His mum would never worry if he was out late at night, and he spent most of his time ‘with friends, making dens, being in nature’. Life as a Manx boy, says Joe, was ‘incredibly safe and sheltered’. He grew up on the Isle of Man (though Douglas, the island’s hub, was just made a city this year). When I was 18, getting drunk by the beach meant White Lightning and someone’s stomach getting pumped, so I’m thrilled the youth of today have learnt better than we did.īut Locke has not lived a cosmopolitan life. He is thoughtful and self-deprecating, funny and arch, and is currently very excited for an evening of drinking Picantes. Our interview takes place on the same day as Brighton Beach House’s opening, an almost cartoonishly perfect summer day without a cloud in the sky. It’s clear he’s still settling into fame and adulthood but, if you’d shot into the spotlight at the same time as being able to drink legally, you wouldn’t wear it half as well. Even if you strip back the chic clothes, the even chicer hotels, and his lead role in Netflix’s latest queer smash Heartstopper, it’s doubtful you knew how to articulate yourself the way he does. No matter what you were like at 18, you weren’t as cool as Joe Locke.
