Last year, E4′s teen drama Skins showed kids getting high, getting drunk and getting laid – and now they’re back for more. Irresponsible? Not at all, says the series’ old hand, Harry Enfield.
This article originally appeared in Radio Times for the week 9-15 February 2008.
Teen telly will never be the same again. Last January, E4’s first home-grown drama set a new blueprint for adolescent TV, with its bold, racy portrayal of the lives of a group of 16- to 18-year-old friends.
In that first series, comedian Harry Enfield played the dad of central character Tony (About a Boy’s Nicholas Hoult). This time, as well as appearing again in front of the cameras, he’s making his TV directing début – and he’s fully behind the series.
“I don’t really watch much telly,” confesses Enfield, “but Skins is just brilliant. I loved the first series, and was asked to direct two episodes for the second. Whether they ask me to do anything else ever again remains to be seen.”
Enfield first met Bryan Elsley, Skins’ co-creator and writer of this week’s episode (and the only member of the writing team over 30), when they were students at York University in the early 1980s. “Bryan doesn’t like to just use ‘normal’ directors on Skins, so he thought it’d be fun to try me.” Did Enfield’s standing as a funny man make it harder for him to be taken seriously on set? “Actually, I’m much funnier directing than I am on screen. I enjoy it more, so I’m jollying around, making jokes, and then I get everyone focused.
“The pressures of acting are far greater than directing. You’re in make-up for hours. You’re hanging around for ages. When you’re directing, the only pressure is time.”
Although Enfield admits Skins is “for the youth audience primarily”, the celebrity contingent – playing what he calls “the slightly caricatured, useless, mad, floundering parents” – will lure older viewers, too. Alongside Enfield, guest appearances in series two include Shane Richie, Peter Capaldi, Arabella Weir, Sean Pertwee and, this week, the arresting spectacle of Bill Bailey dancing with a dog. “Parents can watch Skins with their kids,” says Enfield, “and have a laugh. But for the most part, I guess older people like me, we just like to know what our teenagers get up to, don’t we?”
The basic principal of Skins, according to Bryan Elsley, is “to treat teenagers as sentient, intellectual people who aren’t just waiting to put on a hoodie and stick a knife into somebody”. Storylines are devised by a collective of young British writing talent – from 17 up – and focus on a gang of Bristol-based sixth-formers, portrayed by actual teenagers, not 20-somethings playing it young. And, for all the tales of hardcore, house-ravaging revelry, it is a fundamentally optimistic drama.
So is it an accurate portrayal of teenage life? Enfield thinks so. “Well, definitely. Yeah, of some: of middle-class teenagers from Bristol. The storylines come from the experiences of the young writing team. That, I suppose, gives authenticity, a voice, and an edge, that wouldn’t otherwise be there.”
Is it easier to be a teenager now than when Enfield was growing up? “No. Harder, probably. They think they’ve got everything, but they’ve got nothing. I had punk! I was a bit like Kevin the Teenager [from his sketch show], except quite nice. I didn’t ever take drugs.” No Skins-style house parties? “Not really. Went to a few. Got thrown out of a few. Never had one.”
He must worry for his own children, though. His eldest is now ten. “My kids are never going to grow up. I might have to freeze my children – bury them in ice! They’re always going to be brilliant, gorgeous and talented, eschew all drugs and alcohol, and be just like they are now for ever.” So he isn’t looking forward to becoming an ‘angry dad’, like Tony’s? “What, shouty man? No, not at all. I really don’t want that to happen. But it will, won’t it? Oh God…”
Benjamin Cook
GETTING UNDER TEENS’ SKIN
From making eyebrow-raising adverts to partying in person with the fans, Skins has broken new ground on screen and off…
TRAILER TRASHING
Last year’s Skins trailer showed a suburban house being trashed by teen partygoers; it inspired a glut of imitation blowouts, to the abject terror of anyone with teenage children. Or a house. A breathless orgy of teen flesh, E4’s trailer for Skins series two is an altogether darker, more cinematic riff on the themes established last year. “Lots of older execs at E4 are slightly puzzled by the trailer,” admits co-creator and head writer Bryan Elsley. “They say it doesn’t actually look or feel like the show. But we say that’s not the point; it’s a thing of beauty in itself. That trailer sends out a signal as to the care with which the show is made, and hints at upcoming storylines. It’s saying that Skins is going to be a little more serious this year, more emotion-led.”
NAKED AMBITION
So is nudity just used to lure viewers? “We don’t want our cast to feel uncomfortable, or embarrassed, or exploited by any of the nudity or sexual content,” says Elsley, “so we’re incredibly careful about that sort of imagery. But we’re not about to pretend that young people don’t have sex, because that really, really isn’t true. They do have sex, all the time. But they have much more nuanced, emotional approaches to sex than adults give them credit for. The number of complaints we had about the sexual content in the show last year? Zero. None whatsoever.”
WATCH THIS CYBERSPACE
Elsley, who describes himself as a “television traditionalist”, admits that the myriad ways in which viewers can interact with the show – online episodes, video diaries, clever competitions, official Skins parties – were “slightly against my better judgement, but it meets the needs of our audience. We invite them in. Literally, in the case of the parties. Our fans have a sense of ownership. Yes, they’re savvy to marketing techniques, but they play along. They assert that it’s their right to know how the show is made, because they’re perfectly capable of suspending their disbelief. We aspire to not underestimate our audience.”
WE DON’T NEED NO EDUCATION
Despite the concentrated marketing campaign, Elsley refutes the suggestion that Skins is written for a particular demographic: “As far as I’m concerned, it’s family viewing. It’s for anyone old enough not to be offended by the sex, the drugs and the swearing.” Yet the programme-makers are aware that Skins might offer younger viewers role models for their own behaviour. “The assertion that it’s our job simply to reflect life is always a cop-out. That’s an irresponsible thing to say. But people who think it’s our duty to educate young people on the correct way to live are just as bonkers. It’s about achieving a balance. Characters that behave badly in Skins tend to be punished… perhaps just in slightly unusual ways.” BC
THE INSIDE STORY
“A lot of kids would quite like to be him,” says Joe Dempsie, about his character, substance-abusing party animal Chris, in Skins. “I feel absolutely no pressure to be a role model. Our audience can make up their own minds. They’re not idiots. Skins is one of the first programmes about young people that doesn’t preach to them. It doesn’t lay consequences on thick. It doesn’t tell kids that they’re going to die if, I don’t know, they smoke a joint or whatever.” Last series, Dempsie spent most of one episode in the buff. “I wasn’t aware of exactly how naked I was going to have to be. I won’t lie and say, ‘Oh yeah, it was easy, I just whipped ‘em off’ – it took a lot of nerve. Would I do it again? It depends whether it’s required, or whether it’s just for the sake of seeing a bit of arse on the telly. It’s not something I’d like to make a habit of.” BC
