Holby City spoilers: Bob Barrett reveals he was absolutely terrified by Sacha male mental health episode
In a tense and dramatic special episode, Holby City explores the issue of male mental health when beloved doctor Sacha Levy struggles with his emotions while dealing with a difficult and personal case. The episode breaks from the usual Holby format by exploring, through flashbacks, key moments in the previous months. Sachas reaction to events weve seen before is explored in more detail, and we dramatically see him on the roof of the hospital, struggling to make sense of everything.
Bob Barrett told Metro.co.uk that although last years storyline about Sachas depression seemed to be over, hed never lost sight of that aspect of the character. Its been a horrible year for Sacha because of the shooting, and Essie marrying Raf, so I didnt stop playing the depression, I just didnt do it overtly, he said.
Bob added that the flash-back scenes were a really clever idea.
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Michelle Lipton is an amazing writer and she looked back at all the past years scripts and episodes and produced an incredible script. If youre a character like Sacha you always think your suffering is less than that of someone whose son turned out to be a murderer, or who lost their husband, or who got shot and brain-damaged. But of course with something like that everyone suffers in their way, and thats whats truthful about the episode and the writing.
Two new characters are introduced in the episode, Connor and Tyler (Luke Higgins and Hiran Abeysekera). Bob is full of praise for how much they contributed. Those two boys were so good, he enthused.
We go from the flashbacks to having a character as lovely as Connor, someone who isnt part of the hospital, someone Sacha can open up to about how awful a situation was.
If youve seen the trailer, youll know that an anguished Sacha ends up on the roof of the hospital in despair after breaking a promise to Connor. Theyre gut-wrenching scenes to watch, and Bob revealed that these scenes werent easy for him to film, because hes not good with heights!
I thought I have to do it because its so much part of the episode, but I get vertigo so I was absolutely terrified, he explained. I got in the mindset of where Sacha was at, so it didnt feel like it was me doing it. Eventually I got a bit blasé about it and looked down and my whole insides went!
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Bob says that filming the episode was very intense hard work, but the cast and crew had their own way of releasing the tension.
When youre doing very intense emotional work you also laugh a lot, he says. Theres great camaraderie and you laugh a lot because its a release.
He went on to say that the atmosphere was similar to when they were shooting the series 18 episode about the death of Arthur Digby: You know that its something slightly out of the ordinary for the show. For example, we used a special camera for the roof scenes that meant I wasnt restricted about where I could move or stand, and that helped enormously in expressing what Sacha was going through. Everyone was excited about that. The team we had was amazing and Tracey Rooney is an amazing director, and they all got behind it and wanted to tell the story as best they could. There was a lovely feeling on set.
With mental health charity Mind firmly behind the episode, Bob says everyone at Holby was very keen to do the storyline justice. A show that gets the kind of audience we get can help enormously. With storylines such as Dominics domestic abuse, people watch the show and recognise themselves or their situation, and that means a lot.
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But how does the situation end for Sacha? Viewers will be on the edge of their seats waiting to find out.
Sue Haasler is the author of the official Holby City book, which you can read about here. She also writes novels and theres more about her latest here.
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