Janine Duvitski

Casting announced for Benidorm - Live

Litten has written an all new set of Alicante escapades for the much-loved cast members, including Jake Canuso (Mateo), Janine Duvitski (Jacqueline), Adam Gillen (Liam), Sherrie Hewson (Joyce Temple-Savage), Shelley Longworth (Sam), and Tony Maudsley (Kenneth) as they swap sangria for the stage next year after a quick spruce at the Blow 'n' Go!

I talk to: Janine Duvitski

Last summer I paid a visit to the Solana, and whilst waiting for Blow N Go to open, I chatted to Janine Duvitski to find out more about what's in store for Jacqueline in the new series.

Janine Duvitski interview

Widowed swinger Jacqueline is due to arrive in the next episode of Benidorm, but she encounters some big problems before she gets to the Solana, as Janine Duvitski explains...

Series finale of the sitcom about a transgender woman's romance with a younger man. Judy (Rebecca Root) and Leo (Harry Hepple) are getting married in the morning, which means mild family ructions - Janine Duvitski excels as Judy's annoying mum - and easily resolved church-on-time panics before the couple walk down the aisle. Buoyed by deserved audience goodwill, Boy Meets Girl amiably gets away with a script full of creaking, textbook jokes.

Boy Meets Girl was hailed, in its first series, as groundbreaking - as indeed it was, being the first mainstream UK programme, let alone comedy, to feature transgender people with any degree of prominence. The standout Rebecca Root still intrigues, her relationship with Leo endangered now not by prejudice but by his imminent job in London (in Geordieland this is somehow still perceived as gilded cobbles rather than the ceaseless throb of a larger, twisted normality). There's a resolution, of sorts, thanks to difficulties involving the mother (the increasingly splendid Janine Duvitski, now much older than Abigail's Party, still as magnetising). The problem is that it's not very, if at all, funny. A sitcom without the com is simply a sit. And the sit, in these lovely enlightened days, is not that interesting.

When this romcom about a man falling for a transgender woman first arrived, it was all a bit controversial.

What a thoroughly modern love story, and hip hip hooray to the BBC we thought as we applauded trans actress Rebecca Root for her lead role.

Now, of course, as Judy (Root) and Leo (Harry Hepple) return for a second series, the controversy has gone but we can still enjoy this wonderfully sweet comedy drama.

The plot hardly rattles along, in fact it pootles, with perhaps the odd skip. But that's fine. Not everything we watch should require an emergency manicure the next day.

As we rejoin Judy and Leo, they are in love, totally committed and making plans for a future together. But, plot twist alert, Leo has been offered a new job.

Good salary, pension, five weeks holiday. Perfect?

No, it's in London, a fair few miles from their Newcastle home. Well, we needed some kind of spanner in the works to keep us interested.

"It will be ok, we'll see each other every weekend," says Leo. Oh right, because that always goes without a hitch in sitcoms.

Meanwhile, Harry's mum Pam (Denise Welch) decides to join Judy's mum Peggy (Janine Duvitski) at a transgender support group, but is horrified when someone asks how long she's been living as a woman.

"It's the butch haircut and the way you walk," explains Peggy, helpful as ever.

And elsewhere, Anji is alarmed to discover the salon has rats. But there's a silver lining for Jackie, who takes a shine to the pest controller.

Boy Meets Girl season 2 episode 1 review

All things being done, this is a triumphant return for Boy Meets Girl. The charm and heart-warming nature of the first year is still present. The first season had education and acceptance very much at its core and thankfully, this second run looks set to carry on that theme.