Lesley Manville

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 actress Leslie Manville. She's one of the standout talents of her generation, the kind of performer whose presence guarantees that whatever it is you're settling down to watch, you are in great hands. Hollywood has caught onto her brilliance in recent years with an Oscar nomination in 2018 for the Phantom Thread, but at home in the UK, her star has been shining brightly for decades. It was singing that first revealed her skill in front of an audience, and at the age of 15, she headed to stage school in London. There she discovered a gift for improvisation that would come in handy later, working with the director Mike Lee. Their success together made her name, and of all the actors in his stable, she is his most frequent collaborator.

Presenter1:27

Some people start to slow down in their 60s. Not she. In the last few years alone, she's played the titular matriarch in the beloved BBC sitcom Mum, the cleaner who sets her sights on a couture dress in the hit film Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris, and Princess Margaret in The Crown. Very different roles, though they do share a pragmatism that resonates with her. She says, on my gravestone it should be written, she just got on with it. Leslie Manville, welcome to Desert Island Discs. Thank you, Lauren. Thank you. So Leslie, you have the most incredible range of characters in your career portfolio. What's your starting point to get to the heart of a role when you first approach it?

Presenter2:06

You've got to kind of try and really get into the bones of these characters and work out what makes them tick.

Presenter2:14

What gets me up in the morning is playing people that are.

Presenter2:19

A different from me and hopefully different from the character that I played last time. So that kind of diversity of uh that range of playing

Lesley Manville2:25

Okay.

Presenter2:30

You know, Ada Harris, who's a cleaner, and Princess Margaret, you know, that the gap between them, you know, socially and in terms of their class is what really thrills me. But, you know, ultimately, we're all people with beating hearts and blood flowing through our veins. So it's finding the emotional centre of these characters that's so interesting because, you know, Princess Margaret, her heart will bleed in the same way that Mrs. Harris's heart will bleed. Do characters stay with you after you've?

Lesley Manville2:34

You know that?

Presenter3:02

Left project, I wonder. However much in character I can be, it's almost like I'm on the outside looking in. And I absolutely don't take those characters home with me. I mean, I think if I'd have taken Mary Tyrone from Long Day's Journey and Tonight home with me, it would be very serious. You know, you'd be ill. It's time to hear your first disc, Leslie. What have you chosen? It's Over the Rainbow, and it's because my dad had a great singing voice, real kind of crooner, and I think in Another Life.

Presenter3:34

He would have done that professionally. I mean, he'd have loved to have done that. But he was a very charismatic man. My sister, Diana, who's four years older than me, she has had a beautiful voice as well. And I could sing. So we used to do little gigs. I mean, they might only be in the British Legion Club or some, you know, bingo hall or something. But we used to do these acts. And although we did a lot of classical singing, Diana and I, we trained classically.

Presenter4:03

what we mostly did in terms of like being entertainers I mean, I'm really young at this point, I hasten to add was sing musical songs or modern folk songs and and often my dad would sing as well. So Over the Rainbow became a kind of

Presenter4:19

Family song that we do, either just Diana and I or with my dad as well. But years later, when Eva Cassidy did her version,

Presenter4:29

I was in a not a great place in my life. I was dealing with some sadness. And I heard her version, and I remember sitting in my living room and playing it.

Presenter4:41

Eleven, twelve, thirteen times in a row, straight off.

Presenter4:45

I just think her voice is phenomenal.

Presenter4:48

Uh

Speaker 44:48

Some way

Speaker 24:54

Go over.

Speaker 24:57

The Rainbow

Speaker 24:59

Uh

Speaker 45:10

Yeah

Presenter5:19

Eva Cassidy and Over the Rainbow. So an unofficial family anthem, Leslie Manfield. I think we'd better hear more about that family then. You were born in Brighton, 1956, to Ron and Jean, and the youngest of three daughters. And I believe your mum was creative. She could have been a ballet dancer. Yes, she said that Saddler's Wells had asked her to join the ballet company when she was 18. And she decided not to because she wanted to marry my dad. Oh, and she did that just wasn't the day after her 18th birthday, she said. Yeah. My dad had wanted to marry her at 16, which you could do then.

Lesley Manville5:24

Yeah.

Lesley Manville5:40

Yeah.

Speaker 25:40

Uh

Speaker 25:49

Yeah.

Presenter5:54

But her dad said, No, you're not marrying her until she's eighteen so very romantically they got married the day after her eighteenth birthday. So were they a romantic couple? They were childhood sweethearts. They were very glamorous, gor yeah, they met when my mum was fourteen. My dad was um twenty.

Lesley Manville6:02

Yeah.

Lesley Manville6:05

They were very

Presenter6:12

They were childhood sweethearts and they were together forever. They were really, really part of that Brighton sixties gin and tonic set. You know, my mum looked great in a black cocktail dress and there's some great footage that I've got of them on 8mm film, no sound, of them obviously in some little club somewhere and they're just dancing and just having a great time. And they had some really kind of rock and roll friends as well. So outward facing, sociable. Your mum could have been a dancer, but I think was a full-time mum. What about your dad? What did he do for a living? Oh, dad did all sorts. He was a taxi driver, he was a bookmaker.

Lesley Manville6:48

What if I

Presenter6:56

He really loved to have a little flutter, a little gamble. But I think he must have been like a very successful gambler at times because when he had money, he just spent it on us. I mean, for a while, we had a pony. That was what middle-class girls had, not working-class girls like us, but we had a pony. And very often on a Sunday, we'd go out for Sunday lunch.

Lesley Manville6:59

Yeah.

Presenter7:20

Which was a kind of real treat. You know, working class people, generally speaking, didn't have the money to do that. But we did, but I'm hesitating to say this, but when I was very little, he did go bankrupt. Oh, wow, okay. And we lived in a privately owned house in the country, and then he went bankrupt. And after that, we lived in a sort of Victorian council house in Hove. But he was so generous. You know, if he had money, he wanted to spend it and give it to you. All right, Leslie, it's time for some more music now. Your second disc. It's My Brother Jake by Free.

Presenter7:55

I remember Sundays listening to the chart show.

Presenter8:00

On Radio One, in my bedroom that I shared with Diana, small bedroom.

Presenter8:05

And I had an A4 notebook, and every week I wrote down the top twenty.

Presenter8:12

But My Brother Jake was just one of those songs that I I mean, my hormones were raging, you know, and this song just did something for me. So in the little space that I had between the twin beds in our bedroom, I'd be dancing around to My Brother Jake and just thinking, Oh my God, you know, when am I going to have sex?

Speaker 48:39

Ah, brother Dick

Speaker 48:43

Captain Shape

Speaker 48:46

Heading up Dick, my brother Dick.

Speaker 48:51

Have you thought about

Speaker 48:54

Changing your ways it goes out.

Speaker 48:58

Don't have no doubt.

Speaker 49:00

You don't have to know what the world's about.

Presenter9:08

Free and my brother Jake, a musical first love for you, Leslie Manfred.

Speaker 49:12

Testing manifest

Presenter9:13

So let's talk a bit more about music in your family. There was plenty of it in the household. You and your sister Diana were very good singers. Did you inherit that talent from your parents, do you think? From my dad, definitely. Yeah. And I suppose I well, I have inherited a dancing skill from my mum. We were both classically trained. We went to the Hove Academy of Music.

Speaker 49:24

Yeah.

Presenter9:33

Which we used to go to on a Saturday. And then we had another great singing teacher called Jean Maguire. And we did all the festivals, you know, Brighton Festival, Worthing Festival, the Cooperative would have a festival. I can't help but blow our own trumpets, but nearly always Diana and I we'd come first or second. So a lot of people didn't like us. But you must have felt quite good about that. What was it like being in front of an audience and performing? I really enjoyed it. And I think that time is.

Presenter10:05

formative for me because I know now that if I want to do well and I want to convince people that I'm this character, it's gonna come through some really hard work and that goes

Presenter10:20

Back to those days when I did work hard on my singing. Leslie, it's time for some more music. Disc number three, what are we going to hear next? When I was about 11, Diana was 15, and through our Hove Academy of Music, some of the older singers there, of which Diana was one, were invited to go and be at Gleinbourne for a season because in Verter and in La Boheme, there are teenagers. So Diana went and sang in both of those operas. And I was struck by the end of the duet between Mimi and Rodolfo at the end of Act 1. And it kind of linked up to a story years later in 1982. I'm in New York with an extraordinary bunch of actresses doing Top Girls, the Carol Churchill play. And while we were there, we were invited to go to the Metropolitan Opera and watch a dress rehearsal of Franco Zeffarelli's production of La Boheme. And I watched Theresa Stratus come on to sing Mimi and She's Tiny.

Presenter11:23

And in that moment, you know, I'm quite small as well, and I watched her and I just thought.

Presenter11:28

Wow Maybe I could have been an opera singer. She absolutely blew me away, but it was more than that. It was a kind of

Presenter11:37

sliding doors moment, you know, something I could have done, and probably could have done well and had a career doing. I hadn't, and here I was.

Presenter11:48

Doing a fantastic play.

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In New York.

Presenter11:52

But watching Teresa Strata sing that duet and the top C of course, which I could do easily. But now sometimes I put this on and I think, come on, Leslie, you can see you've still got it, girl. And I try and get the top C. I'm nearly there, but I just just needs a little bit more polishing and buffing. But wow, it's one of the most beautiful classical duets. And of course, it ends with them saying, amour, amour, amours. Of course, it's heartbreaking.

Speaker 412:22

Open this voice in your arm.

Speaker 412:29

And what I believe

Presenter13:19

O Suave Vantula from Puccini's Labo M, performed by Teresa Stratus and Jose Carreras with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, conducted by James Levine. Leslie Manfield, you've got tears in your eyes. How can you not? I mean, you'd have to

Presenter13:34

A really tough cookie not to be moved by that. It's fantastic. And as you said, a sliding doors moment for you. But there are several paths you could have taken in life. Let's hear about your next. You were 15, I think, when you told your mum and dad that you wanted to leave the school you're at and go to the Italio-Conti Stage School in London. What was your dream at that point, your ambition?

Lesley Manville13:40

For you, but there

Presenter13:55

I don't know that I kind of was very clear about it, but I'd heard about the Italia Conti Stage School. And I remember there being a kind of clarity about that being what I wanted to do. I didn't want it to go there, but I didn't know what happened next. I didn't know what would happen next, but I thought, that sounds right. I can sing. I can do musical theatre. Let's see what happens. I got a full grant from Brighton and Hove Council. They even paid for my train season ticket. My dad, who was a cab driver at the time, used to drive me to Brighton station every morning to catch the 735 to Victoria. I think he used to

Lesley Manville14:08

Didn't want

Lesley Manville14:09

I didn't know.

Presenter14:35

absolutely dread me getting on that train, because it was full of business men mostly going to London, and the uniform of Italia Conti was a really short grey skirt, a rather beautiful blue cape.

Presenter14:48

And I would wear white leather boots over the knee. And I think he just used to watch me and think, please God, let her come home safe, you know. So he was worried about sending you into the big city, but but it sounds like very supportive if he's driving you there. Very supportive. I remember he ga he would give me a pound most days and that would get me tea and toast on the train, get me my lunch and get me home and all of that. And there was a great acting teacher called Julia Carey who I'm still in touch with now.

Lesley Manville14:58

Yeah.

Lesley Manville15:01

Sounds like very

Presenter15:17

Arlene Phillips was the dance teacher and I hadn't really danced before, not in a kind of I hadn't done classes. I think you were actually offered a job while you were still there. I was. She was going to form a dance troupe. But I remember her saying, Look, I'm going to form this troupe. Will you be in it? But it's going to be quite raunchy. I said, Oh, well, Miss Phillips, what do you mean by raunchy?

Presenter15:41

In that moment, the kind of good girl came out in me, and I just thought, I can't be on television wearing stockings and suspender belts. It'll be too embarrassing. So she ended up doing it. What was it? Hot gossip. So the hot gossip. The hot gossip. Another sliding doors moment. Another sliding doors moment. For now, Leslie, we're going to hear your next disc if you don't mind. Number four.

Lesley Manville15:55

The hot gossip.

Presenter16:04

It's Sugar on the Floor by Etta James and there's no story really linking my life to this song. It's just a song I discovered and that I now play at least once a week and it's just for me. It makes me feel good and she's got such a stunning, bluesy, smoky

Presenter16:24

Gorgeous, gorgeous voice, and it's another one I like to sing along to.

Speaker 416:30

Try to be kind

Speaker 416:34

Could I ask for more?

Speaker 416:40

Feel like sugar on your floor

Speaker 416:47

Feel like sugar on the floor

Speaker 416:54

Feel like sugar on the floor

Presenter16:59

Etta James and Sugar on the Floor. So Leslie Manville, your first job after stage school was in a West End musical and then you landed a part in Emmerdale. It was an enormous learning curve and also it earned me some money and at 19 I bought my first flat. So it really did set me up for life in many ways but I knew I wasn't going to stay and I remember them saying you don't want to leave, you know, there's no work out there. Just I thought no no I've done it and I'm off now. Thank you. But I mean that financial stability at such a young age. I mean it's hard to imagine now. You must have been earning a lot. Your dad as you say was driving a taxi. How did your family feel about you you going and

Lesley Manville17:30

Thank you.

Lesley Manville17:33

I mean this

Presenter17:41

Wasn't there a an anxiety about leaving that financial stability behind? Yeah, I think and and also but I think more than that my dad just loved seeing me on tele every

Presenter17:51

Your decision to leave work, though, Emmerdale paid off. Your stage career flourished throughout the nineteen eighties. You spent a lot of time at the Royal Court Theatre, and there you starred in some of the most important new plays of that era. Carol Churchill's Top Girls, Andrea Dunbar's Rita Sue, and Bob Too. What's the attraction of new writing for you?

Presenter18:11

It is lovely being the first actor to play a part. And I can't deny that I do like it when I open the play text and there's my name, you know, the first production, and you've created this character. While you were at the RSC, you met film director Mike Lee, and you've worked together for many years, improvising and creating many characters, including your award-winning role as Mary. She was an alcoholic in the film Another Year. Where did you find her? How do you go about inhabiting that kind of identity? No, I mean, a lot. And I think sometimes you just have to say it's, well, it's acting.

Lesley Manville18:40

Pass out

Presenter18:45

Because I haven't had my an overly emotional, exceptionally painful life. I've dealt with stuff. I've had, you know, I've been divorced. I've lost people in my life that I loved. But that's not

Presenter19:00

abnormal but I suppose what I have which is an ability to somehow or other locate it and I'm not embarrassed about displaying it. It's time for disc number five. Well it's Dusty Springfield and I loved her as a kid anyway. I used to think oh wow look at her eye makeup, those big black eyes and the huge blonde hair and I loved her voice. I mean but when I was creating Mary for another year, you have a kind of mock-up of the place where your character lives and you get into character, you get changed, you put their clothes on and you have a little warm-up time before you'll go into an improvisation. And because Mary was so sort of tragic, enjoyed

Presenter19:48

The desperation of her life to some degree. This song You Don't Have to Say You Love Me was one of the songs that I used to really warm up to. And I'd sing along, but try to sing along as Mary would sing, which was not a very good voice. And I'd get warmed up and drinking pretend wine, you know, Mary glugging, glugging, glugging, and desperately screaming out this song and getting more and more in pain. And then I'd go and do the improvisation.

Speaker 420:19

Oh, you don't have to say you love me, just because it has.

Speaker 420:26

You don't have to stay forever. I will understand. Believe me, believe me, I can help but love you. But believe me, I'll never tie you down.

Speaker 420:47

Left alone with just a minute

Presenter20:51

Dusty Springfield, and you don't have to say you love me.

Presenter20:58

So Leslie Manville, you've been responsible for creating hugely popular roles on stage and screen, including your award-winning role as Cathy in the BBC sitcom Mum. Now can you always tell from a script if something's got legs, if it's going to be a hit? Or what are the key ingredients, I wonder? What are you looking for? That's it, really. It's script. You can tell when things leave a lot of subtext open, you know, you can really get in there and things that are not said. And Mum is so much about what those people are not saying to each other. I think that series was particularly lovely because it was telling a middle-aged love story, which doesn't often get told. You know, yes, people over fifty, over sixty, so over seventy can fall in love. And it was just so tenderly and beautifully done.

Speaker 221:13

Yeah.

Lesley Manville21:15

Yeah.

Speaker 221:15

Well

Lesley Manville21:15

Yeah.

Presenter21:49

Very heartwarming as well. You have described your own experience of parenthood as formative though, Leslie. You had your son Alfie in nineteen eighty eight with your then husband Gary Oldman, but became a single parent not long afterwards. How did you manage to maintain your career while looking after him?

Lesley Manville21:56

Um

Lesley Manville22:03

Yeah.

Presenter22:08

I know. I don't I

Presenter22:11

I wasn't going to fall apart. I didn't fall apart.

Presenter22:15

There was absolutely no question about it for me I was going to carry on working.

Presenter22:20

And I was also going to be the most brilliant mother.

Presenter22:24

Somehow I did it. It made me incredibly disciplined about my work. I mean, actually, until he was three I only did plays, which was quite good because I could be with him all day, apart from the rehearsals, I could be with him all day.

Presenter22:38

And then somebody would come at five thirty and I'd go off and do a, you know, a light play like Miss Julie or something.

Lesley Manville22:44

Yeah.

Presenter22:45

You didn't initially tell your parents that that Gary had left? No, because it it was kind of convenient that Gary was going to the States anyway to do a film, so they knew that he was away.

Lesley Manville22:55

Yeah.

Presenter22:56

And I just thought

Presenter22:58

Oh, well, I won't tell them, because maybe in a few months it'll all be all right. But it was a tremendously lonely time.

Presenter23:08

the days before mobile phones as well, so, you know, it's very hard to speak to him or

Presenter23:14

You know, what I had imagined for myself, I'd always imagined

Presenter23:18

Being married to Gary for a long time, you know, we fell in love at the Royal Court Theatre, we were having the most amazing time together and, you know, we loved each other. And we we got married, I got pregnant on my honeymoon, we came back and did the fantastic BBC film The Firm. We were having the best time.

Presenter23:41

But then, you know, the rug was very severely pulled from under my feet. But I'd thought we'd be together forever. We'd have, you know, a big family. But maybe if that had happened, maybe I wouldn't have the career I've got now.

Presenter23:56

I think I'd have given up a lot to have had a good long marriage and the comfort of all of that. But the price would have been something, but I don't quite know what. It's time for some more music, Leslie. Disc number six.

Presenter24:11

It's Barbara Streisand who has featured heavily in my life. When I lived in my flat in Chiswick, I used to stand at the bottom of the staircase and I used to use the kind of, what's it called, the balustrade or something, at the bottom of the stairs. And I used to pretend it was a microphone. So I'd stand there and I'd give my Barbara singing along. But this song, Barbara used to sing it to her son. And although I've never sung this to Alfie, I think he'd die of embarrassment if I sang it to him. But music for Alfie and I has been important. And when he was younger, we used to dance around the kitchen a lot. But in a way, this is a private song from me to Alfie, Not While I'm Around.

Speaker 224:58

Others can desert you, not to worry, whistle, I'll be there.

Speaker 225:06

Demons will charm you with a smile for a while but in time

Speaker 225:23

Not while a

Presenter25:27

Not While I'm Around, Barbara Streisand. Leslie, you're the third actress to play Princess Margaret in the Crown and the series features her famous appearance on Desert Island Disc. So at least a show that looks very like it.

Lesley Manville25:36

Yeah.

Speaker 225:36

Yeah.

Lesley Manville25:36

Currently

Presenter25:40

Leslie, how did you approach that challenge? Well, I listened to her Desert Island discs, obviously, and but the script

Presenter25:49

It doesn't really use her version of the real time she was on. Yeah, she's a little more monosyllabic than I've been today.

Presenter25:58

Let's just leave it at that.

Presenter26:00

Were you already a fan of this series when you got the opportunity to be in it? Huge fan, and went back obviously then and watched it all from the beginning. There is a massive wow factor to the whole series, not least of all, you know, the scripts and the wonderful dialogue we get to do and work with my dear friend Imelda Staunton, you know, playing siblings, which is just so great. And he has written some cracking scenes for Queen Elizabeth and Princess Margaret that really just deals with the fact that they're sisters. And of course, I understand that very well, having two sisters of my own. Leslie, it's time for your next disc. It's number seven. What are we going to hear and why?

Presenter26:45

My eldest sister, Brenda, tragically died a few years ago of a brain tumour and.

Presenter26:53

She was nine years older than me. She had a really difficult life. Unbeknownst to her, she got married.

Presenter27:00

to a man who was carrying Huntington's career.

Presenter27:04

which is a disease that doesn't present until you're an adult.

Presenter27:07

They had two children, two little girls, and he tragically died and this disease that he had came to the fore.

Presenter27:14

And of course the the most awful thing was that her two daughters inherited it. So my nieces died as adults and Brenda had to live through that, watch it. I mean, how you begin to deal with your children.

Presenter27:29

Um

Presenter27:30

Excuse me, that's all right, take your time.

Presenter27:35

How how you begin to deal with your losing your children, God knows. But the amazing thing about her she went to work in the home where they lived out their lives, beautiful home, and she went to work there so she could be with them.

Presenter27:49

For all of that tragedy in her life

Presenter27:52

She'd never put it upon you. She'd never make me feel guilty that I had a healthy, robust child. She would celebrate Al Fi, celebrate my life.

Presenter28:04

She could have.

Presenter28:06

buried her head in the sand.

Presenter28:09

Been bitter. I'm sure she did feel that life hadn't dealt her a fair lot and it hadn't.

Presenter28:16

But she didn't put that on other people at all. She was joyous, she was giggly, she was naughty, she was funny, and I miss her hugely.

Presenter28:28

There's an Adele song, Make You Feel My Love, which not all the lyrics are necessarily pertaining to Brenda, but that is what she did. She made you feel her love, despite what she'd been through.

Presenter28:43

She wanted you to feel good even though her pain was so immense.

Speaker 428:49

When the rain is blowing in your face

Speaker 428:56

And the whole world is on your case

Lesley Manville28:57

But it's all

Speaker 429:02

I can all feel memory

Speaker 429:08

To make you feel my love

Speaker 429:14

When the evening's shadows and the stars

Presenter29:20

Adele, and make you feel my love.

Presenter29:23

Everything about your work ethic, Leslie says trooper.

Presenter29:27

In 2018, you were nominated for an Oscar for your role in Phantom Thread with Daniel D. Lewis, and you were also at the time appearing in the West End. And I heard that you didn't even miss one performance to attend the Oscar ceremony thousands of miles away in LA. Just talk me through the logistics of that weekend. I was doing Long Day's Journeying Tonight in the West End, and we were doing the kind of American system of doing a late matinee on a Sunday. Okay. And then you'd have the Monday off. I see. So the Oscars were on a Sunday, though, so that was a bit of a problem. The theatre didn't want to cancel the Saturday, so they said, all right, we'll postpone the Sunday matinee and add it on later in the week.

Presenter30:11

So on the Sunday morning

Presenter30:14

I got up. There were no flights out of London that would have got me there in time. So Alfie and I had to fly away from LA to Amsterdam at like six in the morning to pick up a KLM flight that would get us to the Oscars with an hour and a half to get ready.

Presenter30:33

I'd had two hours' sleep. I got there.

Presenter30:36

There was somebody doing my hair, somebody doing my makeup, somebody doing my nails, somebody giving me a pedicure and somebody dangling diamond earrings in front of me. It was absolutely bonkers. And of course, the lovely thing was that Gary Oldman had been nominated that year and he won. So Alfie was having a real, you know, it was nice. It was all of his family there. So both of his parents were nominated for Oscars in the same year. Yeah, he's part of a very exclusive club. I think only Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's children have had the same thing. So of course we went to the Governor's Ball and we did a bit of that and Gary was there and Alfie's half-brothers were there and it was lovely.

Lesley Manville30:58

Shop.

Lesley Manville30:59

Yeah, he's not

Lesley Manville31:01

Yeah.

Presenter31:17

But, you know, you're starving. And I said to Paul Thomas Anderson, the director, what's the Vanity Fair party going to be like? And he said, it's going to be exactly the same as this, but with lots of models. So Paul said, let's go. We'll go to a nice hotel downtown. So that's what we did. We got in our cars. We sat in this gorgeous lounge, all of us together. We had cocktails and omelets.

Presenter31:46

So Leslie, it's almost time to cast you away now. Obviously, a solitary life on the island beckons. How do you greet that prospect? Is it something you're looking forward to? I'm so practical. I mean, I do look at things now, domestic things, like

Lesley Manville31:56

I'm so

Presenter32:02

Problems in the house.

Presenter32:04

And I will really try and work out how to solve them. One more track before we send you there though, Leslie Manville, your final choice today. What have you gone for? Well, it's a track from Phantom Thread, the soundtrack written by the extraordinary Johnny Greenwood, because that whole job

Presenter32:21

was so significant and special and wonderful for me and not for the reasons you might think, not because of what doors it opened for me and not because of the Oscars but because of the people and that character who I absolutely loved playing. On the soundtrack it's called Phantom Thread 3 and it's just the most wah boom really meet and two veg piece of music.

Speaker 232:44

Yeah.

Presenter33:22

Phantom Thread 3 from the film soundtrack by Johnny Greenwood. So, it's time to cast you away, Leslie. I'm going to give you the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare to take to the island with you. Of course, you can also have another book. What are you going to choose? This was tricky. I thought of taking Chekhov's short stories, and I know that would feed my soul, but...

Presenter33:44

I think what would be more useful is a kind of botanical encyclopedia. Oh. So I would know what I could eat, what I could pick, what I could forage.

Presenter33:56

What was going to kill me if I ate it? I could understand what was around me and.

Speaker 234:00

Understand.

Presenter34:02

Eat the right things. Would you like it to be a strictly practical volume? Or are you happy for it to be aesthetically pleasing too? It's got to be both, because aesthetic is as important. Then consider it done, Leslie. It's yours. You can also have a luxury item.

Lesley Manville34:12

That's okay.

Presenter34:19

It's going to be a bed with some very, very, very good linen. Because.

Presenter34:25

Living on this island's gonna be tough. There's gonna be a lot to do. I'm gonna be chopping wood. There's gonna be so much to do. If you've had a good night's sleep, you'll be able to handle the day much better. But the linen's got to be very high thread counts. Okay, the linen will be perfect. I know that you favour a vintage linen yourself. You have been known to scour the internet for monogrammed. I have monogrammed.

Speaker 434:42

Did I know that?

Lesley Manville34:46

Yeah.

Presenter34:48

Vintage linen, but yeah, and a really good Hungarian Goustown duvet and pillows on it. You've also got to choose one disc to save from the waves before we send you off to your island, Leslie. Which would you rush to rescue?

Lesley Manville34:55

Omit

Presenter35:04

I think because of its significance.

Presenter35:07

when I was a kid and for the family.

Presenter35:10

It would have to be over the rainbow.

Presenter35:13

Leslie Manville, thank you very much for letting us hear your Desert Island discs. Thank you, Lauren. It's been quite cathartic.

Speaker 436:03

Hello, I'm Amo Rogan. And I'm Nick Robinson, and from BBC Radio 4, this is the Today podcast.

Speaker 436:10

And Nick, this is the moment to ask you what you most enjoy about spending a couple of hours in my company each week. Well that would be enough in itself, but the fun is to go in depth on a story with an expert guest and for you and I to try and really get what's going on.

Lesley Manville36:24

I have CCTV on my home. I've had people rip my gates down. Is it worth it?

Speaker 436:28

Andrea, being an MP, on no occasion did the scan that I'd had ever appear in the other blog. So what do you enjoy most about doing? I love the fact that we've got a really strong sense of community. And yes, I love some of our star guests too. Frank Skinner! Woo! This is where we need Tinda Flawless. I'm going to clap as well just to thicken it up. Listen and subscribe on BBC Sounds.