I TALK TO Sian Gibson

"We wrote the cliffhanger at the end of series one so that hopefully people would want a series two, but we had no idea what would happen next!"

Ten years ago last month, Peter Kay's Car Share launched on BBC One, reviving the career of Peter Kay's brilliant co-star Sian Gibson, who has thankfully been lighting up our screens ever since, with superb cameos in shows like Inside No.9 and The Cleaner alongside major roles in hit comedies Murder, They Hope, The Reluctant Landlord, Mammoth and The Power of Parker, which returns this week for its second series.

And it's no surprise really that the compelling and genuinely funny comedy, co-created and written by Sian Gibson and Paul Coleman is back as it became the biggest new scripted comedy of the year in 2023 when it launchesd, with an average of 2.2m viewers across the series.

Series one transported us back to Stockport in 1990 and followed Martin Parker, who appeared to have a perfect life. but in reality, he was swimming in a sea of debt and lies, and it fell to the two women in his life, Kath and Diane to plot his downfall.

Series two sees the story leap forward to 1992 and the Queen isn’t the only one having an annus horribilis. In Stockport, Kath, Martin and Diane, played by Sian Gibson, Conleth Hill and Rosie Cavaliero, are all trying their best to get along.

Martin is down on his luck, Diane is running Parker’s with Sandy Copper, played by Steve Pemberton, and Kath just wants everyone to be happy. But Kath’s constant interfering changes all of their lives forever. They’ll need to depend on each other now more than ever, but who do they trust?

I recently caught up with the delightful Sian Gibson to find out more about series two, what is was like working with such a brilliant cast as well as why she'd say no to Strictly, but yes to The Celebrity Traitors and whether or not Peter Kay's Car Share could ever return.

Where did the idea come from for The Power of Parker?

Well, it was Paul really. Paul Coleman. He came to me with an idea and said, "Do you want to do this together?" It was initially about a stalker in the nineties so it did evolve a lot, but I

mean, credit has to go to Paul for it. We work together really well and we're very good friends with Conleth (Hill) and Rosie (Cavaliero), so we had them in mind which makes it a lot easier to to write. And it kind of evolved from there.

Were you influenced by any other shows when you were creating the show?

Initially, it was more of a drama than a comedy. But then you get certain actors involved and it's obviously going to be a comedy. We loved American shows like Good Girls and Dead to Me. When we started this, we were both obsessed with Dead to Me. So it's a cheap version of that... with a bit more laughs, I hope!

This was your first writing project for television since Car Share. How did it compare?

It was more scary really, in the way that Peter Kay is Peter Kay, isn't he? He's a comedy genius. A comedy legend. And we're mates, so if I'm completely honest it felt like it was more me contributing, because he just knows what's funny.

The difference we had with this is that we wanted the series to have more of a story. It's more of a comedy drama, I think, in the way that it's not a story of the week. We can't just go, "Oh, this week, they're going shopping. Next week they're..." - there's lots of threads which made it a lot more intense really, to write.

People often talk about a "difficult second album"; did you find that to be the case with this one?

Well, we wrote the cliffhanger at the end of series one so that hopefully people would want a series two, but we had no idea what would happen next! We just hoped that people would want one.

So we kind of started from scratch and knew we had to raise the stakes, which was quite difficult, because we'd had a big fire and a drug dealing gang in series one, so where do you from there to make everything bigger?!

We knew we had a great cast. So that's always helped. But yeah, we were terrified doing the second series, because we were so shocked it went down so well the first time and we just hope people enjoy it as much as the first.

Why did you make the time jump from 1990 to 1992 for series two?

Well I love the nineties. The eighties and nineties.

In series one we centred on Martin's downfall coinciding with Thatcher's downfall and we initially went to move it on to 1997, to Labour and Tony Blair coming into power, and tie Martin in with that.

However, we then thought that was too much of a time jump so settled on 1992 because there was the Windsor Fire, so that tied in... even though we never used it! And the Queen had her annus horribilis.

Also, if I'm honest, we thought if this series started straight away, we've got a lot of explaining to do of where Martin's been for three months. So we thought, if we take it on two years, we can kind of brush over all that!

So, where do we find them at the start of series two?

Diane is running Parkers with Sandy Cooper, so she's moved on a lot. She's a changed woman. She's an independent woman. She's got rid of Martin. There's a real power shift between Martin and Diane, because Martin is on his arse, living with Kath and surviving on Kath's wage. Which especially in the nineties, a man like Martin surviving on a woman's wage, he would not be happy about her being the breadwinner.

So there's a real shift between Martin and Diane and Kath is stuck in the middle. She's fairly happy. She's got a man. She's reconnected with her sister. But senses that they're not happy, so reckons if she can make them two happy, it'll be happily ever after for everyone.

She's quite naive. She's quite simple. She doesn't want a lot in life. But obviously, she's a bit of a liability and when she decides to take things into her own hands, she just ballses everything up!

Which is what we love to see. I love that Kath and Diane have so many scenes together this time. Did you know Rosie before series one?

Yeah. I met her years ago, because funnily enough, Paul Coleman had written a pilot for a show for ITV and we did a table read for it. And we'd never met before, we both did this table read and they're normally quite awful. I don't enjoy doing those things. So we went to the pub afterwards and we've been friends ever since.

She doesn't realise how amazing she is. That's the thing with Rosie. She makes me laugh so much. When we're writing, because we've got Rosie's voice in our heads, Diane is really easy to write for. And we laugh thinking about Rosie doing things that we write for her.

So yeah, I really wanted Kath and Diane to have more scenes together, because I just love being with Rosie and having some time with her. The challenge we had for series two, is that we didn't spend much time together in series one - Diane, Martin and Kath - so we had to think of something that could happen in series two that will force the three of them to have to be together. And work together.

One of the things I adore about The Power of Parker is its brilliant one-liners. As well as the great storylines. What comes first?

The storyline. We've become so attached to all of our characters and all of our actors that we could have just easily written a storyline that involves just myself, Rosie and Conleth. But we really wanted to make sure that all of our brilliant cast, George Costigan, Steve Pemberton, Sheila Reid - who has been a friend of mine for years and I adore - want to come back. And thankfully they're all back for series two.

We've also got a few new actors joining this year. We've got Diane Morgan, Elizabeth Berrington and Navin Chowdhry. So finding things for them to do, which again, we're hoping that if fingers crossed, we get a third series, we've left it open for them that those characters could keep going.

Series three is going to be an absolute nightmare if we get one because we just everyone to be in it! We've got an amazing cast, honestly. We're so lucky because they are all so funny and brilliant. It's a really lovely job and it's that nice that I'd do it forever if I could.

Let's speak about Diane Morgan as Mick. Superb casting! How did she come on board, because aren't you in the next series of Mandy?

Yeah, but that didn't happen until after. I'd never met her before, but obviously I'm a huge fan. Who isn't?

I love everything she does. We wrote it with her in mind. It was like a Hilary Devey kind of character and we could just hear her voice when we wrote it. So when she said yes, we were so happy.

I'm not in any scenes with Diane, but I made sure that I was in those days and I was just hanging around just to see her like a big stalker! Me and my daughter are obsessed with Mandy. We don't watch a lot of telly together, because she's 13, but we will both sit and

just laugh out loud to Mandy.

When it comes to the music choices, how much of that is in the script and how much is in the edit?

A bit of both really. For example in episode three, we have a little dance in a hotel room with Sandy Cooper, so we wanted something that would be funny for three middle-aged people to have a dance to, and we came up with Crystal Water, Gypsy Woman. So that was written in and in series one, Kath and Martin had a sexy dance to Body Talk, so we have songs in mind and hope they clear.

Other than that, me and Paul just get obsessed with the music and watching old Top of the Pops. We sent a massive playlist to Joe (Roberts), the director. and if he wants to use them, great. But he's brilliant. Anything from 1992 onwards, really.

There's a scene in this series where Diane is in the car alone, listening to a song, and Rosie in that scene is hilarious. How much of that was in the script?

The thing with Rosie, is she's so brilliant, you don't have to write much of a stage direction. All you need to put is 'Diane is listening to it in the car' and you know that she'll do something brilliant. You just know she'll be hilarious and funny with the best facial expressions I've ever seen.

That's one of my favourite scenes. Do you have any from either series?

What's really mad about this series, is that it's very fragmented, in the way that for example, I don't have any scenes with Diane (Morgan) but I have scenes with Navin Chowdhry who comes into it in episode four and turns the whole story on its head. I have scenes with George Costigan, which was nice, who plays my dad, who's brilliant.

Every week is different. I have a week in the old people's home with Sheila Reid, Judith Barker and Rhiannon Clements, so I have my own little community there. But it's really nice that I have different pockets and I can't say which I prefer.

The hotel scenes were all done in a week in a hotel in city centre Manchester. That was hysterical.

Do you think you're like Kath in any way?

I'd like to think I'm not like Kath at all, but I probably am. A bit ditsy. A liability. Chaotic! I am like Kath in that I just do everything as it happens. I don't have much of a plan in life. I just take it as it comes and hope for the best!

Looking ahead to a potential third series, do you think you'll time jump again?

We've got too many ideas, really. We don't want to think about it unless we know we've got a series, but I think we wouldn't time jump this series. I think because of the way we end episode six, we'd have to know what went on. We'd have to sum that up.

We couldn't just time jump and it move forward. We've got a lot of answers for what went on there. But you never, we could be going for years and end up in the year 2000! Who knows?!

Many people will likely choose to binge-watch the whole series when it launches. Is that how you watch television? Or do you prefer to watch weekly?

Apart from The White Lotus, where you have no choice, I did love the idea with that show, doing it weekly. And I loved that when you watch weekly you chat to people about it and you have your own thoughts.

I don't watch anything like that. I think I ruin things, because I watch it so quickly, in one go, that I think you miss stuff. And you watch it so quickly that you forget half the things that have happened. You do it in two sessions and it's too much.

Aside from The White Lotus, what else have you been enjoying on television recently?

I'm obsessed with my reality. I hate to say it, but I do like a MAFS. That's gone now. In fact, when me and Paul got together to write series two of this, and think of plots, The Traitors was on and we were both obsessed with it.

Actually, that's another show that you have to wait every night, don't you? For it to be on. And that gap between Friday and Wednesday is ridiculous. Anyway, we got so obsessed with The Traitors, that we - and I hope it works a bit - we loved all the "Who do you trust?", so we tried to bring that into Diane and Martin, as in they don't know who to trust. They're saying one thing to one person, but doing something else. But that was just because we were obsessed.

Would you ever do The Celebrity Traitors?

Oh my God, yeah! I would love to. I'd be out first. I'd want to be a faithful, because I'd be a terrible traitor. I can't hold my own water. I'm an oversharer, and I just know I'd meet someone in there that I think I can trust and I'll go "Don't tell anyone, but I'm a traitor." and then that's it, I'm out! I'd struggle with it, but it's brilliant isn't it?

I cannot wait to see Alan Carr, because I think he'll be so funny... and Celia Imrie?! She'll be brilliant!

What about following your friend Sarah Hadland into the Strictly ballroom?

Well, if you've watched any of series one and two (of The Power of Parker), you'll know that I'll be out week one. You'd wanna go in and be like Sarah. But I'd be an Ann Widdecombe. I can't dance. I'm so clumsy that I'd fall down those stairs episode one and that'd be me out.

Also, I don't know how they do the red light. It's horrific. I speak to Sarah all the time and it was tough for her and she's really fit. I would struggle. I know people do it and say "It's all about the journey and learning to dance", but I don't think it is. You've got to have a bit of something beforehand.

In episode one of series two, there's a scene at the Stockport Traders Awards, Kath's dancing and she walks off the dance floor and proper falls over... well... that happened. And it just happened to be on camera. It was so painful, but I had to jump up and be like "I'm fine! I'm fine!". And that would happen on Strictly, so no. No.

It's been 10 years since the launch of Peter Kay's Car Share. Can you believe it's been so long already? And do you think it could ever return?

It's horrific, isn't it? I can't believe it's ten years. It's really scary because in some ways it feels like another lifetime

I don't know. We've never talked about it returning. We always knew it would end there. And Peter knows what he's doing. He's always done two series of everything. We did the specials and have never talked about bringing it back. Sometimes it's best to leave it.

Is there anything you haven't done yet that you'd love to? Something that's maybe on your career bucket list.

I don't have one. And that's awful. All the jobs I've done, I've felt really lucky that I've worked with amazing people and made friends for life over the last ten years. I'd given up before Car Share, and I've got friends for life now. As long as I can keep doing jobs that I have a really good time on. Because it's work at the end of the day and it's everything that goes with normal everyday life, the dramas that's the shit bits. I love my job. I love filming. I love all of that. I hate it going on telly. I'd be more than happy if we just called it a day and never aired it - "We've had a lovely day. Thank you. Onto the next one." I hate it going on telly. That's the bit I hate. In fact,

Speaking of other lovely projects. What's next for you? Mandy, Death Valley...

Yeah, I've got a little tiny bit in Mandy, which is enough for me. My daughter is beside herself, although I've probably ruined the whole bloody series for her now I'm in it. She doesn't watch anything that I do, because she doesn't want to see me snogging another man, does she? It's a bit weird. But she was really made up with Mandy, because she knows it's silly and fun and that I'll be in and out!

I did a programme last year called Mammoth with Mike Bubbins and when Death Valley came along, it's the same team. It's Paul Doolan. Same writer. Same team. Filming in Cardiff. Mike's in it. And obviously Timothy Spall and Gwyneth Keyworth who are pretty amazing. That was a really nice two week break in Cardiff and I can say that I've met Timothy Spall and he was a dream.

And then I've got series two of Mammoth next month. We start filming end of June. I love going back to the eighties and nineties. It's just a dream, this job. I went to uni in the nineties and I can't believe it's over 30 years ago since I went to university. I've still got some of my clothes from then in my wardbrobe! I'll never fit in them, but still.

The Power of Parker airs Fridays at 9.30pm on BBC One