Playing Cupid

A sharp, funny and honest memoir of building an introduction agency – and witnessing every kind of bizarre intrigue imaginable

Playing Cupid is the story of Dinner Dates, an introduction and social events agency founded by Hillie Marshall in the late 1980s, while she was working as a busy singer and theatre producer. It is a time capsule of how we dated before the online era. Without technology or social media, she built a thriving business that brought happiness and companionship to thousands.

Twenty years later, Hillie had become an agony aunt, a dating expert on TV and radio, and the author of several self-help books, having witnessed a lifetime’s worth of sweethearts, scoundrels, stalkers, survivors, bounders, rebounders, happy endings – and a few tragedies.

But life was never easy. Hillie’s staff needed all their resilience and ingenuity to win clients, calm tempers, avert disasters and keep the bills paid. With humorous stories from the dating scene and her theatre career – and the horror ones too – Playing Cupid is a tale of resilience, risk-taking and seizing opportunities.

A warm and entertaining memoir from the founder of Dinner Dates – a social events club for singles. (Find out how dating was done in the pre-internet era!)

From radiographer to accomplished author, Hillie Marshall pursued a theatre career spanning opera, musical comedy, pantomime and plays. She formed her own production company, Edwardians Unlimited, producing Variety and Old Tyme Music Hall shows with stars including Barbara Windsor, Roy Hudd, Leslie Crowther, Nicholas Parsons, Clive Dunn and Barry Cryer.

During her divorce, and while bringing up children, she founded and launched Dinner Dates in the late 80s, which went on to become one of the country’s leading social events companies for single people.

Putting her experience with people to good use, Hillie became an agony aunt online and in magazines and newspapers, offering advice and a sympathetic ear to thousands. She later put pen to paper, writing three books on relationships.

Hillie became familiar to many through appearances on programmes including Esther Rantzen, Kilroy, The Big Breakfast, Richard & Judy, GMTV, The Vanessa Show, The Time The Place, Carlton’s After 5, and her own show on LBC.

Barbara Windsor summed up Hillie Marshall in her review of Hillie’s first book:
‘Hillie’s lived a lot, loved a lot, and throughout her life been the shoulder for many to cry on. Hillie works from the heart – and no one has a bigger heart than Hillie’.

Find out more about Hillie at hillie.com

"Hillie Marshall’s new book ‘Playing Cupid’ is a hugely entertaining romp through the trials and tribulations of running a dating agency."
5* from Mrs Christine Hughes

"Was a member of Dinner Dates for many years and found this book very amusing, especially trying to link the names in the book to their 'Alter Ego'."
5* from Shr Razwi

"Hilarious! The inside story of a social events company with many examples of the humorous, sometimes painful quirks of human nature. I laughed out loud!"
5* from Pintofbest