NOTICE OF SERIOUS PEPPE: in my skin or how to grow in a dysfunctional family

16 years old, perhaps for the most intense age in Alba life, Gwyndaf has a whole typical teenager. Rather, on the side of the strangers rather than popular, the young Welsh can count on his two best friends, Lydia and Travis, in zoning after the high school and taking his first cooked by stealing trolleys at the outing of the supermarket.

At high school, Beth shows a rebellious and pungent character. It is never the last one to respond to a teacher or send a dense brutus to graze. But behind this facade, he hides from everyone a complex family situation: he must manage Trina, his bipolar mother and Dilwyn, his alcoholic and violent father. For fear of the gaze of others, Beth Ment, always, to justify himself with his teachers and friends. The lie has become a second skin for the young woman, until she breaks …

Online on art.tv from January 24th, In my skin has common points with ShamelessAnother English series focused on a dysfunctional family of the popular class, which has experienced a successful American remake. But where Shameless Give a bag of WTF and Lorgne situations on the side of the punk comedy, In my skin, As the title suggests, He remain in the role of his young heroine, to take the realistic and sensitive portrait of a teenager forced by circumstances to become an adult too early.

It must be said that his designer, Kayleigh Llewellyn, knows what he is talking about: it was this teenager. The series is based on his life, as he explains to the Guardian: “” I lived in the fear that my high school companions discovered that my mother was often interned. I was sure they would make fun of me, he would have pushed me – or worse, my mother would have taken me around. »» ».

A relationship between parents and children inverted

Incorporate by the promising Gabrielle Creevy, Beth is in a situation that has a name: parenting. Developed in the 70s, this concept was defined in 1999 by the psychiatrist Jean-François Le Goff as “” An internal relational process of family life that brings a child or a teenager to take on the most important responsibilities of his age and maturation in a precise socio -cultural and historical context would lead him to become a parent for his (or his) parents “.

As soon as he is absent from the house, to study or spend time with his friends, Beth has a chance in two of having to face a disastrous situation when he returned home: his mother (played with great precision by Jo Hartley) disappeared where He disappeared where he disappeared where his father disappeared he decided to invite his friends in the heart of the week for an improvised drinking, where a teenager has absolutely no place.

With such a family situation, In my skin He could have dedicated miserability or sensationalism, but Kayleigh Llewellyn avoids this trap thanks to a thin writing, which differs from all sleeves. The mother-daughter relationship is treated with nuance and delicacy. Apart from his obsessive episodes, on which he has no control, Trina is a loving mother. The two women take care of each other, each in his own way. And then Beth finds some respite from the paternal grandmother, Nana (of Botcher), the only point of reference for a stable family in his life.

The good moments of the series are those in which these three generations of women spend time together and manage to forget daily events. The latter take both the unpredictable face of the violent crisis of Trina as the brutality of his father, Dilwyn, often there to worsen the situation. At the same time, the series portrays the meanders of a couple of relationships under control, with a violent husband. Browsing with him between fear, anger and legitimate need for love and recognition, Beth crosses his adolescence in constant supervision.

Compartment to survive

As soon as he puts himself out or in high school, Beth’s world is growing. The realization requires more solar shades to illustrate this beautiful escape. The school represents both a potential place of oppression and a possible field for the young woman, who caresses the dream of becoming a writer. With his friends Lydia and Travis, Beth can be herself, in part, since she refuses to confide in her family situation, of which she is as ashamed as her poverty, which she also hides. He then invented an ideal house: a “severe” and too protective mother, who takes her to ballets dances and a trivial father who has a stable job.

The series does not summarize Beth to its dysfunctional parents. Somehow, the young woman saw her adolescence and her first cooked for Poppy, a popular girl. The lie of the parents is combined with a lie on its lesbian sexual orientation, which has difficulty accepting in a homophobic environment of high school.

During the episodes, disappointments and victories, Beth understands that he is never happier and appreciated by his companions than he is. Gradually, he drops the armor, with his mother, friends or Cam, his first official girl in season 2. Her rebellious spirit and her sense of distribution bring an irresistible nibble tone to the series. “Like many people who have been marginalized or who have something to hide, deviate attention with humor. I did it throughout my life.” ” He says the kayleigh showrunner Llewellyn.

Rewarded with a BAFTA in the best dramatic series in 2022, following its transmission on BBC One, In my skin Reach two seasons of five episodes, perfect for a binge-watching, to touch us with the heart, telling a particular adolescence, which resonates universally.