Gavin And Stacey’s Nessa to read shipping forecast on BBC

Gavin And Stacey star Ruth Jones is reprising her role as Vanessa “Nessa” Jenkins to read Radio 4’s Shipping Forecast as the programme celebrates its centenary on the BBC on New Year’s Day. Actors Julie Hesmondhalgh, Stephen Fry and Line Of Duty’s Adrian Dunbar, and sailor Dame Ellen MacArthur are also among those marking the first broadcast of the Met Office’s forecast on the BBC in October 1925.

The famous faces, along with Blur frontman Damon Albarn – who took creative inspiration from the ships for the track This Is A Low, will drop in throughout the day to share historic shipping forecasts along with their personal memories.

Jones said: “Nessa has got quite a colourful history and one of her jobs was on the high seas. The Shipping Forecast was always very important and useful to her.”

During the final episode of Gavin And Stacey this year, which attracted the highest Christmas ratings since 2008 with an average audience of 12.3 million tuning in, Neil “Smithy” Smith (James Corden) stopped Nessa from going back to work on the ships by racing to Southampton Dock.

He proposed to Nessa and the final scene featured a heartwarming montage of a low-key wedding, with her sporting a black dress and the couple finally getting their happily ever after. Comedian Paul Sinha, poet Imtiaz Dharker and writers Ian McMillan and Val McDermid will also be part of the reading of forecasts.

Trevor Harrison, who voices Eddie Grundy in The Archers, will be reading the forecast from November 21, 2021 – the date when his character and Clarrie Grundy (Heather Bell) renewed their wedding vows.

Meanwhile, Dame Ellen is reading the forecast from June 1, 1995 – the day she set off on her round Britain trip and her first solo adventure. The retired British sailor broke the world record for the fastest solo circumnavigation of the globe in 2005.

Director of speech and Radio 4 controller Mohit Bakaya said: “The Shipping Forecast is one of our national treasures. So I’m delighted that we are cracking a bottle against the hull to launch 100 years of the Shipping Forecast on the BBC with a special schedule of programming on New Year’s Day.

“As well as providing crucial information for seafarers over the years, the Shipping Forecast is also a cherished ritual that distils the essence of Radio 4 for so many of our listeners. It is also a moment for those great, unsung heroes and heroines of the Radio 4 schedule – the continuity announcers – to shine.

“On January 1, we will celebrate our ‘national poem’ with a dedicated day of fascinating programmes for listeners from Bailey to Viking, Biscay to South Utsire and everywhere in between.”

BBC presenter Paddy O’Connell will also present a documentary about the history of the forecast, called A Beginner’s Guide, as historian Jerry Brotton presents an Archive On 4, which will explore how Britain is shaped by its maritime past.

The Shipping Forecast is produced by the Met Office on behalf of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. This year marked its centenary, after first being heard on January 1, 1924 as a weather bulletin called Weather Shipping. It moved a year later to the BBC.