Ben Hollingsworth says one of Virgin River’s steamiest moments came at a painful price. In a new interview with Entertainment Weekly, the actor who plays Brady revealed that filming the sex scene atop his character’s motorcycle in season 7, episode 9 left him with back pain that lingered for weeks — but that the awkward positioning was worth it for the emotional payoff on screen.
The sequence, which plays out just before Brie (Zibby Allen) bursts into Brady’s future workshop, sees Brie straddling Brady as he lies back on the bike and rips open his shirt. Hollingsworth described the chemistry between Brady and Brie as “raw sexy,” noting the pair’s spontaneity sets them apart from other couples on the show, like Mel (Alexandra Breckenridge) and Jack (Martin Henderson). He said the moment was pitched to him as even wilder than the pool-table encounter in season 6 — “This scene would make the pool table blush,” he recalled.
What viewers don’t see is the physical toll. “The human body is not meant to have sex on a motorcycle,” Hollingsworth told EW. He described arching his back over the bike and said, “My back hurt for weeks. Talk about an ab workout … It might’ve translated as pleasure or lust on screen, but Ben Hollingsworth was in pain!” The actor framed the discomfort as part of the job and part of capturing the couple’s spontaneous dynamic.
Hollingsworth also explained why the scene’s placement late in the season mattered. He said he knew the scene would happen but didn’t expect it to land in episode nine, and that waiting made it feel earned emotionally. “When you earn something, it does kind of set the mood for the audience because they feel fulfilled,” he said, adding with a laugh that pleasing his onscreen partners emotionally reminded him of pleasing his wife in real life. The actor first joined Virgin River in 2019 and has been a steady presence through the show’s seven-season run.
The interview arrives as the season’s finale has left fans reeling. In the closing moments of season 7, Brady is involved in a brutal motorcycle crash that leaves his fate ambiguous. Asked whether he knows if Brady survives, Hollingsworth replied, “I do — but I can’t tell anyone!” He said reading the script for the finale gave him a chill and briefly made him wonder if the character was finished on the series.
Virgin River season 7 is currently streaming on Netflix. Hollingsworth’s comments add fresh detail to the behind-the-scenes story of the season’s most talked-about scenes and underscore how production choices — from staging to placement in the season — were aimed at giving long-running character arcs a climactic, if physically demanding, payoff.
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