{"id":790180,"date":"2026-10-03T00:52:14","date_gmt":"2026-10-03T00:52:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/790180\/"},"modified":"2026-10-03T00:52:14","modified_gmt":"2026-10-03T00:52:14","slug":"review-sharon-horgans-new-show-youth-wont-make-you-look-forward-to-life-in-your-50s-the-irish-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/790180\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Sharon Horgan\u2019s new show Youth won\u2019t make you look forward to life in your 50s \u2013 The Irish News"},"content":{"rendered":"

They say you should write about what you know, and Sharon Horgan knows ageing.<\/p>\n

Previous series Pulling vaguely dealt with life in your 30s, and Catastrophe, time in your 40s.<\/p>\n

The sequence continues with Youth, which has launched on HBO Max.<\/p>\n

Our protagonist Alex, a literary agent, has turned 50. It\u2019s meant to be one of the best decades of your life. <\/p>\n

\"Review:<\/a>\"Stranger<\/a><\/p>\n

You have the maturity to see life for what it is; your children have probably left home for work or college, you have more time and money and hopefully the good health and mobility to enjoy it.<\/p>\n

Not for Alex. Her life is a ball of stress, panic and an occasional bit of fun.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s divorced and desperate for a relationship. Her career is struggling rather than reaching a crescendo, and her teenage son has dropped out of college because the female student body thinks he\u2019s a pervert.<\/p>\n

Additionally, her elderly parents need more help, and her ex-husband is off to Canada to star in a science-fiction TV series, leaving her to parent Ruari (Aran Murphy) alone.<\/p>\n

She is desperate for a serious relationship because she believes her only chance of later-life love is a partner who\u2019s gotten used to her while she still has some degree of youth on her side.<\/p>\n

\"AlexAlex (Sharon Horgan) and Ruari (Aran Murphy) in Youth. PICTURE COLIN HUTTON\/HBO \"SharleneSharlene Whyte and Sharon Horgan in Youth. PICTURE COLIN HUTTON\/HBO (Colin Hutton) <\/p>\n

\u201cPeople need to fall in love with this me, before old me arrives,\u201d she tells her boss and best friend. \u201cI\u2019ve only ten sexual years left.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo single decade moves faster than from 50 to 60,\u201d Alex says mournfully, although, given her circumstances, it might be a blessing.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s barely moved into her sixth decade when she gets lockjaw out of the blue.<\/p>\n

A young doctor shrugs and tells her, \u201cIt\u2019s an age thing\u201d. Arthritis is to be expected in her 50s, it seems, and the doctor warns her off oral sex for a while. Chance would be a fine thing, thinks Alex.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s shocked at how old her blind date is when he turns up in the restaurant. To be fair, he\u2019s 67, and the sex doesn\u2019t go well.<\/p>\n

Then a younger ex-partner turns up at her door. \u201cYou messaged me,\u201d he says. \u201cYou spelt horny wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n

That relationship goes wrong when she tells him that he\u2019s \u201cnot a serious person.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Alex has to bring Ruari with her on a work trip to a literary conference in Frankfurt. He\u2019s left school after freshers week following a drunken incident with a girl he liked.<\/p>\n

While Alex is busy being humiliated about an author she dropped who went on to self-publish a hit romance fantasy novel with the spectacular title, Goblin Seed, Ruari finds a German fatherly confidant who likes smoking cannabis and drinking in a local graveyard.<\/p>\n

Alex\u2019s best asset, 92-year-old Charlotte Arbor (Anne Reid) is considering moving to another agent after Alex suggested her latest novel was too raunchy and needed a rewrite.<\/p>\n

This didn\u2019t go down well with Charlotte\u2019s daughter, who demanded to know why her agent hadn\u2019t worked hard enough to change her mum\u2019s image to make her a \u201cnatural treasure.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do you do for your 15%?\u201d she asks pointedly, and Alex can barely find an answer, never mind a persuasive one.<\/p>\n

The jokes are good, and there\u2019s an occasional laugh-out-loud moment.<\/p>\n

Three episodes are available to stream now, and the remaining five will be released weekly, on Mondays, from now to early November.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not sure they are worth waiting for.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"They say you should write about what you know, and Sharon Horgan knows ageing. Previous series Pulling vaguely…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":790181,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[96,11521,263,256128,391,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-790180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-hbo-max","tag-review","tag-sharon-horgan","tag-tv","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/790180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=790180"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/790180\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/790181"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=790180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=790180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=790180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}