Bobby Ball and Nigel Havers on The Cockfields
Nigel Havers and Bobby Ball on why their new sitcom will strike a chord with everyone
The Cockfields
TUESDAY-THURSDAY / GOLD / 10PM
Meeting your other half’s family can be challenging at the best of times. But in new Gold comedy The Cockfields, starring comedian
Joe Wilkinson and Motherland’s Diane Morgan as London lovebirds Simon and Donna, it’s even more complicated as Simon has two dads!
Set on the Isle of Wight, the gentle three-parter centres on the couple’s first visit together to Simon’s family home.
While Simon, who’s turning 40, finds spending time with his ever-doting mother Sue (Sue Johnston), controlling stepdad Ray (Bobby Ball) and Alan T itch marsh obsessed stepbrother David( Ben Rufus Green) rather annoying, Donna finds their quirky ways rather charming – at first.
However, she’s then taken aback when they run into Simon’s trendy biological father, Larry (Nigel Havers), who has dyed hair and a much younger girlfriend, Melissa (Sarah Parish)!
TV Times caught up with Bobby, 75, and Nigel, who turns 68 on 6 November, to find out whether it was all happy families playing Simon’s two dads…
What was it that appealed to you most about this show? Bobby: I think it’s realistic. People will watch it and say, ‘That’s just like my family.’ Every now and again something weird happens, though – I love it. I wanted to do it right away because the writers [Joe Wilkinson, who plays Simon, and After Life star David Earl] are lovely lads, and because
I’m not playing the Bobby Ball
I usually play.
Nigel: I just thought the script was great, and I had worked with Gold before on
Murder on the Blackpool Express, so it was like a welcome home.
This sort of family show works brilliantly, and casting Bobby is sheer genius, as Sue Johnston and him together are just brilliant.
What are your characters like? Bobby: Sometimes Ray can be a bit nasty, which is different for me and one reason why I wanted to do this. Nigel: Larry is a sad case. He has a controlling new girlfriend, who he is genuinely in love with. She’s managed to make him dye his hair and wear inappropriate clothes
and jewellery. It’s a look I quite like, as I used to wear gold bracelets when I was 17!
What are Ray and Larry like as parents? Bobby: Ray is strict and lacks patience. He has a son, David, who he tries to keep in order, and he argues with his stepson, Simon, because he talks back to him. Nigel: Larry is not interested in children; he’s mostly interested in himself. He’s such an absentee dad that it is pointed out that he actually had other plans on the day of Simon’s 40th, and had to be reminded to come to the party!
People will watch it and say, ‘That’s just like my family’ BOBBY BALL
And as partners? Bobby: Ray has his wife, Sue, who he controls a little bit, but she loves him. He doesn’t mean to be nasty, but he’s pretty stuck in his ways.
Nigel: They are a typical family, but they do live in the past and are old-fashioned and quirky. Everything would have been fine had Larry not brought Melissa into the equation. She’s explosive and tends to say the first thing that comes into her head.
Introducing a partner to your family is universal. What was it like for you in real life? Bobby: When my wife, Yvonne, was younger, she took me to meet her mum, who said, ‘How can you go out with a man who is shorter than you?’ Then I took her to meet my parents and my dad – who was even shorter than me – said, ‘She’ll be all right for cleaning windows!’ Nigel: When I drove my first wife through Newmarket to spend the weekend with my parents, she said, ‘Wow, what a one-horse town!’ She didn’t know it was famous for horse racing! I did marry her, though.