Sting gives heartwarming reaction to Adolescence cover of 'Fragile'

© Imago/Netflix

Sting and Adolescence

Author: Anna Sky MagliolaPublished 15th Apr 2025
Last updated 15th Apr 2025

Since the release of Adolescence, the Netflix series starring Stephen Graham and Owen Cooper, the show has broken several records. The popular programme features a cover of a Sting song, originally released in the 80s, and now the singer has reacted to the version featured in Adolescence.

Adolescence is about a teenage boy who is accused of murdering a fellow student. For those who haven't seen it, without providing too many spoilers, the show consists of four parts, and each episode is filmed using a single shot technique.

At the end of episode two, which is set in a school, the camera starts to follow one of the students before panning up for a drone shot over the school. The camera then travels towards the car park, where the murdered student Katie Leonard, played by Emilia Holliday, is found.

While Emilia is not seen much in the series, mainly through photos and CCTV footage, she does provide the vocals for a cover of Sting's 1988 song 'Fragile', as the camera pans from the school to the car park.

Emilia, who is just 14-years-old, along with real students from the school choir, perform the cover of the song, as the episode draws to a close, and now Sting has given his reaction to his song being used in the hit TV show.

Sting's reaction

Sharing the scene from Adolescence on Instagram, Sting wrote: 'The reaction to the cover of my song, Fragile, in the new Netflix series Adolescence has been fantastic.

'It’s always interesting for me to hear one of my songs through someone else’s lens. A great cover can reveal things about a song that I didn’t originally see and give a song a new life.

'Emilia Holliday and the students of the Minsthorpe Community College Choir are incredibly talented. Together they have created something beautiful.'

Following Sting's response, one fan commented: 'I loved this song when I heard it on the episode... really moving version!'

With another saying: 'That is so powerful 😢', with a further commenting: 'So appropriate for the scene and so sensitive… still gets me goosebumps… is a really lovely version of a majestic song'.

Filming the end of episode two

Following the release of the series, Netflix answered some questions about the filming of the show. They explained how the final scene in episode two was recorded saying: 'The DOP (Director of Photography) carries the camera and follows a school pupil to the traffic lights with a wide shot as she goes at the end of the school day. Before she crosses the road, a team attach the camera to a drone, which then flies a distance of 0.3 miles across the site to the murder scene, where it comes down to a camera operator and team of grips who smoothly catch the camera and transition into a close shot of Stephen Graham. Easy'.

'Fragile'

'Fragile' was originally released by Sting back in 1988, and has previously been used in the 1995 Oscar-nominated documentary The Living Sea. Sting also performed the song at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, with cellist Yo Yo Ma.

You can hear songs by Sting on Rayo.

Photos from Netflix's Adolescence:

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