A host of Rivals stars joined friends and family of Dame Jilly Cooper today to celebrate her extraordinary life at a memorial service in central London.
A service is taking place on Friday morning at Southwark Cathedral in the author’s honour after her tragic death last year.
Dame Jilly died unexpectedly in October, aged 88, after sustaining injuries from a fall.
Among those arriving before the service were Rivals actors Danny Dyer, Alex Hassell, Bella Maclean and Katherine Parkinson.
Dame Jilly’s literary agent Felicity Blunt, sister of Emily, looked sombre as she walked into the cathedral with her actor husband Stanley Tucci.
The author was known for her steamy fiction novels which focused on scandal and adultery in upper class society, with titles including Riders, Rivals and Polo, part of The Rutshire Chronicles.
Rivals, set in the 1980s against the backdrop of the Cotswolds countryside, was recently adapted into the award-winning eponymous Disney+ TV series starring David Tennant, Alex Hassell, Emily Atack and Danny Dyer.
Rivals stars Alex Hassell and Bella Maclean arrive at the memorial service for Dame Jilly Cooper today
Aidan Turner and Caitlin FitzGerald also came to remember Dame Jilly’s extraordinary life
Danny Dyer, whose role in Rivals has been lauded, also joined the star-studded congregation
Actor, author and foodie Stanley Tucci and his Felicity Blunt were there. Felicity was Dame Jilly’s literary agent
Dame Jilly Cooper died tragically after a fall last year
Dame Jilly’s fictional seducer and showjumper Rupert Campbell-Black, who appears in The Rutshire Chronicles, is said to be partly based on the Queen’s ex-husband Andrew Parker Bowles.
Camilla previously described the author as a ‘wonderfully witty and compassionate friend’ and a writing ‘legend’.
A number of Dame Jilly’s novels were adapted for TV, including an ITV series of The Man Who Made Husbands Jealous with Coronation Street star Stephen Billington and Downton Abbey actor Hugh Bonneville, and a Riders series starring Marcus Gilbert during the 1990s.
She was also behind the 1970s sitcom It’s Awfully Bad For Your Eyes, which starred Dame Joanna Lumley.
Dame Jilly wrote the hit novel Mount! and published her most recent work Tackle! in 2023, which she wrote on her trusty manual typewriter named Monica.
The author was made a CBE for services to literature and charity during the 2018 New Year Honours, and in 2024 was made a dame, later describing receiving the honour from the King as ‘orgasmic’.
She is survived by her two children, Felix and Emily.
