--- title: "Sugar Rush" year: 2005 kind: "series" canonical: "https://film.one/tv/sugar-rush" fi1m_id: "sugar-rush" imdb_id: "tt0452568" tmdb_id: 407 wikidata_id: "Q2476852" fi1m_score: 68 critics_reviews: 2 published: "2026-10-07T14:19:57.109890+00:00" updated: "2026-10-07T14:19:57.739640+00:00" region: "PL" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Sugar Rush (2005) Created by Katie Baxendale, Julie Burchill · 24m · Drama, Comedy ## Identity Sugar Rush - **Canonical:** https://film.one/tv/sugar-rush - **Type:** Series - **Fi1m ID:** sugar-rush - **IMDb ID:** tt0452568 - **TMDB ID:** 407 - **Wikidata ID:** Q2476852 - **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0452568/, https://www.themoviedb.org/tv/407, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q2476852 **Fi1m score: 68** · Critics: 2 of 6 reviews so far *In a sentence:* Brighton, 2005: everyone is having sex except the girl doing the voiceover > Julie Burchill and Katie Baxendale’s Brighton teen drama is quick, rude and funny, and Olivia Hallinan’s Kim is a narrator worth following anywhere. The first series knows exactly what it is; the second forgets, and tidies up a story that was better messy. ## Synopsis Brighton, 2005. Kim (Olivia Hallinan), fifteen and newly arrived from London, narrates her own life because nobody at home is listening. Her mother Stella (Sara Stewart) is sleeping with Dale (Neil Jackson), the man hired to do up the house; her father Nathan (Richard Lumsden) notices nothing; her younger brother Matt (Kurtis O’Brien) is odd in ways the family has stopped mentioning. What Kim wants is Sugar (Lenora Crichlow), the loud, lovely, reckless girl who has adopted her and who wants boys, drink and whatever she can lift from a shop without paying. Kim follows her along the seafront, into pubs she is too young for and towards beds she will not be in, and keeps her mouth shut. Each episode runs 24 minutes and carries an 18 certificate. ## Review Julie Burchill and Katie Baxendale took Burchill’s novel about a fifteen-year-old girl in love with her best friend and turned it into twenty episodes of 24 minutes, first shown on 7 June 2005. The idea is simple and the show never pretends otherwise: Kim wants Sugar, Sugar wants everyone else, and Kim tells us about it in a voiceover that is braver than she is. It wants to be as rude about teenagers as teenagers are about each other, and for most of the first series it manages it. *Sugar Rush* is good, and it is good in a way that British television did not often attempt at the time, which is to put a gay girl at the centre and let her be ordinary, selfish and sixteen minutes from disaster at all times. Olivia Hallinan plays Kim as a watcher. She stands at the edge of rooms, says little, and lets the narration say the things her face is already saying, which is where the comedy lives: we hear the lust and the panic while she passes a drink. Lenora Crichlow’s Sugar is the opposite, loud, bored, careless with other people and impossible not to look at, and Crichlow is clever enough to let us see that Sugar enjoys being looked at by Kim in particular and would never say so. The two of them on the pebbles, sharing a bottle, one talking and one listening, is the show, and whenever Baxendale’s scripts trust that, they are the best thing on screen. Jim O’Donnell shoots Brighton as a place that is always slightly too bright, the pier lit like a fairground, the sea flat and white, the pubs orange. The camera is handheld and close, so the town feels like something Kim is being pushed through rather than somewhere she lives. Paul Cripps gives the family a house permanently half-finished, dust sheets on the furniture and Dale’s ladder in the hall, which is a neat way of keeping the affair in every frame without a line about it. Rhona Russell and Eleanor Baker put Sugar in whatever is tightest and pinkest and Kim in what Sugar would wear if she had less nerve, and the difference tells you who leads. Directors Philip John and Sean Grundy keep each episode moving at the speed of a pop song, which suits the first series and starts to feel like a habit in the second. The adults are better than they need to be. Sara Stewart’s Stella is not a monster, just a woman who has decided she deserves one nice thing and has picked Neil Jackson’s Dale, who is handsome, dim and oddly kind. Richard Lumsden’s Nathan is the funniest person in the house precisely because he is the least aware of what is happening in it. The show is quietly pointed about this: Kim watches her mother want something she should not, and recognises it, and the voiceover never has to spell that out. We laughed a great deal at Sugar, and then, somewhere around the third episode, felt slightly ashamed of ourselves, because the show had been telling us all along that Kim was in pain. There is a scene on the beach where Sugar goes off with a boy and Kim stays on the stones with the voiceover still cracking jokes, and Hallinan simply stops acting the jokes. It is a small thing and it got us. The series knows the difference between a girl being funny and a girl being brave, and it waits for you to notice. The second series, first shown on 15 June 2006, brings in Sarah-Jane Potts as Saint and softens almost everything. The jokes get slacker and more frequent; the voiceover begins explaining what the face has already told us; Sugar is pushed to the edge of her own show. Burchill’s wish to shock was never the point, and the moments where the writing strains for it, a line delivered for the gasp rather than the laugh, are the ones that have dated. Most critics have been kinder to the second run than we are, and we think they were grading it on what the first had earned. It remains rare. Nearly two decades on, a British series with a teenage lesbian narrator, written from inside her head and not as a special episode, is still something you have to look for. See the first ten episodes with someone who remembers being fifteen, and treat the rest as an epilogue the show did not strictly need. *Fi1m score 68, published 7 October 2026.* ## What the critics say With only 2 reviews in so far, the picture is thin but friendly. Both find the series lively and funny, and both score it the same, so there is no spread to speak of yet. The Guardian praises its depiction of Brighton while judging it less shocking than its creator seems to have intended, and finds some of the jokes worked too hard. Radio Times, writing a dozen years later, calls it fresh and notes how rarely television still shows women loving women, which it offers as the main reason the series continues to matter. Neither critic reports a serious reservation about the performances or the writing beyond that. ## Straight answers **Is Sugar Rush worth watching?** *Sugar Rush* is worth watching for its first series, a quick, rude and funny Brighton teen drama with a gay girl at its centre, and we scored it 68. Olivia Hallinan's Kim and Lenora Crichlow's Sugar are worth following anywhere, but the second series slackens and tidies up a story that was better messy. See the first ten episodes with someone who remembers being fifteen. **How long is Sugar Rush, and what is it rated?** *Sugar Rush* has episodes of about 24m. It is a drama and comedy series. **Where can I watch Sugar Rush in Poland?** *Sugar Rush* is not on any streaming or rental service in Poland at the moment. It is available in 1 other country; change your country at the top of the page to see where. Availability is checked daily. **How violent or frightening is Sugar Rush, and is it suitable for children?** *Sugar Rush* carries an 18 certificate in the UK and is not for children. It is a comedy about sex, drink and shoplifting among fifteen-year-olds rather than a violent or frightening one, and the review notes some lines written for the gasp rather than the laugh. Suitable for adults and older teenagers who can take frank talk about teenage sex. **How does Sugar Rush compare to Heavenly Creatures?** *Sugar Rush* is lighter and ruder than [*Heavenly Creatures*](https://film.one/film/heavenly-creatures), a 24-minute comedy-drama with a joking voiceover where Peter Jackson's film is a sustained, unsettling account of a friendship that frightens everyone, including the girls themselves. The film is the more complete work; the series is funnier and warmer, at least in its first run. Choose the film for a single consuming evening, the series for company over several. **What should I watch after Sugar Rush?** After *Sugar Rush*, try [*Heavenly Creatures*](https://film.one/film/heavenly-creatures) (1994, Fi1m 84): New Zealand, 1954, two girls whose friendship frightens everyone, including themselves. Then [*Skins*](https://film.one/tv/skins) (2007, Fi1m 72): Bristol teenagers behaving worse, shot by people who had clearly watched this. ### Reviews we read (2) - **Radio Times**, Ellie Harrison (70/100, inferred): The piece finds the series fresh and funny, while noting how rare its portrayal of women loving women remains. It singles out that continued scarcity as a reason the show still matters. [Read](https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/sugar-rush-the-re-released-lesbian-sitcom-reminds-us-that-queer-programming-still-has-a-long-way-to-go/) - **The Guardian**, Sam Wollaston (70/100, inferred): Wollaston finds the series lively and cheeky, but not as shocking as its creator hoped. He praises its fabulous depiction of Brighton while finding some of the jokes overworked. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/media/2005/jun/08/tvandradio.comment) ## Details - **Created by:** Katie Baxendale, Julie Burchill - **Creator:** Katie Baxendale, Julie Burchill - **Director:** Philip John, Sean Grundy - **Writer:** Katie Baxendale - **Cinematography:** Jim O'Donnell - **Production design:** Paul Cripps - **Costume design:** Rhona Russell, Eleanor Baker - **Cast:** Olivia Hallinan as Kim; Lenora Crichlow as Sugar; Neil Jackson as Dale; Sarah-Jane Potts as Saint; Richard Lumsden as Nathan; Sara Stewart as Stella; Kurtis O'Brien as Matt; Jalaal Hartley as Mark - **Runtime:** 24m - **Release (Poland):** 7 June 2005 - **Genres:** Drama, Comedy ## Where to watch in Poland Not streaming, renting or buying in Poland at the last check. Also available in: US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## If you liked this - *My Summer of Love* (2004): Yorkshire, two girls, one summer; the same wanting, with the jokes taken out - *Show Me Love* (1998): A small Swedish town, a school disco, and the bravest kiss in nineties cinema - *Water Lilies* (2007): French synchronised swimmers; Sciamma’s first, and the chlorine still stings - *Heavenly Creatures* (1994), Fi1m 84: New Zealand, 1954, two girls whose friendship frightens everyone, including themselves — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/heavenly-creatures.md) - *Skins* (2007), Fi1m 72: Bristol teenagers behaving worse, shot by people who had clearly watched this — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/tv/skins.md) --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/tv/sugar-rush