Niamh Moriarty discusses taking on a character with a ‘different disability’ to herself

ok.co.uk:

The amount of hard-hitting dramas are taking over our evening viewing, but this is one you won’t want to miss. BBC four-parter Best Interests, follows an ordinary family driven apart by having to make choices no parent would ever want to make.

Sharon Horgan and Michael Sheen star as Nicci and Andrew who have two daughters Katie and Marnie. Marnie has a life-threatening condition which takes a devastating turn.The doctors believe it is in her best interests to be allowed to die, but her loving family disagree.

And so begins a fight that will take them through every stage of a legal process, as they struggle to contemplate this huge decision.

16-year-old actress Niamh Moriarty plays Marnie and explains the complex process she had in taking on a character with muscular dystrophy. “I have a different disability to Marnie, I have cerebral palsy,” she says. “And it was really important to me that I could change my physicality for the role because as much as we would have similar challenges, I would be able to move myself in a way she wouldn’t be able to. “I’ve never felt so seen in a piece of media than I did the first time I read these scripts.This is an experience that myself and my family go through and it’s never talked about.The way that Jack has written it is perfect, and I can’t wait for people to see it because it is very accurate.” Niamh had her heart set on playing Marnie, but after her first audition, thought she’d lost the role to someone else. “After a series of Zoom auditions it was radio silence for about 6 months,” she says. “Then, I was sat on my couch one day and we got an email asking if we could retake one of the scenes, and asking if I’d grown too much. “I’m a very short person, so I hadn’t grown,.