Cobie Smulders whispered 'inappropriate' things to 'How I Met Your Mother 'costar Josh Radnor before' 'sex scenes

Yahoo

19-05-2025

Cobie Smulders knew exactly how to set the mood before filming sex scenes with Josh Radnor on How I Met Your Mother.
Smulders played Robin, the object of Ted's (Radnor) affection for a majority of the long-running sitcom, and she revealed on Monday's episode of Radnor and co-creator Craig Thomas' How We Made Your Mother podcast that she would whisper "extremely inappropriate" things before filming scenes in bed together.
"Josh and I had quite a few intimate scenes, and so I would try to, as much as humanly possible, before we would roll, whisper something to Josh that was just extremely inappropriate," Smulders said. "We have something in acting called 'the moment before,' which is typically used in an audition [where] you have to land as soon as they roll... there's been a whole life, so you have to create this moment before. So I felt, as a good scene partner, I should lay out what the moment before was. And typically it was what we just did. And usually it was sexual."
"Because there were a lot of post-coital scenes, yeah," Radnor agreed.
Smulders laughed at how she was just being a "giving actor" to her scene partner by laying out what their characters had just done in bed before the scene began.
"I feel like I'm an amazing scene partner and I'm just thinking about the other person and making sure that they're comfortable, making sure that there's a connection there," she said while Radnor laughed. "And so I would just sort of set us up before we actually started the scene in our speaking roles, just with like, 'This is what just transpired between us.' And usually Josh would not be able to say anything and his face would turn that color for those who are watching."
Thomas confirmed that Radnor was "turning beet red" as Smulders told this story. "It's one of my favorite things," Smulders added.
But when the show's co-creator asked for an "appropriately-worded example" of what Smulders would whisper to Radnor, she refused to share any details. "Just think of the worst possible thing and that's really what I [said]," she teased.
Radnor explained that while their costar Neil Patrick Harris, who played womanizer Barney on the show, could be "disgusting" when whispering things to him before a scene began as well, Smulders took the cake with what she'd come up with. "Neil has a real ability to be gross," Radnor said. "He is nothing compared to the depravity that Cobie Smulders laid out."
Thomas laughed as he admitted he and the other producers "never knew" this was happening on set in the almost decade-long run of the series. And Radnor praised Smulders for how she would finish saying her comments right before the director called "action," often leaving him speechless.
"She would time it in such a way that she would finish saying [it], she would stick the landing, and they would say 'action,' and I couldn't speak," Radnor said. "They're fond memories, but I also was immobilized by Cobie's visionary. You could monetize this in some way, Cobie, like if acting stops, you know what I'm saying? I think you could write just the filthiest romance novels... I'm telling you, you have a real talent for spinning the dirtiest webs of narrative, it was always shocking to me. Delightful in its own way."When Thomas once again tried to get more details on what Smulders said, the actor said it's just between her and Radnor. "Only Josh and I know exactly what was said, and the context of what was said, and how it was delivered," she said. "But now you know what was going on."
"Your imagination is free to wander," Radnor added. "And I'm also incredibly breakable. I'm easy to break. But I think probably in some of the blooper reels, when you see me laughing is probably in response to something [she said], if you see us in bed."
How I Met Your Mother originally ran for nine seasons, from 2005 to 2014. While the majority of the series revolved around Ted's on-again, off-again love for Robin, (spoiler alert for something that's been out for over a decade!) he ultimately married and had children with Cristin Milioti's Tracy, who joined the series in the season 8 finale through all of the ninth and final season. However, the series finale revealed that after Tracy got sick and died young, their children encouraged Ted to get back together with Robin years later.
Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly