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‘You can’t paper over the cracks of history. It will haunt you’: Gugu Mbatha-Raw on her race-horror thriller
Gugu Mbatha-Raw discusses her role in Possession, a Sky supernatural thriller that connects a contemporary inheritance dispute in Jamaica with the legacy of British plantation slavery. She says the drama explores how unresolved history can continue to affect the present, while her character, a Bristol lawyer of mixed Jamaican heritage, becomes increasingly connected to a background she had kept at a distance.
Mbatha-Raw plays Claudia, who is sent to Jamaica after a wealthy descendant of a white plantation owner leaves his estate to an untraceable Jamaican man rather than his own family. Initially selected partly for the “optics” of being a Black, half-Jamaican lawyer, Claudia faces a case in which legal questions give way to supernatural and historical forces; the series moves between modern Jamaica and the era of plantation slavery. The 43-year-old actor says she chooses varied, politically ambitious roles, following work in Belle, Black Mirror, The Morning Show and Surface.
In short
- Possession links an inheritance dispute to Britain’s colonial legacy.
- Mbatha-Raw’s character reconnects with her Jamaican heritage.
- The series alternates between modern Jamaica and plantation slavery.
Explained simply
Possession is a new Sky supernatural thriller that examines the lasting impact of British colonial slavery through an inheritance dispute in modern-day Jamaica. The case appears straightforward on the surface, but as it unfolds, it becomes entangled with historical trauma and supernatural forces that defy legal resolution.
Gugu Mbatha-Raw plays Claudia, a Bristol-based lawyer of mixed Jamaican heritage who is brought in to handle the inheritance dispute. Though selected partly because of her background as a Black, half-Jamaican lawyer, Claudia finds herself confronting a personal and historical past that she had previously kept at a distance.
The drama explores how unaddressed historical wrongs do not simply disappear but continue to affect the present day. By moving between contemporary Jamaica and the era of plantation slavery, the series examines how the effects of colonialism and slavery persist in unexpected and disturbing ways.
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