This is Fresh Air. I'm Anne-Marie Baldinato, sitting in for Terry Gross, who's homesick today.

Our guest is award-winning actor, writer, and director, Will Sharp.

You may have first encountered him in the second season of The White Lotus, where he played Ethan, a newly wealthy tech founder whose marriage may be unraveling. For that role, he received an

Emmy nomination for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama. But Sharp had been noticed for his work

already. He's been nominated for numerous BAFTAs, that's the UK equivalent of the Oscars and

Emmys, for writing and creating shows like Flowers,

a comedy about a family struggling with depression, grief, and loneliness.

He received a BAFTA for acting in the BBC Netflix series, Jiri Haji.

More recently, he's appeared in Lena Dunham series Too Much and the

Oscar-winning film A Real Pain. Now he stars as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in a new limited series

Amadeus, adapted from the 1979 stage play. The play was also the basis of the 1984 film. It tells a fictionalized story

of the rivalry between Mozart and the court composer Antonio Salieri, who's played by Paul

Bettany. Salieri becomes increasingly consumed by envy after realizing Mozart possesses the musical brilliance Salieri desperately praised for but can never attain.

Here's a scene from the beginning of the series.

25-year-old Mozart has arrived in Vienna, hoping to build his reputation by composing operas and performing for the emperor's court.

He meets Salieri at a court celebration.

Salieri, a fan of Mozart's work, is shocked to find that Mozart is immature and irreverent,

not a pious genius like his work would suggest.

Here's Mozart, introducing himself.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

Antonio Salio.

The court composer?

...