casting couch

Helen Hunt Will Play a Sexual Surrogate in The Surrogate

Photo: Frederick M. Brown/2011 Getty Images
Photo: Frederick M. Brown/2011 Getty Images

Helen Hunt will play the title role in the upcoming film The Surrogate, which stars John Hawkes as Mark O’Brien, a polio survivor who is paralyzed from the neck down and seeks out a sexual surrogate for his first sexual contact. Moon Bloodgood and Rhea Perlman have also joined the cast, though not as surrogates, which is probably good for everyone. That does not sound promising. But! The film is based on a true story, and O’Brien, a journalist and poet, wrote about that experience in a 1990 article that’s incredibly moving and beautiful; it’s a striking meditation on personhood and sexuality. O’Brien died in 1999, but he’ll appear in the film in archival footage. [Variety]

Helen Hunt Will Play a Sexual Surrogate in The Surrogate