Jack Thorne — who co-wrote Netflix phenomenon “Adolescence” with Stephen Graham — has rejected claims that the show was based on a real-life crime committed by a Black child, a theory that had been amplified by Elon Musk on social media.
The four-part drama, directed by Philip Barantini and starring Graham, Ashley Walters and Erin Doherty, revolves around the brutal murder of a young girl by a 13-year-old schoolboy (played by Owen Cooper).
Since it’s release, its creators have insisted that story was inspired by incidents around the U.K., but not based on an individual crime. Yet a post on X asserted that “Adolescence” was based on a “real-life case such as the Southport murderer” and that, in making the perpetrator white, it amounted to “anti-white propaganda.” Musk, in his usual style, didn’t overtly agree with the accusation but promoted it to a far wider audience by commenting, “Wow.”
Asked about the accusations of race-swapping on “The News Agents” podcast over the weekend, Thorne said that “nothing could be further from the truth.”
Thorne added that having “told a lot of real-life stories in my time,” he knew the harm that could come from taking “elements of a real-life style and putting it on screen.” However, he asserted: “There is no part of this that’s based on a true story, not one single part.”
He said: “It’s absurd to say that [knife crime] is only committed by Black boys. It’s absurd. It’s not true. And history shows a lot of cases of kids from all races committing these crimes. We’re not making a point about race with this. We are making a point about masculinity. We’re trying to get inside a problem. We’re not saying this is one thing or another, we’re saying that this is about boys.”
Last week, Netflix revealed that “Adolescence” had broken records for a limited series, with 66.3 million views after two weeks.
Speaking to Variety, producer Hannah Walters said that, alongside receiving lots of messages from parents worried about the dangers of incel culture and toxic masculinity online, she had many from teenagers.
“Many have actually come from young people, saying, ‘Thank you, because you’ve allowed me to be able to speak to my parents about something that I didn’t know how to address,’” she said.
