Disney+ Sets Premiere Date For Jilly Cooper Adaptation ‘Rivals’

Disney+ has set a premiere date for Rivals, the Jilly Cooper adaptation starring David Tennant, Aidan Turner, Katherine Parkinson, and Danny Dyer.

Lee Mason, Disney’s director of scripted content in Europe, announced at the Edinburgh TV Festival that the eight-part series will drop on October 18 in the UK. Rivals will stream on Hulu in the U.S.

It is part of Cooper’s bestselling Rutshire Chronicles and is set against the backdrop of the excess and antics of the power-grabbing social elite of 1980s England.

The series chronicles the cutthroat world of independent television in 1986 and the long-standing rivalry of ex-Olympian, MP, and notorious womanizer Rupert Campbell-Black (Alex Hassell) and his neighbor Tony Baddingham (Tennant), controller of Corinium Television.

Poldark star Turner is TV presenter Declan O’Hara, a fierce intellectual with an even fiercer temper who is wooed to Corinium from the BBC. Other cast includes EastEnders actor Dyer as Freddie Jones, a self-made electrics millionaire.

Among the wider ensemble is Nafessa Williams (Black Lighting), Bella Maclean (Sex Education), Parkinson (Humans), Victoria Smurfit (Bloodlands), Claire Rushbrook (Sherwood), Oliver Chris (The Crown),  Lisa McGrillis (Mum), Emily Atack (The Inbetweeners), Rufus Jones (W1A), Luke Pasqualino (Skins) and Catriona Chandler (Pistol).

Rivals is produced by Dominic Treadwell-Collins’ (A Very English Scandal) company Happy Prince, and Treadwell-Collins is also executive producing and writing with Laura Wade. Alexander Lamb is also an EP. Lead director is Elliot Hegarty (Ted Lasso), who also serves as executive producer on Episodes 1 to 3. Eliza Mellor (Poldark) serves as series producer.

In addition to Treadwell-Collins and Wade, the series writers room also includes Sophie Goodhart (The Baby, Sex Education), Marek Horn, Mimi Hare and Clare Naylor (The Accidental Husband), Dare Aiyegbayo (The Dumping Ground, EastEnders), Kefi Chadwick (Looted, Avoidance), Tray Agyeman, and Sorcha Kurien Walsh (The Pink Pill). Dee Koppang O’Leary (The Crown) and Alexandra Brodski (Somewhere Boy) also direct episodes.