By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
Published: | Updated:
Sharon Horgan writes and stars in a comedy about life and love in your 50s
Year: 2026
Certificate: 15
Love and life in your 50s are the focus of Sharon Horgan’s HBO comedy, in which she plays the divorced mother of a tricky, university-age child. Alex (Horgan) is looking forward to having an empty nest and dating again – or is she? Uncertainty ripples through an eight-part series in which Alex pinballs between parenting a child who is technically an adult to flirting with her ex, Patrick (Rupert Friend), to dealing with the growing demands of her ageing parents and the small matter of her job as a literary agent in London.
Like everything Horgan does (Pulling, Catastrophe, Bad Sisters, Motherland, Divorce), the comedy in Youth is underpinned by the emotions that come from the fraught situations in which Alex finds herself. Horgan – who wrote every episode – has managed to make an easy and moreish watch out of a time in your life when it might feel like the window for having any kind of fun is about to close forever, and the quality of the cast helping to tell that story is a testament to her TV career.
The casting of the usually intense Rupert Friend (Homeland) as her romantic interest is a nice surprise while, among the supporting cast, look out for fun performances from Harriet Walter and Anne Reid at Alex’s agency – a company that is forever in the grip of some ridiculous crisis or another. And, if Alex’s gloomy offspring, Ruari, looks a little familiar around the eyes, there’s a reason for that – he’s played by Cillian Murphy’s son, Aran. (Eight episodes)
