'It terrified me': Richard Gadd on his follow-up to Baby Reindeer

'It terrified me': Richard Gadd on his follow-up to Baby Reindeer2 hours agoShareSaveAdd as preferred on GoogleShola LeeBBC NewsBBC/Mam Tor Productions/Anne BinckebanckRichard Gadd (left) stars as Ruben and Jamie Bell (right) as Niall in the new BBC series Half ManPlaying Ruben in his new BBC series Half Man was "so far away from me and anything I'd done before", says Richard Gadd. "It terrified me."The six-part drama, written by and starring Gadd, follows three decades in the lives of self-conscious Niall and volatile Ruben, who were once inseparable as teens.Half Man explores the breakdown of their brotherhood and sees Niall struggle to accept his sexuality, while Ruben grapples with a trauma from his past.Gadd explains he didn't initially see himself acting in the series after his "intense" experience with 2024 Emmy-winning show Baby Reindeer, in which he played comedian Donny Dunn.BBC/Mam Tor Productions/Anne Binckebanck"I think he's brilliant", Gadd says of actor BellThe follow-up role was a "big challenge" for Gadd.The actor says that if he were to fail in the role he would "look like a fool" - but he didn't want to let the fear of what people might think stop him.He had to "change everything" about himself for the role, from growing an "awful beard" to changing his hair and bulking up his muscles."I just knew if people were going to buy the guy from Baby Reindeer as this hard-man epitome of sort of masculinity, I needed to really transform," he explains.BBC/Mam Tor Productions/Anne BinckebanckStuart Campbell (left) plays young Ruben and Mitchell Robertson (right) plays young NiallA violent altercation at Niall's wedding kick-starts the new series, which cuts between the 1980s and the present day to explore how their relationship fell apart.Gadd says he was interested in exploring family dysfunction. To do this, he initially establishes...