LIAR’S Joanne Froggatt has hit back at claims the ITV thriller ‘uses sexual assault as entertainment’.
The hit drama’s first series followed Joanne’s character Laura and how she believed she had been raped by charming surgeon Andrew Earlham (Ioan Gruffudd) after a date.
Viewers had been left wondering who was telling the truth in the first half of season one, before Andrew’s disgusting crimes were exposed.
The second series returns tonight, exploring the immediate aftermath of serial rapist Andrew’s murder, with a number of characters in the frame.
Speaking about the impact of that first season ahead of tonight’s series two debut, Joanne, 39, said the subject matter at the root of the thriller was important.
She said: “As a piece of entertainment it certainly ticked the box of a fantastic thriller but also what [writers] Jack and Harry [Williams] did so cleverly was they wrote a thriller based around a subject matter which actually when our first season aired still felt very taboo.
“When I was doing press from the first series I had a few journalists ask me ‘how did I feel about being part of a show that uses sexual assault as entertainment?’ and I said ‘I don’t think it’s using it as entertainment because as a thriller aspect, crime drama, we accept shows that are based on murder, child abduction, paedophilia, why are we not talking about sexual assault?’
“And isn’t that really important that it’s not so taboo that we are not opening up conversations about it?”
Joanne believes the series opened up much needed dialogue and discussions among viewers.
She continued: “I think what Jack and Harry did so cleverly with the way they structured the show and it being called Liar, and for the first half of the series not knowing who was telling the truth, that’s what made people really talk about it and look at themselves and think ‘wow, how do I judge people myself?’
“How do we all judge people who we perceive should behave in a certain way, having gone through a certain situation that we may have not experienced ourselves.
“So why are we then qualified to then judge them on that? which in my eyes, I’m not.
“I think that’s what really hit home, I think that’s what started discussions and that’s what’s clever about it, it’s a really entertaining thriller but it also had something really important to say in the background without hitting people over the head with it.
“And that’s why I really wanted to do the project to start with.”
Series two of Liar starts tonight at 9pm on ITV.
