This script has been lightly edited for clarity.

 

 Jace Lacob: I’m Jace Lacob, and you’re listening to MASTERPIECE Studio.

There are few places as cozy and welcoming as Grantchester — an idyllic little village tucked away in the English countryside where time moves at a slower pace. Summer is always just around the corner, and the wisteria is never out of bloom. But when Grantchester’s new vicar, Alphy Kottaram, first arrives in Cambridgeshire, he’s denied this peaceful veneer. 

 

CLIP

Mrs. C: Did you catch him?

Leonard: Did you punch his lights out?

Alphy: Revered Alphy Kottaram.

Mrs. C: Oh.

Leonard: Oh.

Geordie: Yeah.

 

When Will Davenport decamped with his family for Newcastle, he left a hole in everyone’s hearts, particularly Geordie Keating’s. Life in Grantchester just hasn’t been the same since Will and Bonnie departed, the vicarage sitting empty, waiting for its new inhabitant to arrive. 

While Geordie mopes down at the pub, staring drearily into his pint, the arrival of a new vicar brings a hope that his life in Grantchester would pick back up where Will left off. But to Geordie’s disappointment, Alphy isn’t too keen on solving crimes… particularly after being accused by Geordie of commiting one in his new home. 

 

CLIP

Geordie: Not sticking around?

Alphy: Well, not really my remit is it, murder?

Geordie: Life, death, everything in between? Thought you lot covered it all?

Alphy: Not when there’s a pint calling.

 

Over the course of Episode 3, the metaphorical parallels of Geordie’s work and Alphy’s work get closer and closer until Alphy finds himself absorbed in Geordie’s investigation.  

 

CLIP

Alphy: I had a visit from Lionel Walker

Geordie: Anything interesting to say for himself? I know you vicars don’t like to break a confidence.

Alphy: He said, “If only I had done more.” What? I’ll break a confidence if the truth is at stake.

 

By the end of the episode, Geordie and Alphy chat about the latest football scores over a pint of Grantchester’s “distinctly average.” A new bond formed, and the murder and morality balance restored.

Today, we’re joined first by Grantchester’s new vicar, Alphy Kottaram himself, Rishi Nair, and next by Grantchester writer and creator Daisy Coulam to dive into all of the big changes in this new era of Grantchester. 

 

Jace Lacob: This week we are joined by Grantchester star Rishi Nair. Welcome.

Rishi Nair: Thank you for having me.

Jace Lacob: Thank you for joining us. You’re new to Grantchester, coming into Series 9 as the new vicar. Was there any sense of nervousness about stepping into, if not the vicar’s shoes, then his dog collar?

Rishi Nair: Oh, absolutely. I was so nervous. It’s such an iconic show and coming in as the new vicar after both James and Tom, who are both brilliant actors and played the role so well, was nerve wracking. But everyone on that show was such an absolute dream to work with. I felt so comfortable.

On my screening test, my chemistry test with Robson, which was kind of the final audition process, I remember going in and being quite nervous because this is a stage where you think I might actually get this job. And it’s obviously doing a scene with Robson, who I’ve seen on the TV, never worked with on that, and so that’s kind of nerve wracking. But as soon as I walked into the room, Robson looked over to me and he’s like, Rishi! He came over to me, gave me a big hug, and that just immediately just made me feel so comfortable and allowed me to perform.

And that’s kind of a good indication of how Grantchester was for the next kind of six, seven months working there. The whole cast, the whole crew who have been working together for so many years, just made me feel so welcoming and so part of the family, which really helps ease the nerves and I felt a real part of it from the off.

Jace Lacob: So, I love Alphy’s introduction in this episode. He cruises into the village of Grantchester in a cherry red MG Roadster, he’s got sunglasses and a suede jacket on. And he doesn’t quite know what he’s heading into, I think, because Will isn’t there to sort of introduce him to the congregants or issue a warning about the oven. Is this a moment of optimism before reality sets in, these first few steps into the vicarage?

Rishi Nair: Yeah, I think that would be a fair thing to say. I think he is going there very optimistic and kind of full of hope and thinks things are going to go very smoothly. He’s a very half glass full kind of guy. He sees the best in everything. But Alphy’s a smart man and he’s also not under any illusions. Working in London in a parish in the 1960s, even though it was diverse, would have been still quite tough for him in that period. But certainly moving to Grantchester in 1961, which we are now, and obviously being of a South Asian descent into a town which is very white British, even now, and obviously even more so back then, I think he knows that it’s going to be tough.

I think he knows that it’s not going to be smooth sailing. And I think he’s anticipating that people are going to be staring at him and whatnot, but I’m not sure he realizes how tough it actually will be. And like I said earlier, his character is very half glass full, so I don’t know whether he’s lying to himself or he’s just trying to make himself believe that it’s going to be great, but he certainly enters the village very confident in his suede jacket and his red sports car zooming through, which was a really cool entrance to film.

Jace Lacob: So, over the course of this first episode, we do learn a little bit about Alphy.

 

CLIP

Alphy: My dad’s an accountant, mum’s a housewife. I’m pretty good at football, terrible at maths, and that’s about it.

 

Jace Lacob: You’re an Ealing lad, rather than an Essex one, but how much overlap is there between you and the character you’re playing? Do you relate to him?

Rishi Nair: I would like to say I’m good at football as well, so that’s a good start. But yeah, there are similarities between the two of us. Even though I’m not someone who’s massively into faith or religion, I completely relate to Alphy in that his morals that he gets from his faith are very much exactly the same kind of morals that I have, albeit not from a faith just as from a human perspective. But I can definitely relate to them.

I think that he’s a very loving character. He’s a lone wolf. He plays his cards close to his chest, which is something I definitely also do. He doesn’t give too much away. And I think, like most people, he wants people to like him, he wants to help people, that’s kind of why he’s chosen to be a vicar, is to give back to the community. And I think something that’s also quite similar maybe to myself is, people see him and they have this kind of impression of him because of the way he looks, and I think he takes real pride in proving people wrong and kind of stepping up to that challenge of not being judged by the way he looks, but more by his actions.

Jace Lacob: On the note of being judged by the way he looks, it’s not an easy beginning for Alphy, as you alluded to earlier. He’s assaulted by Geordie, he’s nearly arrested for breaking into the vicarage. It’s a tense scene that reveals some uneasy prejudices below the happy facade of the village of Grantchester, but also Alphy’s own inherent distrust of authority. What did you make of this scene as a sort of establisher for this dynamic?

Rishi Nair: It was really important to me once I got this role, and we were getting to the later stages of the audition, it was really important that when we started filming this, that, you know, it’s 1961, we’re in Grantchester, a white British town, we have Alphy coming in who is of South Asian Indian descent. It was really important to me that we acknowledged that, that we didn’t just kind of pretend that this was all fine then and he’d come in and everyone was like, hey, new vicar. We had to play it to real life. And unfortunately, in those times, someone that looked like myself coming into a town like that would not have been an easy thing to do. You would have had a lot of people stopping and staring at you, amongst other things.

So, the fact that we put that into the show at the beginning, we acknowledge it, we see what would have happened in real life, I think is great. But it was also really important to me and to the rest of the team that that wasn’t the kind of overriding factor of the season of the show. We acknowledge it and we move on and we get on with the show. We don’t want that to be a constant thing that’s just in the show the whole time.

So I was really happy with the way they did that. I thought it was done brilliantly well, how everyone assumes Alphy is kind of robbing the church. And there’s a really great scene when Alphy enters the pub, and everyone just goes silent and stares at him. And it’s like he’s this alien that has just walked into this pub, which was a really fun scene to film, actually.

Jace Lacob: I love the awkwardness of the scene that follows after Alphy and Geordie do not hit it off at all. And Alphy has to sort of lead Geordie out of the vicarage and he sees Leonard and Mrs. C hovering on the periphery. And it’s so awkward not just for Alphy, but for everyone. And Alphy tries to be really gracious, but the tension is palpable.

 

CLIP:

Alphy: Pleasure to meet you, Mrs…?

Mrs. C: Chapman.

Leonard: Sylvia. Not me, she’s Sylvia. I’m Finch, Leonard. Leonard of the House of Finch.

Alphy: I would invite you in for a cup of tea but unfortunately all of my cups are broken, so.

Geordie: Well, if you ever need anything—

Alphy: Oh, you’ll be the first person I call.

 

Jace Lacob: Is he thrown by this encounter? Is this something he’s struggling with at this point to kind of hold on to his composure?

Rishi Nair: Yeah, I think that there’s a part of him that would love to just, I mean, he’s already punched Geordie, so he’s got his aggression out already. But I think, like I said, he’s kind of expecting all of this. And even when they were in the vicarage, just before he comes up, Alphy is kind of figuring it out, he’s like, someone reported me, didn’t they? And Geordie is like, yeah. And he’s like, did they say anything? You know, being like, did someone say because I was brown? And I think Mrs. C says someone’s broken into the vicarage, a swarthy gentleman.

Jace Lacob: Swarthy gentleman. Yes.

Rishi Nair: Swarthy yeah. Geordie doesn’t tell Alphy that, but I think Alphy in the back of his mind knows something like that has happened along the lines. And I think when he comes out and he sees Mrs. C and Leonard, and he can tell by their reaction, everyone kind of knows what’s happening, but no one’s saying it out loud. And I think actually at that point of time, Alphy is quite enjoying it. He kind of has the power in that scene and in that moment.

And like I said, it’s proving people wrong, trying to make them change their minds. And this is a first kind of opportunity of, don’t judge me for just who you think I am. Like, get to know me, and then you can make your own decisions. So, yeah, I think he’s quite enjoying himself and thriving in that particular moment, to be honest.

Jace Lacob: So Alphy hoped to steer clear of Geordie, but they’re thrown together, and this funeral that Alphy’s presiding over becomes a murder investigation. Alphy wants nothing to do with Geordie or the police.

 

CLIP

Geordie: I need your help with the case.

Alphy: You see, that’s still not actually a question.

Geordie: Oh, Christ on a bike, will you help me or not?

Alphy: No.

Geordie: Right. Any particular reason?

Alphy: I’m not a great believer in the police.

Geordie: I’m not a great believer in God!

Alphy: Well then, there we are!

Geordie: What have you got against us if you don’t mind my asking?

Alphy: In a nutshell, you’re a bunch of morally bankrupt, power hungry, violent thugs who wield their power purely to inflate their own egos and line their own pockets.

 

Jace Lacob: I love this scene between the two of them. You and Robson are both so fantastic here. And Geordie is nursing his hurt over Will’s departure, and Alphy inherently distrusts the police, and Geordie in particular, because of their first encounter, but they do find this common ground in caring. Is that the thing that unites them here? A shared empathy or belief in a higher justice of a sort?

Rishi Nair: Absolutely, yeah. I think in that scene, Geordie comes to Alphy and is kind of asking for help with this crime that’s happened, this murder. And I think Alphy’s probably the first person in eight seasons that’s kind of gone, no, that’s not my job, I’m a vicar. I’m not here to solve crimes, you know? And also he’s like, I’m not going to help you because like you said, he’s not a great believer in the police. And I think within that scene, we kind of see the first glimpse of Alphy seeing Geordie for who he actually is.

It’s funny because Alphy’s this person we’re talking about that doesn’t want to be judged by the way he looks, but he’s doing the exact same thing to Geordie. Obviously, Geordie had already thought that Alphy was robbing the vicarage, so Alphy has that in his mind already, but he is judging him purely because he’s a police officer and is very much generalizing Geordie. And in this scene, we kind of see the first glimpse of, oh, actually, he’s not exactly what I thought he was going to be like. He does seem like he has empathy and he does seem like he actually cares about people. And I think that is the first kind of thing that opens up Alphy and is when he kind of says, okay, let me help you. I mean, he’s still not a hundred percent convinced, but that is the first moment I think where he thinks, okay, maybe this guy is not so bad.

Jace Lacob: Leonard pops by with apologies for Mrs. C’s behavior, a casserole, and a bit of a bombshell for Alphy in the form of Dickens, who comes with the vicarage. And they do hit it off. There’s an immediate ease there between the two of them. They’re both outsiders of a sort. Does that make it easier for Alphy to relate to Leonard, that sense of wanting to belong, but not perhaps quite fitting in? Or is this a newer sensation for charismatic and charming Alphy?

Rishi Nair: Yeah, I think there is a part of that. I think when he first comes into the vicarage and offers the casserole, you know, Alphy’s a very forgiving person and also he wants to know the parish, he wants to know the people there and connect with them. And so he completely accepts this apology and it’s really a lovely moment for Alphy as well because when Leonard comes over it’s a real offer of friendship. And Alphy finds that really heartwarming and wants to get to know Leonard. And then obviously when they sit and they speak and he figures out that Leonard is also an outsider, I think that definitely is something that they both relate to because Alphy now has someone he can confide in and ask questions about how to navigate certain things in that town being an outsider.

So there’s definitely a connection there, and in that sense, he’s probably someone who he can connect with the most in Grantchester because he’s probably the only person that can get a glimpse, in some ways, of how Alphy feels and the same with Alphy of how Leonard feels.

Jace Lacob: So Alphy, of course, is drawn into crime solving. He quotes Dickens as to why he became a vicar, “No one is useless in this world who lightens the burden of another. But really, I like finding people answers.” he says, which is, wait a minute, also what Geordie does. And they do actually work quite well together. They develop a pretty quick rapport, in fact. And in the final scene of Episode 3 in the pub, it reveals that this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship. What is it like working with Robson Green?

Rishi Nair: Oh, it is an absolute dream to work with Robson. He is so much fun on set. He has so much energy. And he has the greatest stories, by the way. He’s been in the industry for so long, and I just love listening to his stories, and he loves telling them. It can be quite distracting. Sometimes we’re about to go in for a scene and we’re like halfway through a story and I’m like, Robson, you need to finish this story, man. I can’t go into this scene not knowing what happens.

He’s such a dream to work with and we get on so well. We spend so much time together on this show. And we’re also both big football fans or soccer fans as you guys would know. I was actually only last week with Robson, I went to a Newcastle game with him. He’s from Newcastle. We went to go and watch his local team. So we’re real good friends off set as well as on set. And yeah, the days of working with Robson are my favorite. They’re always good fun. And we have such a laugh together. Maybe sometimes too much of a laugh, but it’s important to have fun when you’re working.

Jace Lacob: Both Will and Sydney before him had a darkness within them, a sense that they were running from something. But Alphy does present himself as a glass half full kind of guy, which sort of disappoints Geordie in a way. Do you see their rapport as being entirely different than Geordie’s with his last two vicars?

Rishi Nair: Yeah, I think so. When I started this, that was also really important to me, that Alphy was very different to the two previous vicars. And of course, in turn, by him being different means the relationship with Geordie being very different. I think Alphy and Geordie are much more seen as equals. They see each other as two equals, they’re friends. There’s not really, maybe like a father son kind of dynamic there. I think it’s much more like two men who have a friendship.

But yeah, it was important that that was different because we wanted, with bringing Alphy in there to be a fresh energy into the show. And also, the dynamics between all the other characters then also change as well, they’re tweaked because Alphy is now there, which just kind of gives it a fresh energy. And it’s kind of a Catch-22 as well. For me, when I was going through the auditioning process, I wanted to watch a couple of episodes of Grantchester to get a feel for the kind of tone and style of the show. But I quickly realized that I didn’t want to watch too much of what Tom or James had done because they were both such brilliant actors and did it so well, and I didn’t want to emulate what they did, whether that be consciously or subconsciously. And also, on the flip side of that, I didn’t want to watch what they did and then purposely try and do something completely different based on that because that also influences the performance.

So, I decided after 10 minutes of watching an episode to turn it off and I thought, let me just trust my instinct, trust my choices. And if I do steer away from the tone and style of the show, then to have the trust in the directors and producers to steer me in the right direction.

Jace Lacob: You made the right choice. Rishi Nair, thank you so very much.

Rishi Nair: Thank you for having me. It’s been an absolute pleasure.

 

Jace Lacob: We’ll take a short break to hear a word from our sponsors and when we return, we’ll hear from Grantchester writer, creator, and executive producer, Daisy Coulam on the handover at the vicarage. 

 

MIDROLL

 

Jace Lacob: And this week we are joined by Grantchester executive producer and head writer Daisy Coulam. Welcome.

Daisy Coulam: Hello, hello! How are you?

Jace Lacob: I’m good. Good to have you back again. We’re talking Series 9!

Daisy Coulam: It’s crazy.

Jace Lacob: It’s been almost 10 years, I think, since we first started chatting about Grantchester, which is mad.

Daisy Coulam: That’s insane, isn’t it?

Jace Lacob: Mad to me! The most recent handover, I want to start by talking about that. When did Tom approach you about leaving Grantchester? Was it after wrapping on Series 8?

Daisy Coulam: Yeah, I think we always knew with Tom. We kind of caught him at an interesting point in his career. Like, he’d just done a film with Tom Hanks before he came to us. So, I think we always knew we were slightly on borrowed time with him. And he’s got loads of ambitions. He directed for us, he writes, he’s making short films and we sort of always knew it was coming. But he gave us enough time so that we knew at the top of Season 9, we’d have him for two episodes, and then that would be it.

So, in a way, it helped us, it gave us a great shape for the series, because we’ve got one vicar leaving, and then we’ve got six episodes to explore a new vicar, which was exactly the perfect amount of time to establish someone and really get to know them. So it worked in our favor, really.

Jace Lacob: Was it vital for you that viewers get a proper goodbye with Will Davenport and with Tom Brittney rather than a sort of off camera one?

Daisy Coulam: Yeah, definitely. I think we would have fought tooth and nail if he hadn’t been able to come back. We would have been like, please just give us a few scenes! It was weird writing that script, writing Episode 2 when he leaves was sort of like a little grieving process. It was like saying goodbye to him and I know it sounds kind of slightly trite, but we do become a family, and every time we meet up, it becomes a family again. And it’s like losing your little brother really. And so it’s kind of sad.

But you know, I got a text from him this morning. We all still stay in touch and it’s good. But it was sort of like, we needed that moment to say goodbye to him, for our audience to say goodbye to him. So, we know he’s happy. He’s happy off in another land, there’s another alternate universe going on, but now we’re with our new guy who we’re very excited about.

Jace Lacob: So, I asked Tom about this, but I would love to get your take as well. Will’s journey on Grantchester is bookended by two images, one of him in black leather on his motorbike, a solitary man, and the other of him in an estate car with his wife, and sons. How do you feel about those bookended images for this character, and does it capture his growth from loner to family man?

Daisy Coulam: Yeah, do you know that wasn’t conscious, but it totally makes sense, doesn’t it? Because he arrives sort of, yes, alone, but also a boy, and he leaves a man, really. And he’s grown up and he’s found love and he’s not being an idiot, frankly. And I think what that says, really, is that, oh gosh, isn’t that lovely? I didn’t realize that! I didn’t realize that at all. And it’s funny because then our new vicar arrives in a new sports car and it’s like the new life comes in. But yeah, it was always a story about him growing up and Geordie sort of being his father figure.

Jace Lacob: I love it. I mean, that second image, I think, especially after last season’s motorbike tragedy seems to directly reference 1 Corinthians without naming it. “When I was a child, I spake as a child. I understood as a child. I thought as a child. But when I became a man, I put away childish things.” And we really do get him putting that motorbike away. It’s gone. He’s got a family car now. He’s got a family and he goes off in a new direction.

Daisy Coulam: And he goes off to happiness, I think. He has grown up and become the man he was always destined to be sort of thing, I think. Yeah, it’s true Grantchester, isn’t it that he’s sort of been saved by the family of Grantchester, and now we need a new vicar to come in and be saved by his friends.

Jace Lacob: Yeah, and it’s true, he does get that happy ending. He has the wife, the kids, he gets the approval of his father figure, which he’s always searched for, and he reaches the light. He’s a character who’s had so much darkness, and I think that’s the perfect Grantchester ending for the character.

Daisy Coulam: Yeah, I was just looking back at, funnily enough, at one of the storylines for Series 9 and one of the things we wrote in there was, “Where there is darkness, light always follows.” And I think that’s the thing about Grantchester, his journey has been dark, but light always comes in the end, and it came in the form of Bonnie and a family, really, for him. That’s all he ever wanted was a family, and oh God, it’s really emotional, actually! I didn’t realize!

Jace Lacob: It is! It is! On the note of emotion, the goodbyes in episode 2 are really gut wrenching. The scenes between Tom and Al, Tessa, Robson, those are so beautifully emotional and resonant. How challenging was it to write those scenes and to make each of them feel both unique and uniquely earned?

Daisy Coulam: It was a hard thing. But what happened was, Al cried in that scene where he says goodbye at the car. That wasn’t written in the script and it just came from him and he just kind of went with it. Because again, they’re really good friends. So we tried to create almost like a little shape within the goodbyes. So we always knew it would be Geordie and Will on the meadows at the end and that it would be about fathers and sons and I always try and get “I love you” in there somewhere. So that was love, those two. And then, yeah, each of them brought their A game. It wasn’t hard to write. And it clearly wasn’t hard for them to act because they all were brilliant.

Jace Lacob: On the note of that final scene,

 

CLIP

Will: Geordie?

Geordie: Yes?

Will: I hope I made you proud.

Geordie: Every day son, every day.

 

Jace Lacob: And then they go their separate ways in opposite directions, they don’t look back. But Will leaves the frame smiling and Geordie is left alone.

Daisy Coulam: Exactly. And we always wanted, that sort of sense that they don’t look back because in a way that journey is complete now and they’re going their different ways, but they’re both where they’re meant to be. And you know that Geordie is going to be searching for a new soulmate, really. It sets up three nicely, you see.

Jace Lacob: It does. It does indeed. So, Tom came back to direct some first and second unit stuff on Grantchester, it wasn’t a full goodbye, but what was the atmosphere like on his final day of shooting? How emotional was the set and how much did Robson cry?

Daisy Coulam: Oh, they’re big criers, those two. They were in the police station and they were just struggling to get through. And at the end we had a little party afterwards, and they put together a showreel of Will’s journey. And when you put it together like that, you go, God, he’s come really far. You know, when he arrived, he was really into the boxing gym and he had all that story, his trust in father figures who let him down and his dad dying, it’s like, oh my God he’s been through so much.

And he gave a little speech and Robson cried obviously but yeah, it was weird because then it was like oh, he’s coming back next week to direct in Grantchester. So he wasn’t away long and he’s always popping up here and there. So yeah, it felt like the end of an era, really.

Jace Lacob: So, I want to talk about Alphy Kottaram. Where did the idea for Alphy come from? With the departure of Tom and Will, what were you looking specifically to achieve in terms of conception with a new vicar? Where was the starting point?

Daisy Coulam: We always knew we wanted to bring in a diverse character because we felt like it was time, really. It was time in 1960s time, but also time for our show to look at that in a more serious way. So, we always knew that, but aside from that, well, it took a little while to get there. I did some reading and there’s a woman in England who was one of the first Black bishops. And her story was incredible about just her as a person within this very white institution and how she approached that and how she approached a religion that tells her Jesus is white and we are made in God’s image so therefore God is white.

And how somebody navigates that system was really interesting to me and to Emma and to the team. But also, it always in this show comes back to who will find their place next to Geordie and what energy do we want from those two. And we’ve had Geordie with Sydney and that was quite a troubled, you know, sort of dark post war, they’d shared that experience. Then there was Will and it was father son. And this is friends. This is like pure friendship and warm and witty and irreverent and they’re both working class and they both like football. And it was like, that’s what we wanted. We wanted almost like 10 minutes of these people aren’t going to get on, and then just a lifetime of, you know, they’re the best mates.

Jace Lacob: And so you mentioned diversity. I typically describe Grantchester as revolving around murder and morality, but it has also always functioned as a condition of England narrative, showing the changing face of Britain as we move forward in time. And the past two vicars, as you say, have been white. Was it then part of the initial conception that Alphy would be South Asian to explore perhaps some of the racial issues at play in 1961 Britain?

Daisy Coulam: Yeah, because I think there’s a very interesting connection between Britain and India. There’s the colonial thing in which I think Britain still to this day, very much romanticizes that time and says, ah, we went to India and it was this beautiful sort of, everyone’s having G&Ts on the lawn kind of vibe about it.

But to bring someone back into this very, I mean Grantchester is this very white, very quintessentially British place and its cream teas, and to bring somebody into that who is Indian actually born in this country, but Indian and what that does to the community. It’s a hard line because we wanted to explore that but not for that to dominate his character really, I suppose, because, in a sense, Alphy has dealt with racism his whole life, and he has a way of dealing with it, and his way of dealing with it is to be incredibly charming. And we wanted to explore it, and we will explore it in various ways.

We wanted to talk about identity, and your identity in terms of your faith, and the identity of what people project onto you, and what you sort of internalize. He’s been brought up in this very white Christian world and he’s navigated it by in a way, not delving into his own culture. So he’s internalized this whiteness, I suppose, is what we will come to explore later in the series and later in, hopefully, Series 10.

Jace Lacob: So here’s your chance to sort of tease. Will was posh, he was a public school lad. Alphy comes from a middle class, working class background. He’s from Essex. He likes cars and football. He says, “My dad’s an accountant. My mom’s a housewife. I’m pretty good at football, terrible at maths. That’s about it.” Is there perhaps more to him than meets the eye or is he the glass half full guy that he appears to be?

Daisy Coulam: I think he is exactly as he appears to be. He is glass half full. He always sees the best in people, in the world, but why is that? What in his past has led him to that moment that that’s his way of seeing the world? And that’s what we want to unpick; what creates somebody so seemingly at ease with a world that isn’t at ease with him, I suppose is the way to tease it.

Jace Lacob: The final scene of the episode subverts the opening image of Geordie on his own at the pub. And at the end, Geordie is joined by Alphy and there’s an ease to the two of them. They even share the same thought.

 

CLIP

Geordie: Game on the wireless was good last night.

Alphy: Palace Everton? Belter of a game.

Geordie/Alphy: Definitely not a penalty.

 

Jace Lacob: Is this the hope offered by a new friendship, a sense of finding a kindred spirit?

Daisy Coulam: Yes, absolutely. And do you know what? That was improvised in the audition scene.

Jace Lacob: Oh, that’s amazing.

Daisy Coulam: “Definitely not a penalty though.” That was between them, they’d sort of come up with that. And I was like, and I’m putting that in the script. And it was just that sort of, they’re on the same wavelength. They get each other. They just get each other instinctively and I love their relationship actually. I’m really excited about exploring it more. Very lucky.

Jace Lacob: So, Will is gone, Alphy’s on the scene, there is an anonymous letter in the postbox which portends doom ahead. What can you tease about what’s on tap for the rest of Series 9?

Daisy Coulam: Yes. So, we like to do a bigger story that’s sort of rumbling underneath the series. We’ve done the boxing sort of grooming ring. I can’t remember any of the others, but we’ve had some big stories. And in this series, it’s sort of an exploration of what religion… how religion… oh, how to say it without sort of spoiling it. It’s sort of about religion and how it can be sort of used for ill, I suppose.

So yeah, this first letter he gets through the Post seemingly makes no sense and is a passage from the Bible. And then you slowly start to realize… It’s one of those series that in a way you need to go back to the beginning and watch again and go, oh, that makes sense now. You sort of start to piece it together. It’s set up in Episode 2 and then carries on through. So yeah, it was quite fun to do that actually, to dot through some little clues along the way.

Jace Lacob: Intriguing. I can’t wait to see what happens. Daisy Coulam, thank you so very much.

Daisy Coulam: Thank you!

 

Next time, we enter the harsh, often hidden worlds the women of Grantchester inhabit. 

 

CLIP

Mrs. C: You’re not mad, Cathy Keating, you’re a woman trying to get by in a world that isn’t made for us, that’s cold and brutal.

 

In two weeks, we step behind the camera with Leonard Finch himself, Al Weaver, to discuss how he approached directing this tragic yet beautiful episode.