“I’m going to be making the most of it!” David Tennant on his BAFTA nomination

📌 David Tennant has admitted he was caught completely off guard by his Bafta TV Awards nomination for his leading role in Rivals.

He stars as Lord Tony Baddingham in the Disney+ drama, adapted from Dame Jilly Cooper’s novel, which dives into the cutthroat world of independent television back in 1986.

Speaking at the nominees’ party at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum earlier this week, David explained:

“It was a real shock, I was not expecting it and I’m very thrilled to be here.”

He added with a smile: “I’m going to make the most of it, I’m coming to the party, I’m doing the works this year.”

David shared that it was actually his wife Georgia who saw Rivals’ success coming from the start.

“My wife was always very sure (of the show),” David said. “She knew the book of old, and when she saw that it was being dramatised, and indeed when a script pinged through on an email, she went, ‘oh, this is going to be the biggest show of the year’.”

David confessed he hadn’t read any of Jilly Cooper’s novels before landing the role:

“I’ve never read a Jilly Cooper book, I knew, sort of, that they’d been big in the 80s, I knew that they were well known for certain things, I thought that right.”

But it turns out Georgia’s instincts were spot-on: “She was absolutely right, I mean, it just took off.”

David had high praise for the team behind the series too:

“It was brilliantly adapted, I think Dominic Treadwell-Collins (the show’s writer and producer) and his team, and all the writers, they really got the tone of it, because it’s from the 80s, so it’s a period as well, so it’s a bit like doing a Dickens or a Trollope or something.”

“It’s got all the texture of looking into the past, as well as all these extraordinary characters and all the twists and turns of it.”

And he couldn’t help but give Georgia another shoutout: “So Georgia was right, very pleased to say.”

Rivals has racked up an impressive six Bafta nominations, including one for “Memorable Moment” — thanks to the unforgettable scene where Rupert Campbell-Black (Alex Hassell) and Sarah Stratton (Emily Atack) are caught playing naked tennis.

The Bafta Television Craft Awards, hosted by Stacey Dooley, will be held on Sunday, April 27, while the main Bafta Television Awards, hosted by Alan Cumming, will take place on May 11 and be broadcast on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.

Photos of David at the nominees party: