18-05-2025
Reuben Owen: ‘I don't want a TV career, I want to be known as the guy who digs big holes'
Television's least-likely star is lying on the grass, all 6ft 7in of him, stretched out in heroically filthy Levi's, with an oversized bulldozer on his belt buckle and thermal-lined Le Chameau boots.
We are in a Cumbrian field, just over the border from his native Yorkshire, and Reuben Owen is taking a break from levelling land for a new milking parlour. The sun is blazing down on the parched, craggy hills, while Texel lambs are bleating their presence. But Owen, 21, only has eyes for his heavy machinery.
The second series of Reuben Owen: Life in the Dales is about to hit our television screens, but it's fair to say that Owen remains almost comically unchanged by fame.
'The proudest moment of my life wasn't taking part in any TV show, it was the day I got my name on my own digger,' he says, face straight as Geoffrey Boycott's cricket bat. 'When that customised sticker was put on, saying 'Reuben Owen', I knew that I had really accomplished something.'
If you're thinking that sounds a little bit bonkers – given that he is the eldest son of the ' Yorkshire Shepherdess ' and therefore a scion of a rural reality-show dynasty – you wouldn't be wrong. And that's what makes him TV gold.
'I can't believe I have my own heavy-machinery company, aged 21, and if the cameras want to follow me and watch, then that's great,' he says. 'The production crew love it when something goes wrong, of course, but we always find a way through. In the country, people have to be self-sufficient, we can turn our hands to almost anything and we always help each other out.'
Reuben is the eldest son of Amanda Owen and her now ex-husband Clive, whose everyday life has had us all hooked since their first observational documentary series way back in 2018. Since then, we have watched the highs and lows of the couple and their brood of nine free-range children at their remote home of Ravenseat Farm – aka Our Yorkshire Farm.
Needless to say, when his parents separated in 2022, it sparked a tabloid frenzy. There was talk of acrimony, and it was revealed that Amanda had started a new relationship after the separation – but after a brief pause, the broadcasting juggernaut trundled on. There was Beyond the Yorkshire Farm: Reuben & Clive, a spin-off Channel 5 series that showed the father and son duo launching the digging business. Then came Our Farm Next Door: Amanda, Clive and Kids on Channel 4, where they renovated a derelict farmhouse.
So far, so predictable. Who doesn't like lambs? Who doesn't get overinvested in property-makeover shows? But with Reuben: Life in the Dales we are talking about heavy machinery; 14-ton diggers, huge wagons, quarrying equipment. There isn't even the archetypal canine eye-candy of a winsome Jack Russell keeping Reuben company in the cab.
'A dog would get run over, squashed under the wheels,' says Owen, matter-of-factly. Everything he says is matter-of-fact. In the whole time we meet he doesn't once use the phrase 'my lived experience' or 'safe space'. 'I also haven't got the time to train a dog properly, but I'm sure the day will come when I get one.'
He's quietly charming, and is touchingly smitten by his new girlfriend, Jessica Ellwood, also 21, with a smile as wide as the River Swale. She hails from a nearby farming family and can really drive a digger – the ultimate compliment from Reuben. He joins her rounding up sheep, she helps as and when – they are such hard workers, it's the best (sometimes the only) way of getting quality time together.
'Jess is so happy and chilled out,' he says, his eyes crinkling as his slow beam spreads from ear to ear. 'We met at a Young Farmers' event and it was the biggest stroke of luck. She's not bothered by the filming, either, which is great; the telly thing brings a bit of money into the pot, which is useful.'
That's all well and good, although at first glance a casual viewer might wonder if it's not rather odd to commission a series (let alone a second series) about a young man and his passion for heavy machinery. Then again, a great many of us said the same about two blokes angling – cue Mortimer and Whitehouse: Gone Fishing garnering nearly two million viewers per episode. Old, broken stuff? Nobody could have guessed King Charles himself, then Prince of Wales, would turn up at The Repair Shop with heirlooms to fix.
So why not Reuben Owen driving his digger? And, in truth, it's surprisingly relaxing to watch him with his great big strapping mates grafting at the quarry, or playing highly competitive tug-of-war. Here is the very definition of good, clean mucky fun and the perfect antidote to the spectre of toxic masculinity that hangs over television dramas.
In this new run, we see Reuben punctiliously training up his younger brother Miles, 18, in driving diggers and tractors, and when he muses 'we are always short of staff', I almost suggest three urban lads and a lass I know personally who would benefit from a summer season in the great all-weather outdoors. I doubt Owen would be in the least bit fazed if they turned up tomorrow in their box-fresh Nikes and pristine Stüssy tracksuits.
He takes people as he finds them. 'What I do is all about people,' he says sagely. 'I love digging holes, but the success of a business isn't down to the diggers, you need good people you can trust and rely on. Yes, I'm in a position where I'm able to employ my friends, but I would do anything for them and they would for me.'
He is clearly his own man and credits his confidence to his upbringing, when the unofficial motto was very much 'fortune favours the brave'. At a time when all small farmers are being forced to diversify, his family have elected to enjoy a parallel telly existence. His mother, in particular, has become a successful presenter in her own right.
But Owen concedes there is a downside to the spotlight: 'The media still likes to dig up my parents' separation, making out there was some massive battle when there wasn't,' he says. 'I know how it went and it was all very amicable. They grew apart and split up, but they are still brilliant parents, whether they're together or not. Every now and again, there will be a headline about some little thing that has been blown up out of all proportion. But you can't be on telly and then expect people not to be interested in what you're doing off-screen.'
The day we meet, there is a tabloid brouhaha about images posted online by Amanda, which snowflake townies thought were pictures of Owen 'manhandling' a sheep. He was actually helping a distressed ewe give birth to a live lamb. But Owen was blissfully unaware of it all.
'I don't have the time or the inclination to scroll through social media,' he says. 'If you do ever see me on my phone, I'll be searching for machinery sales. I don't want a career on television, I want to be known as the guy who digs big holes; my current ambition is to buy a 50-ton excavator. Now that really would be the realisation of a dream.'
