Sharon Horgan is, to put it simply, an absolute powerhouse. A multi-Bafta award-winner who’s created and written some of the most conversation-sparking TV shows of the last decade (think: Catastrophe, Pulling, Motherland, Divorce and This Way Up) she’s lit up our screens with humour and deeply relatable moments.

The first series of her most recent project, Apple TV+’s black comedy Bad Sisters, following the Garvey sisters and the murder of one of their awful husbands, was a smash hit, hailed for being funny, sad, thrilling and exploring the complexity of relationships and women. Now, we’re about to see the release of its second series, which is set to be just as brilliantly chaotic as the first.

Speaking on day two of Stylist Live, Horgan sat down with Stylist editor Alix Walker to discuss the new series. “With Bad Sisters, I wanted to push myself and do something different to what I’d written before and not just stay in my lane doing what I found comfortable and easy. Challenges are how you keep learning your craft.”

About her Bad Sisters co-stars, Horgan said: “They’re all in charge of their own destinies – and they’re all really nice which, as I get older, is the most important thing to me. You spend so much of your time working that you need to surround yourself with great people. I just don’t have time for assholes.” 

Much of Horgan’s career has been underpinned by her keen observations about the relatable minutia of how people really behave, often leading to TV storylines that viewers find endlessly helpful for navigating their own lives. Horgan has spent years depicting the hidden realities of everyday life on screen, whether chaotic new parenthood in Catastrophe or the politics of the school gates in Motherland. 

Sisterhood is a big part of Horgan’s work, she explained, but she hasn’t always felt this sense of connection to female friends in her own life. “I had intense teenage friendships, but I felt really adrift in my 20s and it took until I had kids, when I was in my 30s, to really find my sisterhood and start forming great bonds – and it took a while,” said Horgan. “I still remember walking with my pushchair through a park feeling lonely and thinking: Is it me? But I got lucky and met some other mums very quickly who are still my best friends 15 years later.”

With teenage children now, what advice does Horgan feel most strongly about passing on to her daughters? “I encourage them not to wait around for opportunities,” Horgan said. “I spent years holding myself back because I thought I didn’t have the skills I needed to be an actor and a writer. Then I realised I could learn on the job. That’s why it took me so long to get started – and it meant, by the time I did got started, that I had a messy life I could write about. But I wish I knew I didn’t need all the skills to get going.”

Images: @shotby_farheenxo