When they met: “It instantly worked”
Olly Alexander and Lydia West were set to play best friends Ritchie and Jill on It’s a Sin, but their very first meeting wasn’t a bonding sit-down. Right away, they had to sing a duet their characters would perform. Luckily, they clicked. “I was already in the room, and then Olly walked in,” West says. “I think it was just love at first sight.”
“We hugged each other, and that was it, it instantly worked,” Alexander says. “You see from the show that Lyds is an immediately beautiful, glowing person that you just want to be around. I was just like, ‘Oh my goodness.’”
A band name brought them together
Creator Russell T. Davies is also behind the show Years and Years, in which West starred, which also happens to be the name of musician Alexander’s band. Could this be a coincidence?...
Olly Alexander and Lydia West were set to play best friends Ritchie and Jill on It’s a Sin, but their very first meeting wasn’t a bonding sit-down. Right away, they had to sing a duet their characters would perform. Luckily, they clicked. “I was already in the room, and then Olly walked in,” West says. “I think it was just love at first sight.”
“We hugged each other, and that was it, it instantly worked,” Alexander says. “You see from the show that Lyds is an immediately beautiful, glowing person that you just want to be around. I was just like, ‘Oh my goodness.’”
A band name brought them together
Creator Russell T. Davies is also behind the show Years and Years, in which West starred, which also happens to be the name of musician Alexander’s band. Could this be a coincidence?...
- 6/20/2021
- by Antonia Blyth
- Deadline Film + TV
It's a Sin, the latest show from multi-award-winning producer Russell T Davies, is a heartbreaking and crucial account of the HIV/AIDS outbreak in the UK in the early 1980s. The series first premiered on Channel 4 in the UK on Jan. 22, and it's set to premiere on HBO Max on Feb. 18. Starting in 1981, the show follows a group of young gay men - Richie (played by Olly Alexander), Roscoe, Colin, and Ash - who rally together in a student home in London they call the "Pink Palace" as a mysterious disease seems to be mainly targeting gay men. Throughout the five episodes, we watch as each of the main characters faces the disease in their own way, while the mother figure of the group, Jill (Lydia West), along with her mom, struggle to look after them amid a society filled with fear and little to no information about the...
- 1/26/2021
- by Navi Ahluwalia
- Popsugar.com
Warning: Contains spoilers for It’s a Sin episode 4
All five episodes of Russell T Davies’ blistering 1980s-set AIDS drama It’s a Sin are a tribute to the lives of gay men lost to the virus, but one scene in particular was written in specific recognition of an individual. Speaking to Doctor Who Magazine, Davies describes a moment in episode four as “a little smile” towards actor Dursley McLinden. “I was really desperate to do it,” said Davies. “I did it for Dursley.”
The scene features series lead Olly Alexander as actor Ritchie Tozer, who’s playing a part in a fictional 1988 Doctor Who serial. Dressed in a futuristic uniform and holding a blaster, Tozer’s character Trooper Linden leads a team defending an under-attack space station. “Remember,” he tells his soldiers, “if they get through, we lose the crystal, and if we lose that, it’s the end of the world.
All five episodes of Russell T Davies’ blistering 1980s-set AIDS drama It’s a Sin are a tribute to the lives of gay men lost to the virus, but one scene in particular was written in specific recognition of an individual. Speaking to Doctor Who Magazine, Davies describes a moment in episode four as “a little smile” towards actor Dursley McLinden. “I was really desperate to do it,” said Davies. “I did it for Dursley.”
The scene features series lead Olly Alexander as actor Ritchie Tozer, who’s playing a part in a fictional 1988 Doctor Who serial. Dressed in a futuristic uniform and holding a blaster, Tozer’s character Trooper Linden leads a team defending an under-attack space station. “Remember,” he tells his soldiers, “if they get through, we lose the crystal, and if we lose that, it’s the end of the world.
- 1/25/2021
- by Louisa Mellor
- Den of Geek
Here’s a rule you can’t go wrong with: when Russell T Davies writes a TV show, watch it. His dramas are full-size orchestras of the heart. They do everything: joy, agony, love, sex, sorrow, laughter, and increasingly, righteous anger. In state-of-the-nation BBC drama Years and Years, the Queer as Folk creator looked ahead to the nightmarish world of the near future. In Channel 4’s It’s a Sin, he looks back to the 1980s and the pall cast over gay male lives by the AIDS epidemic.
With an impeccable cast led by the luminous Olly Alexander, It’s a Sin is Davies’ best yet; a joyful tribute to lost lives that delivers a seething verdict on ignorance and cruelty. Over five one-hour episodes starting in 1981 and going through the decade, we meet a group of 18-year-old gay men who’ve escaped parochial hometowns to come to London and start their real lives.
With an impeccable cast led by the luminous Olly Alexander, It’s a Sin is Davies’ best yet; a joyful tribute to lost lives that delivers a seething verdict on ignorance and cruelty. Over five one-hour episodes starting in 1981 and going through the decade, we meet a group of 18-year-old gay men who’ve escaped parochial hometowns to come to London and start their real lives.
- 1/19/2021
- by Louisa Mellor
- Den of Geek
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