Jake Gyllenhaal, like many others before him, harboured a huge crush on his co-star Jennifer Aniston when they had to film s3x scenes together – which made it rather awkward

Jennifer Aniston’s Hollywood co-star Jake Gyllenhaal has admitted filming s3x scenes with the Friends icon was “torture” – because he had a huge crush on the actress.

The pair starred together in 2002 romantic dramedy The Good Girl as two discount store colleagues who decide to spice up their lives with a steamy affair.

The s3x scenes were about as racy as you’d expect – but for Jake, rather painful to boot.

He opened up about his experiences on Howard Stern’s radio show, with the host asking him: “You did a movie with Jennifer Aniston. The movie was called The Good Girl.

Jennifer Aniston starred alongside Jake Gyllenhaal in The Good Girl (Image: Fox Searchlight Pictures)
“And you have even said, gee I had such a crush on Jennifer for years, and all of a sudden I ended up in these romantic scenes with her. It was torture for you, as an actor?”

Jake candidly confessed: “Oh yeah, it was torture. Yes it was, yes. But it was not torture. I mean, come on! It was a mix of both.”

Howard then pressed him: “Did you say to Jennifer Aniston, ‘Listen Jennifer, I’m not trying to be rude here, but if you’re feeling something, a protrusion or anything, I can’t control…’ Did you have that conversation?”

Jake confessed s3x scenes with Jen were ‘torture’ (Image: The Howard Stern Show / YouTube)
Laughing, Jake quipped: “Yeah, just like that. I said ‘protrusion’ or whatever.”

But on a more serious note, Jake admitted: “Weirdly, love scenes are awkward because there are maybe 30, 50 people watching it. Maybe if you have a closed set, it’s less. That doesn’t turn me on. So most of the time it’s oddly mechanical.”

He went on: “And also it’s a dance, right? You’re choreographing for a camera. You could get in it, but it’s like a fight scene. You gotta choreograph those things.

“But in terms of [the scene with Jennifer] I don’t really remember. I do remember a pillow, the pillow technique was used. That was just pre-emptive and used always when we’re actually in a horizontal place in that movie.

Jake was harbouring a huge crush on the Friends star at the time (Image: Dale Robinette/Fox Searchlight/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock)
“I remember those two characters did a lot of making out on boxes in a back room.”

Howard joked: “What a wonderful thing, a pillow saved you. She didn’t know what was going on…”

“I think it was actually Jennifer’s suggestion,” Jake explained. “She was like, ‘I’m putting a pillow here’.”

The pillow technique means a pillow acts as a physical buffer between two actors to create the illusion of having s3x with a comfortable barrier between the stars.