In spring 2021, while shooting Netflix comedy feature The Bubble for director Judd Apatow, Harry Trevaldwyn found himself ducking out between set-ups to take care of his side hustle, online tutoring. “Well, you know, I didn’t know what I’d be doing next!” he explains.

Trevaldwyn need not have worried: since shooting The Bubble, he has filmed the first season of Ten Percent (UK remake of Call My Agent!), as vulnerable but also capable and ambitious assistant Ollie; a role in Leo Leigh’s UK indie feature Sweet Sue; an episode of I Hate You, the upcoming sitcom from Friday Night Dinner creator Robert Popper and Big Talk; and a role in an Apple pilot.

He also stars in the self-penned Billi, an 11-minute pilot — or “blap” in Channel 4 speak — which streams on digital service All 4. Unsurprisingly, the Bristol University graduate is no longer working as an online tutor.

Meanwhile, Trevaldwyn’s self-filmed, self-starring comic shorts, which he streams via Instagram and YouTube, have attracted almost as much attention as his paid screen work, and proved pivotal in winning him advocates such as Apatow and Stath Lets Flats creator Jamie Demetriou. “I only wanted to release my writing when it was perfect, which obviously in my head was never”, but with the self-created sketches of deluded narcissists and other recognisably flawed archetypes, “I could just do them, and put them out there and not worry about them. And nobody needs to let me do this. I can just do this myself.”

The busy 28-year-old, who grew up in rural Oxfordshire and found his calling at the local drama club, is now juggling several writing projects in different stages of development, including a comedy series for Baby Cow and the BBC. Inspired by performers who create their own material — including Demetriou, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Aisling Bea and Mae Martin — Trevaldwyn finds himself drawn to comedy that “can provide release and joy”, but also “can show you so much about the world”.

“I think especially the English sensibility, so much of what we do, and the way we deal with heavy, important things and difficult things, is through levity,” he says. “That’s why I love comedy so much.”

Contact: Isaac Storm, United Agent

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