Episode 3 Holiday of My Lifetime with Len Goodman

Childhood holidays. The anticipation seemed endless!

The holiday itself? Well, it was over too quickly.

So, in this series, I'm going to be reliving those wonderful times

with some much-loved famous faces.

This is a memory I will treasure!

Every day I will be arranging a few surprises

to transport them back in time.

Please! No?

-Come on, Len!

-Yeah!

We'll relive the fun,...

-A-ha!

-Whoa!

Oh no! No!

..the games...

..and the food of years gone by...

That's my boyhood in a bowl.

-Oh!

-My boyhood in a bowl!

..to find out how those holidays around the UK

helped shape the people we know so well today.

Tap dancing.

Aaarggh!

So, buckle up for Holiday Of My Lifetime.

-Close your eyes.

-Yeah.

And here we go.

I'm on my way to meet a young lady who's been a household name

since the mid-90s.

She was born in Bury in Lancashire in 1976.

Here she is as a wee one. Oh! Cute as a button.

She was a natural performer from an early age,

training at the Oldham Theatre workshop from the age of nine.

In 1995, she joined a certain Yorkshire soap,

winning Best Newcomer a year later.

Shall I Dingle-dangle more clues?

Get it?

A few years later, she was in the frame

to take over from Jeremy Beadle in a certain bloopers show.

Do you know what? She got it!

But it was when she put on her dancing shoes

that she won everybody's hearts,

earning her the title

the people's champion.

Well, if you haven't got it by now, you never will.

Here's my gorgeous friend, Lisa Riley.

I'm on my way to pick her up in this crazy Citroen BX,

just like the one her mum drove

all those years ago.

Aw! Smiley Riley! Here comes your old mate Lenny Boy!

Lisa was born in 1976 in Bury, Lancashire,

to Cath and Terry Riley.

Dad ran a printing business, while Mum was head of complaints

at a travel company.

Aged just 12,

Lisa was spotted by a theatre agent

who put her forward for acting roles.

Her big TV break came in 1995,

aged just 19, when she was cast as brash barmaid

Mandy Dingle in Emmerdale.

She then appeared

on the crime comedy drama Hetty Wainthropp Investigates

before turning her hand to TV presenting,

taking You've Been Framed to audiences of 13 million.

It wasn't long before she was gracing the Strictly dancefloor,

where she danced her way to the semifinal.

Since then she's become a familiar face on our TV screens,

in dramas such as Waterloo Road and Moving On.

Today I'm taking her back

to a special holiday of her lifetime,

and I can't wait till she sees the car we're going in.

Look at the car!

Ah! No way!

Ah! It's the same one.

-Oh!

-Lisa!

-Hello, Leonard.

-Give us a cuddle.

-Ah!

-You been waiting for that?!

-Lovely...

-Lovely to see you.

-What do you reckon?

-I can't get over it. It's like a flashback in time.

How do they get hold of these things? It's incredible.

I didn't think it existed.

-To be honest, we don't let everyone know this, they're all mine.

-Oh. OK.

They're all my cars.

-I've got, you know, garages galore.

-A little stash?

-Yeah.

So, where are we going?

We are going to Bronte village, which is in Haworth.

It's absolutely breathtaking. I think you're going to love it. Yes.

-Haworth?

-Haworth, yes.

-You've got to say it like...

-'Owarth!

-Drop the aitch. 'Owarth.

-'Owarth?

-"Or, nor, daunt gore." Go on.

-Oh, no, don't go?

You sound a bit gangsta!

-"Or, nor, daunt gore!"

-Oh, no, don't go!

-Well, it's a progression. Yeah.

-We'll go over it as we go along.

-Now, what's the year?

-It's going to be 1992.

Now, I can tell you that that was the year...

-Prince Charles and Diana split up.

-Yes.

-But, we... We are not splitting up, my darling.

-No.

We are joined at the hip.

That's the way I like it.

To the west of Bradford and just south of Keighley

sits the village of Haworth,

or 'Owarth, as our Lisa would want me to say.

It's also known as Bronte Village,

as it was made famous by the poets and novelists

Charlotte, Emily, and Anne,

collectively known as the Bronte Sisters.

They were authors of some real literary classics,

like Charlotte's Jane Eyre

and Emily's Wuthering Heights, back in the 1840s.

Before any holiday begins, you must start on a journey.

For 16-year-old Lisa Riley,

it was a driving adventure she was already very familiar with.

So this, actually, wasn't a holiday as such. It was a day trip?

Yeah. It was a day trip that happened quite a lot

throughout the year.

It was, like, my little safe haven.

So, what was the attraction about going to Haworth?

-The fact that I'm such a drama queen.

-Right.

-As you well know, Len.

And I've got this fairytale mind.

And, of course, the Brontes.

-Right.

-And I love the Brontes.

-I think, literally, in my former life, I was Emily Bronte.

-Really?

-Yes.

-So, there was Emily, there was Charlotte, and who was the other?

-And Anne.

-Anne was the other one.

-Yes.

It was just, the knowledge, what they did, these three sisters.

They had this very mysterious life and it always interests me.

The more I read, the more I wanted to learn about them and, obviously,

when we get there, you can see that it's there for the taking.

-There's so much you can learn about the girls. You know?

-Yeah.

So, who would have been in the car with you?

The normal outing in the car would be Mum driving

and me in the passenger seat. I'm still in the passenger seat.

-Now, at 39, I still can't drive.

-Right.

My brother and my dad were dragged along a lot of the time.

You know, you can tell with blokes,

they want to be at home watching the cricket.

-Do you know what I mean?

-Yeah.

They don't want to be walking up cobbled streets, looking at culture,

-like me and Mum do.

-No.

-So, it always became a me-and-Mum thing.

-Right.

-I liked it that way.

She liked the same things that I did and I like same things she did.

-So we had great days out.

-Oh, how lovely.

-Yeah.

It's an especially precious journey for Lisa,

as in 2012 she sadly lost her mum.

My mum was a firecracker.

She was called Catherine. You know Catherine wheel at bonfire night?

That's my mum. Spinning away. Big personality. Wonderful laugh.

Lit up a room.

Yeah, it literally is monkey see, monkey do with me and my mum

and I'm proud of that.

Within my career, it was a bit like she became my PA.

So she'd come everywhere with me when I was on tour,

when I was filming.

-She was my backbone. You know?

-Yeah.

-She was brilliant.

So, she was always there by my side and helping me

all the time, which was great.

For Lisa and her mum, 1992 was all about getting to Haworth,

but there was a lot of other things going on that year, too.

Nigel Mansell became the most successful

British Grand Prix driver of the time.

After being crowned World Champion, he announced his retirement.

I've been driving for 30 years,

I represented England at the age of nine in karts.

Here I am, 30 years later, and, you know,

perhaps I can say it, I think I am World Champion now.

It was the end of an era

for Prince Charles and Princess Diana,

who formally announced their separation.

Today, the couple had separate engagements,

a pattern for the future as we now know.

The Princess of Wales showed no sign that she knew about this

afternoon's announcement.

Reporters tried to ask questions,

but the Princess ignored them.

It wasn't a great year for the Queen, either,

as she watched fire tear through her beloved Windsor Castle,

causing around £37 million worth of damage.

And making it all the way to number one in the UK charts

were American pretty boys Charles and Eddie

with their soulful hit...

# Look into my eyes Can't you see they're open wide?

-# Would I lie to you, baby? Would I lie to you?

-Oh, yeah!

# Don't you know it's true Girl, I'm in love with you

# Would I lie to you?... #

I think that's enough of that.

In fact we need a bit of bit of peace and quiet,

and where better to take five than by these wonderful moors?

-Eh?

-See?

-Oh!

-This is proper beauty. The views and everything.

It's the way it's, like, so completely untouched

and they keep it that way.

I guess this is how you would have known it

-as a young girl coming here.

-Absolutely.

Me and Mum, rather than take the motorway route,

we'd take the scenic route, we'd pull in here, literally,

and just sort of embrace that.

-Yeah.

-Don't you find it really romantic?

-Of course it is.

-I do.

You know, you look at this and you can understand the Brontes

-getting that romantic feeling in their stories.

-Absolutely.

And the mystery of the moors.

You can imagine it, a cold winter's night

and that's what portrayed all the time. It's amazing.

-And the lovely little farmers' cottages.

-Yeah.

And all the heather.

That's what I was saying, like, I always envisaged

having this basket on my arm and, like,

running through the heather and everything.

-It'd be fantastic.

-Yeah.

And you pray that it's, obviously, going to stay like this forever.

Well, why wouldn't it? Who would want to come along and spoil it?

Because it's just perfect.

Patrick and Mariah Bronte moved to Haworth

with their daughters in the early 19th century.

At that time, it was unthinkable

that the sisters could become published authors.

But they had other ideas.

Johnnie Briggs knows all things Bronte.

They're middle-class clergyman's daughters.

They have to earn a living

and the living that's open to them is to be a governess.

So it's when they come together in 1845

and make the decision that they are going to take their own place

in the world, through their own creativity

and writing stories and selling them for profit.

In order for them to take their place in the commercial world -

the world belonging to men - they had to use pseudonyms.

They had names of Currer, Acton, and Ellis Bell.

They never said they were men,

but that world will always assume that they are men.

It is the moors, this wonderful landscape,

that is the wild workshop of their imagination.

It's the elemental forces of nature that rage around

this wonderful landscape

that become the backdrop to the characters and stories.

When the Brontes first moved to Haworth in the 1820s,

they lived here in a building called The Parsonage.

It's now a museum dedicated to all things Bronte,

and is the first place to go for any Bronte fan.

It was top of Lisa's list when she came here, back in '92.

Oh-ho! Lisa!

Oh, look! See, it's how I remember it.

Oh, it's just amazing.

-It's hard to imagine that they would have been in this garden.

-I know.

-You know? It's just...

-Oh, look!

-Incredible.

-Sir, could I align you in, please?

-Never!

-Come on, sir.

-Please, enter the house.

-Catherine, please.

Oh, thank you, sir.

Love it!

The Parsonage has been lovingly restored

to how it would have been when the Brontes lived here.

They've even got the original furniture the family used.

The dining room is usually cordoned off,

but I've managed to pull a few strings to get us special access.

So, this is the dining room.

The Bronte sisters must have sat here.

-Well, in that chair.

-I know. I can't believe I'm here.

As a kid, I stood behind the barriers,

like, never being allowed to even go near.

Now I'm sat at the table where the girls would have written everything.

-It's amazing.

-Well, contain yourself.

There something else just going to come in.

-Oh-ho!

-Oh, Len!

The first edition Wuthering Heights.

This is normally in a cabinet and they're here.

I really want to touch them.

Well, you can't. You can look at them.

-So, look, we've got Wuthering Heights.

-Yeah.

All the first editions.

-I can't believe it.

-You nearly touched them, then. Go on. No!

-You know me.

-Naughty-naughty-noo-noo.

I can't come here and not do that. This is, like, my idea of heaven.

My ultimate favourite is, obviously, Wuthering Heights.

You know, and my fantasy brain, me skipping through the moors.

You know, wind in my hair. Just as Cathy would be there.

Waiting, waiting for Heathcliff to just rescue me.

Do you think it was your love of the Brontes

and the books that got you wanting to act?

I really feel that the Brontes really put it in my head

to the literacy side and the performance side

and me wanting to be them and to react and be the actress,

you know, that they created in these brilliant books. Yeah.

I think it really put me on the map.

-As a child, were you always in sort of an acting fantasy world?

-Yes.

Dressing up?

When I was a kid, everything was fantasy and, literally,

I'd put my grandma's heels on.

I loved the clanking of the heels, being like a dolly, and everything.

Everything was fairytale and a performance.

That's what I loved. All the time.

Again, that's what drove me then to join drama school.

It was inevitable.

I want to recreate that early childhood Bronte passion.

and I've got the perfect way to do it.

I thought, maybe, we could re-enact a scene from Wuthering Heights.

-Oh! Amazing. Yes.

-So...

Oh, I love it! I love it! It's like dressing up!

Look at you. See?

This is a wee bit small for my size.

-Oh no!

-Do you love it?

-I love doing it. Honestly!

-Could I be one of the sisters? Literally.

-Yes!

I've got some script here.

I have not broken your heart. You have broken it.

Do I want to live? What kind of living would it be? When you...

Oh, God!

Would you have to... Shut up! This is serious. I'm not having it.

-Loving it.

-No. You've ruined it.

-Yeah. Sorry.

-So...

And the Bafta for best interpretation goes to Len.

-So, we now go to the pink bit, which is you.

-OK.

"Oh, let me alone, let me alone," sobbed Catherine.

That's the narrator, "But I've done wrong,

"I'm dying for it. Is it love?

"You left me too, but I won't upbraid you. I forgive you.

"Forgive me."

SHE GASPS

-It's like real! That was like, really proper.

-Yeah.

"It is hard to forgive.

"And to look at those eyes and feel those wasted hands.

"My answer, kiss me again and don't let me see your eyes."

Oh!

-I was going to give you a full-on...

-Ah, snog!

-No, I'm not.

'It was like we were back in the 1800s, but, do you know what?

'I think I'll stick to my dancing.'

Now, no holiday is complete without sampling the local food.

When Lisa and her family came to Howarth in 1992, there was

one place they'd always visit.

-So, was this the tearooms you came to?

-Absolutely.

You can't come to Howarth and not have a lovely pot of tea

and a little treat, as well.

-We'd always come somewhere like this every time we came, yeah.

-Yeah?

When did you get your first big break?

My first big break was, obviously, Emmerdale, playing Mandy Dingle.

-Oh!

-Yeah, when I got Mandy, literally, I was put on the map.

You know, brilliant storylines,

met brilliant actors that I got to work with.

And Mandy was only for one episode, you know, originally.

Only one ever for one, yeah.

-You were there for one episode and you did seven and a half years?

-Yes.

So, they brought me back and brought me back again.

And they said, "Do you want a year's contract?"

Of course, I said yeah,

-and there I was, seven and a half years later...

-Ah!

..with, as I'm told, one of the most popular soap

-characters in history, which I'm very proud of.

-Yeah.

Yeah. It was crazy, Len, honestly.

I remember, at the time, going into my local supermarket,

and, literally, cos it was my storyline,

my face was on the front cover of every single TV magazine.

-Yeah.

-And, of course, my life flipped from that very day.

-Yeah.

-Do you fancy a cake?

-It'd be rude not to.

-It would, wouldn't it?

SHE LAUGHS

-I'll just call for the cake, I think.

-Oh.

Cake? Cake! Cake time, please!

Bring on the cake!

-You have such power, Len.

-I know.

'Ho-ho-ho, yum, yum, pig's bum, you can't have none!'

-Oh, look at that!

-Oh!

Heaven, heaven on an actual tray.

What was your favourite moment on Emmerdale?

Oh, favourite moment on Emmerdale...

There's so many, after all those years. But, I have to say,

because it's, of course, what the public wanted as well,

was when they married Mandy and Paddy off.

The writers tormented it and tormented it, over and over again.

You know, we broke up, got back together and then, finally,

they married us off.

And true Mandy style, where did I spend my wedding night?

-In prison, of course I did.

-Yeah, of course.

-Of course I did.

Yeah, so, that's definitely my favourite moment.

But, after Emmerdale, Lisa went on to even greater things,

hosting one of ITV's biggest entertainment shows.

Of course, You've Been Framed, you thought Jeremy Beadle.

-Yeah.

-And suddenly, he's gone, so it must have been a bit of anxiety.

Of course, the pressure was on.

You know, it's prime time, Saturday night.

Taking over from Jeremy Beadle,

who'd done brilliant on the show and it was very successful.

So, yeah, I went out there, was myself, had a ball, loved every

minute of it and the next thing, the figures of the show soared.

-Ooh, come on!

-And everybody accepted me. Yeah, it was brilliant.

The pressure was off then, so it was like, everyone's accepted me

doing the show, so keep going as I can. It was ace.

Almost as ace as this lovely spread.

Well, this area is steeped in literary history, isn't it?

And our Lisa was obviously inspired.

'And, now, we've seen her in dozens of challenging

'and intriguing roles.'

So, you know, there you are on Emmerdale, right.

-You're there for seven years, or so.

-Yeah.

-Yeah.

-It was pretty secure.

-Yeah.

And yet, you said, "No, I'm going to move on."

-Yeah.

-That's a really brave thing to do. What made you want to do that?

Curiosity, from what I was taught at drama school, that there

are hundreds of thousands of scripts out there to be read,

you know, hundreds of thousands of parts to be played.

There's so many elements - hosting, radio, film -

within in our industry, you know, dancing...

-Yes.

-..that we can do.

Yeah, but you didn't take the easy option, you've done some

pretty hair-raising and dangerous parts, really, haven't you?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

They're real people. I like playing real characters.

My proudest moment was, certainly, when I did Fat Friends.

When I got this call that they had this part in mind, of Rebecca,

very tragic soul, self-harmer and all that.

And it was that deglamorization and I wanted to get in there, with

-the glasses, looking horrendous, but that's the person she was.

-Yeah.

That was the character.

And when your peers ring you up and go, "Do you know what, Lis?

"You did good there."

-That's...

-Yeah.

-That's... Money can't buy that.

-No.

-That's a really special, special thing.

-Yeah.

I'm in Yorkshire with Lisa Riley,

retracing her childhood holiday of 1992. Inside the St Michael

and All Angels' Church is the Bronte Memorial Chapel.

It was here that Patrick Bronte, the father of the sisters,

worked for over 40 years. He was a campaigner and secured clean water

for residents and also built a Sunday school.

Well, of course, this is the church where the Brontes used to pray

-and their father was the minister.

-Yeah.

This place, more than anywhere in Bronte village, means

the most to me, cos it's the one I'm so connected to with my mum here.

-Yeah.

-Like, more than anywhere.

-And, also, obviously, the Bronte girls are buried here.

-Yeah.

I think whenever you speak to people, friends and family

of mine that have been to Bronte village, the first thing they say is,

-"Did you go to the church?"

-Yeah.

The first thing, because of the history here and the fact that the girls are laid here.

-Yeah.

-And, as a family, the leader of the pack, you know, was the dad.

-This was his workplace.

-Yeah.

-You know, day in, day out.

-And there is a little plaque down the bottom there.

-Yeah.

-Shall we go and have a look?

-Yeah, come on.

So, here we are, Len. This is the plaque.

Obviously, Emily and Charlotte.

-Yeah, and they were so young, weren't they?

-Yeah.

-Emily's 30.

-Yeah.

And Charlotte is nearly 39.

-Yeah, it's very cold in the north, Len.

-Yeah.

They got cold very, very quickly.

I think this chapel is a very special place for you.

Yeah, I think the girls lost their mum from a very young age

-and they were successful and I lost my mum.

-Yeah.

Coming here with Mum, it's very close to my heart,

-so I have a real sense of belonging here. It's lovely.

-Yeah.

You know, I used to go with my mum to the seaside, to Broadstairs.

And whenever I go there now, I always feel a bit closer to my mum.

I do, I know. There's a real feeling I've got today

and that's what I love about it. Because the memories that

you've given me, by not only coming to Haworth and Bronte village,

but here, especially, the chapel, means the world to me.

It was mine and my mum's little safe haven.

-Yeah, it's lovely.

-Thank you.

Haworth really does have emotional memories for Lisa,

but there's something she didn't get to do when she came here in '92.

The Keighley and Worth Valley Railway runs through

the heart of Bronte country and was opened in 1867.

It's now preserved as a heritage railway line.

Teenage Lisa didn't get to appreciate it back in '92,

but I think we can make up for that today.

Ho-ho-ho! Oh, I've got a treat in store for you.

-Right, what's this?

-Oh, no!

-Well, you know, I've loved it, we've done the Brontes.

-Yeah.

Right, and I thought, "Let's do something maybe a little bit

-"different."

-OK.

The train. Now, Oh, no, not just any old train, the steam train.

-Oh, lovely.

-Chugging along, through the Yorkshire Moors.

-Sounds perfect!

-Come on.

-Shall we?

-Yeah!

-Fab, come on.

'This steam-blowing beauty entered service in 1920

'and spent 45 years thundering across the country.'

Now, it's fully restored to its former glory.

Look, "Built 1920."

-There you are, in Derby.

-Yes.

-Isn't that fabulous?

-Yeah, you can smell it, can't you?

-Yeah.

-Aw, I love it.

-Look at that.

Making it move still involved shovelling

shed-loads of coal into the furnace.

'But can Lisa and I do it as good as steam fireman Ralph?'

-Now, wait a minute, Lisa.

-Yes.

-20 seconds, who can shovel the most coal in?

-Oh, OK.

-Ladies first.

-Yes.

-You ready, Ralph? Ready, Lisa?

-Yeah, I'm ready!

And...go.

Oh, it's heavy, it's heavy.

Oh, see.

Oh, it's well heavy!

-Go on, Lis!

-Go on, see!

-Go on, girl, get your back behind it.

-See.

-Five...

-Oh, oh!

-..four...

-OK, OK!

..three, two,

-that's it!

-And how many was that?

That was about 85 shovels.

-A likely story.

-Yeah, yeah.

-Come on, Len, how many was it?

-Move over.

-I got my hands dirty.

Here I go.

Oh, Len, that was just... I had five bits on mine,

he's doing one by one.

-I think we know who's won this already, don't we?

-Yeah, yeah.

-Don't be vulgar.

-Not only have I won...

-That's a proper amount of coal.

-Put your back into it, Leonard.

LISA LAUGHS

One thing, we may hoot the hooter?

Yes!

-Yeah, go on.

-OK.

-Don't burn yourself on that.

TRAIN WHISTLE

Oh! That was ace!

It was supposed to be a little hoot!

With the train fired up, no thanks to me, we're ready to go,

so we'd better take our seats.

And, while the gorgeous scenery goes by,

we'll have one final chat about my mate Lisa's fascinating career.

-Now, you've done TV...

-Yeah.

..you've done stage, you've been on the television,

which do you prefer, is there one that you love the most?

What I love this most is the P word, and it's performing.

Whether that be film, television, radio, telly, you know,

I'm just so blessed to do what I love.

People say, "What are you? Are you an actress?"

Are you this, that and the other? And I'm just a performer.

-Yeah.

-I love doing everything that the industry involves, really.

-Yeah.

-And I'm blessed that I get to do it.

-Right.

You've been in some massive programmes -

is there anything you think, "If I could, I'd love to do..."

-Something, or...

-Yeah.

-Yeah?

-My ultimate dream would be

a period drama, it really would.

You know, down in the kitchen, with the hair, with the mop cap,

-the corset, no teeth.

-Yeah, yeah.

-I'd love to do something like that.

-That would be great, it really, really would.

-Yeah.

Well, we've touched on it before, do you think your day

with your mum in Haworth helped to shape who you became?

Oh, completely, because mum always let me be who I wanted to be.

If I wanted to skip round the church and do little role-plays and stuff, she let me.

Or stand outside the apothecary on the high street in Haworth, you know.

-Yeah.

-She'd let me be silly and do these characters.

-That set me up for the person I am today.

-Yeah.

-Let me get out. Take my hand, madam.

-Aw!

-How was that?

-Wonderful.

-Wasn't that great?

-A train journey with a true gentleman.

-Oh, you and I.

-It's been amazing.

-Oh, it was like Brief Encounter.

You were brief and I was an encounter.

Exactly!

Listen, I know you used to share this day with your mum

and I hope, in a little way, I've taken over from your mum.

It's been so, so fabulous.

-It has and she'd be so proud, honestly, Len.

-Oh, great.

-Yeah, thank you.

-Great.

Now, talking of memory, this is a scrapbook of all our day together.

Oh, wonderful.

-So it's a book of memories.

-A lovely book of memories.

For Lisa, a photographic memento of our trip to Haworth,

which will help her remember our Bronte-inspired adventure.

-Thanks a million.

-Thank you, darling. Aw, you're a gem.

'It's goodbye from Haworth and the summer of 1992.'

A truly special place that Lisa shared with her mum, that will

remain forever in her heart.