behind the Candelabra. Additionally, during her time as an SVP she oversaw the original series Silicon Valley, Euphoria, His Dark Materials, and the miniseries Chernobyl and Catherine the Great.

Prior to HBO, Ginny was a producer on various studio and network films including the Golden Globe® nominated Anywhere But Here starring Susan Sarandon and Natalie Portman, BAFTA Children’s Award-winner Paulie with Gena Rowlands and Tony Shalhoub, Hush featuring Jessica Lange and Gwyneth Paltrow, The Craft with Robin Tunney, Fairuza Balk and Neve Campbell, Emmy®-winning Cast a Deadly Spell featuring Fred Ward and Julianne Moore, Emmy® nominated Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe starring Lily Tomlin, and Tremors with Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward.

Ginny has also served as an adjunct professor in the USC Peter Stark Producing Program. She began her film career as an assistant to veteran director/producer/writer Roger Corman (Little Shop of Horrors) at New World Pictures, working with him from 1982 to 1985. Ginny holds a bachelor’s degree in Communications from Stanford University.

Scott Schofield

Scott is a transgender man who jokes that at some point in his life he is or has been lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and straight. He is regarded as one of the top speakers in the U.S. on the topic of transgender sensitivity and inclusion. Considered one of his generation’s trailblazers in the movement for transgender liberation—openly trans since 2000—Scott has used his lived experience and intersectional analysis to change the nondiscrimination policies of several major universities, coach conservative CEOs at Fortune 50-500 companies to trans sensitivity in the workplace, and teach youth tools for the self-esteem that living an authentic LGBTQ life requires. His TED Talk, “Ending Gender” is used for its welcoming accessibility, from board rooms to dinner tables. 

As a professional actor, he has toured the U.S. and Europe, was the first openly transgender actor in daytime television with a recurring role on CBS’s The Bold and the Beautiful, and starred as a 1920’s transgender jazz musician in the feature film The Conductor. As a writer, he was a finalist for two Lambda Literary Awards, in the Transgender and Drama categories. As a producer, he has created and cast for both scripted and unscripted shows.

Named a “Trans Influencer of Hollywood” by OUT Magazine, Scott is a retained consultant and trainer for the GLAAD Media Institute and oversees special projects in Transgender Media & Representation. He consults from script to screen on feature films and episodes on networks and screening platforms. At GLAAD, he trained District 2 of IATSE in how to welcome trans actors and crew; media trained trans and non-binary actors who want—and do not want—to use their platform for social justice; and worked with creatives and executives to revamp their vision and execution of trans storylines. 

To learn more about Scott’s work, please visit his website www.speakingoftransgender.com.

Erik Stuart

Erik is a Senior Vice President and Strategic Planning Leader for Wells Fargo, where he leads strategic initiatives for senior executives and the Board of Directors. Previously, Erik was the head of corporate strategy for eBay Inc., where he led strategy efforts across the PayPal, Marketplaces, and eBay Enterprise business units. Prior to eBay, Erik worked for E2open, a B2B startup providing marketplace and supply chain integration solutions for the electronics industry, and for McKinsey. He holds an undergraduate degree in Physics from Princeton University and a Ph.D. in Economics from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Erik has been an active proponent of the visual and performing arts for many years. During his time at Stanford he served in leadership positions for the musical theater organization Ram’s Head, and has since helped Ram’s Head to establish an endowment as a member of the Alumni Board of Directors. Erik has also completed extensive training in the Somatica method, which is a modality of intimacy and sexuality coaching.