The Yorkshire Vet star Peter Wright on the show's Christmas special and the challenges of working during a pandemic

Since then, he and fellow vet Julian Norton have helped make the Channel 5 show a hit with viewers earning plaudits for their straight-talking, and compassionate, approach.

It has made the pair household names (certainly up in our neck of the woods) and tonight the programme is back for a Christmas special, featuring Peter Davison.

For Wright it meant a different kind of challenge. “I’ve always enjoyed making the Christmas specials but this one was somewhat different and wasn’t one I was expecting,” he says. “When people meet me over the years they often say ‘you’re just like you are on the television.’ Well I couldn’t act to save my life so I always say ‘what you see is what you get.’ But in this episode I have to act and learn some lines.”

The Yorkshire Vet Christmas special is inspired by the iconic film It’s A Wonderful Life, starring James Stewart.

“I’m working with a fantastic actor called Peter Davison who played Tristan in the original series of All Creatures Great and Small and was Doctor Who. I thought ‘I don’t want to look like an idiot here so I’m going to have to shake myself and do as well as I can and do some acting,’” says Wright.

“You watch people acting on the television and you take it a bit for granted. But when I worked with Peter he brought it home to me just how talented and artistic these people are. And when I watched the programme back I thought how brilliant actors are at portraying different characters. I’m just a country vet and I can’t compete with the talents these people have from an acting point of view, but I thoroughly enjoyed making the programme.”

Even so he isn’t planning to give up the day job just yet, though there is one role he admits he would jump at the chance to play. “I have gone on record saying that if All Creatures Great and Small needed a true life vet to put an appearance in then I think I’d be there like a shot,” he says.

“Working with Alf Wight and Donald Sinclair, it was like being part of a close-knit family when we were at 23 Kirkgate [the famous practice in Thirsk], so obviously I knew them extremely well and I like to think I’d have a little bit to offer, but I don’t want to plug it too hard – I don’t want to frighten them off,” he says, laughing.

It was Wright’s careers teacher who suggested that he studied veterinary science and helped arrange for him to spend time at Alf Wight’s Thirsk practice (now The World of James Herriot), and within an hour of being there he knew where his future vocation lay.

Having had a taste of life as a vet he spent five years studying at Liverpool University before returning to Yorkshire to work at the now famous veterinary practice in 1982, alongside Alf Wight, aka James Herriot, and Donald Sinclair, the inspiration for Siegfried Farnon in Herriot’s brilliant best-selling books.

Wright has had to contend with many things during his time as a vet, but until last year a global pandemic was not among them. But it’s something they touch on in The Yorkshire Vet.

“We do talk about the pandemic and the difficulties it has created for clients and vets, because vets in some ways are seen as a trusted friend. You build up a relationship and during the pandemic I feel as if, for no one’s fault, we had to let them down to some extent,” he says.

“On the farm side because we were considered key workers it was pretty much business as usual, but on the dogs and cats side it was somewhat different.

“You’d have to meet clients in the car park and have a discussion and I think on that level it caused some exasperation and frustration for clients not being able to ring up and make a routine appointment. It became a very cumbersome process but it’s how it had to be.”

Wright admits that Covid has had a detrimental impact on some rural communities. “There are a lot of people who have felt thoroughly isolated by the pandemic and confused to some extent.”

But at the same time, he believes there are positives to be gleaned out of what has been a challenging time for everyone. “I think without doubt it’s brought people together and I think a lot of people my age and older, who wouldn’t have embraced technology have done so.”

WhatsApp groups, in particular, have helped bring people together. “I live in Kilburn and someone might put a message on asking if anyone’s going down to the supermarket as they could do with such and such, and I think it’s brought village communities closer together and that’s a very good thing.

“We’ve never had to contend with anything like this previously, but I do feel that despite all the despair and isolation, I think in communities such as ours I feel it’s enhanced the camaraderie and the help and people have looked out for each other.”

Wright was happy doing a job he loved and hadn’t thought about going in front of the cameras until Channel 5 approached him and Julian Norton about doing a TV series.

“I nearly didn’t make the programme and that’s been well documented. Alf Wight shunned the media, he didn’t need to court the media because the wonderful books spoke for themselves, and as a younger vet back then that brushed off on me.”

It was executive producer Paul Stead, a fellow Yorkshireman, from Daisybeck Studios in Leeds, who persuaded him to give it a go. “He said ‘look, trust me and I won’t let you down’ and he never has. I thought they were wasting their time anyway because it’s all been done, these veterinary programmes, and I thought nobody will watch it.”

But they did, and in their droves. The TV series pulls in around 1.8 million viewers and has been one of Channel 5’s most popular programmes, along with the likes of All Creatures Great and Small and Our Yorkshire Farm.

“I said to Lin [his wife] ‘why do people watch it?’ and she said ‘well, it’s the animals they’re interested in, not you.’ And I think that’s absolutely true. But also I think me and Julian have been embraced by our viewers and I never lose sight of the fact that we have a lot of loyal viewers who love what we do, and enjoy watching our work.

“The other thing is we’ve got fantastic countryside – on the other side of where I live is the beginning of the North York Moors – and we’ve still got the characters and culture, but it’s the people that make it what it is. And when you put all of this into the mix I think it’s been a massive comfort to people during the pandemic.

“It’s given them something to look forward to, both our programme and others that have embraced the countryside, nature and animals in particular.”

The Yorkshire Vet at Christmas: It’s a wonderful Life, is on tonight at 8pm on Channel 5.