Stephen Graham's new Netflix series Adolescence explores the difficult question: "What would you do if your teenage son was accused of murder?" and boasts an impressive cast of British talent.
The recent drama was co-created by Stephen Graham and Jack Thorne (writer of Toxic Town), who have previously worked together on numerous projects, including This Is England and the NHS COVID-19 drama Help.
Is Netflix's Adolescence based on a true story?
In Adolescence, 13-year-old Jamie Miller is arrested for the murder of a teenage girl from his school and his family's world is turned upside-down.
Although the show, which was produced by Stephen Graham and his wife Hannah Walters' company Matriarch Productions, is not directly based on a true story, it draws inspiration from real-life themes of youth, crime, and the challenges that come with adolescence.
While the characters and events in the series are fictional, the show aims to capture the emotional and psychological complexities that many young people face when thrust into difficult and life-altering situations, and the implications that this can have on those around them.
2024 statistics from the Office for National Statistics show that teenagers are more than twice as likely to be fatally stabbed compared to a decade ago.
Speaking at a BAFTA Screening Q&A, Stephen shared why he decided to focus on this topic. "I'd read an article in the paper about a young boy stabbing a young girl, and it made me feel a bit cold.
"A few months later, there was another news report. It was a young boy, again, who had stabbed a young girl - and they are young boys. They're not men. And it was the complete opposite end of the country."
"So, if I'm really honest, it really hurt my heart. For many different reasons," the actor shared. "Predominantly as a father but also, kind of, where we're at in society for this to happen."
Was Adolescence filmed in one take?
Adolescence stands out from other crime dramas. Like Boiling Point (one of Stephen Graham's many successful shows), each episode is filmed in one continuous shot, making them essentially like plays, heightening the drama and intensity.
"Basically that means we press record on the camera, and we don’t press stop until the very end of the hour,” director Phillip Barantini told Netflix.
This meant that the cast and crew had to have "months of preparation and weeks of rehearsals" to get it right, as they only had two takes per episode - there was no filming multiple scenes and cutting them together.
“It technically is a play, and it’s the most zen I’ve ever been because it's naturalism and we are playing to the camera," Stephen shared.
“We went through every beat, through every moment, piece by piece. You immerse yourself into that character from as soon as we say ‘action’, to as soon as we say ‘cut’.”
This made the drama all the more real for the actors, particularly Ashley Walters who stars as DI Luke Bascombe. “Every day, Phil [Barantini, director] will tell you, I was in tears! Every day I was going home, crying in my script. Rocking, you know.”
"It was the hardest thing in the world. No, no it was. I was so insecure. It's a lot; I had to learn the whole script.
"And I had a lot to say in that first episode. And you're leading a lot of it, as well. A lot of it is police jargon and whatever."
Speaking of the first episode, Stephen said: "We knew, because of the technique and how we shoot, that we had to grab the audience straight away, and there's no better beginning than smashing through the door on a raid and coming into the house, pointing their guns at a 13-year-old boy."
"With that possibility, we'd grab the audience's attention."
So, for research, Ashley went on a real-life police raid with Stephen's cousin, clarifying, "he was the copper, by the way!". While the raid was anti-climatic (they entered the wrong address), it gave him some valuable experience.
"It was fun and I got to see procedure and stuff like that, but actually, the heart of that character is him being a dad. That's the connection. And, I think, for Bascombe, someone who's dealing with these sorts of cases a lot, he wanted justice for the little girl, he wanted justice for that family.
"But, on arresting this young man, there comes the question 'Why? Why is this happening?'"
Was Adolescence scripted?
Actors were given a script, but were encouraged to improvise and change words where they felt necessary to make scenes as believable as possible.
On The One Show, Owen Cooper, who plays Jamie, revealed an off the cuff moment that happened during filming with Erin Doherty (Princess Anne in The Crown), who plays Briony Ariston, Jamie's psychologist. "In episode three, it was the second take of the day - we do two takes a day, so it was the second take and you know I was tired so a yawn came to me.
"Then Erin did an amazing line, she said 'am I boring you?' so that took me back and it made made me smile because it wasn't in the scripts, I wasn't expecting that at all so it took me back a little bit but it was amazing."
Adolescence cast
Teenager Owen Cooper gave an award-worthy performance as Jamie, despite this being his very first acting role.
In an interview with ITV, Stephen said: “One of the things I'm exceptionally proud of with this production is the fact that we found Owen.
“We didn't want a young lad who had been through theatre school or drama school. Owen's a normal kid from a council estate and he's working with Margot Robbie now, yah know what I mean.”
Here's the full cast list for Adolescence:
• Owen Cooper as Jamie Miller, a suspected teenage murderer
• Stephen Graham (Boling Point, This Is England, Bodies) as Eddie Miller, Jamie’s father
• Ashley Walters (Top Boy, Missing You, Small Island) as Detective Inspector Luke Bascombe
• Faye Marsay (Bancroft, Lady Chatterley's Lover, Love, Nina) as Detective Sergeant Frank
• Erin Doherty (The Crown, Chloe, A Thousand Blows) as Briony Ariston, a clinical psychologist
• Christine Tremarco (Little Boy Blue, Clocking Off, The Responder) as Manda Miller, Jamie's Mother
• Mark Stanley (Happy Valley, White House Farm, Trigger Point) as Paul Barlow
• Jo Hartley (In My Skin, This Is England, After Life) as Mrs. Fenumore, Jamie's teacher
• Amélie Pease is Lisa Miller, Jamie's older sister
Where did they film Adolescence?
Filming for Adolescence began in July 2024 and took place in Yorkshire at Sheffield and South Kirkby.
"We knew it was going to be set somewhere in the North of England, and we also knew it would be from somewhere around wherever our Jamie was from — in this case near Warrington — because it would have been unfair to make him do an accent,” Philip Barranti said.
Adolescence release date
On the 13th of March, all four episodes of Adolescence were released on Netflix.
Arabella Horspool is a Commercial Content Writer for Yours at Bauer Media. She's a bookworm who is passionate about TV, film and theatre. She enjoys cooking, cinema trips, playing board games and walking her three dogs.