Culture Chat: the bonkbuster world of ‘Rivals’
Life and Art from FT Weekend
Forhecz Topher
4.6 • 601 Ratings
🗓️ 1 November 2024
⏱️ 32 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today we head to Rutshire, to take a crack at the frothy, riotous TV adaptation of Jilly Cooper’s 1980s romance novel, Rivals. The eight-episode series follows a cluster of posh English country-dwellers – including TV executive Lord Tony Baddingham (David Tennant) and local heartthrob Rupert Campbell-Black (Alex Hassell) — as they bonk and bust their way around the Cotswolds. Shoulder pads, extramarital affairs and messy dinner parties abound. But what is the show really about: Class? Sex? The 80s? Lilah is joined by the FT's Robert Shrimsley and Harriet Fitch Little to discuss.
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We love hearing from you. Lilah is on Instagram @lilahrap, and email at [email protected]. And we’re grateful for reviews on Apple and Spotify!
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Links (all FT links get you past the paywall):
– Rivals is out now on Disney+ in the UK, and Hulu in the US. You can read the FT’s four star review here: https://on.ft.com/40sqQa6
– Robert Shrimsley’s column, ‘Were the 80s as much fun as Jilly Cooper says?’ is here: https://on.ft.com/4f5PcL8
– We also love Jo Ellison’s recent column, ‘Jilly Cooper’s Britain: the bad sex world capital’: https://on.ft.com/3Uvj0Zt
– Robert is on X @robertshrimsley. Harriet is on X @HarrietFL and Instagram @huffffle
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Original music by Metaphor Music. Clips copyright Disney.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Life and Art from F.T. Weekend. I'm Lila Raptopoulos, and this is our Friday chat show. |
| 0:07.0 | Today we are talking about Rivals, the new television adaptation of the 1988 romance novel by Dame Jilly Cooper. |
| 0:15.4 | Jilly Cooper is the prolific English writer known for writing, and I quote, bonk busters. In other words, sex-fueled plot-heavy |
| 0:23.9 | melodramas. The plot of rivals centers on a local TV station that needs ratings to stay alive. |
| 0:30.3 | It's set in the 1980s in the Cotswolds in the English countryside. And it's about the rivalry |
| 0:35.2 | between two men, power-hungry TV executive Lord Tony Battingham, |
| 0:40.2 | and local womanizer and general cad Rupert Campbell Black. |
| 0:44.6 | Things get complicated when an Irish journalist is brought in to help out with the ratings, |
| 0:49.1 | and Rupert starts to fall in love with one of his daughters. |
| 0:52.1 | This show is an 80s English society fever dream. |
| 0:55.8 | There are garden parties, pheasant shoots, and countless extramarital affairs. |
| 1:00.9 | Welcome to the cat's walls. I didn't ask to come here. They're all horses and dogs and houses and cars |
| 1:08.7 | and the wives. They haven't had an orgasm since pony club camp. |
| 1:15.0 | The show is on Disney Plus and Hulu. It's gotten rave reviews across UK publications. |
| 1:19.9 | And wherever in the world you live, you will have questions. So let's get into it. |
| 1:24.5 | I'm Lila in New York, and I just stumbled on two of my posh neighbors playing naked tennis. Joining me from London, it's Rutscher's local ladies' man. The men want to be him. The women want to be with him. It's not Rupert Campbell Black. It is executive editor and FD columnist Robert Trinsley. Hi, Robert. Welcome. Exactly as Bill. You captured me entirely. |
| 1:47.0 | I thought I really got you there. I really felt good about that. Also in London, she's wearing |
| 1:51.8 | a puffball skirt and shoulder pads and has a beautiful new boutique in town. It's FT Weekend |
| 1:56.9 | Magazine's Food and Drink editor and actual Cotswold's resident, the great Harriet Fitzlittle. |
| 2:02.2 | Hi, Harriet. Welcome. Hi, Lila. So good to have you. I had a good one for you. I was thinking |
| 2:06.9 | you could be, she's got dirt on both of her guests and she's definitely going to use it in the second |
| 2:11.4 | half of the episode. Just wait. Thank you for bringing one. That's really fun. No one's ever done that. Okay, so first top line, where are you both coming to this from? And what did you think of the show? Why don't we start there? Robert, you wrote a column about this. You didn't leave much on the table. You had a strong view. Let's start with you. What did you think? |
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