Life In Squares

Life In Squares

2015
1 Season
6.3
Drama

The three-part series centres on the close and often fraught relationship between sisters Vanessa Bell and Virginia Woolf, and Vanessa’s sexually complicated alliance with gay artist Duncan Grant as they, and their group of like-minded friends, navigate their way through love, sex and artistic life through the first half of the 20th century.

Episodes

Episode 1
E1Jul 27, 201557m

Episode 1

Painter Vanessa Stephen and her writer sister Virginia embark on a life of unexpected, post-Victorian freedom in bohemian Bloomsbury. But when they are introduced to flamboyant male admirers, their idyll is rocked and the sisters' relationship is threatened.

Episode 2
E2Aug 3, 201557m

Episode 2

As war descends on Europe, the Bloomsbury friends struggle to build a life outside London. Virginia weds Leonard Woolf and begins a unique, unexpectedly happy marriage, which is in stark contrast to Vanessa and Clive's failing relationship. Vanessa comes to the painful realisation that she is in love with gay Duncan Grant and so begins a life devoted to him, painting and her children.

Episode 3
E3Aug 10, 201557m

Episode 3

Twenty years have passed and it is 1937. Duncan and Vanessa remain at Charleston Farmhouse, painting, living and loving alongside each other. Vanessa’s children Julian, Quentin and Angelica also live with them. Julian is determined to fight against Franco in the Spanish civil war, while Angelica, who remains unaware of her true parentage, goes to London to become an actress.

Top Cast

Eve Best

Eve Best

Older Vanessa Bell

Phoebe Fox

Phoebe Fox

Young Vanessa Bell

Lydia Leonard

Lydia Leonard

Young Virginia Woolf

James Norton

James Norton

Young Duncan Grant

Ed Birch

Ed Birch

Lytton Strachey

Christian Brassington

Christian Brassington

Cuthbert

Al Weaver

Al Weaver

Leonard Woolf

Jack Davenport

Jack Davenport

David Garnett

James Northcote

James Northcote

Adrian Stephen

Lucy Boynton

Lucy Boynton

Angelica Garnett