Aidan Turner says society 'can't dismiss' victims of abuse like in Fifteen-Love

Aidan Turner spoke to Yahoo UK about his new Prime Video show Fifteen-Love and how it approaches the subject of women calling out abuse against powerful men,.

Video transcript

ROXY SIMONS: I find too often in society, women who do try and speak out about sexual abuse with powerful men are often vilified or completely dismissed. And I wondered, you know, what did you make of the way this show kind of approaches that, especially with Justine, and how some people see it as delusions at first, but actually, it's real?

AIDAN TURNER: It's, like, who do you believe, and on what basis? What makes you believe somebody over somebody else when there's no evidence? Say, like in this situation? Like, what is it about somebody's character? What is it about their all-around disposition, the way they hold themselves, the way they dress, what their friends say about them?

And as an audience, I've always found that really interesting-- to sit with people, and then the episode is finished. And you kind of have a chat, and you're like, do you believe? I don't believe him at all! And here's why. And you're so, like, oh.

And you know this person who you're talking to. And you're thinking, what is that they find that they relate to that bit, or they think that's a lie? And you sort of almost find it more about the person who thinks that, and through the show. And I love that vehicle that we have in the show to do that.

But it's also-- yeah, I mean, this is a world-- it's, like, who do we believe? And on what basis do we believe them? And with Justine, you know, we see her. And it was mentioned earlier, but, like, we visit her in the show at a time when, you know, life is quite chaotic, and her thoughts are, too, I think.

And she might come across as somebody that possibly, to some people, might not be as believable as somebody who's well-groomed, who's quite suave and confident. He has the backing of his peers and people around him, a solid family-- all the hallmarks of somebody who should be, by all accounts, truthful with the way he's speaking.

I think it's that first look at somebody as well, to go, look, we can't dismiss somebody saying something happened. We need to explore it. Like, it needs to be fully explored. I think it's something else that our show does really well, is that it just identifies safeguards and safety measures that need to be in place. It's so easy, if you find somebody with Glenn's character disposition or intentions, that he can manipulate situations to make them work in his favor, and it goes very dark and sinister.