IT’S BEEN more than four decades since this Cheltenham home first appeared on our TV screens… but would you still recognise it?
The property appears perfectly mundane today but it was loved by millions when it appeared on our screens over 40 years ago.
Do you recognise this house?[/caption]
It appeared on a hit TV show[/caption]
It’s set the scene for the popular series Butterflies that was first broadcast in 1978 and ran until 1983.
It was the Parkinsons who lived at 30 Bournside Road in the show.
The outside of the house remains remarkably similar to how it looked on the set of Butterflies.
Sitting at the bend of a treelined road, the detached brick home is still surrounded by greenery.
The show was set in Cheltenham and followed the bitter-sweet domestic life of a family as Ria Parkinson, played by Wendy Craig, contemplated an affair with a man named Leonard.
Bruce Montague, who passed away in 2022, starred as the love interest.
The home itself was spoken of as “pleasant” on the show.
“I am one of the few lucky ones, I have a pleasant house, a pleasant man and two pleasant sons.
“My butterfly didn’t get squashed,” Ria said in the series.
The sitcom also starred Geoffrey Palmer, who died in 2020, as Ria’s husband Ben.
Nicholas Lyndhurst and Andrew Hall held the roles of the two unemployed sons.
In the 1970s when filming began in the usually quiet street, the sight of the stars and crew added excitement to the neighbourhood, a feeling Ria was searching for in the show amid her mid-life crisis.
Scenes from the British sitcom were also filmed at the nearby Hatherley Park where Ria would sit on the benches to daydream.
Despite running for 28 episodes, the affair never eventuated, leaving the family home intact.
The house was sold for £530,000 in 2008 but the average price for a detached property in Cheltenham is now £640,000.
It is currently not listed for sale but its famous history would be sure to garner plenty of interest on the market.
‘Normal’ homes still continue to have starring roles in hit television series.
The house featured in Adolescence was scouted in Yorkshire and the family who lived there were star struck when Stephen Graham came knocking.
While filming took over, the family who own the property moved out for three months.
The house was a central feature of the series that dominated this year’s Emmys.
The series was filmed at sites across Cheltenham[/caption]
Wendy Craig starred as Ria Parkinson in the British sitcom[/caption]
The show starred Geoffrey Palmer, Wendy Craig, Nicholas Lyndhurst and Andrew Hall[/caption]
The show ran from 1978 to 1983[/caption]
In the show Ria Parkinson contemplates an affair[/caption]
