One of the actors from Netflix’s new smash hit, Adolescence, is a Greater Manchester-born and bred talent and has now taken time to reflect on the “overwhelming” response the show has seen thus far.
You’ll recognise her from countless roles in British films and TV over the years, including multiple Shane Meadows projects, but Jo Hartley is one of several stars to have impressed audiences across the globe with her performance in the incredible new drama.
Topping the streaming giant’s charts after just four days, Adolescence is one of the biggest shows of the year and most streamed UK exports in some time, receiving rave reviews across the board, as well as serious plaudits for how it tackles some seriously tough subject matter.
With most having now made it through all four extremely heavy episodes, the local actor from Oldham hopped on social media not only to express her gratitude for having been part of the project, but also the incredible reaction it received and why so many feel it’s an important watch.
Overwhelmed by so many kind and generous messages about #Adolescence we are so grateful to you all! Thanks.
Sharing a lengthier response spotlighting episode two, when we first meet her character, on Instagram, Hartley wrote: “Overwhelmed by all the generous messages we are getting so far. Being part of such a groundbreaking project has given me deep joy.
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“Seeing people respond so abundantly is very moving and feels quite wonderful. These kids are epic! They smashed it. Cast and crew too. I loved our downtime, we’d all hang out and play games, chat and laugh, we became a family. What a team of talented artists and creators.”
Speaking more broadly in an earlier post, she said of the early reviews: “I’ve been so overwhelmed by such powerful messages over the last few days. THANK YOU. Thank YOU!!! It’s been wonderful to see this show make such an impact on the world.
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“Adolescence asks questions… It presents us with a fatal situation caused by one unconscious act of violence – actions have consequences. Over the four ‘one shot’ episodes we see how it devastates not only a family but a whole community. If Adolescence saves one life, it will have worked.”
Before the limited drama had even dropped, she described it as a “life-changing experience” as an actor and, from a viewer’s perspective, nothing short of a “heart-wrenching and powerful one-shot drama that’ll blow your mind and take your breath away.” We can only echo her words.
As well as Oldham‘s finest being celebrated for her extremely believable, accurate and nuanced performance as teacher Mrs Fenumore, audiences are hailing not only the impressive talent of Owen Cooper, who plays the lead role of Jamie Miller but also the sublime Stephen Graham as his father.
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Co-creator Graham, who also shared the screen with Hartley in This Is England, has been praised for numerous roles in recent years – including director Philip Barantini’s equally talked about Boiling Point (2023) – but many viewers are saying he has officially cemented himself as “one of Britain’s greatest-ever actors.”
If you’ve still not seen anything about it, we won’t dare spoil a morsel more but we will sincerely recommend that you join the millions of others in watching it – though we’ll warn you, Adolescence is by no means easy-going.
You can see the trailer down below:
The Greater Manchester actor is one of numerous show-stealers in Adolescence.
Sir Ian McKellen pays emotional tribute to long-time friend and fellow northern actor Sir Patrick Stewart
Emily Sergeant
Sir Ian McKellen has paid an emotional tribute to his long-time friend and fellow northern actor, Sir Patrick Stewart, following his death.
Sir Patrick Stewart – who was born and bred in Mirfield, West Yorkshire, and is best-known for his theatre work alongside an illustrious 60-year screen career, taking on prominent roles in franchises such as Star Trek and X-Men – sadly passed away at the age of 86, with his death being announced publicly yesterday evening (29 October).
And now, his long-time friend and fellow northern actor, Sir Ian McKellen, has paid tribute.
Sir Patrick and Sir Ian shared the stage together countless times over their decades-long careers, but also famously starred alongside each other in the X-Men franchise, and subsequent Marvel movies, as Charles Xavier/Professor X and Magneto.
The tribute, shared across Sir Ian’s social media platforms, reads: “Before everything else, Patrick was defined by being born and bred in Yorkshire, the proud county in the north of England which he loved to the end. You could hear it in his accented voice and in the stern honesty with which he told you what he thought and felt. Yorkshiremen have no truck with half-truths or avoidance of big issues. He wore his heart on his sleeve, which made him a man to rely on, to admire and in my case, love.
“We first met as ambitious young actors with the Royal Shakespeare Company half a century ago but we weren’t in the same productions.
“My first strong memory was a few years later, meeting him in the street in central London when he told me about an offer to take over a leading part in ‘Star Trek’. “But Patrick think of your stage career in the UK. Do you really want to risk getting lost in Hollywood for years and years?”
“Well, he took the risk and thank goodness for us all that he did, for not just his devoted Trekkies, but film and theatre audiences who marvelled at his using international celebrity to star in a string of cinema successes (‘X-Men’ of course) and in great classical plays by Shakespeare, Ibsen, Arthur Miller, Peter Shaffer, Pinter and Beckett at Stratford-upon-Avon, in London’s West End and on Broadway.
“America was his adopted home, where he met his adored Sunny who has cared for him through sickness and health, through thick and thin.
“But he never forsook his origins: and the proudest achievement of the most respected and beloved actor of his generation on either side of the Atlantic, was his appointment as Chancellor of Huddersfield University in Yorkshire.”
Sir Patrick Stewart’s farewell performance will be in Avengers: Doomsday, which is being released in UK cinemas on 18 December 2026
Featured Image – Gage Skidmore (via Flickr)
TV & Showbiz
James Acaster reveals eerie song all Traitors contestants are forced to listen to before every roundtable
Emily Sergeant
James Acaster has revealed the eerie (and pretty surprising) song that all Traitors contestants are forced to listen to before every roundtable.
In case you’ve been living comfortably under a rock, you’ll probably be aware that comedian James Acaster is currently a contestant on this current season of BBC‘s smash-hit reality TV competition show, The Celebrity Traitors – a show that viewers in their millions are tuning into each week, with some big names on the cast.
Acaster is currently (spoiler alert… but it shouldn’t be at this point, we are several weeks in after all) one of three Traitors competing on the show, and he’s doing a pretty good job at it.
But we wonder how much of his success can be put down to the producers’ love of a certain song they like to play before every roundtable? Probably next to none, but it’s surprising to find out how much of an integral role the tune plays though.
The song we’re referring to here, it has been revealed, is ‘The Hanging Tree’ – a folk ballad made popular by The Hunger Games.
‘The Hanging Tree’, composed by James Newton Howard and Suzanne Collins, was famously sung by Jennifer Lawrence’s character Katniss Everdeen in the third instalment of the film franchise, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1.
The lyrics are as follows:
Are you, are you Coming to the tree Where they strung up a man They say who murdered three? Strange things did happen here No stranger would it be If we met at midnight In the hanging tree
So, as you can see, the song does make reference to ‘murder’, which is a key part of The Traitors game (not real murder, of course), but even with that context, we’re still not sure why the producers are keen to play it out before every roundtable.
During a viral TikTok clip from an on-stage Q&A this week, Acaster revealed the song’s usage to the audience: “You all walk in silence down the corridor, and you all sit down, and they don’t announce it’s gonna happen.
“The first time this will completely blindside you, but they do it every single roundtable. They play that song from The Hunger Games, that ‘coming to the tree’ song. Like acapella, Jennifer Lawrence.”
He continued: “It was every f***ing time, it was the only song we heard the whole time we were in there, and all day I would have it in my head constantly, everyone would, I’d go ‘have you got coming to the tree in your head?’ and they’d go ‘yes, it’s in my head, again’.”
Viewers who watch the show may have spotted the song being played in the background or transition between certain scenes, but now it’s been revealed that the contestants hear it too.
Who would’ve thought?
Featured Image – Euan Cherry / BBC / Studio Lambert
Danny Jones -
19th March 2025 
