Sir David Jason addresses Nicholas Lyndhurst rift rumours as he reveals backstage secrets of Only Fools And Horses
ONLY Fools And Horses is a Christmas staple up there with roast turkey and Brussels sprouts.
The last new episode of the sitcom may have aired 20 years ago but the Trotters remain very much in our hearts, especially at this time of year.
Del Boy himself, Sir David Jason, 83, is rarely on screen these days but is starring in a new Only Fools documentary on Christmas Eve talking about his favourite moments from the legendary festive specials.
And he pays tribute to his co-stars, alongside the crew, who made the sitcom the creme de la menthe.
Here, we reveal his words of wisdom. Sir David on . . .
NICHOLAS LYNDHURST
DEL Boy and Rodney are regarded as the greatest double act in British sitcom history.
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They have appeared in every episode, from 1981 to 2003, and turned Sir David and Nicholas into national treasures. Fellow cast members including Roger Lloyd-Pack, as Trigger, and John Challis as Boycie, were also huge hits on the show.
On his co-star, Sir David says: “You couldn’t have had a better co-partner than Nic.
“We liked and respected each other so much, we were genuinely good friends.”
TRIGGER
THE dozy road sweeper with the deadpan delivery was one of Only Fools’ most beloved characters, regularly landing the biggest laughs.
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Also appearing in the doc, Chris Wadsworth editor of Only Fools said: “John got complaints if Trigger wasn’t in an episode long enough.
“The Trigger fan club would write and say ‘Trigger was only given half a dozen lines in this episode, what are you doing?’”
Tessa Peake-Jones, who played Del’s partner Raquel, added: “Roger was brilliant. His secret was the very serious face. He treated it like a tragedy, as if playing Hamlet.”
Donal Woods, production designer, said: “I remember David and Nic saying Trigger always got the laugh in the end. They’d set it up.”
Director Tony Dow added: “Everyone would be doing dialogue, dialogue, dialogue and in would come Trigger with one line — and it would bring the house down. It must have driven Nic and David mad.”
CHRISTMAS CRACKERS (1981)
ONLY Fools’ debut series aired in 1981 to mixed reviews.
Despite the shaky start, the BBC wanted writer John Sullivan to make a festive special at the end of its run — but only told him six weeks before Christmas, sparking panic among the crew who filmed the episode just a week before transmission.
Sir David explains: “Bless him, John Sullivan was under a lot of pressure. It really wasn’t enough time to do it for Christmas. Two weeks before Christmas we were going, ‘Are we doing the show?’.
He said, ‘Yes, yes’. We said, ‘Where’s the script?’, he said, ‘We haven’t got a script yet’.”
ONLY FOOLS v MINDER
BY 1985, Only Fools was becoming a big TV favourite. The BBC viewed the show as the jewel in its crown going into Christmas and put it up against ITV’s biggest show, Minder, at a time when few could record a show they didn’t watch.
John Sullivan had been given budget of £850,000 — huge at the time — to shoot the episode, To Hull And Back, which saw the Trotters travel to Amsterdam by boat, driven by Uncle Albert (Buster Merryfield).
Sir David says: “I remember that we were disappointed because Minder was one of the big, successful shows that ITV had.
That was so dangerous because we thought we would lose a lot of the audience to ITV. He adds: “I suppose in the mind of Michael Grade (former BBC controller) it was, ‘Well, we’re going to pinch your audience as we’ve got the best show’.”
Only Fools reigned supreme attracting 17million viewers, compared to Minder starring Dennis Waterman and George Cole, which brought in 12million.
MOST EXPENSIVE JOKE
DURING To Hull And Back, there was one scene that took up most of John Sullivan’s giant budget.
The boat Del Boy and Rodney were travelling in predictably ran off course, given veteran sailor Uncle Albert was behind the wheel.
To get back on track, Sullivan came up with the idea that the boat would drift out to the North Sea, where they would encounter an oil rig and ask a bemused worker directions to Holland.
Sir David explains: “We were going to Amsterdam and how to get there was a bit of a problem, so we thought we’d hire a boat. We set out but problem was that we soon realised Uncle Albert wasn’t quite as equipped at navigation as he purported to be.
“The joke was we stopped at the bottom of the oil rig and Derek Trotter shouts out ‘Oi, John, which way to Holland?’
“That episode was one of the, if not the, most expensive jokes ever perpetrated by the BBC if not for television the world over.”
The clip lasted just 40 seconds but involved a 12-hour round trip.
THE 1996 TRILOGY
ONLY Fools was meant to go out with a bang in 1996 with three new episodes, including one where the Trotters would finally become millionaires.
The first episode, Heroes And Villains, featured the iconic scene when Del Boy and Rodney dress up as Batman and Robin for a fancy dress party at a pub which, unbeknown to them, had been cancelled and replaced with a wake. En-route in their costumes they foiled a street mugging of a local councillor.
Bosses were so desperate to keep the scene under wraps they had to close off the High Street in Bristol, where Only Fools’ location scenes were shot.
Production designer Donal Woods explains: “We blocked off the streets with fences and black drapes and put scaffolding up. We just wanted to keep it a secret for Christmas Day.”
The second episode, Modern Men, saw the brothers show rare emotion after Rodney’s wife Cassandra (Gwyneth Strong) suffered a miscarriage, but the scenes won acclaim by viewers who felt the tragic storyline was wonderfully handled.
Tessa Peake-Jones says: “I remember John Sullivan talking about it and saying, ‘I don’t know how this will go down in the sitcom world but I wanted to do it’, so I think it was quite important for him to. As usual, he liked stretching the boundaries a bit.”
The final instalment, Time On Our Hands, became synonymous with Del Boy and Rodney fainting inside Sotheby’s auction house as a maritime stopwatch they found in a garage fetched £6.2million.
They were, at last, the millionaires that Del Boy always predicted they would be.
The episode was watched by a record-breaking 24.3million viewers.
THE 2001-2003 FINALE
THE BBC were so desperate for more Only Fools after its 1996 swansong that they convinced John Sullivan to write three more episodes: If They Could See Us Now . . . !, Strangers on the Shore and Sleepless In Peckham.
David Jason admits he and the cast missed the show so much, they moved filming of their other projects to shoot the episodes which ran in consecutive years.
However, one of the Trotter clan was missing. Uncle Albert star Buster Merryfield had passed away in 1999 but his character was still front and centre of the specials.
Having lost their money in a stock market crash, the final episode, Sleepless In Peckham, saw Del and Rodney in the money again, after discovering crafty Albert had left them £145,000 each in his will.
Recalling that last ever scene, director Tony Dow says: “I remember being in that studio and saying to the floor manager, ‘That’s it, that’s the end of Only Fools And Horses’. The whole place exploded, the audience went potty.”
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Sir David added: “We got a standing ovation in that studio for seven minutes. They wouldn’t let us go.”
- Only Fools And Horses: Greatest Christmas Moments airs on Channel 5 at 9pm tomorrow.
