The character of Arabella, embodied by Michaela herself with histrionic awareness of her expressive means, represents her catharsis. The man had poured a drug into her drink to then abuse her body, her confidence as a woman and friend (according to the BBC, between 20 in England and Wales complaints related to so-called 'drink spiking' were 2 ,650). The truth of the facts gradually emerged in her memory, brick by brick, in the form of sudden, painful flashbacks. The next morning she woke up groggy and, at least at first, unable to remember what had happened.
One evening, to distract herself, Michaela went out for a drink with an acquaintance.
Michaela at that time was working on writing the second season of the popular television comedy Chewing Gum. "It took me two and a half years to write it, and that's all I did in all that time," Michaela Coel said in an interview. Part two: In the steps of Pier Paolo Pasolini.Part one: In the steps of Pier Paolo Pasolini.This is where his idea that “An artist, if he's unselfish and passionate, is always a living protest” intersects with the greatness of Michaela Coel, in portraying a terrible experience lived by the author herself. Echos of Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini enter into the frame.
It is clear from the start, however, that despite the fact that the episodes are full of stories and memories that intertwine, it is the body, or rather bodies, that is the focus of the narrative. She has to hurry back to London to deliver a draft to the publishers who are pressing her, returning from an alcohol and dancing- fueled vacation in Ostia, with the handsome Biagio (played by Marouane Zotti, a twenty-two-year-old actor born in Venice of Arab parents) planted in her head. She jumps in a cab, on her way to the airport. I May Destroy YouĪnd here we are: I May Destroy You is the story of a tragic body, a violated body, that of Arabella Essiedu, a London- based writer of Ghanaian origin who in the midst of a creative stasis decides to go on vacation to the Roman coast in search of inspiration. The beaches and the streets of Ostia host the footprints of Pasolini himself and the artistic footprints of his "apostles", so to speak of those who have handed down his words and reflections. Pasolini and Ostia, however, are not united only by this.īehind the imposing silhouette of death, there are more artistic and less bloody ties seeds germinated on the asphalt of a land that abruptly changed together with Italy. The name Pier Paolo Pasolini is linked to the city of Ostia and the dark night of November 1975, when his murdered body was discovered on the beach. Rose Island: a true and incredible Italian storyīut, if you look closely, those little parks and streets are the places inhabited by poor immigrants, places haunted by Pasolini’s ghost.The sand dotted with colorful umbrellas, the bars, and the nameless park where a pick- up game of basketball is always being played are more reminiscent of teen summer scenarios of some Netflix productions.
I May Destroy You, the new series written, directed and interpreted by the talented Michaela Coel, begins in the streets of Ostia, a southern suburb of Rome. In the British series from the BBC One and HBO, the audience never sees the eternal Rome with its monuments, but instead its peripheral appendix Ostia, the extension of small buildings on the Tyrrhenian coast, the beach stands, trashy nightclubs, like those found everywhere in Italy.