Marian Keyes has been writing bestselling novels for decades without any major film or television adaptations, so fans like me had almost given up hope. Then came the news: the BBC was adapting five of Keyes’ novels into one series, The Walsh Sisters.
Over five books, and now six episodes, the five Walsh sisters navigate addiction, grief, motherhood, relationships and the inescapable chaos of family.
More than 35 million copies of Keyes' novels have been sold, and her works have been translated into 33 languages.
When I speak to Louisa Harland, who plays Anna, she tells me she attended a funeral earlier that day. It feels strangely on the nose, given that Anna’s storyline centres on grief — or, more precisely, running from it. Anna lost her fiancé, Aiden, shortly after the two became engaged.
I nervously mention the coincidence, and Harland agrees.
“I suppose in a way it is,” she says.
Keyes originally wrote five novels about the Walsh sisters, with each book focusing on one sister’s story. Anna’s Anybody Out There follows her life after losing her partner, while Rachel’s story centres on rehab and confronting her addiction. The series adapts this five novels into one packed season, filled with Irish humour, heart wrenching moments and the unwavering strength of sisterly love.
Harland tells me she had been a fan of Marian Keyes’ novels long before being cast. In fact, her love of the source material nearly became a complication during the audition process.
“When we got to rehearsals, I kept referencing the book, and the director and writer, Stefanie Preissner, who adapted it, kind of said, ‘Stop thinking about the book and use the scripts as the Bible.’ Because it was different years, and things had to change to put all the sisters in one series.
“So I think it was great to do the research, almost reading the book, but then we had to leave that and focus on the new world of The Walsh Sisters, where the characters exist at different ages at the same time.”
Harland admits she auditioned for both Rachel and Anna, doing chemistry reads with Caroline Menton for each role. Ultimately, Menton was cast as Rachel, while Harland took on Anna.
Don’t tell her, but after watching — and loving — Harland as Orla McCool in Derry Girls, I couldn’t imagine her playing Anna after the casting announcement. Both characters are daydreamers, a little chaotic, and very happy to go with the flow. Yet they're also complete opposites. Harland proves me wrong, bringing Anna to life in a way I hadn’t seen before. I’m firmly a Rachel girl, but Harland’s portrayal helped me understand Anna better.
Harland’s favourite Marian Keyes novel is Rachel’s Holiday, although it took a few minutes of back-and-forth reflection to settle on that answer.
Glamour chats to the actor portraying Rachel's divisive storyline on the BBC adaptation.
She says she shares “more similarities than differences” with Anna.
“I obviously grew up in Dublin, and I’ve got sisters — we’re so close,” she says. “I’m so close to my sisters to a fault.”
Despite this, she feels the strongest connection to the character of Helen (played by Máiréad Tyers), explaining, “Because I’m the youngest. And even though I’m 33, around my family, they still see me as a nine-year-old.”
As a youngest child who isn’t even allowed to mention sex around my older sisters, I feel this deeply.
One key difference between Harland and Anna is that Harland has never experienced the death of a partner — the central emotional thread running through Anna’s story in The Walsh Sisters.
I ask what audiences might learn from the show’s portrayal of grief.
“Well, I think grief is such a strong emotion and such a strong event to go through as a human being,” Harland reflects. “And I think ultimately we know it’s expressed in different ways through the stages of grief, and everybody handles it differently. It’s seen differently by everybody.”
“The way it's dealt with in the books as well as in the series is, with all the sisters, all of what they're going through, how do those emotions sit amongst the other sisters who are also going through things,” she continues. “I always feel it's like how does one handle grief in a family where everybody's going through their own troubles? And how that affects the process of grief. So with Anna, when that happened, each sister had their own troubles to go through at the time, and where that grief sat amongst the sisters.”
Harland also reflects on Anna’s emotional arc across the season, including her grief over Aidan, her anger toward Rachel, and her guilt over not recognising the early signs of Rachel’s addiction.
“She was angry at herself, I think, for missing so many of the signs with Rachel," Harland muses. "And she was in as much denial as Rachel was about her own addiction. I think Anna was in a similar boat.”
Anna’s storyline is emotionally demanding to approach day after day. Having experienced the loss of my father and later my stepfather, I can’t imagine voluntarily stepping into that emotional space for work. I find it hard enough to write about from the privacy of my own bedroom.
She explains, “But something Marian does so well in her books is that there’s something cathartic about it. She uses humour to process difficult situations, and we all had to remind ourselves that we didn’t want people to feel they were simply experiencing the same emotions as us — something should feel cathartic about watching it. We really had to fight against it being too sad, if that makes sense.”
“You should feel better having read a Marian Keyes book about a topic you may have experienced, rather than feeling like you’ve relived it," she concludes.
Harland describes feeling “blessed with such an incredible group of women and actors around me,” who helped carry her through the process.
The Walsh Sisters group chat remains active. Harland admits she’s bad at replying but communicates mostly through voice notes. She loves receiving voice notes from the others — from Menton, Danielle Galligan, Stefanie Preissner and more — describing them as “little podcasts from the girls.”
Carrie Crowley, who plays Mammy Walsh, is, according to Harland, the “driving force” behind keeping the chat alive, “in a very maternal way.”
The cast quickly moved from colleagues to friends. One bonding moment came while filming at Luttrellstown:
“We were all very giddy about filming in Luttrellstown, which is where Posh and Becks got married. As soon as we arrived, I went straight to the guest book to see if they had signed in."
“And there they were — the parents, some of the Spice Girls, they were all there. And I think that was probably my favourite thing about filming there. It’s an iconic location. But honestly, every day we laughed.”
As a fan of the books, Harland hopes audiences will “see the books in the series” and watch the characters come to life.
“And just see themselves. We’re our worst selves around our sisters, and I’m sure people relate to that.”
Before we finish, I ask Harland whether exploring Anna’s grief storyline has changed how she approaches grief in her own life.
“I think it's funny, isn't it?” Harland muses. “I love the saying, ‘I can’t go on, I won’t go on, I’ll go on.’ I think grief is a case of that, you just have to keep going. The pain will never fully ease; it’s something you carry in your pocket. Even today, you were right when we started, in me being at that funeral.”
She continues, "I guess I hope that I have people around me to support me, because ultimately grief is such a lonely place to be, and I think you need other people in every area of life, but I think you certainly need... I'll be looking for my people if I ever go through something as tragic as that. I think you need to be showered with love, because it's such a lonely place to be, grief."
I couldn't agree more.
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