All Creatures Great and Small (TV series) that be wanted to cast the role. Sellars, instead, asked Timothy if he would accept the role of Tristan Farnon. "I had a wife, I had children, I had a mortgage to pay, and I wasn't working. So I said, 'No. It's Herriot or nothing.'" Timothy put everything on the line. "I got home one night, at about 9 o'clock. My wife was washing up in the kitchen. I walked into the kitchen and she said, without turning round, 'You've got the Herriot part.'" Timothy also stated that, after all of the roles had been cast except that of Herriot,
All Creatures Great and Small (TV series) the first three series and two specials, then by Lynda Bellingham in the final four series. (Bellingham fell pregnant with her first son, Robert, during series 5, so she was confined to bed scenes for several episodes, with a hole cut out of the mattress to hide her bump.) Mary Hignett plays housekeeper Edna Hall in the first three series, with Mrs Hubbard (Marjorie Suddell) (1983 Christmas Special), Mrs Greenlaw (Judy Wilson) (1985 special and series 4, episodes 1–5) and Mrs Alton (Jean Heywood) (series 7) inheriting the roles. (A housekeeper by the name of Mary preceded Mrs Hall, who