An oral history of Happy Valley

"I was told Bob Dylan is a fan": An oral history of Happy Valley

Creator Sally Wainwright and cast members James Norton, Rhys Connah and Siobhan Finneran on the inception of one of the UK's most-beloved, lived-in crime dramas and the long wait for its upcoming final season

By Louis Staples
15 December 2022

GQ Magazine UK

Happy Valley might’ve looked similar to other crime dramas when it first premiered on BBC One in 2014. On paper, some of its elements were familiar: drugs, death and a cop hiding their inner demons while trying to reconcile the past with the present. But from the first scene onwards, when heroic matriarch Sergeant Catherine Cawood (Sarah Lancashire) stormed into our screens, it was clear the show was special.

Created and written by Sally Wainwright, Happy Valley is more than a police drama. It’s a story about a family recovering from trauma in their own unique way. For the most part, the show focuses on regular people who’ve been downtrodden and forgotten about. The first two series, in 2014 and 2016, were met with critical acclaim, multiple BAFTA awards and sky-high ratings. Fans were captivated by Cawood’s rivalry with Tommy Lee Royce (James Norton) – the rapist she blames for causing her daughter’s death and destroying her family. But people also love her bond with her fragile sister Claire (Siobhan Finneran) and her complex relationship with her grandson Ryan (Rhys Connah).

Finally, after seven years off our screens, Happy Valley returns to BBC One on New Year’s Day. In advance of the final series, GQ spoke with Sally Wainwright, Siobhan Finneran, James Norton and Rhys Connah, to delve into the making of one of UK’s most treasured TV shows.

The very beginning 
Sally Wainwright: The BBC asked me if I could create a police drama for them, because I think Scott & Bailey had just done very well on ITV, which I’d written. I thought: “How can I make it different from Scott and Bailey?” And my first thought was: “I'll make it about uniformed police officers.” I was put in touch with a female constable who turned out to be somebody I've known since I was six. Lisa Farrand, who I was at school with. She came on board and she influenced me a lot. She would engage with the storytelling side of it, as well as the more realistic side of it. So she's been a really important part of the show.

Creating the story
Wainwright: Over the years, I've learned that I often write about people who are at the same age that I am when I’m writing. I suppose that's because I'm tapping into my own experience with life. I knew I wanted to write something else for Sarah (Lancashire) after Last Tango in Halifax, because she was so fantastic in it. And we are more or less the same age. When people get older, they just have more stuff going on in their lives, they have more life experience, more personality and more skeletons in their closets.

The story of Becky and Tommy – the daughter having been raped and Ryan being a product of that rape – I don't know where that came from, other than I just invented it. It’s such an epic dilemma. I also watched a documentary by Jeff Lewis called Shed Your Tears and Walk Away, which really highlighted how much drug abuse happens in rural areas. I wanted to set it there because I like writing in my own vernacular. I like that part of the world and filming there, because it's so beautiful.

Finding the perfect cast
Siobhan Finneran: I got sent the script for nearly all of the first series to read and I just thought: “This is really special.” You know, the scene with Catherine getting the sunglasses and the fire extinguisher from the newsagents to talk the guy down off the climbing frame? I read it all in one evening, which is unheard of for me because I normally lose the will to live. But I didn't with this.

James Norton: I read it and I had the same reaction as Siobhan. Mine was quite strange, because, weirdly, I was doing a film in South Africa with Charlie Murphy, who plays Ann Gallagher on the show. We were doing a film about vikings. Charlie and I got sent the script and I remember having conversations with her on these amazing South African hillsides. We thought: “We need to nail these tapes!” Incredibly, we both got the offers at the same time. I had a big beard and I had long hair and she was playing this viking princess. So I have these memories of standing in this beautiful part of the world dressed as vikings, running lines from Happy Valley.

Rhys Connah: I had never auditioned for anything before and I didn't get the full script, because I was nine and it's very violent. I remember reading two different scenes and I didn't think anything of it until a few weeks later when I got the call saying they wanted me for it. Then I remember being on set and having to be told directly: “Don't look at the camera!”

Wainwright: When James (Norton) auditioned, that was a big moment, because we saw a lot of lads for that part, probably about thirty. And they were all great, they all could have done a version of Tommy. But I think what really stood out about James was that he was so quiet – he didn't play the evil psychopath at all. He played this quite sympathetic, shy person. He’d just gone to another level of what it was really on the page. And Rhys (Connah), we saw a lot of little boys to play Ryan. There were a handful that were really good, but Rhys just really stood out. There was only one person who was going to be Ryan.

The table read
Norton: I turned up and I was so scared that they’d think they’d made a mistake. Because I don't [have a Yorkshire accent] like Tommy, I thought they’d think “Oh God, what have we done?” So I remember dressing in the biggest trench coat I could and these massive boots, not speaking to anyone and looking sinister. I remember the read-through so well. Sarah doesn't like read-throughs and she sits and says her lines very quietly into the script, so we're all kind of going leaning in to hear. Read-throughs are pretty horrible. Actors hate read-throughs. People like me are worried they're going to get found out or recast, occasionally have people filming it, they’re a nightmare and you’re trying to do the [best] performance you can. So Sarah, in her brilliant way, just does the complete opposite. She does it really quietly and it's compelling as a result.

On-set buzz
Norton: [A member of the production team] stood up on a lighting truck while we were filming series one. She said “I’ve had an email [From Charlotte Moore, BBC's head of commissioning at the time] and it says that this is the most exciting show we have on our slate right now. You're onto something very special.” And I remember this rush around the cast and crew. It was like: “Oh fuck, we really are.”

Getting recognised
Connah: It happened to me in the zoo once. And it didn't make much sense, because I knew it was a big show, but obviously I didn't see it, because I was only nine. A bunch of teenagers also recognised me and wanted a picture. They were big and cool, so them wanting a picture of me was pretty sick.

Norton: I remember I was shooting Grantchester’s first series when Happy Valley was coming out. People on the crew were just weirded out and they really did start giving me a wide berth. They thought I was Tommy Lee Royce, wandering around the set dressed as a vicar. I think it was very disconcerting.

Fan reactions
Finneran: People have been completely engrossed in it and desperate to find out what's going to happen. They can't wait to get their next fix. People still say: “It's my favourite show!” And they've had to wait years to see what's going to happen next. People often talk to me about Catherine and Claire's relationship and how believable that is. How they've not really seen that sort of relationship on screen before. It's really lovely.

Norton: To be part of a real watercooler show is very special. And the show has built such a global following too. If you go to Los Angeles and New York people love it. Even if they watch it with subtitles on, they always come back to the family dynamic. They like the endless cups of tea and that warmth, because everyone knows what it's like to have a sister or a fractious family with complicated dynamics. That’s the magic at the heart of it.

Wainwright: I often get asked if there was pressure after series one did so well. But I always wanted a second series. If I write a series, I want to do a second and a third series because it's a marker of success. In terms of pressure, the truth is, you're under so much pressure just to write and to make it good, you want everything to land and for stories to work. But if you've driven yourself mad to get it right, you just have to accept that it's in the hands of the gods.

Famous fans
Wainwright: I was told that Bob Dylan likes Happy Valley – and whether that’s true or not, I don’t know. I suppose music stars have to watch telly, don’t they?

Norton: Amy Schumer reached out to me on Instagram and said she loved it.

Returning after seven years
Wainwright: Leaving the gap between the different series was intentional. It was to give Ryan time to be old enough to have some agency in the world, to have had time to develop opinions. I think it would have been crazy to re-cast him, I personally felt really attached to Rhys, because we’ve almost watched him grow up. From the audience's point of view, I don't think they'd have had the same emotional connection with someone else, so I think it was really important to bring back all the same people.

Norton: Seven years. That was mad, both in terms of leaving the characters for that long and what’s happened in between. I remember feeling like it really didn’t feel like seven years? Until Rhys, the big brute man, walked in. Everyone realised that seven years had definitely passed. It suddenly became very real.

Connah: Getting back into the character, I thought about what has happened in Ryan’s life from the last time we saw him. It wasn’t like I was writing my own story about him growing up, but more just thinking about what he’s been through. I thought a lot about his relationships with Catherine and Claire, because they're not exactly the same as regular parents and they’re more than grandparents too. They're incredibly close, but it’s coming up to the point in their life where they're meant to separate a little bit.

Favourite moments
Finneran: I love shooting all the scenes in the house, particularly with Sarah. The scenes in series two where Claire fell off the wagon and was drunk were heartbreaking to shoot, just because of that relationship between those two sisters and that Catherine is still there for her and she doesn't judge her. She still puts Claire to bed and takes care of her.

Connah: Probably some of the best scenes I enjoyed the most from season one with James on the canal boat, because every time that we weren’t shooting, we were off making paper planes and having fun. All those scenes where we were doused in gasoline and fighting were really fun to film.

Wainwright: Series one episode four was the first time I directed. And so that was just a big deal for me. It was something I'd wanted to do for a long time and because I didn't have any experience, it made sense just to do one episode and certainly not to kick off the series. But it worked out well and, in season two, I directed the first two episodes and the last two. Directing in season one was a bit of a gamble because it could have gone really wrong.

Norton: For me, playing Tommy, I’m always asked: “It must be so hard?” And occasionally it is, because it can get really dark. But there’s another part of it where you feel fucking cool? I worry about what people think about me all the time, most actors are people-pleasers.

Bringing the show to an end
Wainwright: During filming of series two, Sarah and I started talking about doing the final series and being really clear that it was a final series. Sarah is always really good at knowing when to stop doing stuff. I thought it would make a really clear statement that this is the end of the story. It's been a fantastic series, but we're going to make a really definite finale. You never know how anything's going to go down, but I think we've done a good job.

The final series of Happy Valley will begin at 9pm on 1 January 2023 on BBC1 and iPlayer.