The Baby star Seyan Sarvan compares ‘horrifying’ parallels between haunting new horror and Roe v Wade ruling-Sabrina Barr-Entertainment – Metro

The actor also spoke about how the women’s liberation movement of the 1970s inspired her character (Picture: Sky/HBO)

Warning: spoilers ahead for The Baby on Sky and NOW.

Seyan Sarvan, who starred in It’s A Sin, has shared how ‘horrifying’ she finds the parallels between the recent Roe v Wade ruling in the US and her new Sky Atlantic TV series, The Baby.

The horror comedy, which consists of eight episodes, follows the journey of a woman called Natasha (Michelle de Swarte) in present day, who – after sharing her disdain for her friends who are having babies – has one fall straight into her arms, right next to a woman who has plunged to her death from the top of a cliff.

As the season progresses, Natasha discovers that the supernatural baby somehow causes death wherever they go, after being born in the 1970s to a woman called Helen (Sex Education’s Tanya Reynolds), who was forced to go through with her pregnancy by her husband after being ripped away from her lover, Nour (Seyan).

Metro.co.uk recently spoke to Seyan, who played lawyer Lizbeth Farooqi in acclaimed Channel 4 series It’s A Sin, to speak about her role in The Baby and the real-life influences behind her character.

The premiere of The Baby in the UK came days after the US Supreme Court ended the constitutional right for an abortion in June this year, overturning the landmark Roe v Wade decision, which was originally established in 1973.

Seyan Sarvan said Sex Education’s Tanya Reynolds was an ‘angel’ to work with (Picture: Sky/HBO)

While the limited series is a fictional tale, it draws from real historical events, shining a spotlight on the female liberation movement of the 1970s and women’s rights to their bodies.

The show felt especially raw to watch after the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v Wade, with Seyan admitting that she hasn’t been able to watch it in full because she ‘found it so hard to even see those scenes’.

When asked about her views on the parallels between the Roe v Wade decision and The Baby, the actor replied: ‘What I would say is that, the word that you just used there, it’s horrifying.

‘This is a horror, the genre is a horror. So the fact that this is happening now and still is a huge mark on how far we have to go.’

Seyan played lawyer Lizbeth Farooqi in It’s A Sin, using real-life people as inspiration for the character (Picture: Channel 4)

Seyan delved further into how Tanya’s character Helen is treated when she is forced to give birth to her baby, as ‘her rights over her body are taken’.

‘She’s treated like she’s not human. I think that’s why I found it so hard to watch – she’s treated like she’s not human. And the course of her life is rewritten,’ she said.

‘Nour and Helen don’t get to see it through, which I think is so devastating. And it’s not just another devastating, same-sex female love story – it’s truth. For so many people that lived in that time, it’s a biopic of that time.’

When preparing to take on the role of Nour, a woman who left Egypt to move to the UK during the Egyptian revolution, Seyan turned to a trailblazing leader for guidance – LGBT+ rights campaigner Lisa Power, who co-founded the charity Stonewall and is a friend of It’s A Sin creator Russell T Davies.

Seyan shared her admiration for Stonewall founder Lisa Power for the guidance she shared (Picture: Mike Marsland/Getty Images for Premier)

‘When she saw my performance in It’s A Sin, she contacted me saying that I reminded her of somebody she knew at the time. And we built an online friendship,’ she recollected, having spoken to Lisa about what it was like to be a queer woman in the 1970s.

‘Lisa was really marching at the forefront. She spoke to me a lot about police brutality and how you would be manhandled, how you would be treated. How abuse would be hurled at you if you were seen holding another woman’s hand,’ she stated.

‘That really informed for me how Nour would walk, how she would be, how her relationship would be with the outside world.’

Lisa sent Seyan a collection of books from the 1970s by male psychologists who interviewed queer women about their lives, which were written ‘with the whole spin of “they’re ill”’.

The actor also watched documentaries provided by the production team about queer women who lived in squats in that era, just like her character Nour does in the story.

‘Squats at the time were divided in terms of… there would tend to be like a white squat, a Black and brown squat, and that was quite divisive in nature. You see in The Baby, in the squat it’s Black and brown women that live there,’ she said.

‘What hit me about that, was that I think sometimes people can assume that the LGBTQIA+ community, that we’re always coming together, and we’re always there for each other. But even within those communities that have been through so much, there’s still so much division.

‘There can be division of race, there can be division within each group, as we’ve seen with what’s been happening with the trans community recently.’

Emphasising how important it is to show this side of history, she added: ‘We’re the only show on mainstream media that is actually talking about this and I think sometimes we just need to make sure these stories aren’t muted.’

The Baby is available to watch on Sky Atlantic and NOW.

Got a story?

If you’ve got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the Metro.co.uk entertainment team by emailing us celebtips@metro.co.uk, calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we’d love to hear from you.

MORE : Lena Dunham and Shonda Rhimes among over 400 TV creators calling for abortion protection from execs

MORE : LGBTQ+ shows at Edinburgh Fringe 2022 – from joyous jazzy musicals to sweet queer love stories

Entertainment – MetroRead More