Is One Day based on a true story? Inspiration behind Netflix series

One Day revisits their story on the same day each year, with viewers having to fill in the gaps for the time that has passed in-between, as the duo navigate life, love, joy and tragedy, both together and apart.

If you're wondering whether the heart-wrenching story is based on a true tale, then look no further. Read on for everything you need to know about the inspiration behind the Netflix title.

Is One Day on Netflix based on a true story?

No, One Day on Netflix is based on David Nicholls's popular novel of the same name, which is a work of fiction.

However, the author has previously opened up about how his own life served as inspiration for the story.

Plenty of scenes in the Netflix adaptation are set in Edinburgh, and Nicholls has discussed his personal ties to the city.

Speaking to The Daily Record in 2011, he revealed he fell in love with the city while living there for a summer during the Fringe Festival.

"When I came to Edinburgh in 1988, I had spent nearly all my life living south of Bristol, and I was just amazed that a city like Edinburgh was actually in the British Isles," he said.

"It was so dramatic and beautiful, and it really made a huge impression on me, and it's stayed with me ever since.”

Are Emma and Dexter in One Day based on real people?

Nicholls has also spoken about how the people he had met over the years had inspired the characters of Emma and Dexter.

Nicholls studied English and Drama at university and, after working as an actor for a brief period, he turned to writing and publishing novels. This experience is reflected in Mod's character, Emma.

"I’d had my fair share of false starts and blind alleys," he told The Guardian in 2021. "Emma’s terrible Tex-Mex restaurant was my Fulham bistro chain, her avocado bathroom came from my bedsit in Battersea."

Dexter's character, meanwhile, was inspired by a handful of people Nicholls had met. "A lot of my male friends had quite a wild, hedonistic time in London in the '90s, and that's gone into Dexter's character," Nicholls told the Midlife at the Oasis book blog in 2010.

Speaking to The Guardian in 2011, Nicholls said of Dexter: "When I was an actor, I worked with lots of men who had a bit of success early on, who were very good looking, who suddenly made a bit of money and who felt no embarrassment – and nor should they have done – about having a good time. I think there are probably bits of them in Dexter."

Who is One Day dedicated to?

In the credits of the show, a dedication to Justin Eely appears on our screens.

Eely was a finishing editor on One Day, meaning he was responsible for making final edits and finishing touches on the Netflix series before it was released on the platform.

Eely had previously worked as a finishing editor on a number of other TV shows, including Belgravia and Belgravia: The Next Chapter, the hit series Killing Eve, Black Mirror and Starstruck.

Is One Day on Netflix true to the book? Differences explained

The Netflix show remains largely faithful to Nicholls's book, and the biggest changes are the alternations accounting for Mod's ethnicity and how the series comes to an end.

Emma’s books are about a character called Nisha Halliday, who is of South Asian descent and a clear stand-in for Mod’s Emma. In the book, however, the character Emma writes about isn’t bi-racial and is called Julie Criscoll.

In the novel, Nicholls deviates from the one day format after the big tragedy (we won't spoil it for you here), revealing how things unfolded the day after Emma and Dexter first met.

In the Netflix series, however, this part of the tale is included in the first episode, and the show ends with the couple enjoying their first Christmas together in 1988.

There are also a handful of minor plot points which occur in the novel, such as Tilly sleeping with Dexter, and Dexter falling for the manager at his cafe, who is called Maddy, at the end of the book, have been left out of the series.

Other changes in the series include a larger role for Tilly's husband, who is rarely mentioned in the novel and fades away into the background.

In addition, while Ian reaches out to Dexter on the anniversary of Emma’s passing in the novel, in the series he actually speaks to him face-to-face, making for a more emotional scene.

What does the title One Day mean?

The title reflects the same-day-each-year structure of the novel, in which we meet our protagonists once a year on St Swithin’s Day – the 15th July – and viewers are tasked with working out what has unfolded in the time in-between.

Speaking to The Guardian, Nicholls revealed that this idea inspired by Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles, which he studied in the 1980s for his A-Levels and which made him consider the significance of a single date.

In the novel, Tess "noted dates as they came past in the revolution of the year" and realised that there was another date which was of greater significance than all those – "a day which lay sly and unseen … that of her own death … giving no sign or sound when she annually passed over it".

Viewers of One Day on Netflix may notice that Emma reads out this quote in one episode when she gifts Dexter a copy of Hardy's novel, though she tells him she knows he'll never read it.

Nicholls eventually let the idea go, but was struck by inspiration once again 20 years later while adapting Tess of the D’Urbervilles for the BBC.

But what single date would be appropriate for his love story? Eventually, Nicholls decided to set his book around St Swithin’s Day which meant that Emma and Dexter could first meet on their graduation night, 15th July 1988, a day marking the start of a new journey for students.

Read more:

• One Day stars defend "shocking" twist: "I think it's necessary"
• One Day's Leo Woodall had to ditch the gym for role after White Lotus
• One Day's Leo Woodall on adapting book for Netflix: "We knew it was a mountain to climb"
• One Day soundtrack: Full tracklist for Netflix drama
• Leo Woodall on One Day, The White Lotus and exceeding expectations
• One Day star Ambika Mod says Netflix series will cover more of book
• Ambika Mod on modernising One Day: "I'm very different to Anne Hathaway"

One Day is available to stream now on Netflix. Sign up for Netflix from £6.99 a month. Netflix is also available on Sky Glass and Virgin Media Stream.

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