Michaela Coel deliv­ers a sear­ing per­for­mance in I May Destroy You

Piec­ing togeth­er the events that led to a crime is a dom­i­nant tele­vi­sion dra­ma sta­ple, which often cen­tres on a body that can no longer speak. Star­ring and writ­ten by Michaela Coel, I May Destroy You is a stir­ring 12-part BBC and HBO co-pro­duc­tion that takes a dif­fer­ent approach to a famil­iar nar­ra­tive. Loose­ly inspired by her own expe­ri­ence, Coel weaves togeth­er a sto­ry of friend­ship, dat­ing and a flour­ish­ing career with the sex­u­al assault that impacts every aspect of her life.

In the first two episodes, pink-haired Ara­bel­la (Coel) arrives back to Lon­don from an Ital­ian work­ing sojourn. How­ev­er, upon her return the unfin­ished draft of her sec­ond book and a morn­ing meet­ing with her eager lit­er­ary agents requires an all-nighter. Frag­ments of mem­o­ry lit­ter the first 30 min­utes, includ­ing flash­es of her time in Italy with the impos­si­ble to pin down Bia­gio (Marouane Zot­ti), unwill­ing to solid­i­fy their rela­tion­ship sta­tus beyond this casu­al hook-up.

Dat­ing dom­i­nates con­ver­sa­tions and social plans; her friend Kwame (Paa­pa Essiedu) leaves to meet a Grindr date, giv­ing Ara­bel­la an excuse to take a break from writ­ing to meet Simon (Aml Ameen) and his friends at a bar. Every­one has their own thing going on, includ­ing Simon step­ping out on his long-term rela­tion­ship with lit­tle care about who sees him. Texts, video calls and scrolling through apps are seam­less­ly inte­grat­ed, effec­tive­ly under­scor­ing how much tech­nol­o­gy plays a role in mod­ern liv­ing. Lat­er, she uses online bank­ing and Simon’s Uber receipt in an attempt to recon­struct the jig­saw puz­zle of a night she can­not remember.

Rather than lead­ing with the black­out and sub­se­quent trau­ma of an encounter ini­tial­ly depict­ed via half-formed frag­ments, we’re giv­en the oppor­tu­ni­ty to get to know our pro­tag­o­nist before her life is inter­rupt­ed by the sex­u­al assault. Ditch­ing her lap­top for an hour-long break in Soho, Ara­bel­la sets a timer on her phone to ensure she doesn’t stray for too long. Karaōke, shots and singing along to ​‘Flow­ers’ by Sweet Female Atti­tude in a bar fol­lows, before a stum­bling, glass break­ing mon­tage halts the joy­ful festivities.

Ear­li­er, a fan has stopped the ​‘Con­fes­sions of a Fed-Up Mil­len­ni­al’ author to take a pho­to and regal her with admi­ra­tion. Hap­py to indulge in a snap­shot and con­ver­sa­tion, she is still adjust­ing to fame and atten­tion. The same hap­pens the fol­low­ing morn­ing, but this time Ara­bel­la can bare­ly focus on the self­ie tak­ing. An effec­tive before and after sequence depict­ing how quick­ly the world can be flipped upside down, even if her cur­rent dis­ori­en­tat­ed state is with­out explanation.

The first two episodes are direct­ed by Sam Miller, who has notable cred­its on Luther and For­ti­tude, and writ­ten by Coel, mesh­ing togeth­er a pre- and post-fugue state to under­score the vio­la­tion that has tak­en place. The unno­ticed head wound, which begins to bleed dur­ing the meet­ing with her lit­er­ary agents and the smashed phone screen spot­ted by her best friend Ter­ry (Weruche Opia) are ear­ly indi­ca­tors this is far from a sim­ple hangover.

When she gets home, touch­ing the door­knob leads to a dis­turb­ing image of a man above her, who won’t let her out of a con­fined space. She can bare­ly recog­nise her own trau­ma, so it is unsur­pris­ing that she flakes out and for­gets Ter­ry has an impor­tant audi­tion for a so-called fem­i­nist beau­ty brand – an audi­tion that goes ter­ri­bly, in part as a result of racial microag­gres­sions from the white women behind the camera.

Events in ​‘Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes’ and ​‘Some­one is Lying’ unfold at a slow pace, allow­ing the char­ac­ters to ful­ly occu­py their space before Arabella’s world is upend­ed. Coel is riv­et­ing through­out, from her care­free exu­ber­ance when tak­ing a break to her word­less con­fu­sion regard­ing her miss­ing hours, cul­mi­nat­ing in vis­cer­al sobs and lat­er the silent wip­ing away of a tear as the pieces begin to fall into place.

Humour is far from absent: some of it is about the writ­ing process (she types ​“how to write quick­ly” into a search engine), while oth­er moments nod to the clue­less­ness and intru­sive expec­ta­tions of her white agents. A mys­tery sto­ry bub­bles beneath the sur­face, but I May Destroy You excels for refus­ing to give easy answers to that hazy evening and every­thing else that follows.

The first two episodes are avail­able now on BBC iPlay­er; Episode 2 airs on BBC One tonight (9 June) at 10.45 pm.