The screenplay was written by Dan Greenburg, who wrote the original source novel, Philly. Greenburg appears as the manager of a motel in the film.
Private Lessons was one of Kristel's few major American film appearances; she was better known to European audiences for her Emmanuelle films which had only limited distribution in the United States. In early 2006, a 25th anniversary DVD release was issued in North America.
Plot
Philip "Philly" Fillmore is an adventurous 15-year-old boy and the son of a rich businessman in Phoenix; when his father leaves town on an extended trip during summer break, the young man is left in the passing care of Nicole Mallow, a French housekeeper, and Lester Lewis, the family's chauffeur.
Nicole playfully teases Philly for his constant leering at women. Resenting her initially, Philly later becomes infatuated. When Nicole goes out shopping, he sneaks into her room and touches her underwear. He frequently uses his binoculars to observe her through windows, deliberately walks by her when she is sunbathing beside the pool, and rides his bicycle past her room. One night, after spotting Philly peeping into her room, she tells him to come inside and, to his utter shock, starts undressing in front of him. However, when a fully nude Nicole invites Philly to touch her, it proves too much for him. He panics and leaves, but not before thanking her. He shares the story with his best friend Sherman.
Next morning, Nicole invites Philly to visit her at night. After a game of tennis with Sherman, Philly looks for Nicole but does not find her in her room. While searching, he is surprised to find her in his father's bathtub. She requests him to rub her back and then invites him to remove his clothes and join her in the bathtub. At first, Philly objects, but she keeps sweet-talking him until he finally gives in. However, he decides to wear swimming trunks. Once in the bathtub, she starts kissing him. When she tries to take off his swimming trunks, he insists that she turn off the lights first. She agrees, but once she touches him, he again panics and rushes out. She apologizes, passionately kisses him good night, and directly invites him to sleep with her, to no avail. After flirting in a movie theater the following evening, they return home and kiss. Feeling nervous and not knowing what to do in those situations, Philly asks her to marry him. After she reacts without fondness to the notion of being his wife, he backs off and leaves. After a day's hiatus, the two reconcile and decide to go on a romantic date to a French restaurant where their love blossoms. After returning home, they have sex.
During intercourse, Nicole pretends to have a heart attack and die. Panicked, Philly asks Lester to help him hide evidence of his relationship with Nicole. Lester knows Nicole is pretending but helps to make Philly believe she really died. The two men bury her in the mansion's garden. The "body" later disappears, and a note orders Philly to steal $10,000 from his father. If he does not do this, the note says, his role in Nicole's "death" will be exposed.
In reality, she is an illegal alien, and Lester is using this secret to blackmail her into helping him in his scheme. He was the one who told her to seduce Philly and fake her death during sex.
When Nicole has second thoughts, Lester threatens to expose her as a child molester. Having truly fallen in love with Philly, she nonetheless reveals the truth to him. The two convince his tennis coach to pose as a police detective and intimidate Lester with questions about Nicole's disappearance. Lester panics but is caught with the money before he can flee the country. Nicole and Philly return the money to the safe, but decide not to expose Lester's treachery. In turn, he reluctantly decides not to expose Nicole's illegal alien status nor her acts of child molestation. As a result, he keeps his job.
Nicole fears that Philly's father will eventually discover their affair and decides to leave. Before she does, she and Philly make love one last time. When summer vacation ends, Philly returns to high school and immediately gets a date with Miss Phipps, one of his teachers.
Dan Greenburg wrote the film's screenplay, which he adapted from his own 1969 novel Philly. Producer R. Ben Efraim would produce a number of additional Private... movies over the next decade, including 1983's Private School (which features a brief appearance by Kristel), and two in-name-only sequels to Private Lessons in 1993 and 1994.
During the bedroom striptease, Judy Helden performed as the body double for Kristel.
The film was financed primarily by Jack Barry & Dan Enright Productions, even though its two chief producers, Jack Barry and Dan Enright, were better known for their game shows on television, of which Barry was the host and Enright the primary producer. The company's announcer at the time, Jay Stewart, provided the narration for one of the movie trailers for the film.
The film was also the first picture for Jensen Farley Pictures (a subsidiary of Sunn Classic Pictures), a movie studio founded by Rayland Jensen (founder of Sunn Classic Pictures) and his fellow employee, Clair Farley.[6] Sunn, initially a subsidiary of the Schick razor company, would be sold to Taft Broadcasting in 1980, shortly before this film's release.[7] Jensen Farley Pictures was created after the sale to Taft, and one of the company's early releases was a film produced by Taft, The Boogens, initially planned for release through Sunn. Jensen Farley would later release another sex comedy whose selling point was the promise of a young man coupled with an alluring older woman, Homework with Joan Collins.
Director Alan Myerson and the cinematographer he hired, Jan de Bont, shot their principal photography for the film in Arizona and New Mexico over the course of 6 weeks during the summer of 1980.
In 1985, the film was made in Italian as Il peccato di Lola (Lola's Sin) starring Donatella Damiani.
