David Tennant Compares Jilly Cooper to Dickens — and Means It

David Tennant had never opened a Jilly Cooper novel before signing on to play Tony Baddingham in "Rivals," which returns to Hulu on Wednesday. He now calls the Rutshire Chronicles author "a bit more like Dickens" than critics ever credited.

That's quite the conversion arc. The actor admits he'd dismissed Cooper's books as "those big books you buy at airports that are a little bit dirty and slightly disposable." His wife, Georgia, rewrote that verdict. She read the scripts first and predicted, verbatim: "This is going to be massive. There's an appetite for this, and an excitement in it that isn't really like anything else."

Georgia Tennant also recorded the audiobooks, which her husband has since devoured. His review: "The books are addictive!"

Why has 'Rivals' landed so hard?

The series, an adaptation of Cooper's best-selling romance saga set in Thatcher's Britain, has become the No. 1 show on Disney+ in multiple overseas markets and drawn gushing British press. Tennant claims no prescience. "I did not see it coming. I'll be honest," he said in a video interview.

The tonal puzzle — broad comedy, boardroom maneuvering, juicy sex — stumped the cast throughout Season 1. "How broadly comic can we be? Where are the stakes? Where's the gritty realism?" he recalled of the on-set debates. Lead director Elliot Hegarty, who also directed much of the new season, supplied the answer. Tennant describes the world as "one degree above real life" — a delicate landing the director nailed with "a really clear vision."

What happens to Tony after Monica's death?

Spoilers begin here. Midway through Season 2, Monica (Claire Rushbrook) died in a car accident after discovering one of Tony's affairs. The new episodes open at her funeral, where a guest observes that Tony has "lost his conscience, he can do what he likes."

Tennant frames his character's trajectory with sympathy, not endorsement. Tony is "just pursuing his super objectives very clearly, and very ruthlessly," he said — and none of his villains, from the serial killer in "Des" to the mind-controlling predator in "Jessica Jones," regard themselves as villains. Tony's engine is grievance: "a very keen sense of injustice about how the world is structured and how unfair that is, and the glass ceiling of class." No amount of winning gets him to the top table.

Losing Monica untethers him. "She allowed him to do many of the things he did because he had this safe harbor," Tennant said. "I think he, in some terrible ways, feels rather liberated. But it's not great for Tony, in terms of his humanity."

What changed from page to screen?

Showrunner Dominic Treadwell-Collins reworked aspects of Cooper's 1980s text, including non-consensual encounters and the lives of gay men under Thatcher. Tennant defends the choice plainly: presenting a series about sexuality means you "can't just ignore that." The Charles (Gary Lamont) and Gerald (Hubert Burton) storyline carries the weight, and AIDS enters the narrative — "a hugely important addition to the source material."

Cooper died last year but worked as an active executive producer on the first two seasons, visited set, hosted the cast at her house, and joined discussions about Season 3. Tennant's verdict on her final act: "I think she'd felt a little written off as nonserious, and then for this to come roaring in and for her to be so celebrated in her final years ... feeling vindicated. Quite right, too."

With Season 3 conversations already on record, Baddingham's ruthlessness looks set to outlive its author's blessing.