Penn Badgley’s wife Domino Kirke-Badgley addresses claims she asked him to stop doing intimate scenes

Domino Kirke-Badgley, Penn Badgley’s wife, has issued a lengthy statement responding to the accusations that she asked her husband to stop doing sex scenes.

The 42-year-old British-American singer and doula took to Instagram on Tuesday (29 September) to set the record straight and clarify the truth.

For context, Penn, 39, who’s best known for his roles in Gossip Girl and the Netflix thriller You, revealed in 2023 that he requested that his character, Joe Goldberg, have fewer intimate scenes in the fourth season of the TV show.

As reported by The Mirror, speaking on his Podcrushed podcast, he told his co-host: “I asked [showrunner] Sera Gamble, can I just do no more intimacy scenes.”

He explained: “This is actually a decision I made before I took the show. I don't think I have ever mentioned it publicly.

“One of the main things was, do I want to put myself back on a career path where I'm always playing the romantic lead?”

The actor went on to explain: “Fidelity in every relationship, including my marriage, is important to me. It's got to the point where I don't want to do that, so I said, ‘my desire would be zero, to go from 100 to zero’.”

He acknowledged, though, that he had signed up for the show, and the X-rated scenes were in the ‘DNA of the concept’ of You.

He said, “So how much less can you make it, was my question to them. She didn't even bat an eye.

“She was really glad that I was that honest. She was sort of almost, I want to say empowered, it had a really positive response. They came back with a phenomenal reduction.”

Now, as we say, Domino has come forward to straighten things out and explained that her husband stepped back from the steamy scenes for his ‘own mental health reason’.

She wrote in the caption: “A few years ago, the internet decided I’d asked my husband to stop doing sex scenes. The truth is, my husband decided to do this for his own mental health reason.

“After working in the industry since he was just 12 years old, believe me, it was time. In the entertainment world, they call actors ‘puppets’ behind their backs, and it’s even more disturbing when they start out as child actors.”

Domino continued in a video: “I continue to get DMs about this thing that happened about three years ago, where my husband decided that he didn’t wanna do intimacy scenes anymore, meaning he didn’t wanna have sex or do any of that, which was really major in his industry because that’s the thing. They like you to do the most. And the characters that my husband has played over the years, people have come to expect that he will continue to play that guy.

“So, when he decided he didn’t want to do this anymore, I was super happy for him, very proud of him because I understood how major it was.”

“I want to say to those of you who still DM me about my husband deciding to do this for himself and his mental health - get over it.”

She also explained how, having been a birth professional for 17 years, she sees a ‘ LOT of similar patterns to those in the entertainment world’.

Domino wrote: “Caregivers are so ready to be invisible, collapse, disappear, or take direction no matter what.

‘They’re constantly allowing folks to blaze past their boundaries all in the spirit of being accommodating or in my husband’s case, entertaining. They’re ok with being forgettable.

“Sometimes I ask people what their doula's name was, and they’re like “oh I don’t remember!” So finally, after years of trying, Penn decided to take a stand and let the world see him. And guess what, he hasn’t lost fans and he’s still getting hired!”