The Sessions(2012)

The Sessions (film)

The Sessions (originally titled The Surrogate) is a 2012 American independent drama film written and directed by Ben Lewin. It is based on the true story of Mark O'Brien, a poet paralyzed from neck down due to polio who hired a sex surrogate to lose his virginity. John Hawkes and Helen Hunt star as O'Brien and sex surrogate Cheryl Cohen Greene respectively.

The film debuted at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Audience Award (U.S. Dramatic) and a U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Prize for Ensemble Acting. Fox Searchlight Pictures acquired the film's distribution rights and will release the film in 2012

plot

John Hawkes plays Mark O'Brien, a man in an iron lung who decides he wants to lose his virginity. After consulting with his priest (William H. Macy), he gets in touch with Cheryl Cohen-Greene (Helen Hunt), a professional sex surrogate

cast

John Hawkes as Mark O'Brien

Helen Hunt as Cheryl Cohen Greene

William H. Macy as Father Brendan

Moon Bloodgood as Vera

Annika Marks as Amanda

W. Earl Brown as Rod

Blake Lindsley as Laura White

Adam Arkin as Josh

Robin Weigert as Susan

Rusty Schwimmer as Joan

Rhea Perlman as Mikvah Lady

Jenni Baird as Nurse Ratchet

Development

Writer and director Ben Lewin of The sessions , a polio survivor himself, first read about O'Brien's experiences with a sex surrogate from O'Brien's article "On Seeing a Sex Surrogate" on the Internet. He was looking for material on sex and the disabled for a sitcom project, and stumbled upon the article. Lewin explained, "I felt that if I could do on film what he had done to me with his writing, then I could potentially deliver something powerful.While writing the script, Lewin drew from his own experiences with polio and worked closely with Susan Fernbach, O'Brien's partner during the last years of his life, and Cheryl Cohen Greene, the surrogate.

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