IVF is a life-changing treatment for many women. While NHS access is becoming more difficult, the success rate of IVF has tripled over the last two decades.
Joy – the story of the first IVF child, adapted by Netflix – is coming to cinemas soon, starring Bill Nighy, Thomasin Mackenzie and James Norton. It was written by Enola Holmes scribe Jack Thorne and directed by Sex Education‘s Ben Taylor. And an emotional trailer for it has just dropped.
The film will span from 1968 to 1978 as important medical advancements are made toward the conception and birth of a “test tube baby.” It also follows the lives of the nurse, surgeon and scientist who fought for IVF to be possible, against a lot of scientific backlash.
It’s a really crucial part of the fertility journey for so many women, which is why it’s truly amazing that a Netflix film is being made to honour it.
Here’s everything we know so far.
What is Joy about?
According to a synopsis for the Netflix film, it will follow three “trailblazers” – a young nurse, a visionary scientist and obstetrician, a gynaecologist and a surgeon – that are facing opposition to their work in producing the world’s first “test-tube baby” Louise Joy Brown.
GLAMOUR has been lucky enough to see Joy, and can confirm it’s not just about the conception of the first IVF baby – it’s about the amazing people who fought for the scientific process and all the women who participated in the studies, in the hope it would bring them, and future generations of these with fertility problems, a child.
Kerry Brown/Netflix
What is the true story that Joy is based on?
It follows Jean Purdy, Robert Edwards and Patrick Steptoe, the three reproductive medicine pioneers who were involved in the development of the first “test tube baby”, Louise Joy Brown, who was the first human to be born from in vitro fertilisation on 25 July 1978. It has been described as “the most remarkable medical breakthroughs of the 20th century”.