‘I never had any idea Midsomer Murders would go on so long’
As the popular whodunit returns, star Neil Dudgeon talks to Danielle de Wolfe
Midsomer Murders has become something of a British television institution.
Encapsulating the smallscale rivalries of middle England, the long-running drama more often than not sees harmless disputes rapidly escalate into deadly encounters. Now, it is set to return to ITV on Sunday nights with four brand new episodes.
Neil Dudgeon, 60, the actor who plays DCI John Barnaby, tell us more about the new feature-length episode.
What can we expect from the forthcoming episodes?
We shot two episodes before Christmas, which are going to be broadcast shortly. The Wolf Hunter of Little Worthy and The Stitches Society, we did those before Christmas. And then we reconvened again in January and we shot another episode. There’s The Stitcher Society – it’s an episode about a village where lots of people have got heart problems and they’re all people of a certain age or a similar age to me. Also, in that is Nimmy March – some older viewers may remember a series years ago called Common As Muck from the mid ’90s.
Can we expect to see any other familiar faces?
In that episode, there was a young man who appeared on set who I had just seen in an entire series. Jacob Fortune-lloyd is his name, who is in The Queen’s Gambit. And then there he was on our set being fantastic… In The Sting Of Death episode is Griff Rhys Jones, who was fascinating and hilarious and lovely to spend some time with. And then also I must mention Derek Griffiths, who was a hero of my childhood from Playschool and Play Away.
Are we right in thinking you took part in a spontaneous yoga class on set?
We had a day when we were filming scenes in the church. And for those scenes, we had an actual yoga teacher and her yoga class. And so, we went outside and I saw that the yoga teacher had started to put the class through their paces or warm-up and I thought, ‘Ooh, I’ll have some of that!’. And so I went and joined in at the back. And it was a fantastic way to start the day.
And it’s now been 10 years since you took on the role of DCI John Barnaby?
I never had any idea that it will go on this long. They said come in and do a few episodes of Midsomer and I thought, ‘I’ll give it a try. I hope I don’t destroy the show after John Nettles has done it so marvellously for 13 years’. But we got through that first series and then they wanted to do it again and I thought ‘Hurrah!’, and sort of repaid the faith of the people who cast me in it.
Yourself and co-star Neil Hendrix make a formidable partnership. Is there a lot of laughter working together?
We’ve had a couple of times over the last couple of episodes where we’ve tried to play the scene without actually making eye contact because it made us laugh too much. And that is, I think, a low point for any professional artist, to be quite honest. I’m outing us both here.
● The new series of Midsomer Murders begins on ITV on Sunday at 8pm