Underneath the Archers (very very long, & on-topic)
Robin Somes
Telegraph, accompanied by a picture of Tamsin Grieg which, if I am quite
frank, has fair set my heart a-flutter.
Anyone seen my coat?
cheers,
robin
Underneath the Archers.
There's marital bliss on and off the air at Ambridge, says Chris Arnot.
The latest bride of Ambridge has some experience of older men, on and
off the air. As Debbie Aldridge, she married leathery, Canadian academic
Simon Gerrard, 18 years her senior, last night as a million or so
Archers listeners tuned in and her fictional father, Brian, stayed away
in disgust. As the actress Tamsin Greig, she walked up the aisle with
the actor Rick Leaf three years ago, almost to the day. She was 30 and
he was 40.
Keen as she was to sign herself T Leaf, she has maintained, for
professional reasons, the name of her father. Unlike Brian Aldridge, he
was there to give his daughter away, albeit from a wheelchair. He was 92
at the time and died soon afterwards, leaving a widow 27 years younger
than himself.
Tamsin was what she calls the "shouty" middle child - noisy,
argumentative and a constant trial for a father born in Edwardian times.
She would have been brought up a country girl had her parents not gone
bankrupt while running the village store at Hawkhurst, in Kent. With
three children under four, the Greigs moved to the big city to live in
rather reduced circumstances.
There is, in truth, little comparison betwen Debbie, the farmer's
daughter from the rural West Midlands, and metropolitan Tamsin, from
urban west London. One married in a sparsely populated register office,
the other in white in the local parish church. St Martin's, Kensal
Green, was packed when Rick and Tamsin tied the knot. At the reception,
bagels ferried in from Brick Lane on the other slide of London were
served (with Champagne) to 400 guests. That's two-thirds of the entire
population of Ambridge.
Certainly, her relationship with her mother, who lives down the road in
Kilburn, sounds less fraught than the constant struggle between
daughterly duty and irritation that characterises how the fictional
Debbie behaves towards Jennifer Aldridge.
Kensal Green and Kilburn are as emotionally rooted and close-knit as any
village in rural middle-England, according to Tamsin. "We have lots of
loyal friends round here," she says, and I love the sense of continuity
that comes from living in a place where you grew up." Even when their
second child is born in mid-August, the couple have no intention of
moving from their stylish, but decidedly compact, upstairs flat in a
sturdy 1920s villa. "Parents say, 'My children must have more space',
but it's not always practical," she says. "Anyway, I shared one room
with two sisters, so you can do it."
Tamsin and Rick's 15-month-old son Nathanael is a sunny-natured lad who
has just, learnt to walk. He likes to watch the express trains
thundering to and from Euston behind the house. "He's a trainspotter
already," says his mother. "It's funny because the place where I was
brought up, in Kilburn, also backed on to the line. You get used to the
noise after a while."
What she never quite gets used to is the frustration of coming into
London from a recording session at Pebble Mill, in Birmingham, seeing
her flat from the train window and not being able to get off. "Going
into town and out again is a bit of a pain," she says. "But at least The
Archers takes up only six days out of every month.
"I've come to realise how much it means to so many people. They meet you
in this imaginative world and they have expectations. I've had men come
up to me and say: 'You should be blonde and have bigger thighs than
that'."
She was a drama student at Birmingham University and, later, an actress
in children's theatre at the Midlands Art Centre. In between times, she
answered telephone queries for the Birmingham branch of the Family
Planning Association. "There's not much I don't know about
contraception," she confides. "Yet the baby I'm carrying now wasn't
planned. Rick was making a film at the time so it's difficult to recall
how we found time to conceive.
"When I found out, I was amazed and delighted. I refuse to look on him
or her as a mistake. It's a gift."
When we meet, she is taking a rare day off from the studios at
Teddington, south-west London, where she's been cast in a six-part
Channel 4 sitcom called Black Books, by Graham Linehan who co-wrote
Father Ted, and Dylan Moran. It comes out in the autumn. "I can't just
rely on The Archers," says Tamsin, "much as I enjoy doing it."
--
http://www.badminston.demon.co.uk
http://www.robinsomes.co.uk/guitar.html
Trust me, I'm a webmaster....
Chris McMillan
<URL:mailto:ro...@badminston.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> In a rare flurry of on-topicness, I found the following in today's
> Telegraph, accompanied by a picture of Tamsin Grieg which, if I am quite
> frank, has fair set my heart a-flutter.
>
the sound of Dobbie's voice.
Sincerely, Chris
--
Mrs. Chris McMillan. Tel. 0118 926 5450. e-mail:
ch...@mikesounds.demon.co.uk http://www.mikesounds.demon.co.uk/
Ben Farrow
2. Who was the Arthur Daily of Ambridge, with his used-car business?
3. Who was the Scottish equestrian lady?
4. Who was the vicar to whom a pregnant Jennifer Archer turned for advice?
5. In what way was Neil carter once a tearaway?
Ben Farrow
Stephen
>1. Who was Michelle Graventin?
This was the true identity of the "Pope Joan" of Mercia; a woman
appointed as Bishop of Felpersham ("+felpers" as Niles would have it)
in the 8th Century. Graventin was a pig farmer's daughter who was
mistaken for a monk as a result of the traditional mediaeval lack of
personal hygeine.
>2. Who was the Arthur Daily of Ambridge, with his used-car business?
This is one of Higgs' less well known sidelines.
>3. Who was the Scottish equestrian lady?
It is considered very unlucky to mention the name of the Scottish
equestrian lady.
>4. Who was the vicar to whom a pregnant Jennifer Archer turned for advice?
Oprah Winfrey(1).
>5. In what way was Neil carter once a tearaway?
He used to hang around with a family of convicted criminals - oh, my
mistake, that was who he married.
(1) using vicar in a fairly loose sense.
--
Stephen
"If one is willing to make adjustments in the historical claims of the Bible,
they can be correlated with the archaeological evidence, if one is willing to
take some liberties with the archaeological evidence."
- J. Maxwell Miller
Penny
>1. Who was Michelle Graventin?
No idea, but Michèle Gravençin worked as Phil and Jill's au pair in 1970.
She went out with Tony before becoming unofficially engaged to Gordon
Armstrong. Michèle had to return to France when her mother became seriously
ill and Gordon never saw her again.
>2. Who was the Arthur Daily of Ambridge, with his used-car business?
Pass
>3. Who was the Scottish equestrian lady?
Pass
>4. Who was the vicar to whom a pregnant Jennifer Archer turned for
advice?
Matthew Wreford was encumbent at the right time.
>5. In what way was Neil carter once a tearaway?
He rode a motorbike... but then so did I.
Penny
I get enough exercise just pushing my luck
umra Nicknames & Abbreviations http://www.bigwig.net/umra/nicks.html
Fenny
ro...@badminston.demon.co.uk says...
> to 400 guests. That's two-thirds of the entire
> population of Ambridge.
>
>
--
Fenny
K Richard W
sufficiently with the following opinion of recent events:
>1. Who was Michelle Graventin?
See elsewhere
>
>2. Who was the Arthur Daily of Ambridge, with his used-car business?
>
Well the most recent was Eddie Grundy - although that revolved more
around the number plates than the cars themselves.
>3. Who was the Scottish equestrian lady?
>
Was Sally Robertson Scots?
>4. Who was the vicar to whom a pregnant Jennifer Archer turned for advice?
>
>5. In what way was Neil carter once a tearaway?
>
He took the conviction for carrying Sandy's drugs.
--
Kosmo Richard W
LSS super-numerary
Brenda Selwyn
Wm Smethurst's NOC gives the population of Ambridge as 360 in 1987.
However, the powers that be (the same ones that keep altering the
maps) have probably decided that this is wrong. AFAIK it isn't
mentioned anywhere else.
Given the number of dwellings, anyone fancy working out which figure
is more likely to be correct?
Brenda (who can't be bothered:-)
--
***************************************************************
Brenda M Selwyn
Nr Bath, North East Somerset
bre...@matson.demon.co.uk
http://www.matson.demon.co.uk/brenda.htm
Chris McMillan
<URL:mailto:pen...@onet.co.yuk> wrote:
> Ben Farrow wrote in message <95825711...@serv3.vossnet.co.uk>...
> >2. Who was the Arthur Daily of Ambridge, with his used-car business?
>
Harry Booker. (Just looked it up in 'the Book'
Fenny
Ch...@mikesounds.demon.co.uk says...
> In article <8fn4fm$9a$4...@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>, Penny
> <URL:mailto:pen...@onet.co.yuk> wrote:
> > Ben Farrow wrote in message <95825711...@serv3.vossnet.co.uk>...
>
> > >2. Who was the Arthur Daily of Ambridge, with his used-car business?
> >
> Harry Booker. (Just looked it up in 'the Book'
>
business in Ambridge?
--
Fenny
anon...@firedrake.org
>ne...@rickmansworth.invalid.co.uk (Fenny) wrote:
>
>>In article <5PS9nAA1...@badminston.demon.co.uk>,
>>ro...@badminston.demon.co.uk says...
>>> to 400 guests. That's two-thirds of the entire
>>> population of Ambridge.
>>>
>>>
>>Where does anything mention the population of Ambridge?
>
>Wm Smethurst's NOC gives the population of Ambridge as 360 in 1987.
>However, the powers that be (the same ones that keep altering the
>maps) have probably decided that this is wrong. AFAIK it isn't
>mentioned anywhere else.
I have no idea where _I_ got the figure of 600 given by Robin; it can't
have been from a Book, 'cos I've never seen them. But I certainly would
have given that as the figure if anyone had asked me. Maybe it's the one
that is mentioned in newspapers when they have reports about Ambridge?
That's about the only place I've ever read anything about the village.
--
Weevil