THERE was “so much nudity” in One Night Only, director Will Gluck has revealed — but most of it didn’t survive the edit.

The romcom, starring Callum Turner and Monica Barbaro, originally featured far more explicit sex in the background of its New York City setting. Gluck says he shot it that way because he wanted to show the world of the film as it was written, including naked couples having sex “on the streets.”

But once the film started being shown to audiences, Gluck noticed a consistent reaction: people would physically shift when nudity popped up in a big shared space. He says viewers would turn to the person they were with, and the moment would pull focus from the story rather than add to it.

Gluck puts that down to changing attitudes around sex on screen — arguing that nudity has moved into a more private realm now it’s something people can access “on your phones at home.” In a packed cinema, he says, adult scenes can make audiences uncomfortable.

So he kept cutting. Gluck says the team edited the film again and again until they hit a balance and those audience comments disappeared.

One Night Only is set during an annual evening where premarital sex is legal, and follows Allie (Barbaro) and Owen (Turner) as they meet while dodging the city-wide commotion of singletons hooking up. Gluck also says the production cast real-life couples as extras — with couples at different stages, including some who broke up during filming and some who became couples.

The premise has already been compared online to The Purge — just with sex instead of crime — but Gluck insists the film isn’t about explaining the rules of the world. He wanted that alternative reality to sit in the background while the story stayed with the characters.

One Night Only is in cinemas now.