Chenée Taylor & Akins Subair star in 'Just Act Normal', a sharp new BBC Three comedy-drama about three siblings navigating a world of secrets, survival, and awkward family dinners. Taylor shines as quick-witted Tiana, while Subair brings heart to the role of her quite loyal brother, Tionne. Together, they lead a fresh, funny, and moving series you won't want to miss.

Thank you for talking to ReVamp! Congratulations on your new show, ‘Just Act Normal’. Can you please describe the show in three words for people who don't know what it’s about?

Chenée: Amusing, Dark, Human.

Akins: It’s about Resilience, Volatility, and Sentimental.

What drew you to this project, and what was your first reaction when you read the script? 

C: What drew me to the project, they sent a a character brief on Tiana and I knew I wanted to play her. Her circumstances were similar to mine, not to an extreme extent, but I could relate and see myself in her a lot. So that instantly drew me. After reading the script for the first time, I realised that Janice's writing is beautiful. It took me on such a journey. I just looked at it and said that this is something that I want to be a part of. 

A: I think I am just going off of what Chenée said there, like how pertinent and beautiful Janice's writing is. I just saw a lot of relatability to the characters and just the world that they're living in despite it being a very peculiar circumstance that they find themselves in it's interesting how Janice constantly weaves and sews it back to somewhat a relatable society that we all live in and I would say. As a result, my reaction from that was just, wow, I found myself laughing a lot I found myself in deep thought quite often, in particular with Tionne's character I just saw a lot of vulnerability there that was waiting to be explored and dissected.

How did you prepare to portray siblings dealing with such a complex and secretive family situation?

A: I don't think there is necessarily any playbook or preparation, as you might conventionally put it. It's more so about getting to know each other off of set and building that chemistry. And I think, ironically, when you're building that chemistry off of the set, you naturally go through the building that chemistry on set as well and you know even if someone drops in an extra line or an extra word perhaps it's as a result of building such great chemistry that you're able to just immediately go off of that and take it to somewhere that you never would have thought of which yeah which is special so yeah just to answer your question I think the key thing here building those relationships.

C: So we did our prep with Nat a week prior where we sat together, and we looked at the character's previous circumstances two weeks before we met them on screen just for, yeah, our understanding of where they are when we first meet them and what their headspace is and yeah I agree with Akins it's you know something that you build offset. 

Were there any particular scenes or moments during film filming that resonated with you personally or were especially challenging?

A: I would say for myself I suppose the relatability was the dynamic amongst the family. You know you go through these moments where you're you're laughing with your family and then you're annoyed with them because they've I don't know taken your favourite cup or your favourite mug. I think as far as it comes to relatability it's yeah just sharing that sentiment um you know with family going through the motions you know and figuring it out I think you know if you're fortunate enough to have you know family around you, you can find that relatable. 

Not to sound too pretentious, but I would say actually because I was cast the day before, I needed to be on location. I would say what came as a challenge to me, albeit a really good challenge, was just trying to get on top of all of the significant aspects of Tionne's character, whether it be the accent, naturally being at the forefront of my mind, the physicality of bringing this young man to life as well. Although I will say that there was a lot of support on set. When I first had my costume fit, that's when this idea of Tionne fully emerged, and I saw the journey that I was going to go on and take this character through. So, I think in terms of the challenges, they were good challenges. I found them almost; I found it invigorating just bringing this character to life despite not going through, you know, the conventional custom brief that my co-stars went through.  

C: Tiana throughout the series you don't really get to see her dealing with her own emotions and just take a moment um so it was nice. There's a scene in episode four where she finally has the time in herself to process everything that she's been dealing with. And that for me, was emotionally challenging, but it was beautiful and tender, and it felt necessary, especially when you've got she's the oldest.

She's taking everything on her shoulders and she doesn't get even a second to stop, think, breathe. She's just got Tiana, Tinny, and Tionne in mind. She just feels the weight of everything.

So are there any role models you look up to? 

C: My Mum! She's beautiful, she’s strong, she's smart, she’s just everything that I aspire to be in life. 

A: I would say my nephew; I wouldn't even pin him down as a role model. He's just inspirational, my nephew, Kaya. He's about to turn nine, and he's just so bright. I would describe him as an enigma. You just don't know what he's going to do next, whether he wants to be a footballer or pianist or you know the guitarist um or go to the moon and be an astronaut, he’s full of life I put him there as an inspiration in terms of within our field of work I have a high respect towards Daniel Kaluuya, even Michaela Cole who again depicted the stage adaptation of Just Act Normal. There are a lot of essentially black artists within the UK who, you know, I have massive respect for, and I look at their journey and how they’ve figured it all out to be where they are and who they are today because there is no really like endpoint to any journey you're constantly learning we're all living life for the first time. So, I find it nice to just see how they've navigated through doing this work amazing.

What do you hope audiences will take away from Just Act Normal?

C: I hope they take away from the show just an understanding that I feel gets lost in today's society that you don’t know what people are dealing with when they go home. They can present something to you that is the complete opposite of their headspace of what goes on in there and of what goes on in their household, so I think just one a journey of understanding which I think we need a lot more of especially in today's society it's gotten very mean, just empathy and understanding. 

A: I think what audiences might take from Just Act Normal after watching it is perhaps delving a little bit more into their emotions, which are buried deeper within a lot of repressed emotions, which might present themselves as something else upon reflection. I think it will allow us to potentially be that much more authentic, you know, our authentic selves.I think quite often it's almost demonized to lead with your emotions rather than, you know, being so well thought out and pragmatic. But I think this show does signify the beauty in, you know, having that emotion and sitting with it, whether it be love or whether it be hate. I think it shows both sides of the coin. Subsequently, you see the siblings' resilience and their loyalty to each other. I hope that the audience takes a lot of authenticity, you know, about the characters in themselves. 

Lastly, if you had the opportunity to ReVamp anything in the world, what would it be and why? 

A: I would say everyone should have free schooling up until the age of 18 globally. I think perhaps along the lines of psychology, it's quite important for everybody to familiarise themselves with their identity and have the opportunity to flesh out who it is that they want to become rather than being yeah if forced or have any kind of political systems imposed upon them where they have to you know forcefully grow up and similarly in the show you know the siblings find themselves in particular circumstances where you know they have this as a result of the excruciating desire to grow up and take responsibility but you know I think there should be some time up until at least the age of 18 where you allow yourself mentally and physically to fully you know develop in the best of environments.

C: To be honest, just the government, the system. I think it's crazy the way that we live. We're humans. We should be running around naked, eating berries, and swimming in lakes. Change the world. Start fresh.

Just Act Normal begins on Wednesday 16th April on BBC Three and BBC iPlayer.