Ricky Whittle doesn’t arrive at the 64th Monte Carlo Television Festival like a guest. He arrives like someone returning to a family reunion. By now, he has become a fixture of the event, a familiar face who has presented awards, served on juries, and hosted the closing ceremony. This year, he’s back on stage again, grateful as ever. He admits he would do anything the festival asked of him—present, host, even sweep the floor—because for him, Monte Carlo has never been about prestige, but about belonging.

That sense of belonging is rare for someone who has spent much of his career moving between countries and cultures. Two years ago, he was daydreaming about buying a house in Italy. Since then, he’s scouted land in Costa Rica and fantasized about the South of France, but the truth is simpler: he wants to come back to Europe. England, with its cold and rain, is out of the question. The warmth of the Mediterranean feels like the place where he could build a real home.

Part of the pull is cultural. Los Angeles once suited him—sunshine, opportunity, a city humming with ambition—but he now speaks with disillusionment about what America has become. When he first moved there, Barack Obama was president, the mood was hopeful, the “American dream” felt real. Today, he sees a country divided, poisoned by political extremism and inequality. He talks about women’s rights being eroded, LGBTQ protections stripped away, racial injustice persisting, and a healthcare system that profits from sickness instead of preventing it.

The contrast, for him, is stark: in Europe, food tastes like food, even when it’s pizza or gelato. In America, cheap fast food and refillable sodas are everywhere, while a simple salad can cost twelve dollars. He calls it a system designed to keep people unhealthy. It’s one reason why so many friends of his in entertainment are leaving the U.S. for Europe. “I just want normal problems,” he says—taxes, gas prices, roads in need of repair—rather than the anxiety of guns and politics.

When the conversation drifts to Ventimiglia, the Italian border town, Whittle perks up. He jokes about moving there just to play on the coincidence with his friend Milo Ventimiglia’s name. But he listens carefully as we explain the reality: migrants stuck at the border, shelters closed, rising crime, and a community caught in the tension between beauty and difficulty. He’s surprised, even saddened. It’s not what he imagined, but it reminds him of how complicated life along the edges of countries can be.

Monte Carlo, by contrast, feels like a bubble of ease. Whittle describes the festival as both impeccably organized and wonderfully relaxed, without the stiff formality of other events. Here, people smile, reconnect year after year, and carve out space for genuine connection. It’s a place where, he says, everything runs smoothly but never mechanically.

Talk inevitably turns to football. A lifelong Manchester United supporter, Whittle laughs at Patrice Evra’s line that Arsenal are like Netflix—always waiting for the next season—but grows serious about what he calls the death of old football. He misses the days of Zidane, Davids, Buffon, Inzaghi. For him, the sport has been swallowed by money, its soul diluted. Injuries mean he can no longer play in charity matches, but his passion for the game hasn’t faded.

Workwise, Whittle has more brewing than he can publicly share. He teases a major video game tied to a blockbuster franchise, due out next year. He speaks even more passionately about the possibility of reviving American Gods, a show he still believes in. A pivotal meeting at the end of the month might bring it back, and if it does, he promises it will surprise everyone in how it’s done and who’s involved. Beyond that, he’s circling an action film and, more unexpectedly, a romantic comedy set in 17th-century France—sword fights, wigs, and absurd facial hair included. The latter excites him partly because it’s something his nieces and nephews could finally watch.

Family is the anchor in all his stories. His four nieces and nephews often spend summers with him in Los Angeles, and he revels in training them at the gym, making protein shakes, and laughing at how his gymnast niece outperforms her brothers. He grumbles good-naturedly about fingerprints on his white walls and Cheetos in the sofa, but the affection behind it is obvious. Being “Uncle Ricky” is a role he treasures, even when three weeks of kids in his spotless house feels overwhelming.

He’s more intentional now about time. Friends losing parents has sharpened his awareness of how fragile life is. He no longer spends his downtime lounging poolside in LA; instead, he flies to Manchester to be with his family, to show up for birthdays and dinners, to make sure he says “I love you” while he can. It’s exhausting—his schedule takes him from Monaco to London, Paris, Scotland, then back to LA just in time for his family’s visit—but for Whittle, family outweighs fatigue.

As he gathers himself to leave for his next appointment, he laughs about finding sleep “maybe in August.” But behind the humor is something steady: a man trying to stay rooted, despite a life of movement. For Ricky Whittle, Monte Carlo is more than a festival. It’s the rare place where he feels both celebrated and at home and for us, each year, our conversations with him feel like medicine for the soul.

📷: Ricky Whittle on Instagram