Set in the world of elite tennis, Fifteen-Love narrates the story of young sports prodigy Justine Pearce, played by Ella Lily Hyland, and her meteoric rise in the world of Grand Slam tennis.
The drama centres around Justine and her coach Glenn Lapthorn, played by Poldark star Aidan Turner.
Justine’s seemingly unstoppable ascent is brought to an abrupt halt at the French Open semi-finals, where she suffers a severe, career-ending injury.
The narrative picks up five years later, with Justine making a damning allegation against her former coach, forcing all to look at the pair’s past successes through a new lens.
Created by The Innocent’s Hania Elkington, and directed by Eva Riley and Toby MacDonald, Fifteen-Love is a nuanced and gripping exploration of trust, power and obsession, tackling tricky topics within the world of sport.
Ahead of its release, we sit down with Hyland and Turner to find out how they approached playing such multi-faceted, complex characters, and the deeper meaning behind the series.
GLENN IS SUCH A COMPLEX CHARACTER, WHAT APPEALED TO YOU ABOUT PLAYING HIM AND HOW DID YOU APPROACH THE ROLE?
AT: I think it’s exactly that. I think it seemed like a real challenge. He’s somebody who has many different personalities for different people; different masks to his family, to the people he works with, to his students, friends. So I thought that was really interesting.
There’s an air of calm about Glenn. There’s a suave coolness to him, too. He’s articulate, he can be funny, he’s charismatic and he’s talented. He’s a really good coach. And he’s admired for that. So with all of that, and then this darkness on the other side of that coin, it’s like, how do you balance that?
How do you pitch that as an actor? Because you need it to feel authentic and be believable and where does that lie – where do get to in your head? Do I know people like that? Have I seen performances like that? What can I delve into in my own imagination? And where does the danger lie for me in a character like that? What would I find really kind of terrifying?
JUSTINE IS A FASCINATING CHARACTER TOO. WHAT DREW YOU TO HER?
ELH: I thought she was really interesting as a character, and I thought the story and momentum of it was really interesting. I loved how physical she is. And I think the physicality of an athlete and how they exist in the real world, and especially an athlete who’s played at such a top level, was something that really interested me in trying to play.
She’s so instinctive, so I felt like everything was kind of messy and physical. And I felt like a lot of what she did was purely from her instinct, which is just so fun to play. And yeah, I think she is really relatable, and kind of messy, and I wanted to lean into that.
WHAT TRAINING DID YOU HAVE TO DO TO PLAY SOMEONE WHO’S PERFORMING AT SUCH A HIGH LEVEL?
ELH: I trained for about three months before I started, and that was the best ever, because I had the script and was working very, like, on my own on that, and it felt like it had so much energy and so much momentum that you almost just want to move it or speak about it to people.
And then, when we started doing the tennis training, I felt like I was exerting so much energy, and then by osmosis, it felt like a lot of the research was being done because I was in those environments, and I’ve never been in that environment before. So getting to chat to the coaches and hear their view on things that were relevant to the piece … and that dynamic between coach and player and how physical and tactile it is and stuff was really interesting, to find out how normal it was.
THERE’S BEEN A LOT OF CONVERSATION ABOUT THE IMPACT OF PROFESSIONAL SPORT ON MENTAL AND PHYSICAL HEALTH, PARTICULARLY IN TENNIS WITH FEMALE PRODIGIES. WHAT DID YOU FIND COMPELLING ABOUT EXPLORING THAT IN A DRAMA?
AT: It’s really interesting. Things have changed now with this loophole that existed in the Sexual Offences Act where a person of trust – if you were a teacher, or a doctor, or physician, carer – you can’t have a relationship with the person you’re caring for. But that wasn’t the case with coaches; coaches could have these relationships, so that obviously adds some dangerous elements into the mix. It’s since been amended, and things have changed since then, but only recently, only a year ago.
But I think something else Hania explores really well in the story, and something I think people might come away with, is just how do we safeguard players? What are the institutions that need to exist around them? What’s the greater conversation to stop anything like this ever happening?
And I think sometimes we think that with professional athletes in any sport, that it’s almost self governing – they know what to do, they can look after themselves, they’re strong, they’re powerful, they’re mentally quite strong.
All of those things might exist on any particular level, but it doesn’t mean that they can look out for every aspect of their life, or it doesn’t mean that things can happen with that being true anyway.
So I think that’s a really big thing – that these safeguards, and these parameters exist to protect players on every level, that this sort of relationship between coaches and players is looked at and examined, and the conversation is broadened and we can tackle it properly.
Fifteen-Love is available on Prime Video from Friday, July 21.
