If you thought that Richard Gadd’s newest show after Baby Reindeer was going to be any less wild: you weren’t really paying attention.
Gadd is returning to TV screens two years after Baby Reindeer shocked the world, with the series being based on the actor’s own experience of being stalked.
The Netflix series, which he also wrote, catapulted him into fame and allowed him to work with nearly any TV producer he wanted. Gadd ended up picking HBO and the BBC and producing Half Man.
Gadd stars in the series alongside Jamie Bell, with Mitchell Robertson and Stuart Campbell playing the younger versions of their characters Ruben and Niall.
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The show follows a pair of estranged ‘brothers’ who reunite on Niall’s wedding day, with Ruben showing up and punching him in the face.
What follows is a look through the years at the pair’s relationship, going back to when they were teenagers in the 80s. Amongst this relationship however is a bizarre scene in which one brother helps the other lose his virginity (literally) and Richard Gadd spoke exclusively to LADbible about why it leaves viewers with such complicated feelings.
The first episode features an unsettling sex scene in which Ruben helps Niall lose his virginity
Ruben and Niall are made to share a room when Ruben gets out of juvey for attacking someone, with both their mums dating but neither of them being ‘brothers’ by blood.
Quickly though they end up forming a brotherly bond, with Niall helping Ruben cheat in an exam.
That night Ruben sneaks in through his window after finding out he passed, bringing with him his girlfriend. Niall pretends to be asleep and watches the two kissing, but is caught, and as a ‘reward’ for helping him with the exam Ruben places his girlfriend on top of his step-brother.
Initially Niall is unable to get an erection, but Ruben encourages him and maintains eye contact as the teenager eventually loses his virginity. The scene is a bizarre one which leaves viewers with complicated feelings, but that was intentional from the writer behind Baby Reindeer.
Richard Gadd purposely made the scene ‘messy and complicated’
Speaking exclusively to LADbible, Gadd said that as a writer he ‘never wants to spell things out’.
He added: “I think a lot of people who I've spoken to who've seen that scene or seen that episode they point to that scene and they have very different takes.
“I think that’s interesting in a way and I think people see it. They can experience that scene and they can take away “that's a very dramatic thing” and then some people see it and they're laughing or they don't see it for what it is but it's a very complicated situation with a million and one takeaways.
“I almost just like just posit a bit of life and just see how people react and I guess that's that was always my aim with Half Man.”
Gadd called co-ordinators a ‘revelation’
Gadd also is an EP on the project, and stated that they used intimacy co-ordinators throughout the series. He told LADbible: “We did so much around that scene and indeed all of the scenes. Sets are extremely safe places thanks to intimacy coordinators. I think it is a revelation in the industry in a very positive way.
“Oh yeah, [we used ICs] all the way through. I mean like not just in that scene. I mean every time there's a sex scene there would have been one.”
Half Man is just as thrilling and interesting as Baby Reindeer but doesn’t follow Gadd’s life as heavily. When asked how much is inspired by his life, the actor said: “It's a purely fictional world, no one's based on anyone, it's nothing like that.
“It’s just Born out of experiences or struggles that I've had and stuff I want to explore.
“I think you can tell from Baby Reindeer to this that I'm interested in in self-struggle and identity and battles with oneself and I think in that respect it's always, you just borrow from experiences you want to explore, themes you want to explore and Half Man is that, it’s just stuff that I wasn't done sort of exploring yet.”
Half Man will be released weekly in the UK on BBC iPlayer from 6am on April 24th.
Topics: TV, Baby Reindeer, TV and Film, Celebrity, Sex and Relationships
Michael Slavin