Daily Mail - Daily Mail Weekend Magazine
ME, A HEARTTHROB? I’VE CONNED THEM
Back with a new chat show, Alan Titchmarsh lays the rumours to rest once and for all...
His spectacularly eclectic career has spanned presenter, novelist, classical music broadcaster and best-selling poet, but Alan Titchmarsh is best loved when in the garden and having a natter. So Love Your Weekend, his new Sunday morning ITV chat show which, he says, is ‘a celebration of rural life and country matters’, should fit the bill perfectly.
Last year he created a social media frenzy when he showed his own glorious garden to cameras for the first time in his ITV show Fifty Shades Of Green. Then he did it again on Grow Your Own At Home, which saw Alan and his wife Alison getting to grips with a camera to film him growing fruit and vegetables during lockdown.
Yet despite having four acres at his Grade Ii-listed Georgian farmhouse in Hampshire, Alan found a thatched barn to film his new ten-part show. ‘I was selfish in that I fancied working near home,’ he says. ‘We thought, “We need a barn, a garden and a field.” Friends in a nearby village had this lovely barn, now it’s our studio.’
His first guest is Strictly judge Craig Revel Horwood, 55, who has become a convert to country life after leaving London for a home in Hampshire in 2014 and confesses that he loves sniffing soil. ‘The ethos of the show is not only the importance of the countryside, but also what it does for individuals,’ says Alan. ‘Craig is living proof of that. No one could be more metropolitan in terms of public perception and his career, but he’s a real convert.’
Then there’s actor and singer Jason Donovan, 52, who sees the garden as a piece of art. He reveals a ride on his sit-down lawnmower and a glass of Champagne on a Sunday afternoon makes him very happy. ‘Some people want billowing flowers and a wild, natural look, while others want things all neat like Jason does.’
There are animals too, and countryside careers. Guests will include sheepdog handler Erin
Fflur Mcnaught, who will become
of Britain’s youngest farmers at 17 when takes over her family’s beef and sheep farm in Wales after her grandfather retires, and Lutfi and Ruby Radwan, owners of the UK’S first organic halal farm, in Oxfordshire. ‘Talking to younger people about loving the countryside is very special,’ says Alan, 71.
Alan also revisits his 2011 TV interview with Prince Charles. ‘If you ever see him walking through Highgrove, he’ll have weeds in his hand that he’s pulled out from somewhere. He mucks in and has an eagle eye,’ says Alan.
Speaking of royals, Princess Diana was so keen to meet Alan she shook his hand when it was covered in manure, and the Queen famously told him, ‘You give a lot of ladies a lot of pleasure,’ at his MBE investiture in June 2000.
Today he reveals what really happened. ‘I’d spoken to the ladies of the Sandringham WI that January, and the Queen had been in the front row,’ he says. ‘I think she was making reference to that – the ladies were very excited.
‘I said, “Look, the Queen’s coming.” And they said, “Oh, we see her all the time – but it’s wonderful that you’re here.”’
Alan’s is one of the most kissed waxworks at Madame Tussaud’s, and he’s had some close encounters himself. ‘I was filming at RHS Wisley and a lady came running up to roll up my trousers, saying, “You have wonderful legs.” I said, “Roll any further and you’ll find they’re not that wonderful!”
‘I’m very flattered,’ he laughs. ‘For anyone who thought I was some kind of heartthrob, it’s nice to think I’ve conned them!’
Lisa Sewards Love Your Weekend With Alan Titchmarsh, tomorrow, 9.25am, ITV.
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