#anna barton

Happy 2 Years since Obsession first aired! 🎉

Because William and Anna say very little to each other until later in their affair, Richard Armitage and Charlie Murphy focus their acting skill on non verbal clues, body language and micro expressions. Which they do very well. RA is always so detailed in his acting and this show actively focuses on that, which is why I’m glad he did this and why I think if you’re a fan it’s worth watching if you can.

I will describe to you a clip from the first episode. It lasts 3 minutes, not a word is spoken until the last second of the clip. It starts with William going to meet Anna alone for the first time, and finishes before they have sex. Absolutely nothing explicit happens, they don’t even kiss, they hardly touch. Anna is fully dressed throughout, William is naked by the end but we only see him from the back. It starts 23 minutes into the episode and finishes 26 minutes in.

I’m NOT a writer. I am not embellishing any of this, just describing in a lot of detail what I can see and hear in the clip. If you watch those 3 minutes closely enough you will spot everything I mention.

23:00 Begin scene

William is outside the main entrance of the building. Rings the doorbell and the score increases in pitch and urgency as he is buzzed in. When he goes through the door, the music changes slightly -a threshold has been crossed and there’s a difference between the before and the after. As William runs up the grand, spiral staircase, the music increases into crescendo. The moment his foot reaches the top step, another element is added to the score. It’s a pulse that sounds like a ticking, or a heartbeat. Or like a countdown. William is standing in front of the flat’s green door. He hesitates… exhales and braces himself, then drops his head and pushes the it open with a creak. He exhales nervously again as he goes in, closing the door behind him.

William walks into the flat cautiously, sees Anna standing in the other end of the room, motionless, watching him closely. We see Anna through Will’s eyes, a figure growing larger as he approaches her. Step. Step. Step. Step. The music is becoming tenser again, it feels like a tightening gear. We see Anna’s face and her eyes are glassy, her breath has sped up. He walks toward her and the score becomes tighter and tighter step step step and STOP. She raises her hand in a “halt” gesture and he freezes, inhaling sharply.

All music stops. Without it, the tiniest sounds seem magnified and the scene becomes immersive.

William takes a shaky breath, his eyes glued to Anna’s, and he gives her an almost imperceptible, questioning head-tilt. They stare at each other mesmerised, both their hitched breaths mirroring each other. Slowly, carefully, Anna starts walking toward him, her heels echo on the hardwood floor. Step. Step. Step and William looks almost shocked at how close she is. Within reach. Two more echoing footsteps and she is so close to him that their bodies are almost touching… almost. She leans her face towards him and he shakily releases a breath he’d been holding. Noses almost touching, breaths mingling… he leans in for a kiss but Anna breaks the moment, nuzzling his cheek with her nose. His stubble scrapes oh her smooth skin with a dry sound and we know how red her mouth would be after just a few kisses. She leans in, sliding his jacket off his shoulders and a muscle on William’s neck twitches, just where he feels her breath meet his skin. When she puts her hands on his chest to unbutton his shirt, he almost comes undone. Smooth cotton slides over his abdomen as she pulls the shirt out of his trousers and lets it fall to the floor. He thinks this time she’ll let him kiss her, but Anna undoes his belt instead, and pulls his trousers and underwear down with a smooth motion, never breaking eye contact. Now William stands uncovered before her and there’s nothing hiding all that he is, all that he feels. He looks almost betrayed when she takes three steps back, until her hands go to the hem of her skirt. He can’t seem to look away from her eyes, but hears the snap of elastic and the whisper of silk sliding against skin and then her heels tapping the hardwood floor as she kicks her panties off. When she starts backing away from him again, cheeks flushed and still staring into his eyes, William looks like a switch was flipped inside him, and he couldn’t have stopped even if he had wanted to. When she lies on her back on the floor, he looks like he might cry. Anna lets her outstretched arms fall to her sides, like a crucifix, like someone who can forgive his sins, parts her knees and says “Yes”.

26:08 End Scene

(Note: English is not my first language and I’m writing this at 1:00 in the morning like an absolute gremlin so forgive any mistakes! I already published this as an addition to my original Obsession review but it’s not appearing in the timeline or tags so here goes nothing.)

Charlie Murphy (Anna Barton in Damage) article in Irish Tatler magazine (10/04/22):

Besides her adventures in Budapest on the Halo set, the actress is in high demand. She is currently filming Damage, the Netflix erotic thriller where she plays Anna Barton, a young woman who embarks on an affair with her fiance's father William (Richard Armitage). It's a tale of obsession and desire framed around a strong female character which the genre is famous for, from Glenn Close's Alex Forrest in Fatal Attraction to Sharon Stone's Catherine Tramell in Basic Instinct.

Richard talks about Obsession on the Dish Podcast.

Richard talks about Obsession on the Dish Podcast.