{"id":623351,"date":"2026-09-13T11:40:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-13T11:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/623351\/"},"modified":"2026-09-13T11:40:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-13T11:40:09","slug":"douglas-henshall-reveals-personal-connection-to-forever-home-character","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/623351\/","title":{"rendered":"Douglas Henshall reveals personal connection to Forever Home character"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Graham Norton&#8217;s best-selling novel <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/tv\/drama\/forever-home-graham-norton-images-newsupdate\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Forever Home<\/a> is getting an adaptation on 5, and it certainly looks like it&#8217;s set to be a series full of mystery.<\/p>\n<p>The six-episode drama will follow Carol Crottie (Amy Nuttall), who begins to grow suspicious after her husband Robert, who has dementia, refuses to leave his home.<\/p>\n<p>The series&#8217; synopsis continues: &#8220;She starts to wonder if the reason he won&#8217;t leave his home has something to do with the whereabouts of his first wife, who ran off with Robert&#8217;s brother 20 years ago, leaving behind their two young children Kaden and Sally.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>For actor Douglas Henshall, who plays Carol&#8217;s husband Robert, however, the role has more of a personal connection.<\/p>\n<p>As he explained: &#8220;My grandmother had Alzheimer\u2019s and my dad has dementia and my father-in-law had dementia. So, I have quite a bit of experience of it and the odd ways that it manifests itself.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Some of it is nuts and other bits are just heartbreaking. My grandmother calling the police down to her house to say that there were naked dwarves who had stolen her pension book.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This was about 40 years ago. Where did you conjure that image from that those would have been the people who stole your pension book?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"image__img\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ForeverHomeEp1HW0364-15.09.14-88fab69.jpg\" alt=\"The cast of Forever Home, sat and stood around a dinner table, looking at the camera.\" data-item-name=\"The cast of Forever Home, sat and stood around a dinner table, looking at the camera.\" title=\"ForeverHome_Ep1_HW_0364 15.09.14\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1 \/ 0.6667109105388903;object-fit:contain\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"700\" height=\"466.6976373772232\" data-testid=\"image-img\"\/><\/p>\n<p>The cast of Forever Home.\u00a05<\/p>\n<p>Henshall continued: &#8220;And then there is the other side of just watching somebody trying to remember who you are or who you might be. And those moments of clarity. That little glimmer in the eyes where for a moment they are there again.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Henshall is perhaps best known for playing Professor Nick Cutter in the sci-fi series Primeval, but is also well known to audiences for playing beloved Detective Inspector Jimmy P\u00e9rez in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/tv\/drama\/shetland-season-11-update-guest-stars-newsupdate\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Shetland<\/a>. Henshall left the series in 2022, with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/tv\/drama\/shetland-ashley-jensen-arrival-exclusive-newsupdate\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ashley Jensen<\/a> taking on the reins as lead detective, DI Ruth Calder.<\/p>\n<p>Read more:<\/p>\n<p>Previously, actor Amy Nuttal <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/tv\/drama\/forever-home-book-change-ending-exclusive-newsupdate\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">teased what to expect<\/a> from Forever Home&#8217;s TV adaptation, explaining that there are &#8220;more twists and turns than there are in the book&#8221;, with actor Lewis Cope (who plays Kaden) adding that the person responsible for the murder in the series &#8220;is actually different to the book&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Nuttall was quick to emphasise that the changes from the source material were &#8220;an added extra,&#8221; and &#8220;a bonus, hopefully, that the audience will love&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>As well as Henshall, Nuttall and Cope, the series also stars the likes of Denise Welch (Coronation Street), Aim\u00e9e Kelly (Hijack), Shane Zaza (Happy Valley), James Baxter (Alma&#8217;s Not Normal) and Kevin Whately (Lewis).<\/p>\n<p>Want to see this content?<\/p>\n<p class=\"consent-placeholder__text mb-0 mt-0\">This page contains content provided by Google reCAPTCHA. We ask for your permission before anything is loaded, as Google reCAPTCHA may use cookies and other technologies. To view this content, choose &#8216;Accept and continue&#8217; to allow Google reCAPTCHA and its required purposes.<\/p>\n<p>Accept and continue<\/p>\n<p>Forever Home premieres on Monday 14 September at 9pm on 5.<\/p>\n<p>Add Forever Home to your watchlist on the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/download-the-app\/?af_xp=custom&amp;pid=website&amp;c=editorial_content&amp;is_retargeting=true&amp;af_reengagement_window=30d\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Radio Times: What to Watch app<\/a> \u2013 download now for daily TV recommendations, features and more.<\/p>\n<p>Check out more of our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/tv\/drama\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Drama<\/a> coverage or visit our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/tv\/tv-listings\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">TV Guide<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/streaming-guide\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Streaming Guide<\/a> to find out what&#8217;s on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/audio\/podcasts\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The Radio Times Podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Graham Norton&#8217;s best-selling novel Forever Home is getting an adaptation on 5, and it certainly looks like it&#8217;s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":623352,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[93,61,60,282],"class_list":["post-623351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/623351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=623351"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/623351\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/623352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=623351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=623351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=623351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}