Netflix
Jamie, the young suspect, is played by newcomer Owen Cooper, from Warrington, with Stephen Graham as his dad
The creators of the Netflix drama Adolescence have said they want the programme to be a piece of work that “causes discussion and makes change”.
Writer Jack Thorne said he and co-writer Stephen Graham, who is also starring in the drama, wanted to explore the problem of young male rage and what fuels it after seeing several incidents of violence in the news.
“I want it to be shown in schools, I want it to be shown in Parliament. It’s crucial because this is only going to get worse.
“It’s something that people need to be talking about, hopefully that’s what drama can do,” Thorne said.
Netflix
The story shines a light on the corrosive impact of social media and misogynist influencers on some teenage boys
The show follows the Miller family, whose lives are blown apart when 13-year-old schoolboy Jamie is arrested for killing a female classmate.
The four-part series has become the most-streamed title in both the UK and the US within the first week of its release.
Its story shines a light on the corrosive impact of social media and misogynist influencers on some teenage boys.
Thorne said he had to look in some “dark holes” on the internet to make the show, but said those holes were not hard to find.
“This is a show about a kid who does the wrong thing and causes great harm. To understand him, we have to understand the pressures upon him,” he said.
“Jamie has been polluted by ideas that he’s heard online, that make sense to him, that have a logic that’s attractive to him, that answer the questions as to his loneliness and isolation and lead him to make some very bad choices.
“We have to understand the things he’s been consuming and that means especially looking at the internet, the manosphere and incel culture.”
Adolescence is the sixth programme Jack Thorne and Stephen Graham have worked on together
Jamie, the young suspect, is played by newcomer Owen Cooper, from Warrington, with Stephen Graham as his dad.
Graham said he was inspired to make the show after seeing two separate reports of boys stabbing girls to death.
“I read an article in the paper about a young boy who’d killed a young girl and a three weeks later I was watching the news and there was a story of a young boy who’d stabbed a young girl to death,” he told BBC Breakfast.
“It really hurt my heart, I just thought, ‘what’s going on in society where this kind of thing is becoming a regular occurrence?’
“I just couldn’t fathom it. So I wanted to really have a look and try and shine a light on this particular thing.”
Adolescence is the sixth programme Graham and Thorne have worked on together.
“The thing that Stephen kept repeating through the process is it take a village to raise a child. The thing we started talking about is it take a village to destroy a child,” Thorne said.
He said the show was not inspired by any one particular incident, but rather an issue “they kept seeing all the time”.
“It could happen to anyone and that’s not saying anyone is capable of being Jamie,” he said.
“It’s about parents that didn’t see him, a school system that let him down and the ideas that he consumed.
“This is an ordinary family and this is an ordinary world and it’s really worrying what’s possible right now.”
Netflix drama Adolescence hailed as ‘flawless’ TV
