John Nettles interview: ‘Actors were on Bergerac for their talent – it wasn’t about inclusivity’

• John Nettles picks me up from Exeter St David’s station in a weary looking mud-splattered Rover. Alas, the claret-coloured open topped 1949 Triumph Roadster, synonymous with Nettles’ career-defining detective Jim Bergerac from the eponymous Eighties hit BBC series, is nowhere to be seen. “That old thing had become so battered, mushrooms had started growing inside it,” he says. “When the late Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip visited us on set on Jersey, we had to cover the back seats with a bla