It begins, of course, with bonking. A closeup on a bare male bottom, thrusting energetically in a Concorde loo. Cries of ecstasy float over a soundtrack of Robert Palmer’s Addicted to Love as the plane hits supersonic and the flight attendant pops the champagne. It can only be Jilly Cooper, and that bottom can only be Rupert Campbell-Black – champion show jumper, international heart-throb, Tory sports minister, braying toff, absolute shit. Lock up your telly remote, because Rivals – that most gloriously 1980s piece of doorstopper fiction, Blighty’s answer to Tom Wolfe’s Bonfire of the Vanities – has landed on our screens.
Full disclosure. I am a Jilly Cooper super fan. Dame Jilly is my heroine, and Rivals would be my Desert Island Discs book of choice. I took my daughter’s name, Pearl, from one of her books. So ardent is my love for Jilly that I applied to be an extra on this TV adaptation of Rivals. (Sadly it didn’t work out.) In fact, I have written about Jilly before. When that article – more of a love letter, if I’m honest – was published, she sent me a handwritten, two-page thank-you note, addressed to “Darling, darling Jess” which is preserved as a treasure in my scrapbook, along with my wedding photos and my children’s first drawings. I am not making this up.
