SUSSEX residents are outraged that TV bosses snubbed their chocolate box villages in their search for a rural idyll.

BBC comedy How Do You Want Me? was written by former Henfield resident Simon Nye, famous for his hit Men Behaving Badly, and the series is based on his home village, near Brighton.

Starring Four Weddings And A Funeral actress Charlotte Coleman and comedian Dylan Moran, it is the tale of a couple who escape London for the fictional country village of Snowle.

Husband Ian loves London and hates the countryside while wife Lisa hates the city.

In the first series, screened last year, viewers saw the lead characters reading the Argus in bed and Simon Nye's mother Sheila, a Henfield parish councillor, even had a bit-part. The second series starts on BBC2 on November 10.

Postcard

But programme-makers claim they had to shoot the episodes 74 miles away in the hamlet of Cookham Dean, Berkshire, because they could not find a suitable location in

Sussex.

Executive producer Roderick Gilchrist said: "We couldn't find a genuine Sussex picture postcard village. Have they all disappeared?

"My parents live in Sussex, near Fontwell, and I know that the Sussex of pastoral dream is a disappearing reality.

"We looked at many Sussex villages and none matched our image of a Sussex idyll, so we had to go to Cookham Dean."

However, many Sussex villagers would disagree.

Historic Findon, near Worthing, dates back hundreds of years and is an archetypal chocolate box village.

Findon parish councillor Michael Grand said: "Obviously they've never been to Findon.

"It's absolutely amazing that they can make a statement like that. I can think of dozens of places just in this area alone, including Clapham, Patching and Amberley."

Ditchling resident Dame Vera Lynn said: "They clearly cannot have been to Ditchling. To start with it's full of history - there's the wonderful old church and some Tudor houses and the Downs."

Lindfield Preservation Society spokeswoman Pat Calderwood said: "I think this is rather ridiculous.

"There are so many pretty villages in Sussex, with some beautiful ones by the Downs, including Fulking and Poynings.

"And in Lindfield there are some beautiful houses. I'm at a loss to know why they made this decision."

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