Chewing Gum
チューインガム
Storyline
The whole story, ending included.
A 24-year-old from a Pentecostal household on a London estate decides to lose her virginity, badly.
Tracey Gordon is twenty-four, works in a corner shop on a London council estate, and is still a virgin. She was raised by a devout mother, Joy, alongside her even more devout younger sister, Cynthia, and for six years she has been engaged to Ronald, a fellow believer who will not touch her. After a Beyoncé-inspired makeover from her best friend, Candice, she sets out to seduce him, but it is Connor, a street poet on the estate, who catches her eye. She finally leaves Ronald, whose lack of interest turns out to have a reason: he is gay. With Connor, every attempt at sex goes wrong, from a pregnancy scare after their first fumbling encounter to a planned threesome. Her mother throws her out, and Tracey moves in with Candice and her grandmother, Esther, while Connor hopes she will move in with him. The first series ends on the day Cynthia is to marry Ronald. Tracey is set on stopping her sister from making a terrible mistake, but Ronald spares her the trouble: at the altar he announces that he is gay, and the wedding is off.
The second series opens three months later. Tracey has been away, part of the time in a homeless shelter, and comes back to find Candice angry with her, her mother refusing to let her in and Connor with a new girlfriend, so she pretends to be dating the rapper Stormzy. She sits her mother's tests for moving home, ends up at a sex club after a party, befriends a local dog and becomes infatuated with Candice's boyfriend's father. Cynthia, meanwhile, discovers sex for herself and loses her virginity before Tracey does.
In the last episode Tracey shares a moment with Connor, who is still with his new girlfriend, then joins a book club in the hope of meeting men rather than boys, and pursues Remi, a handsome member of the group. She sleeps with him, and learns afterwards that he is sixteen. Horrified, she tries to hand herself in to the police and is told that, at sixteen, it is not a crime. The series ends there; Channel 4 did not make a third.
Starring
Michaela Coelas Tracey Gordon
A twenty-four-year-old shop assistant from a strictly religious home, determined to lose her virginity and learn about the world.
Tracey Gordon’s story
Tracey tries a Beyoncé makeover on her chaste fiancé, Ronald, and when she finds him more interested in his male nurse she leaves him for Connor, a would-be poet. With Connor nothing goes to plan: a pregnancy scare after their first fumbling, a threesome meant to fix things, an open-mic night where he fails. Her mother throws her out, she turns down Connor's offer to live with him, and at Cynthia's wedding Ronald declares at the altar that he is gay. After three months away she comes back to find Connor with a new girlfriend. After Cynthia gets there first, she shares a kiss with Connor, joins a book club to meet men rather than boys, and sleeps with Remi, then learns he is sixteen. She tries to hand herself in and is told it is not a crime.
Robert Lonsdaleas Connor Jones
A street poet on the estate who falls for Tracey, though nothing between them goes to plan.
Connor Jones’s story
Connor writes poetry on the estate, and his mother, Mandy, puts Tracey off with stories of his romantic past. Tracey leaves Ronald for him, but everything between them misfires: fumbling first attempts, trouble in bed that a threesome is meant to cure, an open-mic reading she volunteers him for, at which he fails. A visit from him ends with Tracey's mother throwing her out. He finds a job so that she can move in with him; she turns him down, though on the day of Cynthia's wedding they make up in their own way. When Tracey comes back three months later he has a new girlfriend, Emma. He believes for a while that she is dating Stormzy, and tells lies of his own to learn what went wrong between them. At the end, still with Emma, he kisses Tracey.
Susan Wokomaas Cynthia
Tracey's naive, God-fearing younger sister, who plans to marry Ronald and later makes her own discoveries about sex.
Cynthia’s story
Cynthia is even more devout than her sister. Left in charge of the shop while Tracey goes to a job interview, she ends that disastrous day conducting an exorcism, and on Tracey's borrowed laptop she is shaken by the erotic images she finds. She and Ronald, Tracey's former fiancé, announce that they are engaged; at the altar he declares that he is gay, and the wedding is off. Later she demands an apology from him. In the second series she has her own sexual awakening and loses her virginity before Tracey does, to her sister's discomfort, and in the last episode she comes face to face again with her one-night stand.
Shola Adewusias Joy
Tracey and Cynthia's devout mother, who throws Tracey out and sets her tests before she can come home.
John MacMillanas Ronald
Tracey's devout fiancé of six years, who will not sleep with her and is hiding that he is gay.
Why it matters
Chewing Gum is about a woman who has been taught that her body is dangerous and decides, at twenty-four, to find out for herself. Michaela Coel adapted it from her own play, Chewing Gum Dreams, and won BAFTAs both for her performance and as a breakthrough talent for writing it. It gave British television a young Black working-class woman whose desire drives the comedy instead of being the problem it has to solve. Faith is not sneered at from outside: Joy and Cynthia are absurd and loved, and the estate is a community, not a crime scene. The finale takes a real risk. Tracey's long-awaited first time is with a boy who turns out to be sixteen, and the show has her try to confess it to the police, treating it as a wrong she must face rather than a punchline. It leaves a question about how someone kept from growing up does it all at once.