Fay Ripley
Cold Feet’s self-confessed chatterbox on embarrassing her children, turning into her mother and coping with selfie hunters
How do you keep it feeling fresh after umpteen years?
The upside to the familiarity is that you’re relaxed and among some of your oldest friends. They help get you through the ups and downs.
Do you ask for bigger storylines?
We all hunker down as a team of actors, writers, directors and producers to put something on the telly we can all be proud of. But I’m never gonna sit quietly in the corner. We’ll always have a little bit of a chat where need be.
Do you take pride in standing up for yourself?
No, it’s absolutely awful knowing me. I must be really annoying. I believe I’m an expert in most areas, with no qualifications whatsoever. I’m just a chatter – I get it from my mother. She gets on the bus and three stops later she’s got everyone’s life story.
Are you happy to chat to fans in the street?
Always. Lately my character had a cancer story and so I had lots of people reaching out to me. I was chatting to someone this morning and we were both in tears.
Does it ever get too much?
No, although sometimes people want selfies on trains. The whole flipping carriage is aware of it. So I whisper and ask if there’s any chance we can do it at the other end. Otherwise you end up looking like a right tool, doing a picture with someone then sitting beside them for the next two hours. But people are very sweet.
Your children are teenagers — are you an embarrassing mum?
My children would say I’m fulfilling that stereotype. There are a lot of hormones raging right now, theirs and mine quite frankly. It depends which one of us is having a good day or a bad day, but embarrassing them is the norm right now.
Do you feel you have to watch what your children are exposed to online?
There’s a minefield out there for my 13-year-old son, and he’s an incredibly vulnerable age. We’ve got lots of rules in place in our house. No one’s allowed TV in their room, or any screens – including mum and dad.
Do you worry about their future?
People my age all put our phones on the table because we’re expecting calls from the babysitter. Younger people ban phones from the table and the person who looks first has to buy the drinks. Young people will work it out, because our generation doesn’t have a clue. Oh God, I just sounded like how I imagine my mother’s parents probably did when they were talking about The Beatles.
Knowing me must be truly awful. I am really annoying