By Matthew Moore

Copyright hellomagazine

The biggest series of the past year has to be Netflix’s drama, Adolescence, which made it into the ‘Top 10’ of every single country where Netflix tracks drama. The series, which covers the fallout of a schoolboy murdering a female peer, prompted discussions about the manosphere, misogyny and incel culture, and it reached the highest echelons of government. The series was also critically acclaimed, receiving a 98% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes and dozens of awards. It scooped six Emmy Awards, including one for 15-year-old actor Owen Cooper, who became the youngest Emmy winner in history.

However, its success has earned ire from more traditional media, with Louisa Compton, the news and current affairs boss at Channel 4, saying: “We’ve developed and nurtured the talent that has allowed Netflix to come in as TV tourists and effectively commission [Adolescence].” The vice president of production in EMEA/UK for Netflix, Anna Mallett, responded to the accusations during an appearance at the Royal Television Society’s Cambridge Convention.

She explained: “We are not a tourist. Adolescence is a great example of our strategy, which is to make local UK content for local UK audiences. And it’s fantastic that it’s resonated globally. Netflix has been operating in the UK for 15 years. Over the last four years, we’ve invested £6bn, we’ve worked with 200 production companies, thousands and thousands of cast and crew. So we see ourselves very much as part of the ecosystem focused on audiences.”

Louisa’s comments mirror those of Mona Qureshi, a fellow Netflix executive, who said: “My initial response is consternation. I don’t think I’m a tourist – I’ve been around. Nothing about where I am, where we sit, and the conversations we had about Adolescence comes out of anything other than us, within the UK network team, being solely about finding shows and speaking to our local audience. We are all part of the same ecosystem.

“Adolescence simply came out of something which is us reading a script and responding to this fantastic creative team and just being utterly compelled by delivering from the get-go… No one’s thinking global, let’s make something globally. It’s just about being in tune with what the local market wants, and what we as commissioners feel inspires and compels us.”

Inspiration for Adolescence

Speaking at the BAFTAs, Stephen Graham, who wrote and starred in the series, said of the show’s inspiration: “I read an article in the paper about a young boy stabbing a young girl, and it just made me feel a bit cold. And then about three or four months later, there was a piece on the news, and it was a young boy, again, who stabbed a young girl. And they are young boys. They’re not men.”

The father-of-two continued: “It really hurt my heart for many different reasons, but predominantly as a father, but also like, where are we in society for this to happen? Today we don’t know what our children could do in their bedrooms, the possibility of the internet.”