Daily Mail - Daily Mail Weekend Magazine
I OFFERED TO GET MY PECS OUT FOR POLDARK!
Forget Aidan Turner’s topless scything; viewers of a certain age will need the smelling salts when another sex symbol joins the cast of Poldark for the new series – John Nettles. As Jersey detective Jim Bergerac John set many a pulse racing in the 1980s – he even had a sweaty shirtless scene all of his own where he was cutting down some undergrowth.
‘I remember one sunny day wearing just a vest and tensing my muscles. Oh, the arrogance!’ laughs John, now a youthful 72. ‘I offered to do it on Poldark but I was greeted with hoots of derision. I said, “I’ve polished my pecs. Show me the blade, show me the field, I’ll show you the man...” but my offer was cruelly turned down.’
Lustful locals used to follow him around Jersey in Bergerac’s heyday. ‘And I was grateful,’ he grins. ‘I just wish I’d had more time. If you’re doing a series you’ve got no time for a social life. It was a kind of monastic existence. I didn’t get around as much as I would’ve liked, or as much as people thought, which is a great regret to me.’
Poldark marks John’s return to TV for the first time since saying goodbye to Midsomer Murders’ DCI Tom Barnaby in 2011. He plays Ray Penvenen – a rich landowner who lives on a grand estate, while his neighbours Ross and Demelza endure reduced circumstances. When Demelza knocks on his door asking for help, he promises assistance and gives sound advice. ‘Ray Penvenen is a very good man,’ says John. ‘He prefers the company of his cows to people, but I get the feeling he’s lonely. His only relative is his niece and ward, Caroline. He’s raised her since she was orphaned and indulged her beyond measure. He loves her dearly, but not enough that he’ll choose her a decent husband. He’s got a twit of a would-be MP in mind who’s a few sandwiches short of a picnic basket.’
John’s in no doubt why the drama’s so popular. ‘It’s shot stunningly well,’ he says. ‘The production values are very high, but the main virtue of the show has to be Aidan Turner. He’s not only a graceful man, he’s also a very fine actor. As a combination – with the pecs – it makes him irresistible.’ As a Cornish lad himself, from St Austell, John admits it was a ‘pretty good’ feeling to be part of an iconic Cornish drama. He now lives a bucolic existence not far away in Devon with his wife Cathy and a menagerie of animals. He was there happily not acting but indulging his love for history – he wrote a book about the German occupation of the Channel Islands – when Poldark came calling. Will he do more acting then? ‘No, I think I’ve finished,’ he says. ‘Poldark might be my swansong. I’ve found things more interesting than acting, let’s put it that way.’