“Everyone else was on mute because I think if I’d been in the room with people, having to say some of the lines with people laughing, I think it would have just thrown me,” she said. “They’re on mute. I’m just going to say the lines and get through it.”
Shooting the scene was a more “serious” affair with O’Ryan saying the cast and crew didn’t want to “cheapen” the plot point by making it humorous. The star said: “I wanted to do the scene justice for Lizzie, a character who I have grown to love and have had the pleasure of growing up alongside. I was also aware this was a book reader fan fave moment so wanted it to land. It’s also important that whilst the scene is humorous and surprising, polyamory is a way of life for some people and we wanted to respect that too.”
Outlander marks O’Ryan’s most high-profile part to date after training at the Oxford School of Drama.
She always wanted to be a performer and first started out at the tender age of eight in her native Manchester at the Oldham Theatre Workshop. Her mother, who was a teacher, took O’Ryan to the theatre workshop “because I was always a kid who liked performing”.
O’Ryan was in good company there with many Coronation Street alumni starting out at the workshop including Gentleman Jack star Suranne Jones and Weatherfield favourite Antony Cotton. Some more recent stars include House of the Dragon’s Olivia Cooke and Millie Gibson who has been cast in Doctor Who.
The actress was part of the workshop up until she was 19, performing twice a year in their productions. Hailing the Oldham Theatre Workshop, O’Ryan said: “What was so amazing about that place, I credit that place as making me the person that I am and the actor that I am.”
She added her teachers really worked with her and other aspiring artists and really made them feel like their “voices mattered”.
O’Ryan went on to study at drama school before graduating and said it was tough going into the industry, moving to London and working “five jobs”, which varied from teaching people Ping Pong having never played table tennis in her life to serving as an Air BnB meet and greeter, to support herself as she went to auditions.
But working the five jobs took their toll and she admitted when she went home for Christmas she was left “broken” and “exhausted” with her parents telling her that working like that wasn’t “sustainable”.