EastEnders star Ricky Groves has reflected on how he felt to reprise his role as Garry Hobbs this week in the show.
Ricky and his co-star Cliff Parisi headed back to Walford yesterday as best mates Garry and Minty Peterson. The characters returned for Billy Mitchell (Perry Fenwick) and Honey’s (Emma Barton) sten do, and everyone in the pub were completely thrilled to see them.
Garry and Minty only popped back for the party, but we managed to gain an insight into the lives they’re living now.
We learnt that Minty is now married, and Garry is living in his attic and working as a bingo caller.
It was completely wonderful to see the characters again and for Ricky Groves, he wished he was there for longer.
‘An absolute privilege. It was a lovely day’, he said, reflecting on his day of filming as Garry again.
‘It felt weird because I hadn’t been there for fourteen years so it was great to see my old buddies. It was great to meet some of the newer cast. Only wish I was there for more.’
‘I don’t know where they came up with that idea but we were always a double act towards the end’, he laughed, reacting to Garry living in Minty’s spare room.
‘We always said that EastEnders is a bit like Shakespeare. You have your comedy characters, tragedy characters and you have your love characters and your revenge characters. You have got all those things to play around with. Gary and Minty were the Laurel and Hardy of the 2000s.
Pondering over working with Cliff Parisi again, Ricky said: ‘We still keep in touch and it came very naturally. We worked together for such a long time, so it’s kind of like putting on a pair of old shoes. It was great, it the chemistry came back within minutes.’
‘Ricky is great fun and he really made me laugh on the day that we were filming’, Cliff added.
‘He just has these faces that he pulls as his character is always in shock about something and it really makes me laugh [Laughs]. It was lovely to work with him again, and Perry, and all the others including Shane. It was really nice and it felt like going home.
‘It was a bit like being away for a very, very long time and living abroad and then coming back and going into your local pub. Few familiar old faces around really lovely to see everyone and work with them again. I really enjoyed it.’
‘It was great fun, I really enjoyed it. It was like going back to an old house that you used to live in but the furniture has been moved around a bit.’
‘It was pretty much the same’, Cliff smiled.
‘Lots of new faces which was nice. I met quite a lot of the new guys there. I was only there for the day so I didn’t get to meet everyone. What I love about the show is the collaboration that you can have there. We had Jamie [Annett] directing who I have worked with a lot in the past.
‘He is really playful and if you have got ideas, he will listen to them and will try to get them in so, it was great!’
