Kyle MacLachlan was trying to keep Elizabeth Berkley "steady" during their over-the-top pool sex scene in Showgirls.
The pair played love interests Zack Carey, a casino entertainment director, and Nomi Malone, a young drifter, in the 1995 erotic drama, which followed the latter as she hitchhiked to Las Vegas to chase her dream of becoming a big-name showgirl.
Reflecting on the sizzling romp scene during a panel at New York Comic Con (NYCC) on Saturday (10.10.26), Kyle, 67, told Esquire’s Eric Francisco: "That, yeah, the scene was... that was a crazy scene.
"I mean, you know, it’s so funny because when you’re doing them, you’re basically just trying to survive. I mean, I was trying to survive. [And] trying to keep Elizabeth, you know, steady so she wouldn’t fall off and drown, you know?
"By the end of the night, I was exhausted. So you don’t, you know, you’re sort of like, 'Well, I hope that was good.'"
Per Entertainment Weekly, one fan admitted that the raunchy moment in the film brought "endless joy" to their movie nights with pals, and Kyle replied: "I’m so glad to hear that. That’s the whole point, right? At the end of the day it’s entertainment."
Kyle was "wholly enthusiastic" to join the cast of Showgirls because he was a huge fan of its director, now 88-year-old Paul Verhoeven.
However, the entertainer had quite the reaction when he saw the finished result.
Kyle quipped: "Cut to seeing it for the first time, I was like, 'Oh my god.' It was very... yeah, my eyes were blind."
But, he does have some highlights from starring in Showgirls.
Kyle said: "First of all, I got to play kind of an evil guy that looks like he’s a good guy, you know. It was one of the first times that I actually got to do that, and it was a challenging movie, you know?
"I mean, to be quite honest, I was not as attentive as I should have been during the filming."
Last month, the entertainer said his raunchy Sex and the City scenes left him "terrified".
Kyle played Charlotte York's (Kristin Davis') handsome but sexually troubled first husband Trey MacDougal in the HBO romcom series, which saw the character strip off, being drenched in baby oil and becoming the target of impotence jokes.
He told The Sunday Times about taking the role, which left him "terrified", adding: "Every week I would think, 'Oh God, what are they gonna have me do this time?'
"And it was HBO, so you don't even know if you're going to have your clothes on or not. Any sense of propriety just had to go out the window."
Kyle's performance included the memorable declaration "We have lift-off!" when Trey finally overcame his sexual difficulties.
The storyline became so closely associated with him that viewers began shouting jokes about it when they encountered him in public.
Kyle said people would yell: "Good luck getting it up tonight, Trey!"
The star would respond: "Thank you!"
But Kyle admitted his private reaction was: "Oh my gosh…"
One scene proved particularly embarrassing.
Trey was required to play tennis wearing only boxer shorts and trainers, but Kyle discovered simply taking his clothes off was not enough for the production.
He said: "OK, so I get there, and the make-up girls start rubbing all this baby oil onto my chest. I said, 'I think that's enough now.' And they said, 'Oh no, it's not!'
"And then they pretty much baptised me with baby oil, and I thought to myself, oh boy, oh boy… but I've come to accept that whatever I do is going to be a little bit different."