The last time Sally Rooney’s angsty millennial characters were on screen, it was at the start of lockdown in 2020. Her second novel – but first to be adapted for TV – Normal People, was a global smash that turned entire nations on to the horny yearnings of the impassioned class-divide romance of its two man characters, Marianne and Connell, making superstars of Daisy Edgar-Jones and Paul Mescal (and Connell’s necklace) in the process.
It was an intense series, absorbed deeply into the feels of a captivated (and captive, let’s be honest) audience. The adaptation of her first book, 2017’s Conversations With Friends, was commissioned almost immediately afterwards. Now, two years on, we’re going back in time slightly but simultaneously picking up in a very familiar Rooney-esque setting: brooding intellectuals at Dublin’s Trinity College, for the opening of CWF: the TV series.
Conversations With Friends could be another storyline that runs concurrent to Marianne and Connell’s, and perhaps it’s pleasing to think of them all existing in the same Rooniverse at the same time. It’s obvious that Rooney – who herself studied at Trinity College – finds it a rich setting to pull stories from, and she’s right, as higher-education teens veer from being so invincible and obnoxiously self-assured to being genuinely bewildered as to where they even begin to fit in this adult world. This is personified as we’re introduced to Frances (Alison Oliver) and Bobbi (Sasha Lane), the two polar-opposite best friends at the heart of what’s set to be a sort of quartet of love affairs.
The girls are riffing on their duet slam poetry ahead of a performance, and there’s an easy-going chemistry between the two, as it turns out that as well as being BFFs, they’re also ex-girlfriends. We join them at the best time for university students – the months-long summer! – and after sitting her last exam, Frances is ready to P.A.R.T.Y.: “Yay, summer!” she says, and the girls head to the nearest offy to load up on the student essentials: crisps and 2-4-€10 bottles of white wine.
But their idea of a wild party differs from most freshers, as it’s more the middle-aged, let’s-chill-in-front-of-a-box-set vibe, and they’re next shown asleep on each other’s shoulders on the sofa in Frances’ place. When Frances wakes, she holds Bobbi’s gaze for just a beat too long, which is perhaps what prompts Bobbi to announce that she should head home. She agrees to text Frances when she gets home, a small action that depressingly will be familiar to every woman on the planet.
The next night sees them on stage for the first time. While we aren’t given the name of their stage duo (Frobbi? Brances? No, something far more intellectual than an X Factor portmanteau, surely), they’re denouncing the hollow nature of modern female empowerment, spitting out verses about the misaligned reclaiming of pole dancing as feminist.
But who’s this glamazon watching the budding Kae Tempests? It’s Melissa (Girls’ Jemima Kirke) who swoops on in at them at the bar afterwards. “I loved it,” she tells them of their performance. “It was very sweet… but ruthless.” We find out that Frances is the writer and Bobbi is “the muse”, something which Frances wrinkles her nose up at Bobbi assigning herself. Bobbi, with the subtlety of an anvil, also throws out that the girls used to fuck, but not anymore: “We dropped the fucking but kept the poetry”. It turns out that Melissa is a writer who just happens to love wild swimming (shocker) and would the girls like to come and experience the magical, ethereal wonders of a dip in the icy waves of Dublin Bay?
Of course they do. And after a quick Google of Melissa’s husband, the famous actor Nick Conway (played by the famous actor Joe Alwyn, aka Mr Taylor Swift) – Frances sneeringly sends a screenshot to Bobbi saying: “Have you seen her trophy husband?” – the pair find themselves having dinner in Melissa and Nick’s extremely Grand Designs house (two bathrooms!) in Monkstown, the posh outskirts of the city.
“Your house is very ‘cool’,” Frances says with a hint of disdain at dinner, while Bobbi sidles up to Melissa: “I love it, you two are such grown-ups.” Although Frances might be pretending otherwise, the two are definitely seduced by these “grown ups”, the creatives of a writer and her actor husband, their house, their food, their wine – ooh, you guys even smoke here too?
The awkward dinner party chat gets worse when Melissa asks Frances why she enjoys writing poetry: “I like the impermanence of it,” she replies. “I feel a bit sick about the thought of it lasting forever.” Melissa obviously disagrees, to which Bobbi announces that Frances is a communist, stopping just short of making her beat-poet some lines from the Little Red Book on the spot.
While Melissa and Bobbi spark up outside, Frances and Nick have a stilted conversation. “I’m not great at these things,” Frances says. As if they have a gun to their heads, Nick tells Frances he’s in a play at the moment, Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, and invites Frances to watch it, seemingly out of politeness. They swap emails, and this is where it all begins…
A few days later, the girls are chatting about their new obsession (Melissa and/or Nick) and Bobbi’s wondering disparagingly why they’re even married. Frances is more philosophical: “Who knows what happens to two people when they’re alone?”
Meanwhile, Frances has to pay the rent and has got a summer job in a literary agency. But she’s barely sat down before announcing to her colleague: “I’m fundamentally opposed to the whole notion”. Way to smash your first day, Frances! Her precocious side rises up, something which Bobbi later pulls her up on when she’s giving it all that about how it’s obvious that Tennessee Williams is “mannered”. “OK, Frances, now you’re being annoying,” in a way that suggests it’s not the first time she’s picked her up on this.
Frances goes to the play to watch Joe-as-Nick-as-Brick, and texts him afterwards (uh oh) and he replies with a not quite “u up?”, but as close to: “I’m sorry I missed you, you should have stayed for a drink.” He then returns the favour by saying he wants to see her perform at her next spoken word performance. He must be really keen.
In the red hue of the next show, Frances looks out to the audience. Who’s that tousled-haired chap standing self-consciously at the back? It’s Nicholas, of course. After their performances (subject matter: the corrupt nature of the diamond marketing industry) the two couples have a drink and Bobbi makes barbed comments designed to provoke Nick about being a straight actor playing a gay/bisexual character, and she outs Frances as a bisexual in the interim. With that bombshell dropped, Bobbi walks off, leaving the gruff-voiced Nick to flounder about saying how much he liked the poetry and that he will email Frances some compliments that “won’t require eye contact”. “We could try though?” Frances says, her eyes locking on him. Oh, it’s on.
Further chats with mates
- When talking about Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, Nick explains “it’s a melodrama,”, that is, “a sensational dramatic piece with exaggerated characters and exciting events intended to appeal to the emotions”. Interesting to note that’s the exact opposite to CWF
- Gobby Bobbi shows she’s still a care-giver in the relationship when she spends the night when Frances has bad period pains, although would it have killed her to at least throw a blanket over Frances? Real friends don’t let friends sleep curled up on a bathroom floor
Conversations With Friends is on BBC iPlayer now.
