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Dame Jilly Cooper lauds Disney+ adaptation of iconic '80s novel Rivals as 'absolutely breathtaking'
Dame Jilly Cooper’s novel Rivals, published by Transworld, is set to be introduced to a brand new audience, as an adaptation of her bestselling novel is to be released as a television series on 18th October 2024 on Disney+ nearly four decades after publication.
Originally published in 1988, Rivals, the second in the Rutshire Chronicles (after Riders), charts the “titanic struggle” between Rupert Campbell-Black and Lord Tony Baddingham over the television production company, Continuum. Alex Hassell and David Tennant star respectively in the titular roles with Aidan Turner, Bella Maclean, Danny Dyer and Katherine Parkinson joining the cast.
In an interview with The Bookseller, Cooper, now 87 years old, called the experience “absolutely breathtaking”. It took the production a “long time” to be green-lit, but executive producer and screenwriter Dominic Treadwell-Collins “fell in love with [the novel] and was absolutely marvellous". Cooper added: "He made everybody else fall in love with it."
Cooper said that Rivals is her “favourite” of her novels and she hopes a new generation of readers will rediscover the ’80s classic with the new screen adaptation. “There’s obviously a lot of love and a lot of sex and a lot of fun and laughter, but it’s also about a battle, a massive battle between powerful people,” she added.
The cast boasts a litany of star-studded names and “the big stars are huge”. Hassell, taking on the role of Rupert, whom Cooper fondly calls “my Rupert”, is “absolutely divine” and “very, very sexy in the part”. Speaking at the press screening at the Ham Yard Hotel, London, Hassell said it meant a “huge amount” to have Cooper’s endorsement. “I like beautiful people, so the cast was very beautiful,” Cooper added. In turn she calls Turner, who plays television presenter Declan O’Hara, “dazzling with the moustache”, Tennant is “wonderful” and Dyer is “hysterical, but absolutely lovely... and very honourable”.
Cooper thinks the adaptation “lifts” the original text and hopes audiences will be “cheered up” by the production: “That’s what I always want to do... I love people having happy marriages, and being happy. I hope they will be cheered up and have a lot of laughter with it. It is funny, it is a big struggle and they will see the minutiae behind television, it’s a very tough business.”
To mark the television adaptation, Transworld is releasing a new tie-in edition of the novel on 10th October and is launching influencer and online activity alongside “I Love Jilly Cooper” merchandise to complement Disney’s marketing. The adaptation of Rivals marks Disney’s “biggest campaign” for a show produced by Local Original with paid media across the UK and Ireland and broad press coverage.
The first novel in the Rutshire Chronicles, Riders, was adapted for film in 1993, starring Michael Praed and Marcus Gilbert. The adaptation changed the ending and, unlike with Rivals, Cooper “didn’t have any input”. As executive producer on the new series, Cooper consulted occasionally on the script. Although she says she was a “nuisance” and although she was “terribly un-politically correct”, the author offered advice on “what the upper classes would say or wouldn’t say”. It “was marvellous to have an input,” she reflected.
During the Q&A after the press screening, Cooper said that filming “was a happy, happy thing and I just can’t believe it’s so brilliant”. The author added that she felt “rejuvenated” by the adaptation. In the same session, Treadwell-Collins explained that he decided to start with Rivals, the second in the series, because the love story between the characters Rupert and Taggie, played by Maclean, “was the heart of it”. He also jokingly added that he chose Rivals over Riders “because horses are really, really expensive”.
In an online essay, Cooper wrote: “Unlike previous dramatisations of my work, when my characters and plots have been changed out of all recognition, the spirit of my original novel is alive and well.” When speaking to The Bookseller, she added finally that she is “praying” for more adaptations of her novels—but only “if Dominic [Treadwell-Collins] want[s] to do them”.
Rivals has sold 35,709 copies across all formats through Nielsen’s BookScan.
