Visitors to Bolton town centre might have had to look twice at Le Mans Crescent yesterday.

The street was transformed to look like London in the 1980s for filming of ‘Boys’, a new Channel 4 drama set to hit screens next year.

The show features three gay teenage boys who start a new life in London and follows their journey through rejection, prejudice, and the AIDS epidemic.

Olly Alexander, lead singer from the band Years & Years, and newcomers Omari Douglas and Callum Scott Howells play the three boys, Ritchie, Roscoe, and Colin.

Lydia West, from the show Years and Years, plays Jill, Ritchie’s best friend from college and the group’s rock.

Nathaniel Curtis plays Ash, another of the gang’s friends.

Eagle-eyed onlookers could spot Nathaniel, Lydia, and Omari in the crowd as they filmed a protest march scene.

Over 20 people were filmed for the scene, with protesters coming off a bus and pulling signs out the back of a car.

People were spotted with white t-shirts reading "AIDS needs aid!"

Signs with “fight AIDS not gays”, “RIP killed by the system” and “Blood on your hands blazenhensher” were all spotted.

Yesterday afternoon passersby could see Olly cuddling up to Lydia to keep warm as the pair waited to film a scene in the back of a police van with the other major cast members.

All actors had been given fake wounds by the make-up team.

The series also stars Stephen Fry, Neil Patrick Harris, and Keeley Hawes, but none of the trio were spotted in shots yesterday.

'Boys' was written by Russell T Davies, the creator of 'Queer as Folk'.

Filming continues tomorrow so Le Mans Crescent will not reopen until Friday evening at the earliest.