Adolescence ’s Stephen Graham has issued a warning to parents about the dangers of the internet.
The 51-year-old is the star and co-writer of the new acclaimed Netflix series, which follows the family of 13-year-old schoolboy, Jamie Miller, who is accused of the brutal murder of a young girl. Graham plays Jamie’s father, Eddie.
Shot in one-take, each episode follows characters in real time as they attempt to get to the bottom of the incident. Exploring topical issues including incel culture, misogyny and the online “manosphere”, Graham was inspired by news reports of stabbings of young girls.
“I read an article about a young boy stabbing a young girl,” the A Thousand Blows star told The Independent. “And then maybe a couple of months later, on the news there was [another] young boy who’d stabbed a young girl, and if I’m really honest with you, they hurt my heart.”
He explained that the storyline explores a complexity of topics, and that parents need to be “mindful” of the external influences working on their children.
“It’s just being mindful of the fact that not only we parent our children, and not only the school educates our children,” he said. “But also there’s influences that we have no idea of that are having profound effects on our young culture, profound effects, positive and extremely negative. So it’s having a look at that and seeing that we’re all accountable.”
Graham wanted to explore the wider influences affecting young boys from “ordinary” backgrounds.
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Graham plays father Eddie Miller who is dealing with his son being accused of the brutal murder of a young girl (Courtesy of Netflix)
“We wanted him to come from an ordinary family,” he said. “We wanted to be mindful from the very beginning that there was no way you could point the finger. Dad wasn’t particularly violent in the house and didn’t raise his hand to mum or the boy or his daughter. Mum wasn’t an alcoholic. Jamie wasn’t abused sexually or mentally or physically.”
He said the series then asks the question: “Who is to blame? Who is accountable?”, and the answer is not straightforward. “Maybe we’re all accountable family, school, society, community, environment.”
The Boiling Point actor went on to unpack the “microcosm of the home” and “the macrocosm of the world outside”, explaining that the separation no longer existed.
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‘Adolescence’ deals with the issues faced by young boys (Netflix)
“When we were kids, if you got sent to your room or if Kenny Everett was on the telly, and it got a bit racy, you’d be sent to your room and then you couldn’t watch it,” he reflected. “But today even within the context of that home, when lads and girls go to their bedrooms, they have the world at their fingertips.”
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Adolescence does not deal with Andrew Tate or incel culture directly, an intentional decision by writer Jack Thorne to shed light on the complex influences impacting young people and explore “male rage”.
“The kids aren’t watching Andrew Tate,” he sid. “They’re watching a lot more dangerous stuff than Andrew Tate. We were trying present a portrait of complexity of this kid that had been made by all sorts of different influences and the thing about incel culture is there’s a logic to it.”
