‘I'd rather you became a prostitute': The startling life advice from Fay Ripley's father
You might not recall the names of the characters played by Hermione Norris and Fay Ripley in Cold Feet, but you'll remember them as The Posh One and The Northern One. The twist in DNA Journey (ITV1) is that this gets turned on its head. It is Norris who discovers that she hails from humble County Durham mining stock, and Ripley whose background is London and well-to-do. Norris describes Ripley as 'much posher than me in real life'.
Of course, every real northerner could have told you that Ripley's Cold Feet accent was made up and sounded like someone chewing a dry stone wall – she's actually a southerner – but still. The fun of DNA Journey is in the revelations and the way they are delivered. It's a jollier version of Who Do You Think You Are? with fewer tears, miserable tales of penury or hand-wringing over Empire, but with an equally impressive research team.
It helps when the subjects get on like a house on fire and that seems to be the case with these two, who have known each other for more than 25 years. Ripley is very droll. Both approached the programme with some trepidation. 'There's that man, isn't there, that arrives on this programme. The Grim Reaper. He finds criminals and things. So if I see him we know we're in trouble,' says Norris, shortly before that man – his name is Paul – pops up to explain that Norris's great-great-grandmother worked in Soho in the 1870s. 'There were two main occupations that a young woman on her own could have in Soho. One was a seamstress, the other was a prostitute,' Paul explains cheerily, because cheeriness is the show's default setting.
Being ITV1, there are commercial breaks, which allow the producers to throw in cliffhangers such as these. To her great relief, Norris heard that her ancestor was a dressmaker who eventually made it to the more salubrious environs of Regent's Park. Prostitution came into the conversation elsewhere: Ripley confided that, when she told her father she wanted to be an actress, he replied: 'I'd rather you be a prostitute, the going rate's better.'
Ripley's history was a series of success stories. Her forebears, the Hardys, ran a company producing playing cards for customers including George IV. Her great-great-great-grandfather founded Deacon's Music Hall in London in the mid-19th century and later ran Sadler's Wells, which delighted Ripley because she had known nothing about her family's links to the performing arts. There was also a West End performer in her more recent history.
Things were less triumphant for Norris, but even the revelation that another relative killed his best friend by accident didn't remain a sob story, ending with him providing for the widow and devoting himself to good works. The programme ended on a happy note, and I think I prefer it to Who Do You Think You Are?
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