Disney+ is nearly halfway through the Season 2 shoot on Rivals — and the racy Jilly Cooper adaptation has added two new guest cast members to its ensemble.
Mission: Impossible star Hayley Atwell has joined the cast as Helen Gordon, the ex-wife of Alex Hassell’s Rupert Campbell-Black and the mother of his two children, Marcus and Tabitha.
Rupert Everett (My Best Friend’s Wedding) is set to take on the role of Gordon’s husband, Malise Gordon, Campbell Black’s former show-jumping coach and mentor.
The casting was announced by showrunner Dominic Treadwell-Collins at the Edinburgh TV Festival, where he said that Rivals has filmed six of an extended 12-part second season.
Further casting includes Maxim Ays (Boarders), Holly Cattle (Young Sherlock), Oliver Dench (Hotel Portofino), Amanda Lawrence (Malory Towers), Bobby Lockwood (Wolfblood), Eliot Salt (Slow Horses), and Jonny Weldon (One Day).
Treadwell-Collins said he wanted to add greater depth to Season 2 and dig further into the past of the dashing Campbell-Black. He said polo would be a bigger theme in Rivals, but he declined to reveal too much about the series, except to say it’s a “beast.”
Stick-On Muffs & Massive Wangers
Instead, much of the Edinburgh session was spent reflecting on Season 1, which became part of the national conversation in the UK when it premiered last year, partly because of its proud embrace of sex and nudity.
Hassell and Emily Atack recalled filming their famous nude tennis scene in Episode 1, during which Atack had a “stick-on muff” and Hassell decided to toss out the idea of wearing a prosthetic penis. He told the Edinburgh audience that having a “massive wanger” could have detracted from his meet-cute with Taggie’ O’Hara (Bella Maclean).
Lee Mason, Disney’s executive director of scripted originals in Europe, said he agonized over every racy scene in Rivals, revealing that they spent time “in a room arguing” about nudity to ensure it felt right for the tone of the drama.
Mason added that the show had been a good calling card for Disney. “It’s been really good at sort of sticking the flag in the ground and just letting people know absolutely that there’s a range of programming available,” he explained.
Set against the backdrop of the Cotswolds countryside and the glamorous, high-stakes world of 1980s British television, Rivals is based on the novel of the same name, part of Cooper’s bestselling Rutshire Chronicles. It is produced by ITV Studios-backed Happy Prince.
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