{"id":722071,"date":"2026-08-01T03:03:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-01T03:03:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/722071\/"},"modified":"2026-08-01T03:03:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-01T03:03:15","slug":"alien-erotica-football-coaching-and-making-meryl-streep-cry-ted-lassos-new-star-tanya-reynolds-opens-up-television","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/722071\/","title":{"rendered":"Alien erotica, football coaching and making Meryl Streep cry: Ted Lasso\u2019s new star Tanya Reynolds opens up | Television"},"content":{"rendered":"

By the time its third season came to an end in 2023, Ted Lasso was a Big Deal. The cosy comedy about an indefatigably positive American football coach gee-whizzing his way into the hearts of a London football team had won 13 Emmys and racked up more than 25bn minutes of viewing<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Contributing exactly zero minutes to this staggering stat was Tanya Reynolds<\/a>, who joins the series in its fourth season as Ted\u2019s assistant coach, Alice.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know where I was!\u201d she tells me with a helpless shrug as we chat. \u201cI mean, I am a bit of a hermit. I do sort of live under a rock, so it\u2019s not surprising I missed it.\u201d She had heard of it, she assures me, and accepted the invitation to audition because it was \u201cso unlike anything I\u2019ve done before. I just was like: \u2018Football coach. Mad. Yeah, OK.\u2019\u201d A week after sending her tape and thinking nothing more of it \u201cbecause I didn\u2019t think it was very good\u201d, Tanya had a Zoom with the show\u2019s co-creator, writer and titular star, Jason Sudeikis, who offered her the part on the spot. She swiftly watched all three seasons and realised \u201cI really want to be part of this world\u201d.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s speaking from her north London home on a Monday morning \u2013 every hermit\u2019s favourite time to meet a prying journalist who is snooping at your background (I spot candles, books \u2013 Tanya recommends her favourites on Instagram \u2013 and a huge painting of sunflowers, which she swings her camera towards so I can get a better look). In a sleeveless red top, her hair in a scrunchy, Reynolds is blissfully free of media-training gloss \u2013 her answers are peppered with pauses and rephrasings (or perhaps they\u2019re just a result of her being a \u201cnervous person\u201d). She is also warm, never far from a face-splitting laugh and, like all self-respecting Brits, mocks herself routinely and expertly.<\/p>\n

\u2018I am a bit of a hermit. I do sort of live under a rock\u2019 \u2026 says Reynolds. Photograph: Alicia Canter\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

As we settle, amid apologies about her whirring washing machine (\u201cI\u2019m hoping it chills out. You know when it goes mental?\u201d), I ask about Meryl Streep and Martin Short<\/a> coming to see 1536<\/a>, the play she is starring in when we speak, with Margot Robbie as co-producer.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d known they were coming for weeks. We actually graffitied it backstage: MERYL STREEP IS COMING ON THE TENTH!\u201d she says. \u201cWe all stood on the stage, lined up like \u2026\u201d she does her best impression of an old-timey family portrait, \u201cand couldn\u2019t speak. But they were so kind \u2026 We all cried. Meryl cried. It was lovely.\u201d<\/p>\n

She adds that \u201cMargot\u2019s input has been huge \u2026 It\u2019s so wonderful that someone with that amount of power is championing really important work, new work.\u201d And how beautiful is she in real life, on a scale of one to obscene? Reynolds laughs. \u201cShe\u2019s like a painting that\u2019s come to life.\u201d<\/p>\n

1536 is the latest entry on Reynolds\u2019s impressive theatrical CV, which also includes playing Masha in The Seagull<\/a> last year opposite Cate Blanchett, and being nominated for an Olivier award in 2024 for her performance in A Mirror<\/a> at the Almeida. But many will still know her best for her breakout role in Netflix\u2019s Sex Education<\/a> as Lily Iglehart \u2013 the space-bun sporting, cosplaying teen writer of alien erotica (The Trial of Glenoxi: Fucklord of the Universe being one of her efforts). The show proved a hotbed for young talent, with Ncuti Gatwa and Aimee Lou Wood among the cast. \u201cI remember feeling in my very first days: \u2018I am in the presence of superstars,\u2019\u201d says Reynolds.<\/p>\n

Reynolds with Siena Kelly in 1536. Photograph: Helen Murray<\/p>\n

She has since become a TV fixture, starring in Netflix\u2019s bubonic plague romp The Decameron<\/a>, in which she stole the show as wild maid turned \u201cnoblewoman\u201d Licisca, and the BBC\u2019s The Other Bennet Sister<\/a>, where she played a deliciously disdainful Caroline Bingley (please Google the primrose-eating scene). There have been films, too, including Alice Lowe\u2019s era-hopping comedy Timestalker.<\/p>\n

Encouraged by Lowe, Reynolds wrote her own film, Dog Person<\/a>, which she will direct (\u201cI\u2019m definitely terrified, for sure\u201d) and star in, alongside Hugh Bonneville and James Norton. \u201cHopefully\u201d shooting this year, it follows a thirtysomething woman, exhausted by life\u2019s pressures, who \u201cdiscovers this desire to be a dog\u201d. (As if by magic, her own dog, a shaggy rescue called Borage, pads in at this point, after a trip to the vet).<\/p>\n

Born in Hemel Hempstead into \u201cnot a theatrical family at all\u201d (her Italian dad was a builder and her mum a sign painter \u2013 both were \u201cquite quiet and quite shy\u201d), Reynolds decided, aged four \u201cor maybe six\u201d, to be an actor. Where did that come from?<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t. Know,\u201d she enunciates. \u201cI was always showing off and I remember my mum saying: \u2018You\u2019re brilliant at acting,\u2019 and something in my brain was like: \u2018Oh, I\u2019ll do that.\u2019 My parents, even though they we were not even adjacent to that world \u2026 never made it seem like it would be hard.\u201d She was the first person in her family to go to university before winning a fully funded scholarship to the Oxford School of Drama<\/a> \u2013 the only way she could afford to go.<\/p>\n

Given that she \u201cnever had a backup plan\u201d, what does she think about the decline of drama in schools<\/a>? \u201cIt\u2019s crazy to me that drama\u2019s even on the chopping block of the curriculum,\u201d she says. \u201cThat breaks my heart \u2026 The drama department was always my safe space. It\u2019s so upsetting to me that there are kids that may not be able to explore that side of themselves because of government cuts. What is happening? It\u2019s absolutely mad.\u201d<\/p>\n

If there is a through-line in Reynolds\u2019s career, it is refreshingly complex characters \u2013 flawed, forthright, spiky, violent. Playing Licisca, she says, helped her find her \u201cferal\u201d side. \u201cIt\u2019s always been there but it never comes out \u2013 unless in a medieval costume!\u201d<\/p>\n

Reynolds with Jason Sudeikis in Ted Lasso\u2019s fourth season. Photograph: Colin Hutton\/Apple<\/p>\n

Coach Alice is another complicated proposition. She glowers through much of my allotted four episodes, eyeing Ted\u2019s proffered high fives as if she might catch rabies, or worse, fun. But there are glimmers of an unfurling. \u201cI was quite scared at the thought of playing someone tough. The thought of me being tough is hilarious. Because I am a cheese string,\u201d she laughs. \u201c[But] she\u2019s almost performing at the beginning \u2026 Particularly in fields that have been historically male-dominant, I think women can often feel they have to present as the opposite to what is typically regarded as feminine. Alice is trying to be this sturdy, unemotional, humourless machine. But what the show is so good at is showing that, beneath any exterior, no matter how tough or spiky, there\u2019s complexity and depth and tenderness.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indeed, the show is still a wholesome delight: reliably funny, big on cockle-warming, and this season with a great dollop of female empowerment thanks to its new storyline, in which Ted coaches Richmond\u2019s women\u2019s team. It is also a welcome break from the incessant violence against women on our screens, and indeed in all art forms. I mention last month\u2019s revelation that nine out of 10 bestselling novels in the UK feature a murdered woman<\/a>. \u201cYes!\u201d shouts Reynolds, head in hands in exasperation.<\/p>\n

\u201cA big part of why I loved Ted Lasso so much was that it\u2019s exactly the kind of TV I want to watch right now,\u201d she says. \u201cPersonally, and maybe this is because of my own slightly nervous, anxious disposition \u2026\u201d a pause, \u201cor maybe it\u2019s because I\u2019m just fucking exhausted, like so many women out there are just exhausted of\u00a0… yeah,\u201d she trails off, rubbing her eyes wearily. \u201cBut I can\u2019t watch things that are violent, and especially violent towards women. I just can\u2019t,\u201d she concludes.<\/p>\n

\u201c1536,\u201d she adds, \u201cis basically a play about how history is repeating itself [and asking] how far have we moved on from that time that a king [Henry VIII] decided to start changing the laws so he could kill his wives.\u201d A gallows laugh. \u201cTake us out of our huge dresses and put us in jeans, and you could have the same script, essentially.\u201d She adds: \u201cTed Lasso is very different but its whole thing is about optimism and\u00a0positivity and \u2026 communicating with each other. That\u2019s the kind of telly I\u2019m craving.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Others who have been craving Ted will be pleased to see many of the original cast returning. In fact, outside of the footballers, Reynolds is the only new lead. How was her first day on set?<\/p>\n

\u201cI was so nervous. And they write as they go, so it wasn\u2019t like we had 10 scripts in advance. By the time I started, I had read two,\u201d she says. \u201cThey know where they would like to go but they\u2019re also so open to collaboration and they write for the actors, so everything\u2019s getting built as you\u2019re going.\u201d<\/p>\n

A lot of her scenes were with \u201cgenius improvisers\u201d Sudeikis and Brendan Hunt (the co-creator and writer who plays Coach Beard). \u201cSo much of the improv was just them being hilarious, and me trying not to laugh. The whole shoot felt like an exercise in \u2018Don\u2019t laugh. Just don\u2019t laugh.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

They also helped Reynolds find her footballing feet. \u201cLike a lot of people, I definitely have gotten into women\u2019s football in the last couple of years but I had to up the ante getting this [job].\u201d Despite watching \u201cmore football than I\u2019ve probably ever watched\u201d, the match scenes proved tricky. \u201cThey filmed the coaches separately, so we\u2019re not actually watching any football. The lads would improv and shout things out. I just was like \u2018Er, kick! Go on, um, kick the ball!\u2019 I had to constantly ask Brendan and Jason: \u2018What\u2019s a good football-coachy thing to say?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

The release of Ted Lasso will no doubt catapult Reynolds to a new level of stardom. But despite being \u201cobnoxiously sure of [herself]\u201d at primary school, she has been dogged by imposter syndrome throughout her career. Surely it\u2019s getting better with all her\u00a0successes, I ask?<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be honest, I think it\u2019s maybe getting worse!\u201d she laughs a \u2018what you gonna do?\u2019 laugh. \u201cIt gets worse every year. The way I\u2019m dealing with it currently is to take every job as it comes, do my best with it, and then afterwards I don\u2019t watch anything. I just think: \u2018I\u2019m just gonna keep going until they tell\u00a0me I can\u2019t.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Ted Lasso is on Apple TV from 5 August.<\/p>\n