The critically acclaimed actor and director discusses his memoir and the real impact of racism on Black mental health with David Olusoga.

When Harewood was 23, with his acting career taking flight, he had what he now understands to be a psychotic breakdown and was sectioned under the Mental Health Act.

He was physically restrained by six police officers, sedated, then hospitalised and transferred to a locked ward. Only now, 30 years later, has he been able to process what he went through.

Expect a candid and courageous conversation as Harewood and Olusoga chart the journey from breakdown to recovery and what this experience reveals about racism and Black mental health.

Harewood says: ‘As a Black British man I believe it is vital that I tell this story. It may be just one account from the perspective of a person of colour who has experienced this system, but it may be enough to potentially change an opinion or, more importantly, stop someone else from spinning completely out of control.’

This event is presented in partnership with Black Minds Matter.

David Harewood MBE is an actor, director, author and activist. He has performed on stage with some of the most prestigious theatres and across TV and film.

Through documentaries such as David Harewood: Psychosis and Me, Black is the New Black, Could Britain Ever Have a Black Prime Minister and Why Is Covid Killing People of Colour?, Harewood has become a driving force for systematic and cultural change.

Maybe I Don’t Belong Here: A Memoir of Race, Identity, Breakdown and Recovery is his first book.

David Olusoga is a historian, broadcaster and film-maker whose recent TV programmes include Barack Obama Talks to David Olusoga, Empire and the BAFTA Award-winning Britain’s Forgotten Slave Owners.

Olusoga is an award-winning author, whose books include Black & British: A Forgotten History, The World’s War and Civilizations: Encounters and the Cult of Progress. His YA book Black and British: A short, essential history won the Children’s Illustrated & Non-Fiction book of the year at the 2021 British Book Awards.

In partnership with Black Minds Matter

Age recommendation/restriction