Was This A First?

[poliphilo]

Here's something I've never seen done before. One character is breaking the fourth wall- acknowledging our presence with brief comments and meaningful looks- and the character she's with notices how she keeps phasing out of his reality- though he doesn't quite know what she's up to- and calls her on it. It happens in Fleabag Series 2, round about episode 4 (I was binge watching so I can't be more precise.) I thought it was a really clever extension of a Shakespearian/Brechtian dramatic device and it made my scalp prickle- partly because of the newness and partly because of what it implied about the connection between the two characters.