The lead actor in the best British film of the year clearly remembers her first teenage, all-girls’ holiday. As well she should: it was barely a decade ago. After a childhood full of acting jobs (from EastEnders to Tracy Beaker Returns via Holby City) that annually swallowed up her breaks from school, then-17-year-old Mia McKenna-Bruce was intent on finally having a proper Med-for-it break.
“Me and my friends thought we were being bougie by going to Ibiza. But we didn't go to any of the superclubs – we went to the Ibiza strip. It could have been anywhere in the world.” she adds, laughing. Those alcoholiday memories – of pool parties, happy hours, packed clubs, fishbowl-cocktails by the dozen – came in useful between last August and November. The young cast of How To Have Sex, a powerful coming-of-age, loss-of-innocence future-classic, were parked in Malia, "living on the actual Malia strip while we shot. So it was literally like I went back to being 17 again." The Greek resort was the setting for the debut feature from 30-year-old writer-director Molly Manning-Walker – a prize-winner at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.
