MovieChat Forums > Poison Ivy (1992) Discussion > Drew Barrymore was a minor, so how did t...

Drew Barrymore was a minor, so how did they get Away with this?


Hey Drew Barrymore was only 16 or 17 when this movie was made in 1992. So how in the hell did they get away with filming a minor having such makeout/simulated sex scenes with some way older guy?

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Drew Barrymore had lied about her age and that's how she got in Playboy. I guess the same went with this movie.

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"Drew Barrymore had lied about her age and that's how she got in Playboy."

Are you serious? That would make that issue of playboy child pornography.

I can't be near you, the light just radiates.

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These posting under this topics are some of the silliest I have seen on the IMDB meesage boards. First of all, when Drew Barrymore posed for playboy it was in 1995 and I believe she was 19, so certainly of age. It would be pretty hard for Drew Barrymore to get away with lying about her age given the fact that she grew up in the spotlight/public eye.

My guess is that she was 16 when Poison Ivy was filmed because it was at the Sundance Film Festival which is always held in January and so the films was released in 1992. It is not illegal for actors to simulate sex on screen regardless of age because it is not real intercourse there for not illegal.

If it were the case I'm sure Adrian Lyne would have been put away for his 1997 version of Lolita.

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"It has been reported that Jaime Pressly was Barrymore's body double"
I've heard that too, in fact, read it in The Bare Facts. but that really puzzles me - Jaimie Pressly was born 30 July 1977, and the movie was released in May 1992, making her no more than 14 when it was shot.
Why have a body double who is 2 years younger than Drew?

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because a 14 year old jamie pressley is 10X hotter than drew barrymoore at any age


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I agree with that! Barrymoore looks like the dude out of mask....





I had a fish named Sam he lived in a bowl........

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I agree with ddmaingot 100%

Everyone knew Drew Barrymore, she comes for a very famous family line of actors and she was on ET! So clearly people knew who the heck she was and around how old she was. I'm sure due to ET's success her age came out, her been so young at the time. I doubt Playboy would had taken the risk of getting into some serious legal problems and been labeled as child pornography magazine.

Drew didn't have strong sexual scenes with the male actor. She had a few kisses during one scene. It's not like Drew was a virgin at the time, she was emancipated and spoke freely about using drugs and having sex at a very young age.

Also the scene where the male actor is completely naked, was carefully choreographed. He was behind her while Drew was wearing clothes. She was not naked during that scene and male actors usually have to wear a piece that blocks their private parks. It might appear like they're naked because you can see their butts but most likely they're wearing some kind of piece that looks like a sock that covers those parts.

Also, Drew was emancipated during the filming of the movie which makes her an adult.

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I know what you mean. What did she find attractive about someone who's old enough to be her grandfather?

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I think they defo used body doubles for this movie except for the obvious kissing scenes. Personally i think Tom Skerritt is actually quite handsome and charismatic regardless of his age, but in the film she only seduces him because she wants what that family have thats why she tears them apart whether intentionally or unintentionally in the end.

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So that would make you 10???? grow up,..this kinda' stuff goes on all the time, and in my book if yer 18 yer fair game!!!!!!!! If you're two consenting adult's,...yes 18 is adult, like it or not,...then what the heck??? I've been with older and younger women,...it really has noting to do with age but more with Lust, desire, whatever you want to call it,...this is 2005 so quit with the old 'valley girl' ewwwwww's and oh so gross, etc. If ya' didn't like the movie, why bother writing about it??? Or maybe you need some good 'WOOD!'


I don't think that's what the thread starter was talking about:

1)She was NOT 18 when they filmed this movie, she was only 16 or 17

2) 2005 has no relevance to this movie since it was made in 1992

Somewhere in the world, Donald Trump's 4th wife was just born.~SNL

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So that would make you 10???? grow up,..this kinda' stuff goes on all the time, and in my book if yer 18 yer fair game!!!!!!!! If you're two consenting adult's,...yes 18 is adult, like it or not,...then what the heck??? I've been with older and younger women,...it really has noting to do with age but more with Lust, desire, whatever you want to call it,...this is 2005 so quit with the old 'valley girl' ewwwwww's and oh so gross, etc. If ya' didn't like the movie, why bother writing about it??? Or maybe you need some good 'WOOD!'


Nice comment about wood. You're harping on the 'eews' of people like they need to grow up but you act like a dumb ass. I agree about the 'eews' and I don't see what difference it makes whether it's 16 with 36 or 16 with 16 and I think people are brainwashed thinking the latter is acceptable and the former not but you are a vulgar jackass.

Well what an adult is is relative. 16 is legal in most states and considered a young adult. 16 and 17 is considered adult for having certain jobs, consenting to sexual activity usually with anyone of any age above and maybe a few other things. 18 is the age where you are assumed to be fully capable of handling your own affairs and are now fully legally responsible for your actions but that is only one type of adult and ironically you're not adult enough yet to buy booze and you well know that's 21. You're also not adult enough to be president until you're 35. Everyone thinks that you're an adult at 18 but that's not entirely true. It's all relative and 18 is just one type of adult.

You aren't a child after puberty but the lingo in the courts in the USA is different from real world speak and they call you a child by default if you are under 18 but child here doesn't really mean child. A child to them is basically someone too stupid to think for themselves. This is basically the thinking in the court. You could be 60 and if the judge thinks you are mentally incompetent you are considered a 'child'. The difference between a 60 year old and a 16 year old is that the 16 year old is considered mentally incompetent by default. When they call the 16 year old child they don't really mean a child.

When ignorant people say things like 'she's only a child' they are not speaking real language but are just parroting what they heard elsewhere. Teenager and adolescent was made up probably in the last 100 years or so. I'm not sure exactly the real truth as to why but I would bet everything I have that there is money behind it.

In some states you can even be married at 15 with parental consent. For others generally marriage is allowed with parental consent at 16. Otherwise it's 18, which is twisted to me cause in my state I can jump in the sack with a 16 or 17 year old legally but if I want to do right and get married it's not allowed. Oh well. But that's just me. A lady's man like yourself probably isn't concerned about that.

by - ponderer1982 on Fri Feb 17 2006 13:31:15

I don't think that's what the thread starter was talking about:

1)She was NOT 18 when they filmed this movie, she was only 16 or 17


16 is legal in most states and 17 in others. 18 being the age of consent is only law in a minority of the states in the USA. But this is a movie and could be considered exploitation, which is illegal, but since nothing is really happening I don't see how it is illegal. In my state 16 is legal but not if I am in a position of authority. So if it's some chick I meet somewhere it's not illegal but if I were her manager at her job then it would be illegal and she'd have to be at least 18 in that case. So, maybe movies are similar cause it's business. Come to think of it all this being a minor and being a "child" is really just business, too.

2) 2005 has no relevance to this movie since it was made in 1992


I don't get this. So you can have a supposed 1992 attitude in 2005 because the movie was in 1992 when people had this attitude (even though they still do now)? You are allowed to act like a certain year even though it's 13 years later because it was something 13 years ago (at the time of your post) even when you wouldn't have that attitude if it happened now? That doesn't make any sense to me.

In that case hearing about a 14 year old with someone over 18 in the past shouldn't bug anyone that it would bother if it happened now cause it wasn't illegal before it became illegal.

It's all a bunch of BS anyway. Marriage is only allowed at 18 so it's gotta be 18 for me anyway so why should I give a crap.

PS. It's true, this does go on more often than people realize even with guys 20+ years older. Not all the time but secret trysts happen more than probably most people know or would want to know. Face it, you are basically an adult and are told you aren't at that age, but you are and if you don't act like it it's not because you are biologically predisposed to being an immature idiot - it's the fault of the upbringing and the culture surrounding us and the lack of expectation to be an adult or when they are told to be grown up they are denied adult responsibilites at the same time. This was true when I was 16. I wanted to be a man so bad I could taste but the powers that be wouldnt help or let me be. Say a 16 year old female is attracted to some guy who is 35 or in love if she knows him. She wants him and doesn't care (this sort of happens to me now and again - at least they look like they could be 16 or 17. I never asked and never entertained because of the complications but it's not cause I have a problem with it - if she's 15 and looks good and I feel attracted to her I'll admit it. If that makes me sick then so be it) What may (or may not) stop her if the guy lets her is being aware of public perception, parents and other complications that impact negatively on them and on the situation. It would be the same if say the age of consent were 30 and you were 25 and like someone who was 34 but you didn't do anything about it because of your conditioning or because you were afraid of being "lynched" (actually the older one gets the worst of it). This may sound silly but thats because people aren't conditioned that way. If it were the case it would be logical that you are still a child until you are 30. Get some pseudo science behind the argument, get some laws in place wait a generation or two and BAM all of a sudden it seems obvious and anyone who likes someone under 30 is a perv. This is all helped by the cooperation the system gets from parents who would love nothing more than to keep their babies babies for as long as possible, so this scam works brilliantly. Like I said before, I am positive there is money behind this. So, you tell people they are something they aren't or not something they are and you get people who became schizo cases because of a fu-ed up culture.

Drew Barrymore looks grown up to me in this movie. Hubba hubba.

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Drew "divorced" her parents when she was 15, so that's how they could film her in this.

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Yes, but she had a body double during the sex scenes. Jamie Pressly was her body double.

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Yes, but she had a body double during the sex scenes. Jamie Pressly was her body double.


That's not possible since Jaime Pressly is even younger than Drew.

Somewhere in the world, Donald Trump's 4th wife was just born.~SNL

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Jaime Pressly was never in 'Poison Ivy', she was in 'Poison Ivy 2: Lily' (in a dream scene), which led to her landing the lead in the third one.

Maxim interview:

Maxim: Is it true you got your big movie break as Drew Barrymore’s body double in Poison Ivy?

Jaime Pressly: No! Everybody thinks that, but I wasn’t really a body double. You see, in Poison Ivy 2, Alyssa Milano lives in Ivy’s old bedroom and has fantasies about Ivy, and that’s me. So it’s like a dream sequence, and it isn’t necessarily supposed to be Drew Barrymore... Every time Alyssa is reading Ivy's diary, she sees pictures in there, as she's reading it and imagining Ivy, that's me. You don't see my face, but that's me and as she's looking at all the pictures, all the pictures are me, because Drew wasn't going to come and do something like that. So then a year and a half, two years later that's how they found me. They couldn't find a girl and they found my picture, an old picture and called me and said, "Are you acting or anything?" Because at the time I was modeling.

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I never read that interview, but when I first saw Poison Ivy 2 and 3 (back-to-back), I just knew that Lily's daydreams about Ivy had to have been performed by Jaime Pressly, as the body was exactly the same as hers was in 3. Knowing that the rumor of her being Drew's body double was complete crap, I always figured that people were misunderstanding the fact that she was the (faceless) body of Ivy in Part 2. Yet still, she isn't credited for it...
Well, still, nice to have some suspicions verified!

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Jaime Pressly is younger than Drew and would have been barely 15 at the time. So explain that one. I think you are confusing Poison Ivy 3.

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As long as a minor isn't filmed naked in a sexual situation (and you never see her breasts and face in the same shot so it obviously was a body double), it's legal. If it wasn't, somebody obviously would have made a big deal about it by now.

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she was allowed to be semi naked because of the emancipation and that's also why she was allowed to quit high school.

christina ricci also 'divorced' her parents to enable her to extend her daily working hours.

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although i meant to add the emancipation meant drew didnt need permission from her parents to do certain scenes in this movie. im sure if jaid still had legal rights over her and agreed to poison ivy, there would have been no legal problems.

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As long as a minor isn't filmed naked in a sexual situation (and you never see her breasts and face in the same shot so it obviously was a body double), it's legal. If it wasn't, somebody obviously would have made a big deal about it by now.


It is a big deal, I'm not sure what the laws where in 1992, but it can't be much different from now because now minors are NOT allowed to be even semi nude or give the illusion of nudity, even in make out scenes they are only allowed to do things a certain way, they are not allowed to go certain places, especially since they may be working with legally adult actors in those scenes. If you read about the making of the movie "Thirteen" you'll know what I'm talking about. The emancipation had to have been the reason why she was able to get away with doing a partial nude scene.

Somewhere in the world, Donald Trump's 4th wife was just born.~SNL

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"I'm not sure what the laws where in 1992, but it can't be much different from now because now minors are NOT allowed to be even semi nude or give the illusion of nudity, even in make out scenes..."

Obviously you have not seen American Beauty. Thora Birch was only 16 AND NOT emancipated from her parents. Since the scene was only nudity and not sexually oriented, as permitted by US Law, she was ably to perform the scene. Her parents were on the set to monitor the shoot.

- Under federal law, child pornography is defined as visual depiction of minors (i.e. under 18) engaged in a sex act such as intercourse, oral sex, or masturbation as well as the lascivious depictions of the genitals. A court case in 1999 determined that mere nudity involving minors does not come under the federal definition of child porn, nor does it necessarily qualify as obscene, as the Supreme Court had ruled previously that mere nudity in and of itself does not constitute obscenity-

There you go. Everyone has now been educated. Thank me later. Oh, and for some movies that may be considered borderline illegal, see "Pretty Baby" with Brooke Shields. She was fully nude in that movie, at age ll, portrying a young prostitute. Very questionable. Also "Tender Cousins" by David Hamilton. Both movies are legal in the U.S. but seem to cross that fine line, in my opinion.

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Obviously you have not seen American Beauty. Thora Birch was only 16 AND NOT emancipated from her parents. Since the scene was only nudity and not sexually oriented, as permitted by US Law, she was ably to perform the scene. Her parents were on the set to monitor the shoot.


Thora Birch is my age so when she was 16, it wasn't that long after Poison Ivy. As I was talking about in my post that you edited out, today is different, if you are familiar with the 2003 movie Thirteen, and you have read up about how the movie was made you will know what I'm talking about, here's an excerpt from an interview with Nikki Reed (the main character):

New York, NY: Nikki - did you feel at all nervous engaging in the sexual scenes in the film, particularly at such a young age? It's hard enough for a kid to experience that kind of stuff in real life, let alone in front of the camera. Thanks.

Nikki Reed: Yes, because Kip Pardue is 25 or 26 or so, and when we were shooting these scenes we had a welfare worker on the set 24-7. When we were shooting the scenes we had zones we couldn't touch, and if you went past the zone it was illegal.It was more weird and uncomfortable, but it was also fun.


http://www.usatoday.com/community/chat_03/2003-08-21-reed.htm


Somewhere in the world, Donald Trump's 4th wife was just born.~SNL

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I really don't know what point you're trying to reach...

Sure today is different from 1992. Today is also different from yesterday. Whats your point? The laws I quoted are the current laws, not from 1992. They were the same in American Beauty (1999) and, only 4 years later, Thirteen (2003).

I am only pointing out that your statement "now minors are NOT allowed to be even semi nude or give the illusion of nudity" is incorrect, at least according to United States Federal Laws. Sure, if a minor is to be naked in a scene, I would expect the parents there and child labor representatives, as was the case for Thora Birch. This was negated since Drew Barrymore was legally emancipated.

Even so, having minors nude "or even semi-nude" is not illegal in American films. It is regulated and monitored, as it should be. But it's still not illegal.

I was in college when American Beauty came out and I was doing a paper for one of my film classes regarding child labor and nudity laws in the U.S. Nudity in itself is not problematic or illegal. What is really regulated and monitored is physical contact between a minor and an adult. Pampers and Huggies advertisments were the most common legal examples given.

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Melanie Griffith in Night Moves, Michelle Johnson in Blame it on Rio, Cristi Harris in Night of the Demons 2, & Mia Kirshner in Exotica would be some other examples of nudity by actresses who weren't yet 18.

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Also, Dominique Swain, in Lolita. She was 15, I believe, playing a 12-13 year old in that movie. She had to make out with Jeremy Irons who was in his 40's, and other sexual scenes.

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Actually Dominique was portraying a 14 year old, they changed it from the novel.

I can't be near you, the light just radiates.

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True.

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Okay this movie came out in 92 when Drew was 17. Playboy came out in 95 that would make her 19/20 so she was over 18.

I can't be near you, the light just radiates.

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Really? Check out Brooke Shields in PRETTY BABY & THE BLUE LAGOON.

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Hey, at this point she was already drinking, smoking weed, and snorting cocaine.

What hadn't she done?

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Probably moot, but regarding Swain and Irons in the Lolita remake--she was quoted as saying they had a pillow on Irons' lap when she was sitting on top of him during kissing scenes, etc.

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But by the time "poison ivy" came out she was already clean and sober.

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The movie was not made in '92, it CAME OUT in '92.

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