It began in 2024 when Alice Carter, an intermittently recovering alcoholic from the prosperous Aldridge family, fell asleep drunk in the passenger seat of her car. Her nephew-in-law George Grundy, a farmworker’s son, couldn’t resist offering to drive her home (it was a flash car). But Alice half-woke and clawed drunkenly for the door: it made George swerve and knock another car, bearing Mick, Joy and Fallon, from the bridge into the River Am.
On release, he found most of Ambridge pretty unforgiving. Jobless and barred from the Bull, he ranted at all of them on New Year’s Eve. Following a conversation with the now saintly, forgiving Alice however, he resolved to put the past behind him and make good.
Hollie Chapman, who plays Alice, explains, “The tables turned, and when she went from being the drunk to someone giving George wise advice, the scene felt really emotional, and I nearly lost it.”
But as George walked to his parents’ house in the dark that night, someone followed him, whacked him on the head with a wine bottle and left him for dead.
We asked Chapman, Stobie and some of the other actors who play these key figures how they feel about the dramatic revelation and what it means for the future of their characters in Ambridge.
Charles Collingwood plays Brian Aldridge
Alice is Brian’s favourite child, he adores her. But remember, he has daughters and a stepdaughter and always longed for a son. Ruairi is the apple of his eye. Look how he treats him, compared to poor Adam [Brian’s stepson]. He’s always soft with his children. It’ll be fun to have him protecting his boy, who he’s never admitted has done a single thing wrong all his life. But I certainly don’t want Brian to go to prison! The series can’t have two people in jail in six months, and poor Brian is 82. If he were to fade away silently in Wormwood Scrubs, it’d be the end of my excessive wine-drinking at weekends.
Back in the 1980s, they nearly wrote out the Aldridges for being a happy, wealthy family with no problems. But then they gave Brian a romantic wandering eye and the affair with Siobhan, from which Ruairi was born. Crises are an actor’s dream: the hard scenes to play are the ones where you’re walking across a field of not-quite-ripe oilseed rape.
Sunny Ormonde plays Lilian Bellamy
But Lilian’s also never had much of a relationship with Ruairi, only when he was a child. She thought Jennifer an absolute saint for taking him on. And she felt a connection with Alice, because Lilian’s father was an alcoholic, and she herself could have gone that way… Would she agree to protect Ruairi? Interesting one. She might, you know! Blood is thicker than water, though he’s just her step-nephew-in-law.
Hollie Champan plays Alice Carter
Ruairi is certainly not going to be well liked. But remember that he and George are both damaged boys, from their upbringing, Ruairi lost his mother. Those memories are the advantage of a series playing out over a long period of real time.
There are a lot of ways this could play out. Not necessarily criminal justice, but village justice — the people themselves might deal with it!
Arthur Hughes plays Ruairi Donovan
Ruairi’s an interesting person, striving for success. He really pushes himself, and has to deal with a lot: being Brian’s only blood son; having different mother figures; his sexuality. But he’s quite fierce, especially about his sister Alice, protecting her against George. He’s not in control of his emotions, and has a difficult relationship with alcohol.
It’s nice to have some antagonism going on. Perhaps a long-running thing with George when he finds out who hit him. I do like all this. I think Ruairi’s quite dark in many ways. I’d love more darkness in The Archers.
Angus Stobie plays George Grundy
I don’t know whether the class thing will come into play for George, but I do think there’s a scenario where the Aldridge family get away with it as usual. Maybe George will use it against them and gain sympathy across the village as the one who was smashed over the head. Might the Grundys take it as an opportunity? Make a power shift in Ambridge?
Hence then, the article about troubled waters was published today ( ) and is available on Radio Times ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Troubled waters )
Also on site :
- 'The chances of you living 50 years are very small': Theoretical physicist explains why humanity likely won't survive to see all the forces unified
- The Strokes End Coachella Performance With Video Montage Condemning U.S. and Israeli Bombings in Iran and Gaza
- FBI, DOJ scrambling to rebuild after being depleted by resignations and firings