One hour of TV that made an Oscar winner

FOR all of us involved in The Darling Buds Of May, the show was something unique in our careers — its impact so much greater than anything we had envisaged.

So when we got together for a televised reunion earlier this year, we had hoped Catherine Zeta-Jones (pictured) would be able to reminisce with us.

They auditioned 300 actresses for the part of Mariette, the Larkins’s daughter. Then someone saw Catherine in the West End musical 42nd Street.

The rest is history — much of it written in the tabloid newspapers. As she said: ‘Within one hour of television, my life changed.’

What amazed me was the level-headedness with which she dealt with it, especially as she was only 22.

She moved to LA, starred in movies, met and married Michael Douglas . . .

Catherine couldn’t come to Kent that day, but she suggested I fly to America and film a chat with her there. That sounded great to me: we’d film in her New York apartment, then she and Michael would take me out to dinner and at some point someone would say: ‘Hey, Dave, what are you busy with right now? Because I’ve got a script which I know would be perfect for you . . .’

Then I woke up and remembered this was British TV, and the budget to fly me and a crew across the Atlantic for a short interview was unlikely to be forthcoming.

True enough, a compromise was reached — we would film Catherine in her New York apartment, but from the show’s location in Kent, via a satellite link. It was hard to think of anything less Larkin-like.

Still, there we all sat: me, Pam Ferris and Philip Franks, our co-stars, and there, on a giant screen, was Catherine. She looked fantastic.

At one point one of her kids walked in — on their way to school, it seemed — and she explained she was giving an interview about Darling Buds. You could hear the kid, off-screen, react as kids will, kind of: ‘Oh God, Mom, must you?’ It was great to talk to Catherine and see how unchanged she was: still natural, still grounded. Not unlike the show itself. Telly could do with a bit more of that — a family drama, designed to make people feel good.

There seems to be more scope given to things that are angry, loud, harsh. I understand that, but it saddens

me, too.