5 MINUTES WITH...

Stephen Fry, 63, who plays a Tory MP in the drama and says he read the scripts through a ‘wall of tears’, remembering the friends he lost to the killer AIDS virus in the 1980s…

You play an MP who’s in the closet…

He’s a particularly repressed figure because he doesn’t think he’s gay. When he’s with Roscoe (played by newcomer Omari Douglas), there’s a tenderness and a genuine sort of affection, but he’s far too afraid..

Have you watched the episodes? I have, and I’m so proud to be part of it. Watching this series had a deeply personal effect on me – it’s really powerful television. Those young men are just astounding.

Like the boys, you moved to London in 1981…

I never liked “the scene” – the gay bars, pubs and clubs.

I’m romantic, lyrical and sentimental. Plus, I was really bad at it. I thought people would take one look at me and think, “No, thanks”. I was aware by the late ’80s that [thinking that way] had probably saved my life.

How quickly did you become aware of AIDS?

I left university in June 1981 and it began to be talked about that autumn. Suddenly, I found myself sitting on the beds of dying friends, going to funerals with distraught parents. It was such a moving and terrible experience. An awful thing, and it’s amazing how recent and yet how long ago all this was.

Did Russell’s writing ring true? All of it. I read the script through a walls of tears. I just saw all the faces of all these dead friends, the whole broken promise of it... It’s incredible bad luck that just at the time the gay community was beginning to find confidence and joy, and freedom and pride, it should be dealt this staggeringly cruel blow…