Interviews de Robson Green, Tom Brittney et la réalisatrice Daisy Coulam.
Interview du 14 Juillet 2019. Durée : 30:53
After a two-year gap, the crime-solving Rev. Sidney Chambers of Grantchester is back on the case — only to leave the village in pursuit of love and social justice abroad. We speak to series creator, head writer and executive producer Daisy Coulam about James Norton’s final day on set, Robson Green’s tearful goodbye to his on-screen partner and how it felt to write in Tom Brittney’s new main character, the Rev. Will Davenport. Coulam also gives a preview of the mysteries still to come on this upcoming fourth season.
Podcast
Daisy Coulam Previews A Season Of Change In Grantchester
Transcript
Jace Lacob (Jace): I’m Jace Lacob, and you’re listening to MASTERPIECE Studio.
Another sunny Cambridgeshire spring, another series of baffling murders pouring down upon the British countryside. For Grantchester, it’s just another string of cases for Inspector Geordie Keating and his priestly partner, the Reverend Sidney Chambers.
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Geordie: I miss the old days.
Sidney: Which bit? The wars? The bombs? The abject misery ?
Geordie: At least you knew your neighbours.
Sidney: The ones that weren’t dead.
Geordie: It’s not the same anymore. That’s all I’m saying.
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Jace: But now, after years of public service, both holy and otherwise murderously helpful, Sidney is leaving the village. He’s pursuing a romance with the young American Violet Todd, but also seeking a higher calling of a different order.
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Sidney: We can help people. We could do so much good.
Violet: You could get arrested for being with me.
Sidney: I don’t care.
Violet: You’ll be hated.
Sidney: I don’t care. I love you, Violet.
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Jace: Grantchester series creator, executive producer, and head writer Daisy Coulam and her team knew they’d have to say goodbye to series star James Norton in this fourth season. But, she tells us, nobody was prepared for how much his departure would hit them.
Daisy Coulam: You know there were proper tears on set especially between Robson and James who you know they still meet up, they’re still buddies. They just got on brilliantly.
Jace: Coulam looks at the tenure of Sidney Chambers, his incoming replacement, Will Davenport, and the mysteries and storylines yet to come this season.
And this week we are joined by Grantchester creator, executive producer, and head writer Daisy Coulam. Welcome.
Daisy: Thank you very much. Nice to be here again.
Jace: Before we dive into specifics, take us back a bit to the development of this season’s arc. Going in you knew James Norton and Sidney Chambers would be leaving Grantchester. How did you approach this major departure in terms of story?
Daisy: In a way, well every series we try and come up with a theme. You know it might be trial and retribution or some kind of theme and this series because James is leaving it kind of meant that change became our theme you know changes in the air in Grantchester, it’s 1956. Things are changing. And so in a way be kind of because we knew it had to happen. Sadly James had to leave. We embraced it and kind of made it a part of the shape of the series as a whole. So his leaving was about new beginnings and Will coming in was about new beginnings for our show.
Jace: And why was it important to you that Sidney get a happy ending as it were?
Daisy: It’s really interesting. At one point we were gonna kill because you know that’s obviously one of the most dramatic things you can do but then you don’t want to spend a whole series kind of mourning the loss of a character. You kind of need to move on and sort of shake things up. So by giving him a happy ending it meant that we were free to bring in a new character and celebrate his ending and and celebrate Will’s new beginnings.
Jace: Despite the ending of the third season many viewers assumed that Sidney and Amanda could somehow find their way back to each other. Why did you opt to bring in Simona Brown’s Violet Todd as a new love interest for Sidney?
Daisy: I think Sidney and Amanda, we’d gone through every permutation of it and it felt to us we wanted to be brave and do a new story and I suppose for a to find a love interest that completed Sidney and um and he wasn’t constantly on the back foot and didn’t have a history with you know it’s a new a new dynamic and it just felt like something interesting to do. I think.
Jace: In the Sidney Chambers novels, of course, Sidney marries German immigrant Hildegard. Did you have any conversations with James Runcie about wrapping up Sidney’s story here?
Daisy: We we did and it’s funny because I suppose for us the series is kind of diverged so much from the books that it felt sort of slightly odd to go back to it and actually I think our Sidney is a different Sidney who I’m not sure Hildegard, our Sidney would and James Runcie’s Hildegaard would actually fit anymore although in the books it is lovely that he kind of gets married and has a child and you know who knows maybe it will fall apart with Violet and he left up there a few years time.
Jace: Did it feel like a luxury to be able to write Sidney’s storyline to its conclusion with James on hand and not have to wrap up those plot threads off screen as so often happens?
Daisy: Yeah I mean we were so lucky. I mean James from the moment we started working with him his star rose so quickly and we were you know there was a point where we could have lost him at the end of season three but he was very kind and he wanted to give his character a send off too so it worked out well for all of us and it was really sad. You know there were proper tears on set especially between Robson and James who you know are still they still meet up they’re still buddies they just got on brilliantly.
Jace: I mean what was the atmosphere like on James’s final day of shooting How emotional did it get on set? How much did Robson Green cry?
Daisy: What was lovely was the final scene, one of the final scenes they did which I thought was beautiful idea was James’s scene with Tom Brittney, who plays Will, so it was kind of the handover scene in the cell where they talk about Geordie and basically we wanted the scene where it’s the handing of the baton over to the new character to say, you know Geordie can be an idiot sometimes, but he’s a good friend.
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Sidney: He’s a stubborn old sod.
Will: So am I, unfortunately.
Sidney: There was a time I would never break a confidence.
Will: Meeting a man of the law changed that, did it?
Sidney: Let’s just say Geordie gave me a new perspective.
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Daisy: So that was one of the final scenes they filmed. Robson was there but watching behind the camera and then everyone just had a little cry and had a little glass of champagne and…Yeah, no it’s just it felt like the family lost somebody. But then Tom Brittney weirdly has exactly the same energy as James, he brings exactly the same quality of warmth and inclusion and it’s really we’ve just been really lucky.
Jace: We mentioned change. The season begins with Sidney and Geordie on a stakeout. Change as you say it is definitely an underlying theme this season with this first episode in the civil rights movement, how did you look to embody that sense of social and political transformation?
Daisy: Well it was interesting because for us we’re actually slightly pulling the civil rights movement forward in time to 56. I think it was slightly later in the 50s. But I was really inspired by, of all people, Lin Manuel-Miranda, who I read an interview where he was talking about Hamilton and he was saying the story of America you know that is the story of America then, told by America now. And I thought, I really want to do civil rights, I really want to do that. That sense of change, the world is changing and moving forward. And so that’s why we just wanted to do something quite explosive and kind of bold in the first episodes. I think it just worked really well for Sidney to have a cause, a social uprising, something that meant something to him and gave him purpose. And meanwhile we just we just tried to find really interesting characters. I suppose, I got slightly obsessed with Reverend Todd, this guy who has to embody religion and kind of has to sort of in the face of adversity has to be really calm and controlled and it’s like what’s that to be, you know, to be a man like that to feel angry and not be able to express it. I just thought this something really interesting putting him in a scene with Sidney and so to me it was about the civil rights movement. But it was also about characters that challenged Sidney’s view.
Jace: It’s clear that Sidney is bored. He’s stuck in a rut. He’s putting himself in danger with bloody heroics and listening to the virtues of baking soda, water, and a vigorous scrubbing with a sturdy brush. Psychologically where is Sidney’s head at when we pick up with him at the start of the season?
Daisy: He is, I think you’re exactly right, he’s bored. He’s seen it all he’s done it all he’s basically going through the motions at church that you know he’s a religious man and he will never be anything but religion isn’t exciting him anymore, and the world of Grantchester is slow and, you know, a bit murdery sometimes, but mainly slow and sort of kind of tame and he’s looking for more he just doesn’t know what he’s looking for. I think he’s he’s desperately searching for something and in walks Violet.
Jace: Reverend Todd’s talk in the church is interrupted by Gregory Jones and fireworks which sound eerily like gunfire. There’s a panic as people flee becoming trapped in a very small corridor. Sidney wears an expression of claustrophobia of pure terror. Is this meant to evoke a sense of PTSD from the war.
Daisy: Visually we wanted to do something that was sort of representative of his being trapped in his world in a way and trapped in these sort of backward thinking people who spread hate and he needs to burst out that door and move forward with positivity. That’s actually I suppose it is in a way it’s but is harking back to his war and the struggles he had with that.
Jace: Sidney and Violet appear to be holding each other up in this horrific moment. At one moment Sidney seems to pull her up as she faints. Is this intense moment what forges their connection?
Daisy: Yes. We always talked about, their relationship is forged in fire. They’re always, you know, they’re together in adversity. There was a stage direction in that where they kind of locked eyes and you know is it that in this intense moment of, ‘We could both die,’ you know, they see something in each other.
Jace: Violet cannot only put Sidney in his place but she also calls him out for his failures or shortcomings. Was it essential to you that he be paired with someone who would not only give him an injection of optimism, as we’ve said, but also provide him with that much needed cause or mission?
Daisy: Sidney is a kind of, he’s a wallower, as well. You know, he wallows in self-pity quite a lot and we really wanted a character that was like, ‘Hang on a sec. You’ve got everything, you’re a you know a middle class white man, what’s your problem?’ Kind of thing. Just — Sidney needed to be challenged and not only his religious life, but as a man, really. And I suppose that’s why we didn’t go back to Amanda, because I’m not sure she would ever challenge him. You know, she kind of allows him to be himself and I think he needs a..he could use a kick up the backside, if I’m honest.
Jace: Violet herself is a hoot. I love the scene where she pulls out that bottle of gin with the prostitutes.
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Peggy: No offense, lady, but the last thing we need, is an uptight, bible-loving bitch telling us that Jesus will save our souls. He hasn’t saved us yet. And I’m pretty certain he ain’t going to save us now, so…
Violet: Any glasses that aren’t smashed or is this bible-loving bitch gonna to have to drink from the bottle ?
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Jace: She reveals herself to be a lot less straightlaced than the viewers might expect. Where did the idea or the genesis for Violet as a character come from, what makes her tick, as as her creator?
Daisy: Well we did quite a lot of research and well and found this not a huge amount on the women of the civil rights movement because although they were very forward-thinking bunch, the women in a way were treated like the sort of people to make the tea and you know support and facilitate the men. You know it was the 1950s still so. But it just it struck us that we wanted a woman who if she lived in a different time she would you know she’d be president kind of thing. She knows what she wants. She’s clear. She uses her religion for good she’s just feisty and brilliant. And also I just that kind of moments like that the gin, is when you get a nice character they start writing themselves a little bit. I didn’t know she was going to do that until I was writing ‘Oh she’s got some gin in her bag! Brilliant.’ So you know, you kind of you just embrace the, once you kind of know how you want them to be, I suppose, in a way you have to set up a character in one and a half hours or whatever you’ve got to make them stand out, and those kind of moments, I think, do help.
Jace: The seduction scene upstairs at the vicarage was as unexpected as it was passionate. Is it grief or passion or both that brings the two of them together at this moment?
Daisy: Well I think it’s both. It’s kind of bad Sidney at his best because it funny enough when I did the first draft, I don’t think he kind of kissed her. And we were like this is. Come on he’s got a you know he’s got to cross a line here because it’s Sidney. He always crosses the line.
Jace: He can’t help himself.
Daisy: Never.
Jace: There are some stunning sequences in this episode. One of my favorites is a scene in which Reverend Todd played by the always extraordinary Patterson Joseph asks Geordie for a bowl of water with which to wash his son Charles’s corpse.
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Nathaniel: May I have a bowl of water, please ?
Geordie: You can’t touch him.
Nathaniel: I bathed him on his first day in this world. I shall bathe him on his last.
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Jace: How difficult was it to write this this very emotional scene ?
Daisy: Funny enough, that again, that’s one of the scenes where it just sort of I knew, I liked the idea that you bring a child into the world and you wash them on the first day and then he’s not going to stop now, it’s he’s gonna wash him on his last, and I suppose what I found interesting about Reverend Todd was that he’s quite sort of…not repressed but his emotions were held back and in that moment he’s gonna do something beautiful and sort of quiet, but without saying if you see what I mean he’s not a man of words necessarily to his family. He’s a man of action and I just that kind of came quite naturally that I love that scene as well. He’s so good, Patterson Joseph !
Jace: I mean it’s too good. He’s amazing, particularly in that in that scene and it’s the little things in that scene the sense of the intimate and the personal contrasted with the clinical and the impersonal — the tag on the corpse’s toe, the sterility of that police morgue. How much of that did you front load into the script and how much came out on the day via Patterson’s performance or direction ?
Daisy: I mean a lot of that is Patterson and Robson and what I didn’t realize when I watched that scene having scripted, it was quite a, you know, sort of not basic script, it was quite sort of simple but what you realize is Robson brings something to it to you because he’s Geordie, he’s got four children of his own. And he’s not going to stand in the way of a grieving father. You know, he may have protocol and rules but he’s literally faced with a man’s grief. And so he’s sorry. I just thought they both brought brilliant a quiet sort of brilliance to it, really.
Jace: Before this next question, a brief word from our sponsors…
Jace: This episode marks the introduction of Tom Brittney’s Will Davenport the chaplain at Corpus Christi who, spoiler alert will take over as Vicar in a few episodes.
Daisy: Yeah.
Jace: Did you strategize about how to gently introduce Will to the audience ahead of his eventual arrival at the vicarage ?
Daisy: We did, because I’m aware of those shows that you know, it works very well sometimes you know you say goodbye to your old character and bang! You’re with the new character. But for us, we wanted to try something a little different and firstly we felt like we wanted to see Sidney and Will together. So because it just infuses it, then you feel like Sidney is giving permission for the Will to be in the show, in a way. And we wanted to give space to Leonard, for Leonard to have a little moment because, Al Weaver is a brilliant actor and he has quite a big role in the show as well, before Will arrives.
Jace: Will does give up the identity of the anonymous person who gave him the murder weapon to Geordie, who acknowledges what that must have cost Will personally to do before they shake hands. What does Geordie make of Will and how does this scene set up their future dynamic ?
Daisy: I think the thing about Geordie is he…He lived vicariously through Sidney, that’s what they were. He always said his relationship with him was that they saw you sort of didn’t quite never quite fully got him, but really wanted his life and really found him interesting. And I think it Will there’s a similar thing he sees this guy. He sort of admires his, you know, his stance and his beliefs. It’s just like he finds him intriguing and I think likes him from that moment. You sort of, he’s annoyed with him, obviously for not revealing secrets but then they shake hands and you get in that tiny moment you get the kind of yeah, this could work, this could be a friendship we’d like to see. But they talked a lot about, Robson and Tom, talked a lot about their relationship being slightly different. The age gap it’s more kind of father and son. So it becomes something quite different from Sidney and Geordie. And it just gives us so much to explore. So it’s exciting.
Jace: Despite his negativity and gloom in this episode Sidney offers a word of advice to Reverend Todd.
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Nathaniel: I can’t see God.
Sidney: God always leaves a path back to him. You will find him. You will. There’s grace in this world if you look for it.
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Jace: Is that directed at himself as much as the Reverend ?
Daisy: I think so. I think you have to struggle when you when you’re feeling miserable like Sidney is when, you’ve lost someone like Reverend Todd has you struggle to see the good in the world and I think through telling Reverend Todd that he’s sort of telling himself to you know see the good go out there and find it and Violet is his grace I think.
Jace: It’s a beautiful moment when Sidney steps aside to let Violet give the blessing at the Grantchester fete, and she gives an impassioned speech about standing together. Does this scene reaffirm her own sense of agency, her own mission and cause ?
Daisy: Yeah, with that, that was we were very keen because a lot of these women in the civil rights movement didn’t get to speak. We were determined that she would in some way stand up there even if no one wants to hear it and no one really understands what she’s going on about because they’re a village fete, we wanted her to have her moment.
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Violet: I am from a place of violence, oppression, and prejudice. You may look around you and think – who gives a damn – there is none of that here. But look harder. There is oppression. There is prejudice. There is suffering. And if one person suffers, we all do. If one person falls, we all fall. I truly believe there is a better time for all of us. One where we all have our moment in the sun.
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Jace: Geordie sums up Sidney’s life as quote, ‘An endless merry go round — Sin. Feel bad. Drink. Sin. Feel bad. Drink.’ I mean is it Violet that breaks him out of this cycle ?
Daisy: Yeah. I think it’s. She holds a mirror up to him and says, ‘Take a good look. You need to sort yourself out,’ and I think that’s what he needed. And it’s about as much about him finding agency and taking that power back, cause he very often, you know, it gives over to the whiskey drinking and the kind of staggering down the road drunk, he gives into those moments, and I think also Sadie, who is also somebody who helps him change he feels he let her down, and he knows he’s got to be better.
Jace: Sidney has previously struggled between his duty to the church and his parishioners and his personal desire for fulfillment, for happiness, for love. You can see in the scene where Sidney decides to go after Violet that it’s a monumental decision for him. That that’s weighing on him. What ultimately sways his hand ?
Daisy: I think it just comes down to love, I think, and also here’s a woman who I think he says to her at that scene in that scene, ‘You made me a better person.’ And I think that’s what it is and that for me was what it was about. He felt enriched by being with her. And he doesn’t want to lose that. I mean he could, he could stay in that church and sit through all those meetings again but nothing will ever be as good as being with her. And I think, yeah I love that scene. I was, we were sat in the other side of the church watching him, going, ‘Oh go on, Sidney! Go after her!’
Jace: The kiss outside the church in a beautiful scene that’s full of love and optimism. In the script you write very simply, ‘Sidney kisses her, a most excellent kiss. Sidney has never been more sure of anything than this in his entire life.’ How does this moment change Sidney and how does the simplicity of that writing transform into that amazing scene?
Daisy: That’s so funny! A most excellent kiss! That’s like Bill and Ted, or something. No, the lovely director, Tim Fywell…I find it really fascinating, that process where you write something and you have kind of something in your head and then the director takes it and he picks in a big Steadicam shot and it’s all swirling and there’s, you know and the music — John Lunn composed this beautiful track that really kind of soars and suddenly that scene, you know, again just everything kind of came together, all these people came together to make it really beautiful.
Jace: This isn’t about Violet staying in Sidney’s world, but rather Sidney leaving to follow Violet into hers, a reversal of a common trope in popular culture. Was it important to you to not fall into that trap, that it’s Violet who has to give something up for the man in her life, rather than the reverse ?
Daisy: Absolutely, absolutely. That was I mean at one point Sidney says, ‘Stay,’ and we wanted her to say no, because you know, her world is everything to her. And I think it says a lot about Sidney, how Sidney has grown that he’s willing to sacrifice some of the people he loves for somebody else, because he can be a little bit selfish at times so it was nice, yeah it was nice that Violet got everything and a chance to stand up and speak and be heard.
Jace: Sidney’s final sermon contains a message that we are never alone, one that seems to link itself thematically to Violet’s speech at the fete.
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Sidney: It’s terrifying to step outside the bounds of our lives. Step away from those we love, from the friends we cherish. But sometimes we must. Sometimes God has a different path for us. One that feels impossible because we must leave so much behind. One that makes us feel alone. But know this — we are never alone.
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Jace: Was this an intentional thematic flourish ?
Daisy: It was a goodbye without saying goodbye. Because, you know, you don’t want to have endless goodbye scenes. And what was great, the director said to James in that scene, ‘Just look at Robson, and direct it at him, like you’re just saying it to him.’ And James cried then as well, actually he has a little, you know kind of whibble, cause it was it was he was saying goodbye as well, in a way, to his character. That was his final sermon and he was saying goodbye to the show, goodbye to his friends that he’d made over four years. You know gosh, it’s making me sad just thinking about it now !
Jace: The final scene with Sidney and Geordie broke my heart. Both James and Robson are so fantastic in this scene which radiates with pure emotion, particularly when Geordie takes Sidney’s hand and squeezes it. How hard was it to write this final scene between these two friends, both in the sense of Sidney and Geordie and in the sense of James and Robson ?
Daisy: It funny enough, it was it again it was one of those scenes that sort of flowed because you knew what they say, and you knew as friends what they would — there’s so much that’s unsaid in that scene as well. But kind of watching what they did to it was just beautiful again. There was a lot of crying on set, though. At one point I heard the director go, ‘I need a tissue in here.’ He was crying, and it was really sweet. The room was going, because it’s just a friendship that you want to keep doing. But that’s what’s brilliant about Tom Brittney, is, he kind of swooped in and you know, in a way, just brought that same loveliness. And we’ve just been very lucky.
Jace: ‘One last game.’
Daisy: Oh !
Jace: When did you know that you’d want to end their time together on the show with a final game of backgammon ?
Daisy: Well also because in the final book that James Runcie wrote, there is a sense that, in the book it’s much more, you know, one last case, and we were just thinking, what you know one last something would be good one last something. And it’s just that they’re remembering they play backgammon is one of their first scenes together and they talk about it in their final scene of that episode and it just felt like you know we’ve got to come full circle here, and you know a lot of their friendship was forged in that pub and over a backgammon table, and I just thought there was something quite sweet about that.
Jace: In many ways Sidney and Geordie’s dynamic is the central relationship of the series. Was it daunting at all to dismantle that and build a new one between Geordie and Will ?
Daisy: It’s absolutely terrifying because you think, ‘Oh God if this doesn’t work, you know, you’ve got a lot of people’s livelihoods riding on it not let alone you know a show that we all love it a lot.’ So we want we just kind of very, very sort of protective of it. So to bring somebody new in was hard and it’s like where do you even begin, really? But that basically a group of us got together before the show started and we shared all our ideas and found quite quickly actually, Will’s character came together and you know once you can sort of hear their voice then things start to take shape and then once you see Tom — like we saw quite a few people, auditioned really good people, really good people. But Tom just had that — he’s such a sweetie, he’s so enthusiastic in a sort of…and that was what we needed. That sort of exuberance, and he just brought that in spades.
Jace: Without spoiling too much, there’s an increased attention on the characters of Cath, Mrs. C and Leonard this season as they each get their own storylines to shoulder. What went into the decision to give each of them more emphasis this year ?
Daisy: Well every year we kind of we desperately want there to be room for them because they’re all not only brilliant actors, but interesting characters. There’s so much to kind of unpack about them, and I suppose in a way, not having it, having a bit of space with Sidney not there for a little bit, and it just gave us a few more options, I suppose and a bit more space just to explore them. And we were we were desperate to give them all you know I could do Leonard the series, or Mrs. C the series, quite happily, if I could. Spin offs. So yeah, it was lovely to do.
Jace: In the broadest of strokes, what can you tease about what’s coming up for the rest of the season ?
Daisy: So there is a lot for everyone. Leonard and Daniel’s relationship is coming on apace, which is very nice to explore, but there will be some problems along the way, which will shake the vicarage. Leonard, yeah. Poor Leonard has some problems. Mrs. C, equally, there’s a kind of fractured relationship. We wanted to have a sort of dynamic in the vicarage, you know, the family is struggling without Sidney there so there’s a lot of exploration of that. And for Cathy, her decision to take the job. It was again, it was about exploring women’s experiences in the workplace and without giving too much away, tapping into that hash tag me too thing, just stop there, say no more.
Jace: Daisy Coulam, thank you so very much.
Daisy: No worries. Thank you for having me.
Jace: While the viewing public mourns the early departure of James Norton from the fields and pubs of Grantchester, Robson Green would like to remind you — he hasn’t gone anywhere just yet.
Robson Green: You know I’m the old guy. He’s the six foot two, charismatic, hyper-intelligent, beautifully talented, James Norton you know? It was tough, it was really, really tough. But the overriding arc of that moment was goodbye. But you have brought so much joy and love and generosity to the show that will be taken on by our new charismatic member of the clergy, Tom Brittney.
Jace: Grantchester star Robson Green joins us here on the podcast next Sunday, July 21 to explore life without his original crime-solving partner.
Interview du 28 Juillet 2019. Durée : 40:17
The heavy burden of replacing Grantchester lead James Norton in the village vicar’s pulpit falls to none other than Tom Brittney, and it’s a role he’s thrilled to take up. With a warm welcome from fans and the on-set Grantchester family alike, Brittney reveals how it felt to motorcycle in to the sleepy village, and previews what secrets await viewers for the rest of this season.
Transcript
Jace Lacob (Jace): I’m Jace Lacob, and you’re listening to MASTERPIECE Studio.
Good news! There’s a new vicar in the sleepy, bucolic hamlet of Grantchester, and it’s…not Leonard Finch?!
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Leonard: Will’s bidding farewell to the city center. He’s going to be the new vicar of Grantchester
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Jace: Much to Leonard’s chagrin, Will Davenport, the young and handsome village newcomer, has been installed as the new vicar, and his arrival to the green Cambridgeshire meadows isn’t embraced by every member of the well-run vicarage.
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CLIP
Sidney: Funny how a man can be murdered, and all anyone's worried about is his private life.
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Jace: And now, we’ve seen how vengeance, and the law, could inspire cruelty and violence.
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CLIP
Will: Mrs Chapman ? I’m William Davenport — Will. The Archdeacon sent me to introduce myself to you as the prospective new Vicar of Grantchester.
Mrs. C.: Did he now ?
Will: It’s a real pleasure, I’ve heard so much about you.
Mrs. C.: Well you can tell the Archdeacon that the position’s already been taken, thank you very much.
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Jace: For actor Tom Brittney, stepping into the ranks of a popular series after three beloved seasons was a hefty challenge. But the famously tight-knit cast and crew of Grantchester welcomed him with open arms.
Tom Brittney: Look at any scene where Dickens is looking lovingly at me, there is a metal stick with a sausage right behind my head. No, he’s the biggest diva I’ve ever worked with, my God.
Jace: Brittney offers a glimpse into his burgeoning career, a preview of Will’s still-unfolding journey in the village, and his own secret tricks for winning over the most hard-to-please member of the Grantchester vicarage — Dickens.
Jace: And this week we are joined by Grantchester star, Tom Britney. Welcome.
Tom: Hi. Thank you for having me.
Jace: We meet Will Davenport in the first episode of the season. In the script, he’s described as, quote, “late 20s, affable, energetic, a strong sense of right and wrong.” What were your initial impressions of the character?
Tom: Well it was quite good, because when I was auditioning for it, normally when you’re auditioning for a role you get maybe like a line or something that would describe the character. But when I went for the third round Daisy Coulam, the writer, had written like a three-page character biography which gave pretty much every facet of this character. Ultimately what Will was, was all there, and I instantly just connected to his drive for good, and his passion, and his strong opinions, I loved that, but also with the darkness in him, the darkness that drives him. There was something that I connected to in that, and just really really wanted to play the character more than anything else in my life.
Jace: How familiar were you with Grantchester before getting cast?
Tom: Not at all. I knew of it, I knew how much of an institution it was, how well-loved it was by people. I’d seen the first episode years ago when it came out, with my mom, and I never caught the series afterwards. And then when I got the role, I made a purposeful effort to not watch it, so that I was coming at it with fresh eyes and not accidentally replicating anything James did, because I am a big fan of James Norton and I didn’t want to watch and go, because I knew how daunting was anyway to step into his shoes, and actually watching the first couple episodes was the first time I saw him play Sidney and I was like, ‘Ah, damn it, I’ve got a big job here. He’s a he’s a damn good Vicar.’
Jace: You said you wanted this part more than anything. What was your reaction when you were cast?
Tom: Cried. I was on the bus to go see my girlfriend in town and I cried on the bus, because I’d spent the last few weeks after I’d met Robson Green at the chemistry read, just to be honest from the first take, I really really wanted it and I didn’t realize in the first take actually that the character was the new lead. I thought he was the villain, I thought because it was a scene that… the interrogation scene. I thought that the character was the villain of the thing.
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CLIP
Will: No one tells you anything.
Geordie: Not a bastard thing.
Will: That’s a shame.
Geordie: It really is. Who gave you the knife, Chaplain?
Will: I’m not going to tell you that.
Geordie: Is it someone you know?
Will: I’m not going to tell you that, either.
Geordie: Did they confess to the murder of Charles Todd?
Will: I should probably stop you there. I’m not going to tell you anything. At any point. About any of it so…
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Tom: I didn’t realize it was taking up James Norton. And then when I found out I was like, “Oh, yeah.” I mean I wanted it anyway but yeah especially then. And then meeting Robson, I kept calling my agent every single day and just going, “Please if you heard anything…” and then there was good news, it was it was looking good, and then it kind of, you know you never know. Casting be such a long process. And then you have about two to three weeks later I found out it was mine, and I thought I made a terrible mistake. I thought they’d said the wrong name.
Jace: What was the first scene that you shot on Grantchester?
Tom: It was the first scene, when you’re introduced to my character, yeah exactly. When I meet Leonard and I meet Sidney. That was my first day on set which was a good day. You know sometimes when you film, you film non-chronologically and you know I could’ve been chucked into one of the heavier scenes which is fine. You know you’re used to that, but it was really nice to have that ease-in and have the first day on set, that was my first day in the show. It was. That was a nice way of doing it.
Jace: What sort of preparation did you do in terms of playing the part of a young modern 1950s Vicar? Did you talk to any vicars or parish priests who might have been around at the time?
Tom: I did do a fair bit of research, I made a little sort of research book about what was the historical context in the 50s, and the life of the vicar. I did go to a church near me, an Anglican church near me to sort of see a sermon but it didn’t work, it wasn’t the vibe that it would have been. Religion is very different to how it was in the 50s. The role of a vicar is very different in the 1950s than it is now. When you’re researching a vicar it seems that a lot of vicars have their back up of going like, ‘Oh everyone thinks we just work one day of the week. But I’ll show you. We work every day.’ And that would seem to be like a gripe that a lot of Vicars had, that people didn’t understand there was there was so much more to their role in life, and that was something that I’d never realised and especially like I said in the 50s, in a village to the role of a vicar is more than just even religious advice. They were part of everyone’s life. People went to them for every sort of problem.
Jace: During this handover did James offer you any advice?
Tom: He did. He did. He had three pieces of advice he said, Have fun. Just, you know, you’re part of the family now. Keep your phone in your top pocket of your Vicar costume, so no one can see it when you have it on you. And the third one was pretend like you haven’t heard Robson Green’s stories a hundred times when he tells them. And that one was the most useful piece of advice.
Jace: Will is new to Grantchester. He’s an outsider. I mean did it help with your transition that the show’s characters are themselves wary of Will, that he has to earn their trust as Sidney replacement?
Tom: Yeah. Because he made it sort of life imitating art. I was nervous. New actor on the block, Will is the nervous, eager-to-please new vicar on the block. For instance during my first sermon, and most of the background artists are villagers from Grantchester, and they’re all, you know you can see when I first came on the set that they’re all kind of looking at me in this way like I’m a new boy and you know, some of them would come up and go, “Big shoes to fill!” They weren’t doing… they meant well, they weren’t trying to get in my head but you know they were… there was an anticipation, but that helps me in my performance, of sort of being.. “I’ve got to… I’ve got to be a damn good Vicar, I’ve got to be a good actor in this in this moment.” And so it was nice to be had to replicate that thing, yeah.
Jace: If Sidney Chambers is whiskey and jazz, Will Davenport is rock and roll, motorcycles, boxing and cake. Do you see Will as representing a different sort of vicar than Sidney, coming from a different generation?
Tom: Totally I think you know, our age difference isn’t massive in terms of the age, but it means a great deal in the generation that we are. He fought in the war, I didn’t and that affected his relationship with Geordie, that they both shared that common ground and I didn’t. I represent the youth, the sort of Americanized youth of the late 50s, with Elvis coming over and Rock and Roll and the leather jacket and James Dean kind of things. It also informs the way that I think, and I think Will’s idealism comes from… I don’t know maybe that “American dream” kind of thing, the movies that he’s seen and stuff like that, rather than the morbid time of the war, of death. And this is coming out of that now, and I think Will does represent that.
Jace: “We have a platform to say something… we have a boat…why not rock it.” Both Will and Sidney use the pulpit as their platform for change. Does Will embody the sense of change in the air of 1956?
Tom: Yeah I think. I think so. I think, you’re going into the 60s, which was when a lot of people became more political, and Grantchester has that thing in the first episode. The political aspect, with the racism and the homophobia. That’s the wonderful thing about Grantchester not shying away from the social issues that were around at the time, and I think the youth is starting to become more aware of that maybe than they were. And I do think Will, although he’s in the church, which you know, is traditionally… has a way of rules, I don’t think Will likes that. I think he wants religion to be better, and not to be a you know, stuffy old thing that you know, can be used for oppression or hatred. It has to be a force for good.
Jace: I mean he’s already trying to make it more accessible. Mrs. C is shocked by the fact that he says call me Will, that he’s sort of pouring his own tea, I mean. It seems like he wants to be the approachable vicar.
Tom: Yeah. Mrs. Bennett has that line of, “Is he a communist?” Because it’s just you don’t have people like that. That’s not how the church works. That’s not even you’re not that liberal. That’s no that’s alien to these people in this village is that it’s always gone one way and Will comes in and disrupts that.
Jace: In last week’s episode, a leather-clad Will Davenport barrels down a Cambridgeshire country lane on his motorcycle without a helmet. How integral is that moment into understanding his character? This sense of sort of freedom on the road.
Tom: I loved doing that scene because it was just him just on his bike driving into this village where he’s always wanted to be in this role and he’s just living the dream as far as he thinks before he gets there and realizes that no other people are quite onboard with his dream. Yeah.
Jace: Did you have any experience driving motorcycles before that?
Tom: No I did not and I never in my life thought I get on the back of one. But the producers forced me to. No I love it. I love being able to. It’s a wonderful thing as an actor being able to do skills and in Grantchester, I think I put about four or five different skills I never thought I’d be out to pick up. I had to do for the character which was great. You always love to be able to do that, but motorbike riding was was one, that… look I was petrified when I got on the back of the bike for the first time and I fell off a few times. Because you’ve got this powerful metal beast between your legs that is trying to throw you off in a way. And I’m very scared of death and hurting myself, I’m not ashamed to say. I wish I had that part of me that was a bit crazy and didn’t care but I do. And so it took a while to get over that hurdle but then once I did I loved it. I really… after I’d been on the back, and you know there’s there’s a couple of shots where I’m, you know, it’s not, it’s obviously a stuntman because they have to they have to protect the actor. And you know I want to give them credit for that, but once I’d done a few scenes on the bike I started loving it. And when I got back on the actual motorbike, I was probably going a little faster and I should have. So I really did enjoy it.
Jace: There’s a rivalry between Will and Leonard, particularly over the position of vicar at Grantchester. Why does Will offer to step aside and let Leonard have the position initially?
Tom: Because I think it goes against his as much as he wants the job more than anything it would go against his morals. You can see, he can see in Leonard that everything he says is true, Leonard is ready for it. He’s good. Will wouldn’t want to take that away from someone else, that would go against who he is, and he could be could be a vicar somewhere else. I mean, Grantchester would be lovely. But if it’s not his time it’s not his time.
Jace: Will has brought an Italian espresso machine with him. He tries to win Mrs. C and Leonard over with a cappuccino, which is too bitter for Leonard and ends up on his own with Dickens.
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CLIP
Mrs. C.: What the Dickens is that smell ?
Will: I made you a cappuccino.
Mrs. C.: A cuppawhat ?
Will: It’s Italian coffee with whisked up milk. It’s not strictly authentic, but I like it.
Mrs. C.: I don’t trust that foreign muck.
Will: Should I tell her where tea is from ?
Leonard: Don’t take it personally, she’s like that with everyone.
Will: Well, cheers. Nice to be part of the family.
Leonard: It’s nice to have you, it really is.
Will: Too bitter ? I can get you can some sugar if you like ?
Leonard: No…I’ll go.
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Jace: Is there a sense at this point that he’s sort of on the outside looking in?
Tom: Definitely. I think the fact that the only thing that shows an interest in him is Dickens is very isolating. He’s gone from, yeah, right, riding into the village on this bike, couldn’t be happier, to being met with with nothing but, you know, this ice cold reception, and that wasn’t how he saw it happening. He wanted people to come in and be like, “This is a new vicar!” And he goes, “Please call me Will!” And everyone embrace him and that’s not how it’s worked. And I think that breaks his heart a little bit, that he’s that he’s on his own and that he can’t share it with anyone.
Jace: Number one on the call sheet of course is Dickens.
Tom: Diva Dickens.
Jace: The Diva of Grantchester. Did your classmates offer you any pointers or warnings about working with the always professional Dickens ?
Tom: No ! Tessa Peake-Jones, who plays Mrs. Chapman, she said, “Oh, Dickens is lovely, one-take Dickens, one-take Dickens!” She couldn’t be more wrong. Look, I love dogs with all of my heart, I’d never speak ill of a dog but Dickens has an ego problem and a sausage addiction. Look at any scene where Dickens is looking lovingly at me there is a metal stick with a sausage right behind my head, so don’t be fooled. Yeah. He’s the biggest diva I’ve ever worked with, my God.
Jace: At the start of this week’s episode we do come to that opening image. The greaser image is definitely brought to life as Will works on his motorcycle looking, as the script indicates, quote, “sexy as hell,” which might be the only time anyone has said that of a vicar. Is Will the embodiment of modernity coming into this picturesque English village to shake things up?
Tom: Yeah I guess he is. Like I said you know he represents that that that new youth at the end of the 50s, and he wants things to change, the traditions have to change, that’s why him and Geordie kind of clash because Geordie’s views and Mrs. Chapman’s and a lot of people in the village’s views are old fashioned. They must change because things are moving forward. Society is moving forward and if you can’t move with it you’ll be left behind.
Jace: On the note of “sexy as hell,” how comfortably do you wear the mantle of “sex symbol?”
Tom: I get asked that a bit, because obviously you know, James is, he is a sexy, floppy-haired, square-jawed man. It was, you know he’s James Norton, and having to step into that, of course you’re like, you get that kind of nerves that you’re not going to live up to him and it’s not about that really, it’s it’s about the performance and the acting you hope. But obviously a show like this. People do also like to look at a I guess a good looking Vicar so I’m sure at one point I will have my my James Norton topless boat scene at some point and play that. It’s not something that comes naturally to me. I look… I play, I play roles that fortunately sometimes, you know, them being attractive is written as the character thing and that makes it harder, I think sometimes, because when you have insecurities about the way you’re looking for that it’s odd to have your looks be a focus in that way.
Jace: There’s a great moment when Will puts on his vestments and looks at himself in the mirror with an easy smile. “I’ve never been more certain of anything in my whole life,” he says during his institution service. Why is he so sure of his vacation and his faith?
Tom: Because I think he was searching for something that took him out of the place that he was in, and the life that he had, and religion seemed to fill that hole completely. Like I said there’s still parts of religion that… he is not completely blinded by this thing to the point of not being able to see the flaws in himself or the flaws in what he represents. But. Religion. Religion and the calling. You know that was something as well in the research that I read, I didn’t realize that the calling was a real thing in that sense, that a lot of the vicars that I was reading the research talked about how they just one day found this calling and they had to follow it. My calling was wanting to be an actor. That was my calling. I never was more sure of anything else in my life. And I don’t know what that was. I don’t know what one day made me feel like that’s what I had to do. But. Yeah it’s the same for him.
Jace: Before this next question, a quick word from our sponsors…
I love the dynamic between Will and Robson Green’s Geordie Keating. There seems to be it does seem almost paternal. In a way like a father son dynamic. What do you make of their relationship?
Tom: I’m glad you picked up on that because it was something that we didn’t realize until later. It was something that you know. round the later episodes, we kind of analyzed what was going on and the way that we were working, and it was like yeah.. you’re like the father, you know, I wish I’d had in a way, and I’m like the son he wishes he had. Him and Sidney were more on a level I mean maybe because of that experience. Yeah. Yeah. Because of their experience in the war and the way they interacted and I and I love our relationship. of, we were the head and the heart at different times. And we bounce off each other in that way. Sometimes I go with got emotional things that Geordie will go with the logical way and they don’t always match up and but that’s useful to be able to look at that. I am the same as a person sometimes my emotions can get the better of me and I lose my head in that way and having someone like Geordie for Will, you know, is useful I think they work off each other really well.
Jace: And how easy a working relationship was that with Robson Green?
Tom: The chemistry that you hopefully see is exactly what it is. He’s genuinely I never thought in my life I’d be able to call Robson Green like a “close friend,” and he is, like I miss him terribly when I’m not filming and he made going to work, if you can call it that, every day, just a joy.
Jace: Will is reluctant to get to get dragged into Geordie’s world.
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CLIP
Will: I know how this works, Geordie. You’ll reel me in and next thing I know I’ll be down at the police station doing your job, instead of mine. I’m needed here.
Geordie: Sitting in my office is a young boy covered in someone else’s blood. He’s refusing to speak. Surely there’s no greater need than that ?
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Jace: Which are words to live by. What is it about this case that changes his mind about assisting Geordie?
Tom: There is… it’s the element of Adam, the child. That’s it really. He would never have got involved if it weren’t for that. And you see it when when Geordie tells him about this child covered in blood coming in, that you see Will go, “Well, yeah, okay I have to. I have to.” But it’s because of his own past that there’s something that really resonates in him and he has to he has to see this case through, because if he doesn’t then he’ll never ever forgive himself if it doesn’t, you know, and when it starts to – when the case starts to go against what he thought it was, it breaks him slightly as a person and and yeah he does, he does put his duties as a vicar aside unfortunately which he would never think that he would do. But his calling is taking him here.
Jace: Cake is so important to Will that it appears almost symbolic in this episode. It’s an emblem of friendship and goodwill. While the cops keep shouting at Adam it’s Will who brings him cake. What does this moment reveal about Will’s personality?
Tom: I love that you are able to analyze that, to put the cake down as an object. Of course it is. I never thought of it like that. I did realize that I probably talked about cake quite a bit and I wonder what is that thing was with that but I guess it’s just that yeah, that connection that he wants to have with everyone, having everyone round, “Please call me Will,” making them cake. He wants to connect with people. He just happens to have some cake in his pocket and probably knows that it would make a child feel a lot happier in that stressful situation. Things like that. Yeah. He wants to make people feel better. Cake helps.
Jace: Cake always helps. Will realizes that Adam is deaf, and begins to sign to him. We later learned that we’ll learn to sign from a girl who Will refuses to name. Is there a tragic love story in his past?
Tom: Yeah there are. There are many. There are many. He’s he’s had a pretty tragic past in general and I think with women as well. And that’s led him to choose a life of celibacy. I don’t think he wants to drag any women or anyone into his life or his mess until he’s certain because he’s had trouble with them before. Yeah.
Jace: “People are born with innate goodness,” Will says. “How they turn out is a choice.” Geordie maintains that Will is an idealist, which he denies. How do you see Will’s worldview? Is closer to idealism than pragmatism?
Tom: I’m not sure because I’m sort of torn about it. Will is very opinionated. He believes that that is how it is and I know that there’s a part of him that is saying that because he has to believe, that because he has to believe that people are good. Otherwise, if people are born evil then then they’re hopeless. What do you do? But then he does realize that some people just might be, and that changes his worldview. Some people can’t be saved, that he can’t help everyone, and that’s hard to hear because he wants to help everyone.
Jace: I mean that seems an outgrowth of sort of the philosophy the show has embraced all along which is sort of “hate the sin, love the sinner” to sort of reach out to people in need. But the notion that for some of these people there isn’t salvation, that they can’t be saved, I think would be a tough pill for Will to swallow.
Tom: Yeah it completely rocks these foundations that he’s he’s built up his life on. But I know I’m the same. I think. You know, I think the world can be a horrible place and it can be terrible people in it, and you like to hope that there is some way that you can change that. More and more, I realized that there just isn’t, there are some people who are just born evil I guess.
Jace: I mean that notion is echoed in Will’s fury at Carter.
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CLIP
Carter: There is only one person to blame for Miriam’s death and that’s Adam. Oh woe of all subtlety and all mischief. Thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness.
Will: You will answer Inspector Keating’s questions, or we will drag you kicking and screaming down to the station and every person in the town will know that you’re under suspicion for killing your wife. You woeful excuse for a father !
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Jace: Should we feel that this pushes Will’s buttons for a reason that perhaps he was abused in some way by his own father?
Tom: That’s very astute of you. Yeah. Well that’s, yeah. That’s part of his past. Without going into it too much, is to do with his family and his father. And yet then seeing the treatment of Adam, I mean it would to anyone regardless of whether they’ve been treated badly or not but particularly in him, and also using scripture as an excuse for what he’s doing. That is entirely… you cannot tolerate that, because you can’t use those words to hurt someone in that way.
Jace: Is Will perhaps less placid than he initially seems?
Tom: Very very much so. Yeah. Always underneath the surface there is an anger that… you know it’s not a..it isn’t.. he’s not a thug, he’s not a hooligan, he doesn’t just want to hurt people it’s completely opposite. But, I think there’s this some self-hatred and stuff that is, you know, the past has made him an angry person at the world, and he’s trying to direct the anger into being a force for good.
Jace: There is a beautiful moment in the wheat field where Adam signs, “It was me,” and Will holds Adam, tears in his eyes. What was it like filming this incredibly emotionally loaded scene?
Tom: It was a very upsetting episode. Me and Adam Niall, the actor who played Adam, got along really, really well, and that made it easier to do that, you know, because I genuinely really liked him, and not like it wouldn’t matter either way, but it makes it all easier and then that moment of knowing that or fearing the worst that this boy that you’ve come to sort of almost love in this very short space of time because you empathize and understand him that he could be capable of something that again puts him at odds with my beliefs. I could forgive him God could forgive him. But he’s potentially murdered someone. That’s that’s a terrible thing to have to come to realize.
Jace: The anger that sort of bubbles up within him I think comes to the fore in the boxing scene, which does underline that sort of need for physical release within him. There is a sense that he is definitely struggling with some demons and is boxing an emotional release for those sort of pent-up feelings as much as a physical one.
Tom: Yes. Absolutely. I think. I mean I do it myself, I’ve got a boxing bag that I also use to sort of… it’s very very similar to it, the more I realized, in certain ways. But it is, I think with him it’s to stop him becoming more self destructive or destructive or just being destruct outwardly destructive in a way. He’s very close to hurting Carter terribly. He’s very very close, and he has to stop himself from hurting this person, and that anger has to be released somewhere, and boxing is that outletm and because he can’t be that destructive person. He can’t be that anymore.
Jace: He’s actually really good at finding clues and piecing together motive. I mean what are his skills as a vicar lend to him here?
Tom: His ability to talk to people. That’s the difference between me and Geordie, Geordie’s much more blunt with it you know. And Will can speak to people in a more relatable way. You know the scene with the grandma. They’ve seen the little way that she moves and realizing that she was a Mennonite all her life. And he does start to piece together that there’s things wrong.
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CLIP
Will: Not everyone was at the market the morning your mother died.
Esther: But Grandma’s old, she’s frail.
Wil:l No she’s not. She’s just treated that way. You’d had enough of being contained and patronized.
Geordie: If your son couldn’t control his wife, then you would.
Hannah: You’ve already denigrated our mother. Please leave the rest of us in peace.
Esther: You did it for Adam, didn’t you?
Clara: I couldn’t let her hurt him anymore.
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Tom: His ability to watch the way that people interact with each other or talk to him. That’s I think is his skill is his connection with human beings.
Jace: And is that sort of in his role as observer, as outsider, does that sort of make him more attuned to the nuances of human behavior?
Tom: Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. I think. I think he wants to think he’s a man of the people and it’s made him more aware of how people are. I think yeah definitely gives him a keen sense of, well the crime solving abilities. Yeah he does. He just takes it out very quickly.
Jace: It’s calling.
Tom: I know!
Jace: Will gives his first sermon to the congregants at the end of this episode. It’s about fellowship.
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CLIP
Will: Fellowship is a constant. A comfort. A source of strength in a world that can be complicated and frightening. Two are better than one… for if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow. I hope in the days to come that we can lift up each other. I’m here. I’m your friend. Particularly if there’s cake involved.
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Jace: Is this Will’s mission statement ultimately?
Tom: Yeah it is. He wants to… He wants to help the world in the grandest way and in microcosm you can help the people of Grantchester. He wants to be on their level. He doesn’t want to be… you know again, there’s some stuff in his past that he’s trying to get away from, that maybe would put him at odds with people, you know a class thing for instance, maybe he wants to be down with it. That’s why Mrs. Bennett probably calls him a communist because he has a socialist kind of idea of the world would be quite good. Where people help each other out. I mean the world is a horrible horrible place and it can be lonely and isolating. We all go through terrible things. If we can live this life with the help of one another, that can make it a lot easier.
Jace: The tension between Will and Leonard hasn’t dissipated at all, and the mood in the vicarage seems particularly fraught. How does the Will/Leonard dynamic continue to play out this season?
Tom: Well I don’t give too much away. There are some ups and downs, and a very very big down at one point, which… which is horrible. It was horrible to do ,and for us to go through it, because Leonard’s having a tough time this series, he’s having a really tough time. So is Will, and they’re not really…. they’re not helping each other as much as they should be, and that’s because of Leonard’s situation, and he did want to be the vicar, and he did want to solve crimes with Geordie, and I’ve come along and wrecked that, and Will couldn’t be more guilty about that fact, and he knows that, and he wishes Leonard could understand that he doesn’t want to be at odds with him. But I think ultimately… I think ultimately it will work out.
Jace: How does Will approach Leonard’s rather delicate embrace of his homosexuality? Is he more accepting of Leonard’s sexuality than Leonard himself might be?
Tom: Absolutely. Will is completely liberal with that idea, that it goes along with who he is. For him to be… for him to take on the church is homophobia would be… that’s that’s what I’m saying about his being religious. But he he understands the flaws in the church, the fact that people have used Christianity to… for homophobia and for sexism and things that don’t go along with who he is as a person. He’s a very liberal and open-minded person. And I think hopefully will help Leonard embrace himself a bit more.
Jace: As always, 1950s-set Grantchester delves into stories that feel particularly relevant today, whether it’s racism or homophobia or sexual assault. I mean is the series as socially minded as it is crime-focused in your opinion?
Tom: You know I was thinking about this the other day, because I think in a way, although it’s a murder mystery, and that is what the show is at its heart, I think the murder becomes secondary to the lives of these people and the world that they live in. And in this series, you know. Yeah. I think Grantchester, as far as I know, has always… never shied away from issues. But it’s not… they’re not put in for any reason other than… that’s the world the Grantchester inhabits. I mean when the episodes came out you did get people kind of having a bit of a pushback to it, who… kind of didn’t like the idea of seeing racism portrayed in the way it was, as if the 50s were some wonderful, glorious time where that didn’t happen. And you think, “oh my God, are you crazy? Of course it was.” It was one of the worst, most racist times in photographic memory. There were pictures of people being lynched. That’s the whole thing of you know the thing of Nathaniel Todd coming over from his country, and talking about this boy being lynched for buying a white girl an ice cream. That’s it. That’s a terrible thing that happened within our, you know within many of the viewers lifetimes. And I love that Grantchester doesn’t shy away from that. You know, it might be a cozy murder mystery at times, but it really can be hard hitting with the issues.
Jace: You talked about your calling as an actor. I mean when did you get that that sort of vocation? When did the calling come to you?
Tom: It was very early. I was always a bit of a class clown and you know I sort of, you know, would bunk out classes to go and you know mess around and you know with some mates and sort of put on little plays together. My mom was my elementary school drama teacher which kind of… probably should have put me off the whole idea of being an actor, because she was…. she was a, you know, a stern teacher, Mrs. Brittney, but uh, but she always encouraged me, she she did acting herself in you know in the Am-dram society in my village, and she she writes plays herself, so I always had that around, me seeing it, and she was the one that helped me see that acting wasn’t just a hobby or something fun to do, that it could be a career, which I didn’t realize until I was about 16. I kind of thought in my head that Brad Pitt had a day job, that I couldn’t understand something so fun could be a career. And my high school, unfortunately, didn’t look at acting as being a career. They saw it, you know, you went down into a normal thing, you became an accountant or a lawyer, you went to Oxford or Cambridge, funnily enough, and just that’s what you did. You didn’t, no you didn’t become an actor. I thank God my mom and my dad supported me in that.
Jace: You played poor doomed red coat Lieutenant Jeremy Foster on Starz’s hugely popular Outlander. What was it like being in a show with a truly obsessed, we’ll say, fan base?
Tom: It was an experience. I mean look, I owe a ton to Outlander. Without that exposure to the American market, which enabled me to come over here and and get jobs, and then vice versa going back to Britain. It opened up a ton of doors for me. But it was, yeah, it was quite frightening, it was my first time. I was only in two episodes, but because I was the first red coat that wasn’t evil, people really took to me. And yeah, I start getting bottles of Sake sent from Japan, or beers from Sweden, lot of.. a lot of alcohol which is great. They know me well. And just presents from all over the world, from people who see me in a couple of episodes, and somehow love me.
Jace: I mean, did that help prepare you for fan the reaction to Grantchester?
Tom: It did because I think they share a similar fan base of very committed fans, which means you can go either way. And that was people who loved the Jamie in the books, and Sam might not have matched up with what they saw. So others did, but, when people don’t like you they can hate you especially on the Internet where people feel free to say whatever they want. So I was prepared for that, like a sort of barrage of hatred that I wasn’t James Norton, and I was replacing a much-loved character. Luckily that never happened. I mean, when I did come on the set, I saw when we were filming Grantchester, that because… people find out that we’re filming there and there were 50 people all waiting to see Robson and James and me because they knew about me but luckily they were very very nice to me.
Jace: You’ve talked about the fact that you are a huge fan of Tom Hanks. You play Tom Hanks’ right hand man in Greyhound. Did you fanboy out at all about Hanks when you were filming this?
Tom: I’m unabashedly a crier. I cry a lot. I’m a very emotional person. But when I got that call, I was in the middle of Soho in London, just having a drink with some friends, and I just broke down. Like I broke down… you never in your life… I remember auditioning for it. I auditioned for films where you’re like, “OK I could play this part,” but then there was a Tom Hanks film… “I’m never going to get that,” and you know to get a call saying “Tom Hanks wants you in his film,” you never in a million years think you’re going to hear that in your life. And then yeah when, we when we got to set and I saw him, I cried again because I was like… you know you grow up watching this guy. He’s the reason I’m an actor. Saving Private Ryan. I remember vividly watching that film and going. “I would kill to be in a film like that.” And, what, 15 years later, I’m I’m in a film like that. I mean a World War Two film standing next to Tom Hanks, looking him the eye, talking in an American accent, with my hero. I still can’t quite believe that something I’ve been able to do.
Jace: You’re also an avid photographer. What do you like to shoot?
Tom: I’m really into… sort of people, I really like taking photos of people, and I got into doing protest photography a few years back. And I go to human rights protests, and stuff I knew about because I’m a member of Amnesty International, and I just start taking photos, and, you know sort of selling them to newspapers, and giving them to Amnesty, you know I love doing that. Taking dramatic photos of people in these sort of dramatic situations, and I’m inspired by people like, you know, Don McCullen and Steve McCurry, a lot of war photographers. I mean, I genuinely, if I wasn’t an actor, I would love to have been a war photographer. Would’ve been the dream. I was very close at one point. I was watching this documentary about Tim Hetherington, who died in Libya when he was taking photos there. And I was like, “I need to do that, I need to do something better with my life. Acting is not enough. I need to help people out.” But I done I’m too much of a coward to do that. I’ll just stick with the acting.
Jace: I think most people would be not okay going into a war zone…
Tom: I know, but there’s a certain breed of people who are just willing to go and put their lives on the line to you know get those stories out there. I was watching a documentary the plane over here about Marie Colvin, who was killed in Syria. And just watching that and going, “these brave people, who are willing to put their lives on the line.” And again, that’s why I like Will. That passion to help. And I want to try and in some way do that through acting if I can.
Jace: Tom Britney thank you so very much.
Tom: Thank you so much. Yeah. Thank you.
Jace: In this fourth season of Grantchester, it’s not just Inspector Geordie Keating who has new colleagues to deal with. His wife, Cath, has entered the workforce, and found the experience both thrillingly modern — and a stark reminder of how far women still need to go.
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CLIP
Mr. Draper: Mr Hobbs is a man, you’re a woman. Maybe you gave him the wrong idea?
Cathy: No…
Mr. Draper: It sounds to me like you’ve made it very clear to him that you’re not interested anymore.
Cathy: Anymore? I never was.
Mr. Draper: That’s the end of the matter then. Put it down to experience.
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Jace: Actor Kacey Ainsworth, who plays the acerbic and steadfast Cath, loved her character’s expanded arc in this current outing of the show.
Kacey Ainsworth: She’s realized that she needs to have a bit more outside influence and also like a lot of women in the 50s, they had gone through the war and they’d done jobs that were traditionally male jobs and…they wanted a bit more out of life, I think when you get to this stage in the 1950s.
Jace: Ainsworth joins us next week, August 4, to discuss Cath’s surprising — and timely — plot turn this season, and why her character is just as much a vital part of the village as her husband and his rotating crew of religious crime-solvers.
Podcast
Tom Brittney Is More Than Just Another Dashing Vicar
Interview du 21 Juillet 2019. Durée : 30:59
With the recent departure of his friend and castmate, James Norton, from the fields and dells of Grantchester, Robson Green is quick to reassure fans of his series that his character isn’t going anywhere just yet. As the fourth season continues along, Green describes what it meant to say goodbye to Norton, what new changes await his Geordie Keating beyond a new parish priest, and how it felt to team up with Al Weaver’s Leonard Finch on a confusing murder investigation.
Podcast
Robson Green Reminds Us That Geordie’s Not Going Anywhere
Transcript
Jace Lacob (Jace): I’m Jace Lacob, and you’re listening to MASTERPIECE Studio.
The affable Reverend Sidney Chambers has left the country, and his police and backgammon partner, Inspector Geordie Keating, is left to pick up the pieces — criminal, and otherwise.
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CLIP
Geordie: I’m fine. I think you miss him more than I do… Bloody jazz, woman troubles, nice to have a bit of peace for a change.
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Jace: After years of hijinks, grade A detective work, and pint after pint in the pub, Geordie is looking after the residents of Grantchester alone — and finding he still needs a priestly companion on his beat.
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CLIP
Geordie: You know you really didn’t have to come.
Leonard: So how would you and Sidney play this? Do we ‘stake it out’ ?
Geordie: I was just going to go in and ask a few questions.
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Jace: Grantchester star Robson Green — who plays Geordie — is famously close with his co-star, James Norton, and the rumors of onset tears during Norton’s final day of shooting this series were only too true, according to him.
Robson Green: I was done, as was everyone else, and there were genuine tears, but hopefully economic and hopefully enough, not too much that the audience goes, ‘Oh my goodness, he’s a blubbering idiot,’ you know?
Jace: Green joins us to talk Geordie Keating, Robson and Jerome, and the mysteries still to come in the remainder of the fourth season of Grantchester.
And this week we are joined by Grantchester star, Robson Green. Welcome.
Robson: Thank you very much. I hope you’ve given me a good build up, but I apologize now for the anticlimax.
Jace: Change seems to be the underlying theme of this week’s episode. Georide has to face the future without his trusted partner by his side, albeit in a brand new shark skin suit. What is Geordie’s state of mind coming off of Sidney’s departure?
Robson: Well it’s a strange one isn’t it? I mean he’s he’s stuck. I mean, the theme for this new series was all about change, progressiveness, people being liberated, people moving forward. But the only person who wants to stay still and maybe go into reverse gear is Geordie. He wants to go back to how things were. And since Sidney has gone I guess the overriding theme and arc for him in that episode is he’s lost and the one person he can rely on, his wife, she’s moving forward as well. Kacie Ainsworth, who plays Cathy, she does a superb job of becoming this liberated woman with this new job, new friends, and most of those friends being men, and in the fifties, for a wife to be in that position in that relationship and be liberated and become the breadwinner… so not only has he lost his friend but he’s lost this anchor in his life as well so he feels so he’s got all those things going on. Plus the fact that he’s got to solve a crime, and who does he look to to help in this episode? Leonard! So you know there’s gonna be comic potential in that, there really is.
Jace: I mean what do you feel that Sidney meant to Geordie ultimately? Was he the sort of north star for him?
Robson: It’s the son he never had, and maybe to Sidney, Geordie was the father he never had. Their relationship was unique. It was offbeat, but it was rooted in love and there’s so many themes in in this new series, we deal with issues of betrayal, of racism, of homophobia, we deal with sexual abuse at work, but the writing arc was the love that these two men had for one another, the need for each other’s companionship. And I think that you cared enough about how much they loved one another. That’s the reason why I think the series is successful, and people cared enough to want to follow them. And I think that’s what it was based on: trust, friendship, but mainly love.
Jace: Your final televised scene with James Norton was fittingly over backgammon and pints at the pub.
Robson: Yeah.
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CLIP
Geordie Still trying to make me a better man ?
Sidney: Always.
Geordie: One last game, Sidney ?
Sidney: One last game.
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Jace: What did you make of the hand squeeze as a gesture of friendship and intimacy between them? Was it scripted that way ?
Robson: It wasn’t scripted, and I wasn’t a fan of it. When Tim Fywell, the director wanted to do it, he said ‘I don’t want you to hug each other that’s too obvious. I need some kind of physical contact…’, and I was kind of against it because, you know, the eyes are the windows to your soul as an actor and we can speak through looks and the visual grammar of the eyes. This they say so much but I went with it and it became this kind of spontaneous moment. Believe it or not we worked really hard at that hand squeezing moment. It was ‘I’m going to miss you.’ And therefore it was this very spontaneous act. And you know as actors you fake sincerity you suspend disbelief and you hopefully want the audience to believe you’re a detective. And I’m sure James wants the audience to believe he is a charismatic member of the clergy, which he is. And there was just no acting required. So, for one of the first times in my 35-year career there was this moment of… it was outside the show. We’re still great friends and I love him dearly but there was something that I will never see the likes of again and I was waving goodbye to so I just held his hand, the hand was a goodbye, and not a dry eye on set. It was a really really difficult scene. I’ve never experienced that before. Ever. You try not to let emotions because we are storytellers. That’s all we do. You try not to let emotions get in the way. I mean I’m not really a detective. I’m not a method actor you know. And if there are anybody who takes their parts seriously, I tend to put a sign up on set saying ‘Danger: Actor at Work’ because, you know we are storytellers and then we’re in a very privileged position. But there was something deeply special about that moment and knowing that I was going to miss him so much, and the joy Robson and James had on that set was was palpable. But as characters it worked as well. You know I’m the old guy. He’s the six foot two charismatic hyper-intelligent beautifully talented James Norton, you know? And yeah it was it was tough. It was really really tough. But the overriding arc of that moment was goodbye. But you have brought so much joy and love and generosity to the show. That will be taken on by our new charismatic member of the clergy, Tom Brittney.
Jace: Daisy Coulam specifically said that there were many tears from Mr. Robson Green. Is that true ?
Robson: Yeah. I mean they were genuine. I try… when you… I’m not a Method actor, as I mentioned, I don’t recall on sad occasions in my life… to bring out an emotion I don’t need a piece of music to spur on a certain emotion, I have to trust the script, I have to trust the moment, I have to trust the relationship. And the beauty of this series, whatever themes were playing, i’s how it affects those likeable relationships that have been created by Daisy Coulam, and she wrote that scene so economically. I can’t tell you how much joy James and I had on set. I mean honest genuine love and laughter and saying goodbye to that was pretty tough. And so when you’re saying goodbye to all those things and you have those people on set who’ve been with you on the whole journey, with some incredibly creative people in this show, and wondrous people to be alongside, and they were all there right at the start. We didn’t know how this was gonna work out but it was immediate, it was it was gonna be great. The relationship that we had was so important, and saying goodbye to all that was so tough, and I just… I just went…take one, I was just done, man, I was absolutely done, as was everyone else, and there were genuine tears, but hopefully economic and hopefully enough… not too much that the audience don’t go, ‘oh my goodness he’s a blubbering idiot…’ you know ?
Jace: This week’s episode throws together Geordie and Leonard as crime solving partners, as we touched on briefly before. What was it like working with Al Weaver on this episode, one that was overflowing with unexpected elements of humor ?
Robson: Yeah I mean firstly if anyone have asked me who’s, outside, you know, yourself, Robson, who’s your favorite character to watch outside you and Sidney, and it’s it’s Leonard played by Al Weaver. Leonard has this beautiful endearing quality, incredible vulnerability, and the way he plays his sexuality, the repressed sexuality that he had to have in in those days. He just gets it on the money and Al Weaver has beautiful beautiful timing it’s almost perfect, if not perfect, and it’s not something he works at, it’s an inherent quality that Al Weaver has. So I knew immediately whatever this scenario we are gonna go into, this one being men who like men’s company and where they hang out, is integral to solving a particular crime. And I seek the help of Leonard because of the world I’m about to walk into. It just has, you know it’s going to have very moving and have lots of pathos, but you know it’s it’s it’s gonna be funny, because just the way he times anything. Be it tragedy, be it betrayal, be it loneliness, be it isolation, Al can somehow make it hilarious. He has this wonderful ability that I always kind of compared with Stan Laurel of Laurel and Hardy, he’s able to turn the ludicrous and the absurd into something incredibly beautiful, Al Weaver, and that’s what Leonard does. He turns very bizarre situations into something really endearing, beautiful, likable, and something that you really care about enough that you want to follow. And I just knew, when I read the outline for the episode, I said “ah, this is gonna be a ball,” and you know he delivered, as he always does. He’s a genius. I love him.
Jace: My favorite moment might be when Leonard shouts “Stop! Police!” to a fleeing Jeanne Sims on the bridge. How on earth did you keep a straight face filming that ?
Robson: Well it’s not that, it’s it’s the fact that he says it with truth. All great comedy comes out of tragic moments. You have this bumbling insecure kind of dysfunctional individual believing he is part of the police force and when when he says “Stop Police!” in the way he does, and I’m not doing it any justice in this conversation, but when he does you’ve just felt the crew stifle their laughter. There was this this spontaneous kind of gasp of laughter, it was so beautiful. Again, take one, you couldn’t repeat it. It’s just the way he did it. But he it comes from truth. And that’s why his comedy is so beautiful. And why people love him so much. It’s interesting. Last time I was in America promoting Grantchester, every single American I spoke to, the favorite character’s Leonard. Every single American. Well there’s no accounting for taste is there? I says ‘What do you think of Geordie?’ They said, ‘Who?’ I said, ‘Yeah, that’s showbiz.’ There you go.
Jace: Leonard and Geordie are both very obviously uncomfortable at the Ganymede club for very different reasons. In terms of how Geordie responds to homosexuality, is that a sign of his quiet modernity, that he’s actually far more accepting of Leonard than we might expect ?
Robson: Absolutely. And again, Al Weaver’s decision to have Leonard in an environment where he should be so comfortable being horrendously insecure and uncomfortable was an absolute joy to be part of. And you know, and the way Geordie’s going on, ‘Aren’t these the kind of people you like socializing with?’ and somehow he thinks his cover’s blown. And you know Geordie sees the good in everyone, and the way I deliberately chose to bring those out, I didn’t hang all the washing out at once within the series before this one. You allow the audience to go, ‘Oh, he’s not as reactionary as we think he is. He sees the good in everyone but he has a definite moral choice of what is right and what is wrong and in an upholding of the law.’
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CLIP
Geordie: And would you have any idea where University men with such shared interests might be likely to congregate ?
Leonard: Maybe the classics department ?
Daniel: I think the Inspector means socially, where men with the same interest – what’s ‘same’ again in Greek ?
Leonard: Homo… Oh! Oh, I see!
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Robson: And gross indecency was illegal in those days. And he’s a stickler for the law. Yet that is challenged when he cares and has a a relationship, a very close relationship, with Leonard who is a homosexual member of the clergy.
Jace: Before this next question, a quick word from our sponsors…
Last week it seemed as though Geordie and Cathy were on better footing than last season. This week Georgie visits Cathy at the department store and gets a glimpse of her new job and they celebrate a very disastrous 13th-anniversary dinner.
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CLIP
Geordie: When we first met? Bakers knew how much bread they needed to make, they didn’t need a computer to tell them. And men were men, and Greeks were from Greece, people were simpler – like us. How’s the Peach Melba ? Divine ?
Cathy: Can we go home now please?
Geordie: Are you alright ?
Cathy: I’m fine.
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Jace: What is the state of their relationship at the moment ?
Robson: It’s one of denial. Geordie and Cathy are, for want of a better term, dancing around the abyss. There is a dinosaur in the room that Cathy is not talking about and suddenly Geordie is thinking ‘What’s going on? She’s got this new job, she’s got this new life, she’s possibly the breadwinner now.’ That’s embarrassing for him. What are the men gonna think about him at his workplace? You know, still those themes resonate today and something is deeply amiss with the way she is behaving, but being the person he is he doesn’t ask her out right and therefore things become deeply corrosive so on the surface the public face is fine but privately, like many relationships today, there is something not quite right in the home of the Keatings and that plays out beautifully and then he rest of the series and Kacey plays it so beautifully. Again she’s an absolute joy to work with. And if you get it right, you really care enough about them. I mean he wronged her badly in the last series and she’s somehow forgiven him but that’s still festering away. Once there is betrayal, the corrosive path is set. And when you’re trying to row a new pathway you come into the ones that are going to cause all sorts of problems. He just wants to go back to how it was, he wants Sidney back. I think he wants to go back to World War 2. As I said, my grandfather used to say you know, ‘The good old days..’ Really? But that’s that’s his thinking. And it’s really nice to play.
Jace: This is an episode that’s all about the future, from the shark skin suit to the poster advertising the terror from tomorrow, to computers, or even as in episode one, “Elvis the man with the pelvis” as Geordie likes to call him. What does the future represent for Geordie ?
Robson: It’s interesting you mentioned the shark skin suit and Elvis the Pelvis because when the episode aired in Britain way before that in fact, Emma Kingsman Lloyd, Daisy Coulam, they didn’t tell you this, when they saw the rushes of me in the suit they went, “Mmm…you’re not gonna be wearing that again. You look too much like Robson.” And it was really interesting because I’d fought for Geordie. I just watched so many episodes of Colombo again. I was a huge fan of Peter Falk and and the way he held himself and the way he paced himself and the way he behaved and his rhythms and stuff. So I plagiarized a lot of Peter Falk did. And suddenly the suits gave it kind of knocked 10 years off Geordie in terms of the imagery, and it was a funny one. I kind of agree with Emma. There was something un-Geordie-like about it and I guess it worked for the episode but looking at it it just made him so young that it was hard to believe it was the same person. And and it’s interesting that the Elvis thing, that we worked on with Emma as a theme, “Elvis the pelvis,” I love the fact that Geordie holds that the downfall and the poisoning of society, at the footstep of Elvis Presley, has poisoned the minds of all these young people. I thought that they they’re great devices but again it was one that we, in the final part of the episode, Emma went, “We’ve got to get rid of this suit.” So, in the actual writing, the suit was going to kind of remain, and it was this new Geordie, and he was moving with the times, Emma went, “Absolutely not.” And Daisy went, “No way.” and the directors agreed, they went, “No, he’s got to go back to that one color,” which again was a Peter Falk-plagiarized notion of of the tone, the mauve. So it was just the one look, and if you followed the series and watch all the episodes, I very, very rarely change my costume, which is just a godsend to be on set because, yeah there’s there’s the very charismatic talented James Norton changing every five minutes and all the other actors because they love the pomp and ceremony of the costumes, and then be in the caravan up having a cup of tea. I love it. I changed my tie. That’s it. So it was a really good device where everybody was moving on but Geordie went, ‘No. There are certain aspects of my life and the way I behave that I will not change and refuse to change.’ And he likes his outfit. So relaxed, and you know if he makes out he’s really uncomfortable in that suit.
Jace: My favorite scene from this episode is not only the one between Geordie and Leonard in the pub where they clink glasses over Leonard’s potential role as the new vicar. But the scene in which it all goes to hell in the park, in which Leonard confronts Geordie for outing Bob Guthrie and gives him the doilies which were meant to be an anniversary present for Geordie and Cath.
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CLIP
Leonard: You’re always supposed to be a good man! Or was that just Sidney’s influence? I miss him too, but that’s no excuse to behave like that and neither is whatever happened between you and Cathy last night.
Geordie: That has nothing to do with this.
Leonard: Well have you ever considered that Professor Simms’ relationships had nothing to do with his murder ?
Geordie: We’ll see about that once we know what’s on this tape, won’t we ?
Leonard: I don’t think I’m cut out for this.
Geordie: I think you’re right.
Leonard: Oh. I forgot to give you these. Anniversary present. They’re only doilies — thirteen years is lace. Congratulations.
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Jace: I mean you touched on this earlier, that this is not really about Geordie, it’s not really about Leonard, but does he mean to hurt Leonard here when he tells him that he’s not cut out for this ?
Robson: Again, the subtext is, he cares for Leonard. He likes Leonard. But sometimes You tend to hurt the ones you love and care about, and it’s… so there’s always a different agenda going on when you’re angry with someone else. This is about Sidney’s gone. I want Sidney back. That’s why I’m angry with you. It’s got nothing to do with the way you are in the way you behave and the way you’ve behaved. And within the police force and I brought you along. This has to do with Geordie and Cathy. And again, Daisy and John Jackson who’s constructed this beautiful episode, played the guilt card just at the end, when the generosity of spirit comes out and Leonard when he gives him the anniversary present, because Leonard is mindful of people’s feelings and what is going on in their lives. Leonard is in tune with everybody and how they are and really remembers occasions, be it an anniversary or be it a birthday, or be it something one person and a person said to another person that was nice, he’ll always remember them and repeat them and tries to bring joy into the world, you know. And that’s just a brilliant device to to instill Geordie, with guilt, and he’s not angry at Leonard at all. Geordie is just angry with himself and the world and his relationship and the fact that Sydney’s gone and he’s stuck. So that’s great subtext to play.
Jace: Geordie once again crosses paths with Will Davenport, who was a thorn in his side in the investigation in Episode One. How did that experience shape his perceptions of Will ?
Robson: Again he sees him as a good person but no one can replace Sidney, so that’s what you play as an actor, as a storyteller this series. No one can replace Sidney. No one will ever replace Sidney. So, the whole relationship arc between Geordie and Will is definitely a slow burner until it plays itself out in episode five, when we really see who the real Will is and how they relate to one another. So it’s just coming to terms with this kind of ying and yang with Will and how he how he viewed him initially in the first episode. But again, people are gonna go to Will and confess their sins. People are going to go to Will, and tell him their deepest secrets, things that they would never tell anyone else. And that is a fantastic device for a detective. So Geordie’s always got that card under his sleeve, if you know what I mean.
Jace: Will is younger than Geordie, younger even than Sydney.
Robson: No he’s not, only on screen.
Jace: Only on screen, we’ll say. How does that age difference help or hinder the bond between these two future crime solving partners ?
Robson: Well it’s… it’s the petulant teenager syndrome isn’t it? It’s this this arrogance of certainty that young people bring today. And I’m sure during the late 50s and mid 50s when, you know people were being progressive, creative, liberated, speaking out. And while Sidney experienced World War 2, and conflict, and collective trauma, Will didn’t. So there’s always this element within the relationship, is, “You have no idea what life is about”‘ And to coin a phrase that my father used to use many a time and I’m sure you’ve heard it, “You don’t know you’ve been born.” And if you play that initially in the relationship between Geordie and Will, it becomes very very interesting. So initially he’s the petulant teenager who has the arrogance of certainty, thinks he knows everything. But life is not how he’s portraying it. And so therefore there will be this kind of capitulation with Will’s character as the series carries on.
Jace: How would you describe Tom Brittney in one word ?
Robson: Tom Brittney in one word. Um… Charismatic.
Jace: And what about Robson Green in one word ?
Robson: Unquantifiable.
Jace: I was going to say irrepressible, but unquantifiable…
Jace: Many listeners may not realize that you and Game of Thrones actor Jerome Flynn were a singing duo called Robson and Jerome,–
Robson: Certainly.
Jace: In the 1990s. You had several number one hits to your name, and a legion of fans that included Princess Diana. What was this experience like ?
Robson: Okay, so, what you may not know is we were in a series called Soldier Soldier, and wanted the episodes of Soldier Soldier, a very, very popular program over here, when we only had four channels, we now have thousands, we had four channels in the UK and one of the most popular shows was Soldier Soldier. It was about these young soldiers who were abroad and and how being in the Army affected their lives in conflict. And there was an episode when we were in Germany, filming Germany, and there is a wedding. The band don’t turn up. So Jerome Flynn and Robson Green, “Paddy and Tucker,” get on stage and sing “Unchained Melody.” Jerome was a trained singer. I’m a trained singer. I was in an acapella group put up at the Phil Spector sang for many years, supported Paul Weller and the Hank Langford band, and the flying pickets and Billy Bragg. We did the Red Wedge tour, so I knew things, I was trained singer, he was trained singer, and we sing this number on set and the whole crew go, “Whoa. That’s really good.” And Mandy, “you should release that.” And of course we laugh. We get a phone call after the episode goes out. The phone call is from Simon Cowell who nobody knew. So imagine me going..imagine the phone call: “Hi. Simon Cowell here.” “Who?” Yeah. That’s showbiz. “Sorry mate…what’d you want? A record? You want me to… No don’t be stupid I’m not releasing a record.” he went, “Before you put the phone down. I will pay you this amount of money if you recruit…if you and Jerome Flynn record Unchained Melody.” It was a seven figure sum. Yeah exactly. So I started gargling…so it’s like, okay. Wow. And we record the song. It’s released. It’s the fastest selling single in the history of British popular music. It goes into the Guinness Book of Records. Guinness Book of Records. Outsells the Beatles. We’re talking about the Rolling Stones. Michael Jackson. All of a sudden we’re on top of the Pops, in the audience is Tina Turner, Elton John, David Bowie, and Bon Jovi are there, Oasis, and we’re number one. And Jerome just looked at me and he went, “Our lives will never be the same again…” And they weren’t, and then we went on and had number one hits, and we were trained singers but we were actors within this scenario. The highlight of the music was when it stopped. But there was a… there was a defining moment. I may have mentioned this before. I’m not sure if I have to American press or any radio show. But we had a show over here called Animal Hospital and Animal Hospital was at the height of when the Robson and Jerome records were going out, and in Animal Hospital what people did is they brought in the pets, and the scenario was is the pet going to survive or is it gonna die. And a woman brought in two guinea pigs, and they were called Robson and Jerome, and and when asked what seems to be the problem with your guinea pigs, she said, “It’s Robson. He’s not right.” And Robson the guinea pig, died as did our singing career. But my mum was ringing me up, saying, “You’re on TV! you’re on TV! Robson and Jerome you’re on the other side!” I went, “What are you talking about, mom, this is Animal Hospital…” She went, “Yeah those guinea pigs. They’re Robson and Jerome!” So this very surreal bizarre evening happened, and I think that was the kind of… It was a sign. It was a sign to stop, I think and we did.
Jace: Robson Green, thank you so very much.
Robson: Thank you. Pleasure.
Jace: For all the tears and bittersweet goodbyes, the most challenging aspect of a lead actor leaving is finding someone to be their replacement. But even more daunting is being that someone: it’s one thing to say goodbye to a beloved and familiar face. It’s another thing altogether to be a new face in an otherwise familiar setting.
Tom Brittney: Yeah. Because he made it sort of life imitating art. I was the nervous, new actor on the block and Will is the nervous, eager-to-please new vicar on the block.
Jace: Actor Tom Brittney plays Reverend Will Davenport this season on Grantchester, and he joins us next on the podcast to explore what it’s like to take over from James Norton as the dashing vicar-in-residence in the sleepy village of Grantchester.
Interviews aux Masterpiece Studios
