“A really good friend can be like a mirror to you”: Nicola Coughlan, Lydia West and Camilla Whitehill on Big Mood season two

Following a turbulent ending to season one, Maggie (Nicola Coughlan) and Eddie (Lydia West) are back for the second coming of Big Mood. A compassionate look at female friendship and the challenges of living with bipolar disorder, Camilla Whitehill’s dramedy continues to find levity in even the most painful moments the characters share. Following a special screening at BFI Southbank, Coughlan, West and Whitehill discussed the return of the series.

The second season sees Maggie and Eddie reach a crisis point in their friendship following the latter’s return from California. “Friendships have to grow and evolve to make sense,” said Coughlan, continuing, “Maggie kind of wanting everything to go back to how it was and Eddie wanting to move on and neither of those things making sense. The whole season is a journey of, ‘How do they get back to that or do they?’”

Exploring the intensity and love that two women can experience on a platonic level, the series shows how female friendship breakups are often more painful than romantic ones. “In friendships, it’s really hard when you’ve been through something to just have an honest, open discussion about what’s hurt you…You see Maggie and Eddie skirt over what’s actually the issue,” West reflected.

There’s an unwanted (for Maggie, at least) addition to season two. Returning to the UK, Eddie brings along her new bestie, Whitney (Hannah Onslow), a wellness guru who touts pseudoscientific remedies – and annoys Maggie to no end. “I wanted her to be threatening but like so annoying,” said Whitehill. “I didn’t want her to be someone Maggie would want to be friends with because that’s even more annoying!” She added, “I love a love triangle, and I wanted to do a really good friendship love triangle to see whether they survive it.”

Whitehill discussed how Whitney represents the rise of wellness grifters and how easy it is for vulnerable people, like Eddie, to fall for their supposed cures to serious maladies. “Everything is so weird now, isn’t it?” she said. “It’s the rise of sort of capitalism…You buy something, you take something, you go on a course and by the end of it, you’re going to be amazing, healed, sane, normal ladies. That doesn’t exist.”

Asked about the challenges of writing about bipolar disorder, Whitehill lamented the cliched media narratives surrounding mental health. “There was like two years ago when we were all, ‘Mental health!’” she joked. “But we were only really doing depression and anxiety at that time. Nothing’s changed, and the mental health services are worse than ever, so I don’t know what that was all for, but we got some great slogan t-shirts!”

The leads had a blast together on set, so it’s unsurprising to hear that their backstage rapport translated to the screen. “It’s really easy to get on with Nicola, and from the first meeting…it was just there,” West enthused. “It felt really easy, it felt really natural, it felt really flowing, and then getting to know each other wasn’t forced. We just quickly became friends.”

Coughlan agreed, stating, “It makes it much easier when you want to be with the person and often actresses have jobs where they wait in the green room…which is easy to do with Lydia. [To West] You’re just a very real person with a real life, and it was nice to talk about things.”

Asked what she’d like audiences to glean from watching Maggie and Eddie’s journey, West stated, “I hope that audiences feel encouraged to have those chats with their friends and feel that space because the whole of season two, I just want them to have a hug.”

As Coughlan reflected, “A really good friend can be like a mirror to you.”

Antonia Georgiou

Big Mood season two is released on Channel 4 on 14^th April 2026.