Poldark star Aidan Turner has a dirty secret!

“Poldark? I’d never heard of him!”

It’s one of the most iconic and fondly remembered TV roles of the past 40 years.

But new Poldark star Aidan Turner has an admission to make about taking on Ross Poldark, the part memorably played by Robin Ellis in the mid-1970s.

“I’d never heard of Poldark,” confesses Dublin-born Aidan.

“But when I told my parents I was going to play Ross they nearly had a fit!”

Ellis crops up in the new eight-part BBC1 series and Aidan admits he’s conscious of the expectations of taking on such a striking role.

“I don’t want to let people down, but I don’t think it’s productive to think about how you can disappoint people. And, remember, a lot of people haven’t seen the previous adaptation as it was 40 years ago.

“There are a lot of people that won’t have heard of it. Having scenes with Robin Ellis was brilliant. He is such a lovely guy and still receives fan mail. You can only imagine what it was like the show was absolutely huge.”

Poldark is set in the late 18th Century with Ross returning from the American War of Independence to his beloved Cornwall only to find his world in ruins.

It’s a dashing, swash-buckler of a role with Aidan more than happy to get stuck in, especially to the horse riding sequences with trusty steed, Seamus.

“You can’t do bad acting on a horse, you look too cool,” laughs Aidan, known for TV series Desperate Romantics and Being Human as well as the Hobbit trilogy of movies.

“Anytime I could get on the horse I’d do it,” he adds.

“They wouldn’t let me gallop along the clifftops, for obvious reasons, but I did as much as possible.”

Poldark, BBC1, Sun, 9pm.