Raquel Turner
| Raquel Turner | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Only Fools and Horses character | |||||||||||
| Portrayed by | Tessa Peake-Jones | ||||||||||
| Duration | 1988–2003 | ||||||||||
| First appearance | Dates | ||||||||||
| Last appearance | Sleepless in Peckham | ||||||||||
| Created by | John Sullivan | ||||||||||
| Classification | Former; regular | ||||||||||
| Profile | |||||||||||
| Occupation |
Actress (1988-) Stripper (1980-1988) |
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| Father | James Turner |
|---|---|
| Mother | Audrey Turner |
| Brothers | Quentin Turner |
| Husband |
Roy Slater (1979-1983) (divorced) Derek Trotter (1990-present;partner) |
| Sons | Damien Trotter |
Rachel "Raquel" Turner (formerly Slater; born 4 June 1957) is a fictional character from the BBC television sit-com Only Fools and Horses, in which she was Del Boy's longtime girlfriend. She was portrayed by Tessa Peake-Jones.
With Only Fools and Horses moving into its sixth series, writer John Sullivan wanted Del Boy to start looking for more mature women, rather than continually chasing 20-year-olds, and to have a long-term relationship, so he came up with the character Raquel for the 1988 Christmas special episode, "Dates".
During the episode, she was introduced to Del via a dating agency and at first the two got on well. She told Del that she was a trained actress, with ambitions to have a full-time career in the profession, although her only experiences of the business thus far had been an unsuccessful pop duo with a friend, Double Cream, various low-key stage appearances (including one headlining at the Talk of the Town, Reading, in which she fluffed her lines so badly that the crowd cheered when last orders was announced) and a one-line part in a Doctor Who episode (which may sound somewhat impressive in the modern day, but the show had a very poor reputation in 1988, and would be cancelled the following year by Michael Grade). She also mentioned that, owing to her career choice, she had long been estranged from her parents, not having seen or spoken to them for years.
However, she declined to mention to Del that she supplemented her income with a part-time job as a stripagram, a fact he only discovered when he unwittingly booked her for Uncle Albert's birthday party at the Nag's Head pub. Humiliated in front of all his friends, Del told her he didn't care to see her anymore. However, a conversation with Raquel revealed just how much Del had meant for her: he had given her the strength to wake in the morning and actually enjoy it. She then told Del that if he wanted her to stay, she'd refuse the job she'd been offered and stay with him. Del changed his mind but an untimely misunderstanding with the police (he mistook a female officer for another stripper) got him arrested and he was unable to meet up with her. Heartbroken, she left London to work in the Middle East and later the United States.
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Wikipedia