It’s been nearly two years since Hulu premiered its adaptation of Sally Rooney’s Normal People, revving up fans’ thirst in quarantine. And thankfully, Hulu’s other limited series based on Rooney’s hit debut novel, Conversations With Friends, is arriving just when it’s needed.
The streaming service announced Conversations With Friends premieres in the spring with 12 episodes. It also shared a first look at the series. The pictures give a glimpse at the vacation Frances (Alison Oliver) and Bobbi (Sasha Lane) take with Nick (Joe Alwyn) and Melissa (Jemima Kirke) at the couple’s villa. There is also a shot of Nick caressing Frances while still prominently wearing his wedding ring, and Bobbi intently glazing at Melissa.
Read more
In Conversations With Friends, Frances and Bobbi are 21-year-old queer poets who are also a spoken word duo. They previously dated, but have since become best friends. They gain the attention of Melissa (Jemima Kirke), a writer and photographer who decides to profile them.
Melissa invites them into her home, already forming an ethically questionable dynamic with them from the start. But when she introduces her actor husband Nick (Joe Alwyn) to the two friends, Nick begins an affair with Frances, while Bobbi takes a liking to Melissa.
In an interview with Vanity Fair, it’s said the series will be mostly faithful to the book, though there’s one big difference: Bobbi is a Black American woman in this version, and she is “slowly picking up Irish phrases as she’s spent a few years away from home in New York,” as explained by Lane.
“Lenny and I had a lot of conversations about where she’s from, how much where she came from is spoken about,” Lane says to the magazine. “We wanted to keep Bobbi even further from the rest of them. Letting her have an American accent kept her a bit more singled out.”
