Tracey Ullman

Presenter0:01

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne, and this is the Desert Island Discs Podcast. Every week, I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book, and luxury they'd want to take with them if they were cast away to a desert island. And, for rights reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast. I hope you enjoy listening.

Presenter0:43

My castaway this week is the actor and comedian Tracy Ullman. She's arguably the most successful British woman on comedy's international stage, and her creative adventures encompass two continents and many disciplines. She was the first woman to be offered her own television sketch show both in Britain and America, where she became the first non-American female comedian to make it big.

Presenter1:07

She enjoyed a spell as a pop star and has shared the big screen with Meryl Streep, Kevin Klein, and Hugh Grant. Her many accolades include a dozen American Comedy Awards, seven Emmys, two BAFTAs, and a Golden Globe.

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Thirty years after relocating to America, life brought her back to the UK and to the BBC, where she introduced us to a kleptomaniac dame Judy Dench and a sex bomb angela Merkel. And although her inspiration moves with the Times, she is, she says, still putting on the show she would act out as a little girl to entertain her mother after her father's death. She says, I realized I used to do this in my mother's bedroom when I was six. I used to be everyone in my village, everyone at school, and everyone in the news. And I'm still doing that same show. I think I'll be doing it in my 80s. I'll just impersonate everyone around me in the nursing home. Tracy Ullman, welcome to Desert Island Discs. Oh, thank you very much. I'm so glad to be here, Lauren. Now, Tracy, audiences have, of course, long been amazed by your propensity for metamorphosis, which has been with you since your earliest days, too. What is it about becoming someone else that you love? Um, gosh, it makes it sound sad that I don't like being me.

Presenter2:20

But uh it's just what I could do. I think when you're a kid and you're good at football or you can play the piano or you I could just impersonate people and I love people. Now we do see brilliant comic actors like Emma Thompson, Sharon Horgan, Phoebe Waller Bridge winning plaudits and prizes on both sides of the Atlantic. But you know back then when you first started out the prevailing attitude was pretty much that women just weren't funny. Did it feel like you were blazing a trail?

Speaker 12:37

Winning

Presenter2:48

What you had to do back then, really, all those girls have had fabulous careers. They didn't have to move to America to do it. So.

Presenter2:56

I started to look at American comedy. I realized that women had been given a shot in American comedy, much more so.

Tracey Ullman3:03

Mm.

Presenter3:03

than in English comedy. Like Lucille Bohr had her own show in the fifties, and then people like Carol Burnett had a wonderful variety show in the sixties and Gilda Radner on Saturday Night Live, the late, great Gilda Radner. I saw some shows of hers on English T V.

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In the early eighties and I thought, wow, I want to do that, you know? Look at her, she's on par with the guys. She's not having to play a traffic warden or a sexy girl in a bikini like on the bloody Benny Hill shows, which I found just so annoying. So I think America got started early on that stuff. But there's nothing like English character actresses, you know, to me. Like I was I still wanna be Dandy Nichols, Patricia Hayes, Peggy Ashcroft.

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Joan Plowright, Maggie Smith, we still have those wonderful women. I've seen that. Well, I can do Maggie's voice, dear.

Speaker 13:48

Wonderful women.

Presenter3:53

Well, back to you, Tracy, and to your first disc now. What is it and why are you taking it with you to the island? American Girl I love all the songs Tom Petty songs. American Girl reminds me of doing my shows in America, like the mid nineties.

Presenter4:07

And they were so hard, I mean because I did this crazy stuff. I'd put all this makeup on, I'd cover my head in rubber, wigs, you know, voices, filming, you know, from five till midnight. I'd get to the end of a week and I would just go nuts in the makeup trailer to this song. And I'd be covered in glue and rubber, I'd be exhausted, I would have lost nine pounds, and this just got me going.

Tracey Ullman4:31

That's a great big world.

Tracey Ullman4:34

With lots of places to run to

Tracey Ullman4:38

Yeah, they share the die

Tracey Ullman4:41

Try and cheat.

Tracey Ullman4:43

Got one no browsed to a golden key

Tracey Ullman4:48

Oh yeah

Tracey Ullman4:50

Alright.

Tracey Ullman4:52

Take it easy, baby

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My glass of night she was

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An American girl.

Presenter5:01

American Girl Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Tracy Ullman, listeners, might find it surprising that the starting point, even for your funniest characters, is quite a poignant one. You say, I always look for the sadness in people. Why is that?

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I had this wonderful um lady that worked at a bank, the Midland Bank, when I was a young girl and and she spoke like that. She was okay and she was marvellous, you know. She lived with her mother and she drove a moped.

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And she had, you know, one of those you don't have to be mad to work here, but it helps, you know, one of those people. And she just killed me and she's brave and she gets on with life. And uh I like I like the bravery. Those sort of people ins inspire me. You recently played uh feminist writer Betty Friedan in Mrs. America, an acclaimed drama series. What approach do you take to a role like that?

Speaker 15:52

What a

Presenter5:56

They gave me a a a tough time giving me that part. It was the last to be cast. Um some people thought because they think you're just going to do an impersonation there's still a perception of me as a wacky zany comedian, you know, and it's not what I do. It's not. I started off as a character actress and going into comedy was just a fluke. It wasn't what I thought I would do and I've never done stand up to told a joke to save my life.

Speaker 16:02

Why was that?

Presenter6:20

I was really glad they would acknowledge that I can play that person for real. But interesting that you're up for the fight and quite keen to prove them wrong. Yeah, bloody right. I saw that there was pitch of those girls on the board. I thought I can be a part of this. I can do this too. And uh yeah, I want to be

Tracey Ullman6:25

But interesting

Tracey Ullman6:27

Oh yeah!

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Taken seriously.

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throughout your career, you've played such a huge range of characters. I mean, every age, gender, sexuality and ethnic background. Would you feel comfortable taking on such a broad spectrum of roles today?

Speaker 16:48

Time

Presenter6:52

No, probably not. It wouldn't be the right sort of atmosphere for it, no. I think, you know, the late eighties, it was just what you could do, what you w what you were doing then, you know, it's and uh

Speaker 16:54

Yeah.

Presenter7:05

It would be different now. Have you ever regretted a character that you've created?

Presenter7:11

No, don't regret anything. Don't apologise for anything, really. It's pointless, you know. More onward. No.

Presenter7:18

I don't.

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It's time for your next piece of music, Tracy. Disc number two: What is it and why are you taking it with you to the islands?

Speaker 17:21

Declaf.

Presenter7:25

I was five when I went to a Beatles concert at the Hammersmith Odeon. My mother and her friend Irene had got tickets and uh I was with Adam Wood, who was supposedly my boyfriend at that time, you know. And we were terrified. We sat like literally in the third row. My mother was there in a leather mini skirt going bonkers.

Presenter7:46

I couldn't hear anything. People were throwing gonks, you know, their stuffed toys at the stage. But I knew it was magic, and I knew I loved them, and I was having feelings that no five year old should have.

Tracey Ullman7:57

When I call you up

Tracey Ullman8:01

Your love

Tracey Ullman8:03

Is engaged by love.

Tracey Ullman8:09

So I

Tracey Ullman8:11

Furage, we have lost.

Tracey Ullman8:15

The time

Tracey Ullman8:17

That was so hard to find.

Tracey Ullman8:21

And I will lose.

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Ah

Tracey Ullman8:23

My mind!

Tracey Ullman8:26

If you won't see me, you won't see

Presenter8:30

The Beatles and You Won't See Me.

Presenter8:34

So Tracy, let's go back to that little girl with her mum and the leather mini skirt. You were born in Slough in nineteen fifty nine. Your father, Anthony, was Polish. I think he'd been a lawyer and then served with the Polish Army before coming to the UK after being evacuated from Dunkirk.

Speaker 18:47

Uh

Tracey Ullman8:47

Yeah.

Presenter8:49

That's right. And he sat up home and started his own business in Slough. What was it?

Speaker 18:50

Yeah.

Presenter8:54

Everything. You know, he did everything for the Polish community, sort of sold them furniture, got them married, you know. A guy came up to me on a plane once and he said, Your dad sold me my first Beatles suit and some winkle pickers. You know, if you wanted something, you went to Anthony's store on Chandos Street. He did very well. He was very eclectic and I remember bits about him and he was wonderful and very enthusiastic about me and would put me on the counter in his shop and say, Tracy's going to be a star and make me sing little Polish songs and it was just lovely.

Presenter9:33

And he met your mother Doreen while she was in the Land Army. After they married she worked with him in his shop. Did they work well together? Yeah, she was a trained seamstress and uh they worked together and, you know, sh they would get all these suits down from Manchester, then

Presenter9:49

kits and she would make them all up and they they worked very, very hard and built the business together. Sadly, you lost your dad when you were very young, just six, and I I know that his death was unexpected and very sudden. What do you remember about that time?

Presenter10:04

Um well, he had had an operation and then he came home and he was reading me a story and he's he s became unwell. Then an ambulance came and um I think I knew

Presenter10:20

That he'd passed away, but my family dealt with it in a way then, which you just wouldn't deal with a child with grief now. It was sort of, they said for a while till they settled matters and things, oh, he's on holiday, and um I didn't go to the funeral, and I think you would now. And then it was very much, you know, you go to new school, you just get a new uniform, you get a new doll, and you carry on, and nobody talked about it. And you know, not to blame my family, but grief was dealt with differently then.

Presenter10:51

So

Presenter10:53

It was difficult and um but of course I talked to my mother about it eventually, but it was just such a shock for her. It was very difficult for her. She was in her thirties, she was very young. Um and I, you know, as you get older you realise how really hard it is was for her.

Speaker 111:02

Yeah.

Presenter11:07

Tracy, it was hard for your mother to keep the business going because she didn't speak Polish and didn't have your dad's connections in the Polish community. Money was tight and the family moved house, and you had to leave the private school that you'd attended up to that point. How bad did things get for you?

Presenter11:23

My fortunes, financial fortunes came and went. She would w wash up in pubs and, you know, work in hospitals and

Presenter11:31

It was, it's hard, you know, when you're um a girl and a woman on her own and you know, benefits and all sorts of yeah, it was blumbing hard. At one stage, I think she was working in a food lab and she would bring food back. Bring food home. She did. She used to bring back food from this food lab, and it was brookbond or something. And she brought back this corned beef, and we were all eating it, you know, and it was like fritters and sandwiches for a whole weekend. And then she said, Oh, she said, She looked at the label on a Monday. She said, It says unfit for human consumption. We're like, Mom, you could have killed us.

Tracey Ullman12:05

Uh

Presenter12:05

Alright Tracy, time for disc number three now. What are we going to hear and why?

Presenter12:12

Um, oh yeah, Nichols and May at work. This is Elaine May and the movie director Mike Nichols, who died a few years ago. And they used to play in clubs in Greenwich Village and they improvised. You can hear them in this recording, and they are just working at figuring out a sketch. And that's the joy of the work. I've done this many times. You just be bold and you say, let's try this, and then it makes you laugh and you realize you've got a punchline. And also, it's a woman. It's Elaine May. It's a woman being funny, as funny as the guy.

Speaker 112:48

I want something now that'll take some education, but i it's something that I want very much and if if you and Pa are willing to make the sacrifices and send me to school.

Presenter12:53

Oh.

Speaker 212:53

Man, I see.

Speaker 212:56

Send me to school. Buddy, how could you ask that? We would do anything for you to be a professional.

Speaker 113:02

Mother, I want very much to be a registered nurse.

Tracey Ullman13:05

Stop laughing.

Tracey Ullman13:12

Say it again.

Presenter13:15

Nicholls and May at work. Mike Nicholls and Elaine May. Tracy Ullman, although grief overshadowed your early childhood, your mother Doreen and sister Patty had a keen sense of humour. What kind of things would you say to make each other laugh at home? We just loved impersonating people, you know, from work and from school. So she was a good mimic too. Yeah, yeah. And putting on shows in the bedroom, as I say, I'd stand on the window sill and uh

Speaker 113:34

So she was a girl

Presenter13:41

Hello, everybody. I want you to know this is me and this is my show. And on the show, we have tonight Edith Piaf, you know, no grand riandret, you're stupid. And she goes, oh, she speaks French, you know. And then I go, and then I was Kathy Kirby, and then I was, you know, Diana Dawes, and I just bring anybody, and then just doing silly shows dressed in her night dresses. And, you know, the three of you, you, your mum, and your sister, was there a feeling of it being, you know, the three of you against the world a little bit? It sounds like that.

Speaker 114:11

It sounds like

Presenter14:12

Yeah, very, very female upbringing. I wished I'd had a brother. I wished I had more male influence, but I missed that. Was always looking for a fella or a son. I was always a son. I've I'm I've grown up now and I have a son and I I wanted a boy.

Presenter14:28

Time for your next disc. Tracy, what have you chosen and why are you taking it with you today? That's the way of the world, Earth, Wind and Fire. This is me at stage school. And we had some very cool teachers like Linda Sheward and this lady from America called Vander. And she would play Earth, Wind and Fires, that's the Way of the World. And that was our jazz warm-up. And this is like endorphin release American music to me. Every time I hear this song, I immediately start stretching and moving and trying to do the splits.

Tracey Ullman15:06

Are you high higher?

Tracey Ullman15:08

To the world where you belong, hearts are fire.

Tracey Ullman15:14

Creates love desire.

Tracey Ullman15:18

Hi La!

Tracey Ullman15:20

To your place for the throne

Tracey Ullman15:25

Together on a special day

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That's the way of the world, earth, wind, and fire. And I feel fully worked out after that, Tracy Oman. So when you were twelve, you won a scholarship to the Italio Conti Academy of Theatre Arts in London. And I think your headmaster at school had spotted your potential, hadn't he? Ronald Harding. I remember his tweed suits and perfectly polished English brogues and he was, you know, I was terrified of him. I didn't and he just had this lovely suddenly, he was this very kind, you know, this child should go and be encouraged to perform. And, you know, you get five good teachers in your life, you're lucky. And then when I was doing my show, the Tracy Oman show for Fox in America years later, he showed up and he was on a bus tour of California with some retired people and we brought him on at the end of the show. The producers of the show heard he was in and we did a little bit with him. And I dropped him off that night in his tweed suit and his brogue shoes and said, thank you very much, Mr. Harding. You, you know, you made my life. Thank you. So was stage school largely a positive experience for you? There were some brilliant teachers and I, you know, and there were some odd children in showbiz elements I didn't like. I mean, I used to get sent in auditions, you know, and they'd line you all up on a West End stage and some guy'd go, Yes, you step forward, you step forward, and you. And I remember stepping forward once. He went, No, no, no, not you, the little blonde girl next to you. How did you deal with that? And how did you deal with the rejection? Well, I just thought I if I can't make it by the time I'm twenty, I'll become a travel agent and or I'll try and go to

Presenter17:02

University and be a journalist. But did you believe you could make it as an actor? People on situation comedies.

Presenter17:09

You know, it would be sort of like, Oh, darling, I I didn't know what to do. The vicar came round and we were so terribly embarrassed and I thought, Oh, you have to speak like that. If you want to be an actress and, you know, if you wanted to go into the Royal Shakespeare Company or something, Lauren, you really had to speak like that, and I didn't want to do the voice. I began to think, Oh, my God, you've got to be posh to be an actress or to do this. So I was a dancer, you know,'cause I could dance sort of okay. And so I then I joined Dougie Squire's Second Generation and did lots of pantomimes and

Speaker 117:28

Mean it?

Presenter17:39

Summer seasons and things and just had a great laugh. I didn't, you know, take acting seriously. I didn't think I could be an actress actually, yeah, because of my accent.

Presenter17:48

So you took a a dancing job. A German ballet company was putting on a revival of.

Speaker 117:50

German par

Presenter17:53

Gigi in Berlin. I know Gigi in German.

Speaker 117:53

DG is in Berlin.

Presenter17:56

Wow. I mean, not everyone can say that. So it's amazing. Living in West Berlin, you know, with the wall up and.

Speaker 117:57

Not everyone can say that so it's amazing living in

Presenter18:03

Oh, we used to go out till ten in the morning. This was Berlin in the seventies, you know. We used to go to clubs where you sat on toilets and the rats ran around in cages around you. It was really wild, you know. I went back when the wall was down and it wasn't as much fun actually.

Speaker 118:12

Wild.

Presenter18:17

Anyway, I was a kid and it was fun. It's time for disc number five. What's next? I love Elvis Costello. I always loved Elvis Costello. He was on the same label as me. I think briefly, Stiff Records. And this is a song I did my courting to with my husband Alan McEwen. And I remember him driving me to Bath in his black Rolls-Royce that was all scratched down the side. You know, typical England, he had MV marks all the way down the side of his Rolls-Royce. Someone who keyed it. Yeah, someone who keyed it, yeah.

Tracey Ullman18:45

Someone who keyed it.

Presenter18:47

And we played this album and the song that became our song was Every Day I Write the Book.

Tracey Ullman18:53

I am giving you a long book Every day, every day, every day, every day I write the book.

Tracey Ullman19:06

Chapter 1 If it didn't really crazy long Chapter 2, I think I fell in love with you.

Tracey Ullman19:16

You said you'd stand by me in the middle of chapter three but you would love to your own tricks in chapters

Presenter19:23

Every day I write the book, Elvis Costello and the Attractions.

Presenter19:28

Tracy Ullman, in 1981 you performed in a play called Four in a Million upstairs at the Royal Court Theatre in London. It was an improvised play about club acts. What did you enjoy about the experience?

Presenter19:40

It was the perfect thing for me to do. Because it was improvised, you could sort of alter it a little or just try something fresh. And keeping spontaneity is huge for me. I'm not very good at doing theatre because I get really bored after like two weeks. I can't do the same thing over and over again. It's frightening to me. But this play, you could shift it a bit and do little try little bits, and that was magic. Not long after that, Tracy, you were offered your own TV series, a sketch show called Three of a Kind with Lenny Henry and David Copperfield. That was a huge break, but I think you made it quite clear to the BBC commissioners that it had to be on your terms. I said I'm Tracy Ullman, I'm not blonde, I don't have big breasts, I will not wear a bikini, I don't want to be the butt of sexual jokes, I don't want to be a sexy traffic warden, I want to do equal stuff with the guys, and uh I wanted to write as well and get into improvising and doing that sort of stuff.

Presenter20:35

I gained control because I knew my power was in creating good characters and being funny and feeling the power and the audiences enjoying it. You know, some of that show, you look back and you go, oh, it's terrible. There's the worst jokes in the world on that show. Really mainstream humour, like, oh, I'm just going up to Ron the Bath, love, cut to David walking across the screen with a bath or a lead, you know. Me and Lenny, we were doing things like we used to do Simon and Julie, this couple that wanted to be on reality television. And this was an 81. We just wanted everything to be filmed. We want our wedding filmed and we want our life filmed. And, you know, I thought, wow, we were ahead of the curve there, Len. What I think the great thing about Three of a Kind was it was a really terrific middle-of-the-road family show. You know, so there was all this like cool, you know, Raymond Review Bar sort of stuff, but we were a hit on a Saturday night. What was the rush like when it was a hit, when people loved it? You don't know what's going to be a hit. You don't know. You can think you've got this great sketch, it's going to be great. You work at it all week, go, that's the funny thing. And then I like to just be so spontaneous. And on the night, I mean, I've done crazy things like saying, Can I borrow your spectacles? And taking someone's spectacles from a makeup girl that had this horrific strong prescription and I couldn't see and I was twirling around. I nearly vomited. And it was one of the best sketches I've ever done in my life because it distracted me. It's just that lovely laughter that is unexpected and stops the lines and you just know that you've transported yourself and them and it's a lovely feeling.

Presenter22:03

Tracy, it's time for your sixth piece of music today. What are we going to hear and why are you taking this with you?

Presenter22:09

I had a big hit with a wonderful, wonderful song called They Don't Know written by the late, great Kirstie McCall, but I want to play her version today because it's so beautiful and simple and she was just a genius, this girl.

Tracey Ullman22:23

We should just take our chances while we've got nothing to lose

Tracey Ullman22:49

Yeah.

Presenter22:49

There's no

Presenter22:51

Kirsty McCall and They Don't Know, which of course you covered, Tracy on when I was singing along there and trying to hit that high note of the baby bad. It's her. We I could never get it either, so we used hers. On your version? Yeah, it's Kirsty.

Speaker 122:56

Brain's ahead.

Speaker 122:59

It's

Presenter23:05

Fabulous. Tracy, you married the producer Alan McEwan when you were twenty three years old. You once said that you fell in love with him over the course of a train journey. Tell us about that. Yeah, it was like one of those sort of like, you know

Presenter23:18

Rom-coms where you don't like somebody. He was very rude to me. I did a television show for him and he was very rude to me and kept sort of insulting me and just being really offhand. And I remember one night after we'd done this shoot on something, I met him on a train station and it was just you know, Birmingham to London. And I saw him and I went, I don't want to travel with you. You're not a very nice person. You're very rude. And I didn't like how you spoke to everybody yesterday. He went, Oh, shut up. I'll buy you breakfast.

Presenter23:42

And breakfast was like nine pounds then on British Rel and and that just that hour, literally in ten minutes, whatever it was, from Birmingham to London, he just charmed the pants off me and, you know, we were married three months later. And for thirty years? For thirty years. I liked to laugh. He made me laugh. And my life began when I met Alan McEwen.

Presenter24:04

It really did.

Presenter24:05

Alan had a base in Los Angeles, and after you married, you both moved out there. Why did you feel that the time was right to start a new life in California? I was pregnant, actually, so I knew I had to sort of calm down a bit. Alan liked being in America. I always loved coming to and from England, but I knew I never no one offered me a job in a long time. But it was different in LA. James L. Brooks, who produced the Mary Tyler Moore Show and Taxi, among other huge hits, offered you your own TV programme. He gave you some homework first, though. What did that involve? He said to me, If you want to do this show, you need to understand

Presenter24:40

origins of comedy and T V shows in America and politics and everything. So he sent me to the Museum of Broadcasting in New York.

Presenter24:48

He said, no, watch loads of old shows. And I used to do it. I used to go there every morning with my cup of tea and I was pregnant and I would watch, of course, immediately watch all the Lucille Bull stuff stuff I already knew, but things like your show of shows with Imogene Coker and Sid Caesar sketch shows in the 50s that Woody Allen and Neil Simon used to write for. And I think that's something is really important you have to do. You can't just fly in, have a meeting and do a show three weeks later. You can't. So it was a sketch show and you did impressions, but of course there was no internet back then. So how did you come to research all of those different American accents and inflections and styles of speech? I used to call like a car dealership.

Presenter25:28

Or like a telephone exchange in Brooklyn. Hello, I remember talking to Rosemary. You're going to have to talk to my supervisor. And I would just say, could you just talk to me a little, Rosemary? I really want to talk to you. But you know, okay. And then I would say to Fox, would you send me on a tour? I want to go to Toledo, Ohio. And I would just take pictures of people. I'd end up in their homes at two in the morning, you know, eating burgers and taking photographs of them and asking them to tell me about themselves. And so I found the equivalents in America that I'd found in, you know, in England all my life growing up. And, you know, I met a sort of K. Clark type in Detroit and I just loved it.

Presenter26:07

The show also included an animation segment featuring, for the first time, a certain yellow, all American family of five. Did you have any idea that The Simpsons would have such a massive impact? I breastfed the yellow people.

Presenter26:21

No, I remember Matt Groening, who was a genius, came in and was awfully shy, you know, and he showed us these drawings. I remember seeing the first picture of of Marge with the blue hair.

Presenter26:32

Of course Julie Kafner, who was on the show, did the voice from Marge.

Speaker 226:32

French Julie Kafner, who was on the show.

Tracey Ullman26:36

For more

Speaker 226:37

Uh

Presenter26:37

And um, you know, and Dan Castelonetta, who was on the show too, he he did Homer. I remember the first recordings. They'd go upstairs to the booth and do these voices. And I didn't do it'cause I was always so busy doing other stuff, but I'm so very proud of you launching The Simpsons. It was an extraordinary thing.

Presenter26:54

Alright, time for your next piece of music, Tracy Ollman. What are we going to hear, and why?

Presenter26:58

I couldn't have played this a few years ago because it's just so poignant and intense for me. But it epitomizes my love for him and our togetherness and how we conquered the world in our way and for us with our love and our work and our energy.

Presenter27:17

I love you, Alan, this is for you.

Tracey Ullman27:19

If we are

Tracey Ullman27:23

On earth together, it's you and I.

Tracey Ullman27:31

God has made us for love.

Tracey Ullman27:37

It's true.

Tracey Ullman27:41

I've rarely found someone like you.

Presenter27:50

You and I, Stevie Wonder. Tracy Ullman, Alan died in twenty thirteen following a long illness, and a couple of years later you came back here to the UK. Why was it the right time to come back?

Presenter28:03

There was more dignity to being a widow in London.

Presenter28:07

Alan has given me the two incredible children. Mabel, who has now given me an incredible grandson, Elijah, and is about to have another one, and my son, Johnny. They were both born in America, but Mabel loves living here. She's very British, and she's my powerhouse. She just kept me going. And just walking around and talking to people, and you don't do that in LA. You're up a hill and you know in your car all the time and the connection with people was crucial at that time. So it was the company. You said more dignity to be in a widow in London because of that, because you could be among people. Yeah, just going down the market and talking to people. It's just, you know, it's a better environment if you're on your own than it's very lonely in Los Angeles. And of course, they were full of memories of Alan and him dying. And I wanted to.

Speaker 128:37

So

Speaker 128:38

You see more

Speaker 128:43

Because it could be among people.

Speaker 128:50

And the mm

Presenter28:58

Shake it off a little. The BBC snapped you up, of course, for a new series of Tracy Ullman's show. Were you don't it about playing to a British audience after a while away in the States? Yeah, yeah, it meant a lot to me too for it to be good and uh.

Presenter29:14

I used to talk to Alan all the time, you know, in my trailers and what do you think of this, Al? What is about this sketch? And I'd drive home some nights and tell him about my day. And I felt he, you know, sounds corny. Maybe his spirit and energy was there with me. Did you always know what he would say?

Speaker 129:28

Did you always know what he

Presenter29:30

Yeah, uh it's funnier, but it's still not funny.

Presenter29:35

More energy. And it was lovely to be able to do it and feel happy and feel the joy of working and being other people and getting distracted and knowing that I still wanted to do it and I could do it without him physically being there. Yeah. What about time away from work? Oh god, I'm so boring. I mean I just like I like to knit. Isn't that awful? Yeah, I like knitting. I like watching. I like anything about totalitarian regimes on BBC4. Okay, so you're knitting to totalitarian regimes. Yeah, that's me. Anything about North Korea or, you know, the Cold War. And I watch Love Island.

Speaker 130:10

Yeah.

Presenter30:15

I'm very eclectic.

Presenter30:17

Tracy, of course, before any of that, I'm about to cast you away to the island.

Speaker 130:21

Yeah?

Presenter30:22

And from talking to you today, I mean, I can't help thinking that unlike many of my castaways, you won't be lonely'cause you'll have all of these characters inside of you to keep you company. They keep popping out. Yeah. I mean, who will you definitely take with you? I would like to take Angela Merkel'cause I think she'll be very sensible.

Presenter30:41

She would help me to understand the situation and would possibly be able to figure out who could come and rescue me. You know, she might be able to get in touch with NATO. Well, we've got one more track, Tracy, before you both head off. What's it going to be, and why?

Presenter30:55

You know when you hear a song and you just burst into tears or you just think, Oh my god, this is so apt, it's about

Presenter31:02

Surviving. It's about letting go of things in the past and letting go of pain, and it got me through my grief and.

Presenter31:10

It's about the last third of my life and being brave and pushing on and not looking back. And it's This Is the Sea by The Water Boys.

Tracey Ullman31:20

Once you were a teller.

Tracey Ullman31:24

But now you are free.

Tracey Ullman31:29

Once you were a tether!

Tracey Ullman31:33

And now you are free.

Tracey Ullman31:38

That was the river.

Tracey Ullman31:42

This is the sea.

Presenter31:50

The Water Boys and This Is the Sea. So, Tracy Ullman, I'm going to send you away to the island. I'm giving you the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare to take with you. You can also take a book of your choice. What would you like?

Presenter32:03

The Diary of Adrian Moll, aged thirteen and three quarters.

Presenter32:07

Because it's brilliant. You can also have a luxury item. What would you like? Well, I'm going to steal from one of your past guests here. Gilly Cooper loves animals. Like me, I love dogs so much. I cannot not have a dog in my life. So she said she would take nuts with her to the island so she could tame the monkeys to be her friend. And I just thought that was so brilliant. That would be make things complete for me to have an animal friend on the island. Well, we will knock you up, absolutely no problem. Finally, which one track would you save from the waves if you had to?

Presenter32:43

I think it would be you and I because it gives me such strength and love and completeness and it would just have Alan with me. Tracey Ullman, thank you very much for letting us hear your Desert Island issues. Thank you. I've had a wonderful time.

Presenter33:20

I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Tracy. I'm pretty confident that those nuts are going to do the trick and she will make plenty of animal friends on the island. We've cast many actors and comedians away, of course, including Dawn French, Kathy Burke, and Steve Coogan. Tracy's three-of-a-kind co-star Seleni Henry is there too. You can find all of those episodes in our Desert Island Discs programme archive and through BBC Sounds. Next time, my guest will be the entrepreneur and philanthropist Tom Elube. I do hope you'll join us.