What shows did you get into this year, over our various lockdowns?
I watched a lot of stuff. That’s all we could do really, apart from eat – I worked out a lot, too. I fell in love with 90 Day Fiancé, which I think is the most brilliant reality show on TV right now. I loved the latest series of Insecure, and Gangs of London with Paapa [Essiedu, Opia’s I May Destroy You co-star]. I loved I Hate Suzie, and Adult Material – Hayley Squires did a fantastic job. That was a brilliant little find, and it was so interesting to learn about the porn industry and the human side of it.
And were there any series you got into that you might not have ordinarily watched?
I couldn’t stop watching Ted Lasso on Apple TV+. I was like, what is this actually about? An American who coaches American football comes to the UK to a weird team and is … teaching them football? But it was just nice, simple and uplifting – it was a little treat to forget about the world and just watch something wholesome.
Is there a show you hope comes back in 2021?
The Good Wife spin-off, The Good Fight, with Cush Jumbo. I need that to come back so badly. That’s one of my favourite shows. It’s politically charged and was very blatantly anti-Trump – it’s been interesting to watch them find creative ways to trash him. I’m also looking forward to the new stuff that’s going to come out of this period. A friend of mine, Nicôle Lecky, is doing a BBC show called Superhoe, based on a one-woman show she put on at the Royal Court. I’m excited to see new projects, especially from black creatives and other people of colour – I believe this year has been the trigger to open those doors.
What was it like to witness the huge reaction to I May Destroy You?
It was pleasant [laughs]. It helps that everyone loved it – I just kept seeing loads of praise. I was really happy to see that people got it. They understood it. There were so many different things to take from the show, so everyone could relate at some level. People might have had some degrees of separation from what happened in the show, but they could still feel it. I had a friend who I haven’t spoken to in ages call me, and we were on the phone for a good hour having a discussion about it. I would never have expected him to have watched it, but he said it taught him a lot. It touched a lot of people regardless of where they were from, what gender they were or their sexuality. Being in something like that has also informed the kind of work that I take going forward as an actor. I want to do things that I feel will affect people.
The show also kickstarted big conversations on social media on subjects such as stealthing, the non-consensual removal of a condom during sex
Yes, and obviously, the different degrees of prosecution for it – it’s seen as a sexual crime in the UK, but in the States, it’s not. I’d never heard of stealthing before the show. I think I said to Michaela, is this something that happens all the time? She said yes, and then I went and did my own research, and I was like, it’s wild that people experience this. The show was educational in that way, but not in the sense of “let’s sit down and do a lecture”.
The show was a bit different in that it dropped weekly rather than all in one go
Yeah, I loved that. It reminded me of waiting to watch a show when I was younger, and looking forward to it. At least we had two episodes a week in the UK – in the US they had one a week, so they were way behind us! I think having that weekly drop meant that a lot of people could have discussions, and have a roundtable or a Zoom with their friends. And because it was so heavy, with so many issues, I think it was a brilliant way to break it up and allow it to be consumable – I personally don’t know how anyone could binge it. Plus, I was on telly for six weeks.
A common observation was that the characters were very nuanced – no one was all good or all bad in that world
There were a lot of complexities. I did get a few people say “I hate Terry, Terry’s a horrible friend [to Bella]”, and then I also had people Tweet “oh my God, I wish I had a friend like Terry”. It’s human nature. Nobody is perfect. We all have our flaws, our issues and our complexities. And I think Michaela did a fantastic job of humanising all our characters.
• I May Destroy You is on BBC iPlayer
