Stylish Television: Rivals

Jilly Cooper’s raunchy books were real favourites of mine when I was a teenager. Imogen was my personal fave, but I also loved Rivals and Riders, which are amongst her most infamous reads. Now Rivals has been turned into one of the best TV shows of the year. It is currently available to stream on Disney+, and I binged the whole series in 2 days last week. It is, quite frankly, unmissable. It is my favourite television of 2024.

Rivals is flashy, trashy and oh so watchable. The characters are memorable, the performances are wonderful. From David Tennant chewing up the scenery with relish in his role as the ‘bad guy’, power crazy TV mogul Tony, to an almost unrecognisable Danny Dyer as the lovable nouveau riche Freddie Jones, Rivals is all about the characters and their interactions. If that is not enough, you also have the gorgeous Aiden Turner and Victoria Smurfit as TV god Declan O’ Hara and his actress wife Maud, Katherine Parkinson as romantic author Lizzie Veradkar (always one of the most sympathetic characters in the book) and Alex Hassell as the naughty, but oh so nice hero, Rupert Campbell Black. It is quite a cast.

It is also super in its evocation of those sometimes awful, sometimes amazing, 1980’s fashions. Nafessa Williams, brilliant as Cameron Cook, looks incredible throughout, not least of when she makes an appearance, almost like a goddess at the O’Hara’s New Years Eve bash. Her outfits are power dressing, but with style, she never puts a foot wrong. Equally, Emily Atack, when not playing naked tennis, also looks like the ultimate 1980’s golden girl as the glamorous MP’s wife Sarah Stratton, complete with silk blouses, pencil skirts and the biggest and bounciest of blow dries.

I love the storyline of Rivals, which can make you laugh out loud one minute, and then packs a punch the next. The characters are more complex than you might imagine, for instance, the vulnerability of Rupert Campbell Black and his complex relationship with Declan’s daughter, the Kate Middleton lookalike Taggie (Bella McClean), and the pain of Maud, stunning on the outside, yet suffering within from giving up her career to support her husband in his dreams. Oh, and you won’t see a more beautiful relationship develop than that between Freddie Jones and Lizzie Veradkar as they are drawn towards each other as they face their loveless, struggling marriages. 

Rivals is available to binge watch now on Disney+, don’t miss it!

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