*Slight spoiler warning for Enola Holmes*
Louis Partridge may not be a household name, but he’s sure about to be.
In Enola Holmes, Netflix’s exciting adaptation of Nancy Springer’s The Enola Holmes Mysteries book series about Sherlock Holmes’s sister (played by Millie Bobby Brown), the 17-year-old teen actor stars as the innocent, well-dressed young Viscount, Lord Tewksbury who’s suddenly disappeared and on the run from his family. When Enola sets out on her journey to find her missing mother (Helena Bonham Carter), she comes across Tewksbury hiding on a train in a suitcase and the pair’s lives and fates become entwined from then on in the film.
It’s genuinely one of the best teen movies we’ve seen in years, equally brought together by the witty dialogue, costume design and direction from the film’s director Harry Bradbeer (Fleabag) and crew, as much as it is thanks to Millie and Louis’ wonderful chemistry and charm. Louis himself is, not surprisingly, on track to be the next Timothée Chalamet, a dashing and charming young protege, who is also learning French for his finals, with the acting chops to match that cheeky, clever smile.
In the lead up to the film’s release, Girlfriend spoke to the Enola Holmes star, Louis Partridge, about working with co-star and Stranger Things actress Millie Bobby Brown, his hairstyles in the film, and whether he’s emotionally ready to carry the weight and responsibility of becoming the internet’s next big crush. Answer: he has no idea if he is.
“I mean, I’m not quite sure,” Partridge confesses to us. “I have no idea how well it’s gonna be, like, I haven’t had any experience with that.”
“And I’m not really sure if I am prepared. I mean, I don’t know what the scale of it’s going to be. I’m quite excited about it. I’m really excited but I’m also a bit nervous, I’m not really sure what’s going to happen. But that’s quite exciting, right? Like, pretty cool.”
In Enola Holmes, Louis’s character Lord Tewksbury goes through two different hairstyles: a long, swoopy hairdo and a short to the side fringe. The difference between them is like night and day. One accentuates Tewksbury’s gentleman scholarly charms, is a call back to his high social class roots as a young lord and compliments his clean cream suit. The latter is more modern and youthful but a symbol of what he’s had to let go to survive in this world.
Truly, you can make a case for either style, but which one did Louis prefer?
“Oh, short hair every single day of the week like, no,” he said. “The long hair [took] about an hour every morning [to do]. Slicking all this back and putting this wig on. Yeah, it was a wig. I don’t know if people would know. But I mean, yeah, it was clipped in.”
“I had to be really careful. It was all in my mouth and my eyes, and I just wanted to get rid of it. So quite frankly, when the cutting scene came, I was over the moon to go back to my old hair. I think Enola did a pretty good job. I mean, you see my hair afterwards. And she, [laughs], she’s not too bad. No, I think short hair, definitely.”
And, good news for all you Enola x Tewksbury shippers out there! If you watched Enola Holmes and asked yourself, ‘why didn’t they kiss? All that build up and for what?’ then know that, just like those texts, you weren’t reading into things too deeply. Enola and Tewksbury were originally meant to share a parting goodbye kiss in their final scene together. But, when the day came for it, Millie and Louis both decided against it, feeling like their characters didn’t need it to prove they had a connection.
“There was actually in the script—yeah, maybe I shouldn’t tell you, it’s a little bit of inside information—there was meant to be a kiss scene,” Partridge admitted. “Well not a kiss scene but like a little kiss on the cheek or something at the gates when I’m in my, you know, top hat about to go into to vote. But we decided on the day to leave it sort of up in the air or leave it hanging, which I think was a really good call. Because it’s sort of, you know, it’s ambiguous, we don’t really know.”
“And it also I think it’s quite innocent,” he adds. “It’s not one thing, that relationship, there’s elements of romance, obviously, but then they also get on really, really well. And so I really liked it. You know, they don’t have to define sort of where they are and they just get on well together as people so I hope the internet received it like that, and not just like, ‘oh my god, they’re in love.’”
And look, if there’s anything we are here at Girlfriend it’s realistic/realists. Enola Holmes is an amazing film and with at least three other books in the series, we can certainly imagine (and would love) to see a few more films on the way. But, Tewksbury is only in the first book, begging the question: could we actually see Louis Partridge in future Enola Holmes films?
“I mean he’s not, uh, yeah, he’s not in the second book but if he was to be in a second film, it’d be interesting,” he told us. “I haven’t even thought about that. But I think I would love to see him acting with Enola [again].”
“Towards the end of the film, he grows, he takes on more responsibility, which is kind of nice. So I’d like to see him keep some of that [and] take something from the last film and grow even more but also see his innocence and little flickers of that.”
“I think a relationship with Enola whether doing something together with Tewkesbury sort of coming into his own a bit as he does in the first film but maybe maybe solving a thing or two this time… doing something, basically [laughs].”
Enola Holmes releases on Netflix on the 23rd of September.
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