Eileen Atkins

Speaker 10:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 10:08

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen ninety eight and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:31

My castaway this week is an actress. She's been at the forefront of her profession for more than thirty years. Apart from appearing in many distinguished theatre productions, she won the Evening Standard Best Actress Award last year. She's also written screenplays and was the creator, with her friend Jean Marsh, of both Upstairs, Downstairs and House of Elliott. She's also famous in the United States for performances in her own adaptation of the works of Virginia Woolf. All this from a woman whose childhood was made miserable by a mother who dressed her up as a Latter-day Shirley Temple and forced her to waggle her bottom in working men's clubs. I am a vessel through which people speak, she says. As long as I'm acting, I'm happy. She is Eileen Atkins. The most recent person to speak through you, Eileen, is Alan Bennett in Talking Heads, one of his recent Talking Heads on BBC Two. You were the antique dealer who sold the scrap of Michelangelo for £100. Are his creations easy to slip into? I mean, do they are they easy to

Eileen Atkins1:29

Fit. Oh, yes, very. I think the wonderful thing about Alan is that actually there's a link with Virginia Woolf because

Eileen Atkins1:36

She said that

Eileen Atkins1:38

That men weren't interested in the thoughts of a woman.

Eileen Atkins1:42

In a drawing room. And that is really what he's writing.

Presenter1:43

But

Presenter1:45

Gas, isn't it?

Eileen Atkins1:46

Yeah. Yeah.

Presenter1:47

And do you have to like that person do in order to be able to play her? She wasn't a particularly

Eileen Atkins1:52

Likeable woman. You know, the first thing he said to me was, She's a horrible woman, Eileen.

Eileen Atkins1:56

Yes, weirdly, you do, and you get quite offended if people then say she wasn't very nice, because you've then worked out exactly why she isn't very nice.

Presenter2:07

Yeah.

Eileen Atkins2:07

and sort of forgiven her.

Presenter2:08

But somebody said about you this is this is a compliment as an actress she could find humanity in Snow White's stepmother. But is that what you do? You go looking for it.

Eileen Atkins2:18

I would hate to be thought I always played sympathetically. And John Osborne once got very angry with me and I had one of his horrendous letters when I played his mother.

Eileen Atkins2:30

in a better class of person, simply because I worked out that the poor woman must have at least been tired from working all day at one job and another job in the evening and having a husband who never earned.

Eileen Atkins2:42

And he said I played it too sympathetically.

Speaker 42:44

Mm-hmm.

Eileen Atkins2:45

Once you have searched inside yourself.

Eileen Atkins2:49

for the reality of that person.

Eileen Atkins2:52

Then you know that that's in all of us, so therefore you play it with, I suppose, some.

Presenter2:59

Yeah.

Eileen Atkins3:00

Empathy, if not.

Presenter3:00

Sympathy.

Eileen Atkins3:01

Thanks.

Presenter3:02

Patently you like Virginia Woolfe. You've played her opposite Vanessa Redgrave in In Vita and Virginia. You wrote the play, and you've delivered her words verbatim in a room of one's own.

Presenter3:11

What is it that you like about her?

Eileen Atkins3:15

I simply adore her. When people, friends of mine, say, How can you like her? She's such a snob, they were all such snobs. I once actually recorded a couple of friends of mine who said that about her, and I recorded them in my house one evening, and I played it back to them the next day and said, You don't think you're slightly snobbish? And I think everyone has their own snobbery. And after all, when they people go on about her and say, Oh, they were so vile to each other and they said such awful things, that was the whole idea of the Bloomsbury evenings, that they would be very critical of one another. But they could also be very funny. She could be funny, couldn't she? Oh, this is the thing I try, and this is the word I try to spread about her, because people are frightened of her. And one has to remember that she was the person they most wanted at a party. I mean, when Lytton Strachie and Clive Bell were sitting in the country one day with it pouring with rain and they'd been bitching.

Eileen Atkins4:07

Virginia.

Eileen Atkins4:09

And Clive Bell, after a pause, said, All the same.

Eileen Atkins4:12

Who would be most likely to see walking down the path at this moment?

Eileen Atkins4:17

And they both said Virginia, because she was such huge fun. But then she was a manic depressive, you know. She'd probably be given pills today and may not have written.

Presenter4:25

And you?

Eileen Atkins4:26

Who came to

Presenter4:26

Uh-huh.

Eileen Atkins4:27

Christmas. Uh

Presenter4:27

Yeah. Christ

Eileen Atkins4:31

I decided to do the one woman show because of Barbara Gartner. I was doing a little film in Cardiff with Ian Holme.

Eileen Atkins4:38

And uh we were in the same hotel and I was wandering along the corridor and he called out he said, Eileen, do come and see. It's Terry Rogan with Barbara Cartland and Jaja Gabor.

Eileen Atkins4:48

and he said it has to be watched.

Eileen Atkins4:52

And I went and we sat there, we were roaring with laughter, and she suddenly went on about Mogadon, which I've taken since I was twenty nine years old, every single night of my life. And she said, Anyone who takes Mogadon for more than

Eileen Atkins5:05

A few months, their brain absolutely disintegrates.

Eileen Atkins5:09

And

Eileen Atkins5:10

Patrick had been sort of nagging me to do it. I said, No, I don't want to learn a one-woman show. And I thought, I'm going to learn it, I'm going to do it.

Presenter5:17

Yeah.

Eileen Atkins5:17

Just to pro

Eileen Atkins5:19

Yeah.

Presenter5:19

Mm-hmm.

Eileen Atkins5:20

And I did.

Eileen Atkins5:23

Uh my first record is um Schumann's Waltzeinen. It was played in The Unexpected Man that I'd just done recently with Michael Gambon, and I loved it so much I sometimes didn't come in with my lines because I got carried away with it.

Presenter6:39

Sviatoslav Richter playing the opening of Schumann's Waltzin and Opus Eighty Two, and that was recorded in nineteen fifty seven and it was used this summer in The Unexpected Man, a play which you did with Michael Gambon. Two strangers in a train thinking aloud about their lives and inevitably about each other. Again, effectively monologues for the most part, which, as we say, the talking head was as well.

Presenter7:04

Is that more fulfilling in a funny kind of way than dialogue? You're absolutely on your own, in a sense, aren't you? It's down to you.

Eileen Atkins7:10

Down to you. It's sort of six of one, half dozen of the other. Um when I first said to Alec McCowan, I rang him up to say, you know, is there any method of learning the one person show? And he said

Eileen Atkins7:22

And I said, Didn't you get terribly lonely?

Eileen Atkins7:25

And he said, Yes, you do get lonely, and it is awful when something funny happens on stage, and you know there's no one to share it with. But he said,

Eileen Atkins7:35

You will find that when you go back to doing your play, you'll think, oh, now they've come on to mess it up.

Eileen Atkins7:42

And there's a there's a little bit of both.

Presenter7:44

What about when you're doing it for television, as in the Alan Bennett? And effectively it's a thirty five minute monologue, but you change so there are because it changes for angle and shot, doesn't it? So each section might be what, about eight minutes? Seven, eight minutes. How many takes would you do on?

Eileen Atkins7:56

Seven eight.

Eileen Atkins7:59

Uh

Eileen Atkins8:00

I did.

Eileen Atkins8:01

Two, mostly.

Eileen Atkins8:04

and sometimes three, and it's utterly terrifying.

Presenter8:07

And is there a little genie sitting on your shoulder saying, You're nearly there, but you're going to make a mistake before you get there?

Eileen Atkins8:12

Anyway

Eileen Atkins8:14

How did you know that? That's exactly what there is. I once made a very funny mistake like that. Um we were doing a charity evening for Harold Pinter, and there were uh five actresses uh Joanna Lamley, Judy Dench, Penelope Wilton, myself.

Eileen Atkins8:29

And

Eileen Atkins8:30

Anna Massey.

Eileen Atkins8:32

We'd got a very long poem by Akhmatova.

Eileen Atkins8:35

And I had the beginning and the end.

Eileen Atkins8:38

And I was very nervous, and I started it off, and I thought, that's right, I've started it very well. And then they all picked it up and went on. And then I had.

Eileen Atkins8:46

The l the very last I thought, God, we've done well, see if I can really carry it on.

Eileen Atkins8:51

And the last line was And the Pigeons Coo Above the Neva.

Eileen Atkins8:57

And I feeling so pleased with myself, and I said, And the kidcheons poo above the Neva.

Eileen Atkins9:04

Yeah.

Eileen Atkins9:05

Alan and Asse actually exploded on stage and we all ran offstage laughing. And I think Harold was quite cross.

Eileen Atkins9:13

Record number two.

Eileen Atkins9:14

Well, I simply love.

Eileen Atkins9:16

Tap dancing and I I want the tap dancing from Forty Second Street.

Speaker 49:22

On the avenue, I'm taking you to 42nd Street.

Speaker 49:29

Hear the beat

Speaker 49:30

Have dancing feet.

Speaker 49:34

It's the song I love, the melody of 40 seconds

Speaker 49:41

One of the beast innocent friends

Speaker 49:45

Taxi ladies from the 80s who are in this

Presenter9:50

Wonder Richard, as Peggy singing and tapping Forty second Street from David Merrick's original Broadway production. Was it tap Eileen Akkins that you did in in the working men's clubs when you waggled your bottom?

Eileen Atkins10:02

Yes, um even smarter than tap, I did something called toe tap.

Eileen Atkins10:06

On a drum and sang Yankee Doodle Dandy. And how old were you?

Eileen Atkins10:11

And why? Why did your mother put you to this, as it were? Oh, um, a gipsy came to the door when I was about three and told my mother that I was going to be a great dancer.

Eileen Atkins10:22

And uh my mother believed things like that. So I was sent off to dancing classes and I screamed and cried and hated it and was sent home and she sent me again when I was four and I screamed and cried. And did you go on hating it?

Eileen Atkins10:33

No. Because you went on doing it. It's very hard to be unhappy when you're tapping. It's a strange thing. And I'm a very gregarious person, so that I did love um the other children and I was always organising things and things like that. But I did dislike intensely doing the working men's clubs and I was very tired and it meant I was tired at school.

Eileen Atkins10:56

And many teachers tried to stop it. I would absolutely, I have no idea if it still goes on, but I would ban, I would ban children being employed.

Eileen Atkins11:05

in any way in the entertainment industry.

Eileen Atkins11:10

No, no, my mother, I think a

Eileen Atkins11:13

She thought she was a hu she was very fat and she thought she was a big plain woman and she had this little baby when she was forty six, little and until I was six I was pretty and then it all went. And I think, you know, she wanted this little thing to dance and she wanted I think she wanted to be, I don't know, famous something, I don't know.

Presenter11:34

This was all on a on a council estate in in Tottenham, north London.

Eileen Atkins11:37

North London.

Presenter11:37

And and your father uh earned his living reading gas meters? Yeah.

Eileen Atkins11:42

Yes, but he had been in service, which is how uh upstairs, downstairs came into

Presenter11:47

So is that where the idea came from?

Eileen Atkins11:48

Yes. Under chauffeur to the Marquis de Sauverel.

Eileen Atkins11:52

and the Portuguese ambassador, and he couldn't drive.

Eileen Atkins11:56

And all he had to do was uh keep the car clean.

Eileen Atkins12:00

And keep the chauffeur awake. And apparently he looked like Hitler. Yes. Th this I realized when I

Eileen Atkins12:07

grew much older, was his claim to fame. He wanted to be famous.

Eileen Atkins12:12

You know, people say you don't have to look like Adolph.

Eileen Atkins12:15

Go, Mr. Akin. And this was during the war. Yes.

Presenter12:16

And this was just

Eileen Atkins12:18

I mean, he didn't have to have the little moustache and slick his hair down, did he? But other than that, he was he was a nice dad. He told you stories, I think. I think he left school at twelve.

Eileen Atkins12:27

Um

Eileen Atkins12:29

And he was highly imaginative, but I guess would be called slow today.

Eileen Atkins12:35

Um

Eileen Atkins12:36

And that's why he didn't want me to read, because he knew that once I started reading, I'd read my own stories and he wouldn't tell me stories anymore. He'd be redundant. So he hated books being in the house.

Presenter12:43

He'd be redundant.

Eileen Atkins12:46

So there were none? No, there were no books, no pictures, and no music.

Presenter12:50

Record number three.

Eileen Atkins12:51

I'd like the Brahms clarinet and piano sonata. In um I'm mad about the clarinet anyway, and in The Unexpected Man, my character goes to an evening of Brahms sonatas and it made me s because of the part. Nearly everything you learn as an actor is because of the part. And I started listening to them again and I thought

Eileen Atkins13:13

I don't play music nearly enough and um it reminded me just how much I love this.

Presenter14:20

Gervaise de Payer and Gwyneth Pryor playing part of the second movement of Brahm's clarinet and piano sonata in F minor.

Presenter14:27

Apparently, Eileen, and it seems to be true for such a lot of people, it was a teacher at school who saved you from all of this, as it were, one Mr. Burton. Tell me about it.

Eileen Atkins14:36

Yes, I

Presenter14:37

Yeah.

Eileen Atkins14:37

It's nearly always a teacher. Um he absolutely saved my life. I I really don't know what would have happened to me without uh Mr. Burton.

Eileen Atkins14:47

My mother worked out that if I could speak properly I would get little speaking parts.

Eileen Atkins14:54

As a telegraph, you know, as a dancer, I would get the odd line.

Eileen Atkins14:58

So she sent me with a note to school.

Eileen Atkins15:01

asking the teacher to give me elocution lessons, and the woman sent me back with a note saying they'd be seven and six, and my mother said, I can't afford that that was that. So we didn't do anything about it. And one day this man who was

Eileen Atkins15:14

Our religious instructor stopped me in the corridor and said, I hear you want to learn to speak properly.

Eileen Atkins15:22

And I said, Well, my mum does. My mum wants me to do. He said, If you come whenever I tell you to, if you stay as long as I want you to, if you do whatever I say, I will teach you.

Eileen Atkins15:34

And

Eileen Atkins15:35

He taught me about life. It wasn't just the theatre. I'm I'm almost crying thinking about it.

Eileen Atkins15:42

Um

Eileen Atkins15:44

The first time he gave me a piece of Shakespeare, he didn't tell me it was Shakespeare. It was so clever of him. He just typed it out and said, read that.

Eileen Atkins15:51

And it was Helena in a Midsummer Night's Dream, and he said, What's that about?

Eileen Atkins15:55

I said, Well, it's this girl who can't get her blow, can she? and um, you know, she's really fed up'cause he likes the other one.

Eileen Atkins16:02

And he said, Does anything strike you about it? I said, Well, it seems a bit like poetry, but it's not, is it?

Eileen Atkins16:07

And he said it's Shakespeare. And I was never nervous of Shakespeare.

Eileen Atkins16:12

But he he made me look at things, he brought paintings in for me to look at.

Eileen Atkins16:18

He opened up the world to me, and without him I didn't work very hard at school, and I was bottom of the class for three, four years running. And he said, I'm working hard on your parents to get you to drama school. If you don't get school certificate, if you don't matriculate, you won't get to.

Eileen Atkins16:35

to drama school.

Eileen Atkins16:37

And he said, Why don't you work? I said, Oh, I can't concentrate.

Eileen Atkins16:41

and he took me to a big typing pool.

Eileen Atkins16:43

And he pointed and said, If you don't work, that's what you'll spend the rest of your life doing.

Eileen Atkins16:48

And I shot up from bottom to tether and I got seven out of eight subjects.

Presenter16:53

And what did your mother say when you told her that you wanted to be an actor, that you wanted to go to drama school?

Eileen Atkins16:58

They were bemused.

Eileen Atkins17:01

They didn't really th the reason they didn't like it was that they didn't understand it. And from then on the horror started really, because they didn't understand about plays. They'd never been to play. He took me to my first play and he took my mother with me and she had to sit through King John.

Presenter17:20

What what did she say, your mother, or what did your parents say, when you eventually made it, when you did, you know, in later life, become a great success?

Presenter17:29

Yeah.

Eileen Atkins17:29

They were told

Eileen Atkins17:31

by other people.

Eileen Atkins17:33

The tie was a success.

Eileen Atkins17:36

And I think they were proud, but I think they would have much, much rather.

Eileen Atkins17:41

I'd been in musicals.

Eileen Atkins17:44

Next piece of music

Eileen Atkins17:46

I'd love the Rolling Stones, Mick singing Hey You Get Off of My Cloud. I did a day's filming with Mick Jagger.

Eileen Atkins17:55

For fifty pounds because I so wanted to be nice or to be able to do it. I mean, you paid them. I would have done.

Eileen Atkins18:01

The sexiest thing going, I thought, and rather still do, I think.

Speaker 418:14

Ain't good out there.

Speaker 418:17

I'm gonna go around

Speaker 418:32

Ha ha ha

Presenter18:36

Rolling Stones and get off of my cloud. You didn't go to Rada, Eileen, but you managed to con the Guild Hall into teaching you to act. How did you do that?

Eileen Atkins18:44

That Yes, um mister Burton said apply for a scholarship to Rada.

Eileen Atkins18:49

And oh, about two hundred applied, and I got down to the last ten, and I'd been in for my third.

Eileen Atkins18:56

Audition

Eileen Atkins18:58

and there were only three scholarships. And the day my sister got married I got the wire to say that I hadn't got a place and I behaved appallingly and nearly ruined her wedding.

Eileen Atkins19:09

So he said, Well, you'll have to be a teacher and go to Guild Hall.

Eileen Atkins19:13

And I thought, Oh no, I won't.

Eileen Atkins19:15

and I did a teaching course at Guildhall, for which I got a grant.

Eileen Atkins19:19

And without telling anyone, I simply went to all the um lessons for the for acting. I don't think you could probably do it today, but I I I simply got there at nine o'clock in the morning, came out at ten at night.

Presenter19:32

And you had

Eileen Atkins19:32

But you had to own up in the end, presumably. My last term, they didn't find out. The principal had me in and said, Eileen, I don't understand this. You're on a teaching course. You're doing your exams now to be a teacher. And you appear to be in three plays this term. And I said, I'm sorry, I've been doing it all along. And he said, Oh, go away. I'm not going to say anything now.

Presenter19:51

But apparently you you suffered terribly because in your view you were a working class girl from Tottenham mixing with all these knobs.

Eileen Atkins20:01

Yes. Well, you learn that everything you do

Eileen Atkins20:05

Is is wrong. I mean, I learnt very quickly that it was common to ask for tea. You had to have coffee.

Eileen Atkins20:11

I just

Eileen Atkins20:12

It was years before I felt that I could have a cup of tea if I wanted to. It it just it it it's difficult.

Presenter20:21

So the accent, the mannerism, everything.

Eileen Atkins20:24

I copied everything and I had just learned a perfect Celia Johnson accent when as I left drama school the big thing that happened was that um all the Albert Finney, everybody, Tom Courtenay, all the Northern stuff was in.

Eileen Atkins20:41

So I very quickly persuaded everybody that I came from the Midlands or the North. I used to be very vague. I used to say sort of I north of Birmingham. Do you still worry about class today? Are you still aware to alert to it all?

Eileen Atkins20:56

I hope I've stopped having the huge brick on my shoulder because really at my age it would be ludicrous and with my luck that I've had it would be ludicrous.

Eileen Atkins21:06

But I'm afraid it's still that.

Presenter21:07

It's there.

Presenter21:09

Record number five.

Eileen Atkins21:11

This is Vivaldi lute music.

Eileen Atkins21:16

It it it was it was used in a production of The Duchess of Malfi.

Eileen Atkins21:19

A disastrous production of The Duchess of Melfie I did in Los Angeles as an American said to me, We know we have to sit through Shakespeare, but do we really have to sit through this?

Eileen Atkins21:31

But even though it was utterly disastrous, I had a wonderful time, and this music has lived with me ever since.

Presenter22:39

Rolf Lieslevan, playing part of the Largo from Vivaldi's concerto for two violins, lute and continuo in D major. Your career, Eileen Atkins, seems to have really taken off in the second half of your twenties. You played Shakespeare at the Old Fic, Viola and Miranda, you acted with Olivier and Alec Guinness. And then you had a big hit, didn't you, opposite Beryl Reed in The Killing of Sister George. So it's a and since then I presume you've never been out of work, really?

Eileen Atkins23:05

I needn't have been. No, I have been, but I needn't have been. There has always been a job.

Presenter23:09

It does look as if you avoided the subsidised theatre in the main. Is there something in that you resisted both Stratford and the National, didn't you?

Eileen Atkins23:16

Um

Eileen Atkins23:18

Larry Olivia did ask me a couple of times to join the National.

Eileen Atkins23:23

But I wu something more attractive was always happening. Somewhere up

Presenter23:27

So it wasn't to do with a another kind of inferiority complex that you just felt that somehow they were too intellectual or too

Eileen Atkins23:34

Oh, no, no, no, no. In fact, I think I rather thought I should have been there. Um no, I think the competition uh at the at the national was huge. Uh in my age group there was Joan Plarite, Maggie Smith.

Eileen Atkins23:46

Billy White, Lord Geraldine McEwan, and I probably was canny and thought, I think I'll stay out of that and do some stuff in the West End and at the Royal Court instead.

Presenter23:55

Of course you could have had a part in Upstairs, Downstairs, which you were helping had helped to create at about that stage, and and you didn't. Now a lot of the names you've mentioned and others, Judy Dench, of course, have taken on parts in the television that's made their name, and you didn't do that. Why not?

Eileen Atkins24:11

Not. No, everybody asked me that. It was at the time

Eileen Atkins24:15

That we did it.

Eileen Atkins24:17

I I was having a very good

Eileen Atkins24:21

run in the well, I've had a very good run for a long time. But if you do a series like that, I think you've got to commit yourself to two or three years to it. And the exciting thing for me is

Eileen Atkins24:33

To find a character. The interesting bit for me is the rehearsal.

Eileen Atkins24:40

First night is just terrifying, and is this going to work? But the the really interesting thing is building a character. Now, if you do a television series, you build the character and then you just say various things that they say every week. But

Eileen Atkins24:55

I it would have

Eileen Atkins24:57

For me it would have lacked interest. So it didn't enter my head. And anyway, I'd only ever wanted to do theatre. That was what I wanted to do. And in the States, of course, you've

Presenter25:07

Done so much of it. You're you're to the truth is you're more famous in the States than here, aren't you?

Eileen Atkins25:13

Well, I I'm I'm

Eileen Atkins25:15

I'm much better known in New York.

Eileen Atkins25:17

And I pull in audiences in New York.

Eileen Atkins25:20

I put bums on seats in New York and I'm always worried that I won't put a single bum on a seat in the West End.

Presenter25:25

How do you explain that?

Eileen Atkins25:27

Um well

Eileen Atkins25:29

In Britain we're very addicted to going and seeing, which I didn't realise when I I still wouldn't have changed my mind about it, but people do go and see T V stars in England.

Eileen Atkins25:41

Or film stars. In New York, there is a r a real

Eileen Atkins25:46

Broadway audience and the the people who go to the theater in New York don't watch television.

Eileen Atkins25:53

And I think that's because their television was so bad. And so there are theatre stars.

Eileen Atkins26:00

For want of a better word, star is a silly word. But there are people they go to see, and I'm now one of those people they go to see. Number six.

Eileen Atkins26:10

Number six is the Mammas and the Papas. I really love them. This to me is America. I used to listen to them all the time over there, and this is a totally American song.

Speaker 426:24

I got that on my lead.

Speaker 426:28

And I pretend to play I've pretended to play

Speaker 426:32

You never preach it like the cold

Speaker 426:36

He knows I'm gonna stay.

Presenter26:54

The Mammas and the Papas and California Dreaming

Presenter26:57

Um it was in America, Eileen. You you'd finished a round of Vita and Virginia, you were playing in the next play, Les Parent Théribe, by night, you were writing More Wolf, the screenplay for misses Dalloway by day, when suddenly you discovered you had a lump.

Presenter27:12

Now, if I can say it it's it's strange this because yours is actually rather an optimistic breast.

Eileen Atkins27:18

It's cancer story, isn't it?

Presenter27:19

Yeah.

Eileen Atkins27:20

Well, yes, and I've been trying to think recently, and I'm afraid my own profession.

Eileen Atkins27:25

Is hugely at fault for our attitude towards cancer and journalism because I've realised that.

Eileen Atkins27:32

It's only worth putting cancer in a play.

Eileen Atkins27:35

If the person's going to die, that's dramatic. But if you say, well, this looks hopeful, and she'll probably last another 25 years, there's no story.

Eileen Atkins27:45

I didn't know anything about cancer until I got it. Uh first of all, they told me that they it was a small lump, and I was in America. Um

Eileen Atkins27:54

Wonderful surgeon called Chips Cody.

Eileen Atkins27:58

And he said he was 99.9 sure that it hadn't gone anywhere else. And I thought, oh, well, all right, so a lump's coming out. And I was looking forward to going back into the play. It does sound as if.

Presenter28:06

It does sound as if you took it all in your stride. I mean, I was careful.

Eileen Atkins28:08

Yes, I found the lump. I asked them to find me. I said immediately I went in to see them. They said, yes, it's cancer.

Eileen Atkins28:16

And I wasn't even really that phased. I sort of knew it was. And I thought, oh, yes, I think you can have the lump out. And then.

Eileen Atkins28:25

came the day they had to tell me it had gone into the lymph glands.

Eileen Atkins28:29

And that was frightening.

Eileen Atkins28:32

And I thought, oh, hell, lo I'm afraid the first thing, vanity, I'm going to lose all my hair. Well, I didn't lose a single hair.

Eileen Atkins28:40

I did say that.

Presenter28:40

Even though you had chemotherapy.

Eileen Atkins28:43

which again people don't know.

Eileen Atkins28:46

Now I have to say that that is me and everyone. Each case is utterly individual and some people have hell having chemotherapy. Because the truth is I think you compared notes with Linda McCartney along the way. Yes, we used to talk, and poor Linda

Presenter28:56

Um that's

Eileen Atkins29:02

It went another way for her.

Eileen Atkins29:05

Um

Eileen Atkins29:06

But um But the bottom line is what? You're just lucky?

Eileen Atkins29:10

Well, you don't know. I mean, I'm on six monthly check ups now.

Eileen Atkins29:15

And I think what happens is that everyone is everyone who has had it.

Eileen Atkins29:21

and is so far all right, which is all I will say, daren't say so, because we're all so superstitious. You're terrified that the day you say I'm fine, you're going and say So I think you don't hear about those of us. I I ha I have to be eternally grateful to Susan

Eileen Atkins29:40

Who I didn't know, and she turned up at nine o'clock in my

Eileen Atkins29:46

Apartment in New York.

Eileen Atkins29:48

And she had had a double mastectomy and it had been in every single lymph gland. Now it's then it was twenty-five years ago, twenty-seven years ago.

Eileen Atkins29:57

and she had two years chemotherapy.

Eileen Atkins30:00

And she was brave enough to write a book about it and say, I got over it.

Eileen Atkins30:06

Next piece of music.

Eileen Atkins30:07

The next piece of music was

Eileen Atkins30:10

Music used by Patrick Garland.

Eileen Atkins30:13

At the end of Eatron, Virginia, because um Virginia Woolf

Eileen Atkins30:17

Committed suicide by putting stones in her pocket.

Eileen Atkins30:20

and lying down in a river.

Eileen Atkins30:22

And

Eileen Atkins30:24

This is the music he used, it's Poulanx improvisations.

Eileen Atkins30:28

And I think this particular piece is his homage to Edith Pieff.

Presenter31:34

Pascal Roget playing one of Poulanc's improvisations, number fifteen in C minor.

Presenter31:39

It was um Elliot who said Webster was much possessed by death and saw the skull beneath the skin, and you've played his most famous character, the Duchess of Malfi, as you mentioned. And you are much possessed by death, aren't you? You think about it a lot.

Eileen Atkins31:51

Yes, I've thought about it ever since I was a child. I got I had somebody interviewing Arthur Millier the other day and they said, Tim, do you think often now of death? He said, Oh, not more than three times a day.

Presenter32:04

But why? What do you think when you think? Think about it.

Eileen Atkins32:10

I wonder

Eileen Atkins32:12

I'm an agnostic.

Eileen Atkins32:14

I'd love not to be, but I have to be honest and I'm an agnostic.

Eileen Atkins32:20

Half of me hopes there's nothing.

Eileen Atkins32:26

A lot of me I long for there to be angels, but I'm none too sure I want there to be a God, and I think He's such a cruel God if He is, unless He's got a jolly good explanation for a lot when I get there.

Eileen Atkins32:38

Um I can't imagine not thinking about it quite often, sometimes rather calmly.

Eileen Atkins32:45

Sometimes almost looking not forward to it, but I I've hardly ever been depressed. I'm not a depressive, and I was immensely cheered up the first time I met John Mortimer. Because of the things I play, people tend to think I'm going to be gloomy. And he the second day I meet him, he said, Oh, I didn't realise you were going to be a jolly girl.

Eileen Atkins33:06

Are you going to be a jolly girl on your desert island? I'm going to be disastrous. I I I I can't kill a thing. So unless I can live forever on seaweed or something, I'm hopeless. I'm not a country girl. I don't know what to cut and build or anything. I I'll be absolutely hopeless. If you don't come and get me Zoon, I'll be dead in no time.

Eileen Atkins33:27

Last record.

Eileen Atkins33:28

When we were doing The Unexpected Man, I have to talk about Orlando Gibbons. And I said to Matthew Watches, Is this a made-up name, Miss Orlando Gibbons? It's a funny name. Why is she made up a musician? He said, Have you never heard any Orlando Gibbons? I said, No. He said, I'll bring some in tomorrow. And if there is a heaven.

Eileen Atkins33:50

I would like them to be singing this as I go.

Speaker 433:54

Lance together to heart to God so hell by healing.

Speaker 434:10

The Savior Ghost Hill is our earth.

Presenter34:52

The Oxford Camerata, directed by Lawrence Cummings, singing Orlando Gibbon's setting of Psalm forty seven, Oh, Clap Your Hands How very appropriate for an actress. If you could only take one of those, which one would you take?

Eileen Atkins35:05

Oh goodness, now I think I'd take Mick with me.

Presenter35:06

Okay, I think I

Eileen Atkins35:08

McJagger? Yes. Cheer you up. Yes, and I'd strut about the island.

Presenter35:09

Yeah.

Eileen Atkins35:13

and point and dance, and they'd been over there to laugh at an old woman dancing.

Eileen Atkins35:18

And what about your book? The book I'd like is um all of Virginia Woolfe's diaries. But if I can't have all the volumes, I'd like Olivia Bell's um compressed version called A Moment's Liberty.

Eileen Atkins35:31

And your luxury.

Eileen Atkins35:33

Oh, my luxury

Eileen Atkins35:35

I'm absolutely mad about um a painter called Atkinson Grimshaw.

Eileen Atkins35:40

And he does a lot of um cities, twilight, moonlight with rain.

Eileen Atkins35:47

and lighted windows, and I love that moment. And the thing I love about England almost more than anything is our weather.

Eileen Atkins35:56

And I love November and February.

Eileen Atkins35:58

when it rains, and I think on that island

Eileen Atkins36:01

With endless sun and

Eileen Atkins36:04

I would just love to enter those pictures and be back in England.

Presenter36:09

Eileen Atkins, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Eileen Atkins36:13

Thank you.

Speaker 136:21

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For more podcasts please visit bbc.co. uk slash radio four.