Gatwa spoke about how portraying Eric has helped him. He told Elle, “Shout out to [screenwriter] Laurie Nunn for giving nuance to this gay, Black character and gifting him to the world. He’s so fierce and unashamed. It was healing for me, and great for people to see themselves represented. It taught me the importance of representation: it’s so powerful and necessary.”
He continued, “It undid a lot of the internal-ised hate I had. I’ve experienced racism my whole life, and while I always believed in myself, always knew [racists] were stupid and uneducated, I guess it did misinform my view of how the world works. It makes you think everyone has that opinion and you’ll constantly have to fight through life – then you learn that you don’t: you can find a tribe, you can find your people.”
Along with Gatwa, the main cast of Sex Education includes Asa Butterfield (Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, Hugo) as Otis Milburn, Emma Mackey (Barbie, Death on the Nile) as Maeve Wiley, Gillian Anderson (The Fall, Hannibal) as Dr. Jean Milburn, Connor Swindells (Barbie, Barbarians) as Adam Groff, and more. Although each season has a different focus, the overarching plot revolves around Otis, Maeve, and Eric battling high school, relationships, and sex while also trying to help others.
Fans of the series can look forward to September where they can see how each character’s storyline wraps up in the fourth and final season of Sex Education.