Ben Whishaw practised on prosthetic body parts for This is Going to Hurt

Ben Whishaw practised on prosthetic body parts to help him prepare to play a doctor in This is Going to Hurt.

The No Time to Die star plays Adam Kay in the TV adaptation of Kay's 2017 book This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor, which depicts his rise through the obstetrics and gynaecology department and the toll the job took on his personal life.

Three doctors served as consultants on the show and helped Whishaw understand how they would handle a specific patient using prosthetic dummies.

"They were there every day and would come from a shift direct to the film set and tell us how what we were filming that day would work," he recalled to the BBC. "We practised on prosthetic body parts. The doctors would say, 'You need to do this. Put your hand down. Feel it this way.' It was amazingly helpful.

"I thought I was quite good. And the doctors said that I wasn't bad either. But obviously, it's a big difference to transfer from a prosthetic body to a real one. Not a lot in common really between the two."

Kay, who wrote the series, was only able to meet the actor twice before shooting began and Whishaw admitted he still feels "incredibly shy" around the comedian, who quit as a doctor in 2010.

"On the one hand, he's someone I don't know that well, but then I've done this very kind of intimate portrayal of him and his life, so it still feels quite strange to me," he explained.

This is Going to Hurt is available to stream on BBC iPlayer.