Dawn French brings back Vicar of Dibley character to honour terminally ill friend

French originally played the role of Geraldine Grainger from 1994 to 2007

Dawn French has revived her Vicar of Dibley character during a “living funeral” for her terminally ill friend, Coppafeel founder Kris Hallenga.

Hallenga has been living with stage four breast cancer since 2009. Last week, the 37-year-old aarranged an event to celebrate her life, with help from her friends and family.

“If you’re a little behind, in January I decided I wanted to organise my own living funeral, my FUNeral, and in doing so celebrate a life that I have truly loved, surrounded by people I loved,” Hallenga wrote in an Instagram post.

“It was during a psylocibin (magic mushroom) journey later in January that my very wild and wonderful ideas were concocted and in March I started to organise the event of my life,” she added.

For the dress code, Hallenga asked her guests to dress up as “YODO (take of that what you will)”.

As part of the ceremony at Truro Cathedral in Cornwall, French dressed up as her Vicar of Dibley character Geraldine Grainger to deliver a eulogy for her friend.

“It was my privilege and joy to Dibley it up at her living (she was there) FUNeral on Sat,” Dawn wrote in an Instagram post. “She wanted to host the best possible party. She did. It was phenomenal. So much love filling Truro cathedral.

“It was her own festival celebrating an extraordinary life. What a total babe,” she added.

In her Instagram post, Hallenga said that she’s “never felt love like it. I’ve never felt joy like it. I’ve never felt such kinship with mortality. I’ve never felt so alive.”

French originally played Geraldine from 1994 to 2007.

Vicar of Dibley is based follows Geraldine as she moves to the fictional Oxfordshire village of Dibley, which is assigned its first female vicar after the Church of England decides to allow women to be ordained in 1993.

The BBC show has won multiple British Comedy Awards, two International Emmys and multiple British Academy Television Awards nominations.