The co-star of a cult BBC sitcom has recorded a special video message to cheer up Norwich students whose futures are on hold because of the coronavirus.
Charlie Cooper from This Country posted the message to University of East Anglia (UEA) drama students, urging them to keep on being positive and “keep your heads up”.
Mr Cooper stars in the BBC3 mockumentary as Lee ‘Kurtan’ Mucklowe, a young man living in a village in the Cotswolds.
His co-star is his real-life sister Daisy May Cooper, who plays Lee’s cousin Kerry Mucklowe.
In the video message, Mr Cooper adopts the character of ‘Kurtan’ to lift the spirits of the drama students, saying: “This is a quick little video message for all you thespian students at UAE. UEA? U...E...A. University of East Anglia.
“My mate Robert, who you should know because he’s your teacher - or whatever they call them now - said a lot of you will be down in the dumps and a little upset that your exams have been cancelled. I don’t know why, but each to their own.”
He added: “A quick message to say keep on being positive, keep your heads up: you will be back in the rehearsal room in no time, finishing your degree and job’s a good un.”
The message was sent after Mr Cooper was contacted by UEA senior drama technician Robert Little.
Mr Little said: “With the lockdown many students at the UEA have returned home and have found the immediate future uncertain. This has created a fair amount of stress and worry about how they can complete the assessments, some to complete their degree.
“As you can appreciate drama tends to be a practical subject, so sending in work has a physical problem, which the university will find a solution to. So I asked Charlie Cooper of “This Country” fame if he could help and could he send a message to add a badly needed smile for the students. He obliged without hesitation . What a generous and warm man he is.”
This Country, which has run for three series, centres on themes of social clumsiness, the trivialities of human behaviour, the eccentricities of living in rural England, and the boredom and social isolation of young people in small communities.
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