Why is ‘Red, White & Royal Blue’ rated R?

Amazon’s newest gay romcom, Red, White, & Royal Blue, is set to make a splash on the platform when it premieres on August 11. Based on the Casey McQuiston book of the same name, the movie stars Taylor Zakhar Perez and Nicholas Galitzine in a romantic tale of enemies to lovers. With an R rating, though, you might be wondering how explicit the film gets — is it kiss-and-fade-to-black, or something more raunchy than that?

Why is Red, White, & Royal Blue rated R?

The film’s reviews have noted that the chemistry between Galitzine and Perez is intense and passionate. The novel on which the movie is based has more than a few sex scenes between their characters, and it sounds like the movie won’t be shying away from showing the intimacy between the two. That’s not a guarantee that the film will be anything more explicit than your average PG-13 fare, though.

Gay romance has always been rated a bit harsher than its straight counterpart. Sex between two men, even if it’s only an implication in a scene, is often viewed as a greater taboo by the rating board than sex between a man and woman is. That makes it a little challenging to determine whether or not the film will actually be all that salacious.

Officially, Red, White, & Royal Blue is rated R for ‘language, some sexual content and partial nudity.’ There will likely be some steamy scenes between Perez and Galitzine, but nothing too revealing.

What’s Red, White, & Royal Blue about?

Perez plays Alex Claremont-Diaz, son of the first female President of the United States of America, Ellen Claremont (Uma Thurman). Galitzine portrays Prince Henry, the son of the reigning King of England, James III (Stephen Fry). The two could not be more different; while Alex aspires to be President himself one day, Henry can’t wait to get away from all of his responsibilities and duties.

Although Alex views Henry as a boring snob, the two become embroiled in a scheme to publicly present themselves as best friends following an international gaffe. The two, of course, begin to develop something more as they spend more time together, but the pressures of fame and the responsibilities of their positions might just keep them apart.

The film promises to be a pretty fluffy gay romance — a breath of fresh air and a milestone when you consider that most gay romances (the few that there are, at least) end in tragedy.