“I don’t even know what I’ve done this week,” Mia McKenna-Bruce tells me over Zoom. What’s happened over the past week, you may ask? Well, the How To Have Sex actor has been nominated for Bafta’s EE rising star award (which she would later go on to win) and it’s all been a “complete whirlwind”.

Directed by Molly Manning Walker, How To Have Sex is an exploration of the darker side of party culture, focusing on issues around consent, coercion and misogyny. The film follows three 16-year-old girls – Tara, Em and Skye – as they go on a rites-of-passage holiday to Malia in search of sun, parties and hookups. As the girls hop from club to club, the holiday starts off light, fun and blurry. They end up befriending a group of new friends staying in the flat opposite, including two boys, Badger and Paddy.

During one of their nights out, Tara (played by McKenna-Bruce) is sexually assaulted by Paddy but makes light of the situation to her friends. Assuming Tara is simply being coy about her budding romance with Paddy, Em and Skye continue to make jokes until it all comes to a head on their way back home in the airport.

It’s a beautiful but harrowing film that I wish existed when my friends and I were growing up. A sentiment that seems to be echoed among fans of all ages. “I didn’t have anything like this when I was younger either; it’s one of the things that pulled me into the project straight away. I knew it was special,” McKenna-Bruce shares.

Tara comes across as a confident young woman at the beginning of the film but as time goes on, the viewer starts to see that there’s a side to her that’s shy and self-conscious. “As soon as I read for Tara, she felt really real. She’s a ‘yes’ person and wants to be the class clown but there’s much more to her than what she presents to her friends and it was something I could relate to a lot,” the actor adds.

Playing multifaceted and complex female characters is an element that McKenna-Bruce wants to take with her into future projects, including her latest film Sister Wives, a queer drama that follows two young women living in a strict polygamous society as they try to navigate their feelings for one another. She started shooting on the project last week. “It’s another strong women-led project and it’s incredible so far. I just want to tell stories that matter to people, especially a powerful female story.”

McKenna-Bruce has many great memories from filming How To Have Sex, but there’s one in particular that will always stay with her. On one of the days they were supposed to be filming on the party strip, it had rained so much in Greece that everything had flooded so they had to move filming inside – with the director rewriting the scene at the last minute. “We were standing on this podium-like stage in a club, singing One Kiss by Dua Lipa at the top of our lungs with all the crew singing it back at us. It felt like we were all living our pop star dreams and Molly was both directing and DJing.”

Ahead of the awards ceremony, Stylist spoke to McKenna-Bruce about her EE Bafta rising star nomination and some of the experiences that have shaped her along the way.

Winning the BAFTA EE Rising Star award would mean…

Everything. It would mean I’d hopefully get to keep doing what I love for a really long time.

The film I’ve watched the most is…

Finding Nemo. I can pretty much recite the whole film. It’s a work of art.

The one thing I couldn’t go a day without is…

Coffee. I mean, I literally have a coffee with me right now.

The best holiday I’ve ever been on is…

Thailand. My family and I went on holiday there a few years ago and we were out there when it was Thai new year and there was this huge water fight on the streets. It was incredible. It’s definitely one of my favourite places I’ve visited.

The nicest thing that anyone has ever said to me is…

I’ll always remember when I was chatting to a director a while ago, she said to me that she’d love for her daughter to grow up into someone like me. It stayed with me as it’s such a beautiful and real thing to say to another person.

Of all the women that you know, who has made the biggest difference in your life?

My mum, definitely. She’s wild but I love her to pieces. [She’s] such an incredible person. I’m lucky to have someone like her in my corner.

Something I would tell my younger self is…

Surround yourself with good people. It’s something I’ve really tried to instil into my life over the past few years, having wonderful friends and family around me. But it’s also so important to me in a work capacity; it makes such a difference when you’re filming on set with a group of great people. Because you end up making magic. It’s exactly what happened with How To Have Sex; it all just came together in a really special way.

The TV show/film/book that had a big impact on me is…

I cannot stop thinking about The Bear. It’s such a brilliant piece of television. I’m one of those people who if I watch something and love it, I get deeply invested in it. So much so that I’ll walk around and see the characters everywhere I go. And to be nominated for this Bafta alongside Ayo Edebiri is a real honour.

The thing that I’m most looking forward to in 2024 is…

The Baftas. But I’m mostly excited to watch my four-month-old son start learning to walk and talk. It may be cliché but time really does fly by when they’re that young. It’s magical. My son changes every day, sometimes I can’t believe the baby we brought home from the hospital is the same baby now. Becoming a mother has changed so much about myself, including how I approach work. It’s allowed me to say no more often and be more selfish about when and what I work on because I want to spend as much time with him as possible. He puts everything into perspective.

How To Have Sex is streaming now on MUBI

Images: Klara Waldberg; Mubi