‘She has a big laugh that bounces off the houses’: How Sarah Lancashire and Happy Valley brought cheer to Yorkshire

Calder Valley people tell of the debt the area owes to Sally Wainwright’s hard-hitting and regionally accurate cop show

After a seven-year absence, Happy Valley returns on New Year’s Day for a highly anticipated third and final series … and no one is more cheerful than residents of the Calder Valley, West Yorkshire, where it’s filmed.

The gritty drama has put the area firmly on the tourist map, and local people love the way it portrays them and their humour.