The Darling Buds of May

Pop Larkin

Ma Larkin

Victoria

Charley

Mariette

Petunia

Zinnia

Edith Pilchester

Oscar

Montgomery

Primrose

Brigadier

John Blenheim

After the show came to an end, David Jason described the wrap party as a "very jolly affair". Jason was asked by Yorkshire Television executives why he thought he could play a TV detective in the upcoming A Touch of Frost (1992). Jason felt he was being interrogated by good and bad executives. He explained the genre was extremely popular and he wanted to explore a slightly darker edge in the character of Frost, while claiming the superiority of the English approach to TV detective shows (audience attempts to solve crime in tandem with the detective) to the American attempt (audience is shown the crime and the criminal at the start of the story, and then follows the detective's trail to the guilty party). After that, Jason had convinced them.

David Jason described the cast as one big happy family, and working on the show as happy days. He said similar things about Only Fools and Horses.... (1981). He said the cast felt like a family off the set as well as on it, and they genuinely liked each other, so an extra degree of warmth came through because of that.

Hundreds of actresses were interviewed for Mariette before Catherine Zeta-Jones was cast at the age of 22. Much of her career had been in musical theatre up till then, but being cast as Mariette was her big break. Jones was inexperienced with television, and very nervous in the beginning; David Jason advised her to keep her eyes still while doing dialogue in closeup, something he used to do. He said her Hollywood success was down to his tuition. She managed to play the part of Mariette with just the right mix of innocence and coquettishness. Her stardom couldn't have happened to anyone nicer.

Sidney Charles 'Pop' Larkin: This calls for a cocktail!

Sidney Charles 'Pop' Larkin: Sounds perfick.