Murder(?), mystery, and steamy love scenes are but a few of the things that are bound to spark audience interest in Strictly Confidential. The other is the fact that the new thriller was written and directed by Damian Hurley and stars his mum, Elizabeth Hurley (Gossip Girl, The Royals, Austin Powers, Bedazzled). Georgia Lock (Evermoor), Lauren McQueen, Freddie Thorp, and Genevieve Gaunt round out the attractive young cast in this soapy, sexy Caribbean-set outing from Lionsgate.
The lowdown: It’s the anniversary of Rebecca’s (McQueen) death, and Mia (Lock) returns to the Caribbean paradise where she and her best friend shared her final days. Mia can’t shake the trauma and sets out to uncover the mysterious death. No sensual thriller is void of devilish twists. Strictly Confidential piles them high. Fans of Gossip Girl, Riverdale, Sliver, or A Simple Favor will no doubt be pulled into this seductive world of sex, betrayal, and murder. All that and provocative love scenes with Elizabeth Hurley filmed by her… son. The mother/son duo unpack all that and more about the filmmaker’s first cinematic outing in this exclusive MovieWeb interview. Read on.
The Tragedy That Inspired Strictly Confidential
Strictly Confidential (2024)
- Release Date
- April 5, 2024
- Director
- Damian Hurley
- Cast
- Georgia Lock , Lauren McQueen , Elizabeth Hurley , Freddie Thorp , Pear Chiravara , Max Parker
- Runtime
- 89
Damian Hurley grew up in the public eye. His mother, Elizabeth Hurley, was already a movie star when he was born in the early 2000s. Stepping into show business seemed like a perfect fit, but it wasn’t until the pandemic hit that Hurley fully solidified his commitment to his future. When asked about the genesis of Strictly Confidential and what inspired him to write and direct it—Elizabeth Hurley is also one of the producers—he said:
“I first came up with the idea for this film when I was 17. Me and my friends lost a very close girl from our friendship group to suicide. And it was a really horrific, devastating time. At the time, I saw tons of my friends really struggle to not only comprehend it, but actually refuse to accept that it had happened.”
He continued, sharing his experience of losing another loved one in his life, “Although I could sympathize with them, I couldn’t really understand what they were feeling until my biological father took his own life the year afterward,” he explained. “I really pulled on that when I was writing this film. You know, it’s about a young girl who refuses to accept the mysterious circumstances surrounding her best friend’s suicide and goes on a desperate quest to find the truth.”
Filming Those Sensual Scenes in Strictly Confidential
Elizabeth Hurley found fame in the 1990s thanks to the Austin Powers films starring Mike Myers. There was also the tabloid-tracking heated romance with Hugh Grant. Other film comedies, such as Bedazzled and EDtv, revealed her natural ease with the genre. Provocative films and TV roles, such as The Weight of Water, Mad Dogs and Englishmen, Gossip Girl, and The Royals, offered a mix of mystery and sensuality. Strictly Confidential blends the latter, revealing several eye-popping scenes between Hurley’s Lily and Pear Chiravara’s Natasha. Hurley has filmed steamy scenes in the past, but not in front of her own son. And without an intimacy coordinator, no less. How did that go down?
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“To be honest, filming the intimate scenes for Strictly Confidential actually felt really liberating,” Hurley admitted. “It was a good feeling as an actress to have someone who I knew was completely on my side, on the other side of the camera; somebody who wanted to make the best scenes possible, wanted me to feel comfortable and to really [have] my character shine through and to get it right. I just felt relaxed having Damian there because we have a sort of—Damian calls it our twin telepathy. And it just worked really well. Some people think perhaps that was awkward. It wasn’t awkward. It was actually just wonderful.”
Elizabeth Hurley Says She Is ‘Very in Sync’ With Son Damian
Leaping off Hurley’s “twin telepathy” comment, we asked the actress when she knew she and her son Damian had a unique connection. “I was the single mother of a single child,” she said. “So, by default, we were each other’s confidants quite early on in Damian’s life.”
Damian Hurley’s father, Steve Bing, died by suicide in June 2020 at the age of 55. Having raised a child on her own created a deep bond. “It wasn’t really until [the] COVID lockdown that suddenly we spent a great deal of time together,” Hurley added. “And that’s when I think his creative juices really started to flow as well.” During his youth, Hurley wrote his first short film before moving on to draft Strictly Confidential. Elizabeth Hurley added:
“I think we just realized then that we were very in sync. We both loved the same things in show business. We wanted to achieve the same thing with his first movie. I realized that I really wanted to devote some of my time to his projects and give him that start in the industry that he’d chosen. And we have a shorthand, which I think really helps. On some levels, it means we’re probably ruder to each other than you would be to another work colleague, because, you know, we’re family.”
“Rude” yet loving, and Hurley went on to say that those blunt reveals actually speed things up. “The biggest thing of all is that we love each other, so that on set he could say to me, ‘Mom, you missed your mark.’ Which of course for another actor, he couldn’t be so rude. ‘And I can say to him, ‘Damien, you’ve got five minutes to get out of this building, we’ve got another location to get to.’ As a producer, I wouldn’t go and speak to another director like that. So, in fact, we quite like working together. It works.”
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Elizabeth Hurley Told Her Son to Avoid Show Business
Sure enough, if you come from a showbiz family, you’re bound to watch some your clan’s work. Damian Hurley did. “My favorite growing up, obviously, Austin Powers, Gossip Girl, The Royals, Bedazzled, I always loved my mom’s work.” Deciding to be a filmmaker is a big decision, however. Was there any advice his mother gave him about entering the industry?
“Well, initially it was to not enter the entertainment business. Everyone in the industry, including myself, would tell anyone who wanted to come into the industry—don’t. It’s a beast industry and it’s torturous. But at the same time, there’s nothing we’d rather do. I can’t think of another industry in the world I could possibly dare to be in. Once mum understood I wasn’t going to become a banker or a lawyer or an astrophysicist, she got totally behind it every step of the way and has been so ludicrously invaluable.”
“I can’t imagine having tried to attempt this project without a creative producer on totally unequivocally Team Damian,” he added. “I don’t know how it would have been. It certainly wouldn’t have been such smooth sailing.” Strictly Confidential hits theaters and is available On Demand April 5. Watch the trailer below.
