‘Grantchester’ Star Tessa Peake-Jones Reflects on Emotional Final Day of Filming (Exclusive)

Twelve years ago, Tessa Peake-Jones first slipped on the apron and perpetual frown that would define her Grantchester character, Sylvia Chapman, during the early seasons. But her initial day on the set stands out for a comment made by costar Robson Green, another actor who has been with the beloved British mystery series for all 11 seasons.

“This was a Monday,” recounts Peake-Jones, whose vicarage housekeeper was then known as Mrs. Maguire. “We were in the vicarage garden, and I think we’d gone out to dinner the night before in Cambridge. We were waiting for them to light one of the rooms and Robson said, ‘Well, who knows? We could still be doing this into our pension.’ And we all went, ‘Oh, don’t be ridiculous. Of course we won’t.’”

But those words proved prophetic, and as the final season rolls out on PBS this summer, Peake-Jones’ character has grown and changed with the times. It’s no exaggeration to say that Mrs. Chapman was far from enlightened when the Masterpiece series premiered in the U.S. in January 2015. “She started as this bad-tempered, narrow-minded religious woman with a heart, but it was buried rather deep,” the actress says. “She hasn’t always been the most popular in terms of her opinions. It’s been nice to stretch that as far as you can, where the public still likes her.”

Thanks to Mrs. C’s marriage to wealthy Jack Chapman (Nick Brimble), her friendship with formerly closeted ex-curate Leonard Finch (Al Weaver), and her business venture with housewife-turned-entrepreneur Cathy Keating (Kacey Ainsworth), the character evolved into a modern midcentury woman. Both her wardrobe and her attitude improved. She now looks after the vicarage for its first non-white man of the cloth, Alphy Kottaram (Rishi Nair), who came to the English village two years ago.

Tessa Peake-Jones and Al Weaver (Courtesy of Kudos, ITV, and MASTERPIECE)

Peake-Jones credits showrunner Daisy Coulam and her writing team with pushing her character in new directions and letting her maternal instincts evolve around Leonard and the young vicars. “Once she got to know us, she would also write for the actors because she’d see our skills. To watch [Mrs. Chapman] opening up has been quite interesting to play. What’s been lovely is she’s learnt from other people. She’s very much taken on learning from Leonard.”

That education went both ways for the actors, who have known each other since Weaver was in drama school and Peake-Jones was his mentor. “He tries not to tell people this, but I now tell everyone,” the actress declares, noting how the writers fed off their relationship. Leonard supported Mrs. C when she was diagnosed with breast cancer, and she stood by him when he was arrested for gross indecency. “They’d write those little double acts for us. Sometimes they’d be sad or moving, but other times they’d be funny because they knew we could play off each other.”

That’s one thing Peake-Jones will miss now that she won’t be spending the summer making Grantchester. Although saying goodbye to the show was hard, she didn’t keep anything from the set or one of her character’s floral ensembles as a souvenir, proclaiming, “I’m never going to be wearing what Mrs. Chapman wears, I have to say.”

But she’s not saying goodbye to mysteries. This summer, she’s been in Ireland shooting Last Resort, about a group of old friends who become amateur sleuths during their vacation, for Britain’s Channel 5. “They turn up in a holiday resort and find there’s been a serial killer there for 10 years, and they solve it,” Peake-Jones previews. “It’s going to be good fun.”

As for Grantchester, she recalls the final day of shooting as well as she does that first one. But the last one was a roller coaster of emotions for the cast. “They arranged it so that we could all be filming on the same day,” she says. “We started the day thinking we weren’t going to get carried away. But by afternoon, the execs had come onto the set, and the writers, and there were lots of photos being taken. It felt a bit like having a party, except we were still filming.”

She continues, “When they finally said, ‘That is a wrap,’ we all just hugged. We held in a circle and we just cried. It was very meaningful and really quite moving because we will see each other socially, but it’s not the same. We’ll never be in this room, filming together.”

Grantchester, Sundays, 9/8c, PBS (check local listing at pbs.org)