Adult Material

Adult Material is a smart blend of genuinely affecting interpersonal drama, workplace comedy, and it seems like there may even be some crime elements ahead, based on that cliffhanger. It feels like a British Boogie Nights for the digital age, but with a welcome focus on a woman’s experience.

It was a clever, whip-cracking script by Lucy Kirkwood.

While it starts in a loosely comic tone, Adult Material never lapses into prurience, and over four episodes grows into something sinister, complex and sometimes hard to watch, as Jolene and Amy slide into crisis.

Kirkwood’s world is a fully realised one, recognisable to us all (if slightly more semen-spattered than we’re used to). That it often plays at length like a workplace comedy – the bored rattling off of health and safety questions and answers after the shoot (“Did you feel like you were raped during this shoot?” “No”) – means your defences are down when the moments come that confront the business they’re in.