Victoria Wood

Speaker 10:00

Hello, I'm Kirstie Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen eighty seven, and the presenter was Michael Parkinson.

Presenter0:29

The most simple description of our castaway will be that she's a very funny woman. One writer said that if we simply consider her as a joke factory, she'd be the Nissan of show business. Joe writing a thought, she's also an actress, comedian, playwright, scriptwriter, musician and composer. Whatever she does, she displays that rare ability to make people laugh. She is Victoria Wood.

Presenter0:49

Victoria, do you think you're going to enjoy this stint on the desert island?

Victoria Wood0:53

Yeah.

Presenter0:53

Why?

Victoria Wood0:54

I liked being on my own better than with other people.

Presenter0:56

You try to escape, do you think?

Victoria Wood0:58

Depends how far the nearest place was. I can swim quite a long way. But I probably wouldn't,'cause I'd be too frightened.

Presenter1:04

And what about the choice of music for this Desertan? You've taken you're going to take eight eight records with you now. Is it interesting to find out why people make the choice? I mean, is it about memory for you or or what?

Victoria Wood1:14

Well, mostly it's mood. It's things I play to put me in a good mood. And if I was on a desert island, I'd want to be in a good mood all the time. But there's some of them I've known for years and years and so they do remind me of other things.

Presenter1:25

And w what part has music played in your life? Has there always been music with you? Have you always been interested in it?

Victoria Wood1:28

Oh, it was a huge bit. It was the first thing I I was ever good at was playing the piano,'cause I was certainly never good at anything else. And the the first really good time I had was when I was in a youth theater and I was in a brass band when I was about twelve and thirteen and that was a great time as well.

Presenter1:42

What do you play in the brass band?

Victoria Wood1:43

Second trumpet.

Victoria Wood1:45

I could play but not March. Well I could play or March but not not but the same term.

Presenter1:49

Not at the same time.

Victoria Wood1:50

I had to leave.

Presenter1:51

Let's have a first choice of music now.

Victoria Wood1:53

Well the first one is um a piece by Eric Coates called Saxo Rhapsody, which is played by Jack Brymer. And uh I when I was doing the sessions for the series I've just done, we had Jack Brymer in on the session and I was going to go up and say, Jack Brymer, I love your record. Well I didn't, I just said hello. But sometimes I've played this as a sort of tribute to him.

Presenter3:13

There's a Saxo Rhapsody by Eric Coates, played by Jack Bramer. You mentioned their brass bands. That of course means that you're brought up in brass band territory, doesn't it?

Victoria Wood3:20

Yes, Bury, Lancashire.

Presenter3:22

And what what what's uh what is your background? What did your parents do?

Victoria Wood3:24

Well, my father's that very northern occupation and insurance underwriter. We're just sort of sort of ordinary middle class family. No clogs, I'm afraid.

Presenter3:32

Nothing romantic either.

Victoria Wood3:33

No, no.

Presenter3:34

My

Victoria Wood3:34

B

Presenter3:34

No. What sort of a a background was it though? I mean, was it a a very happy childhood, a very sort of contented one?

Victoria Wood3:39

It was just very ordinary really. I was a very boring boring child. Youngest youngest of four occupations, playing the piano, eating, watching television, which is all I do now really.

Presenter3:43

Yeah

Presenter3:49

And what kind of ambitions did you have as a chair?

Victoria Wood3:51

I wants to be a boxer, first of all, and then I want to be famous.

Victoria Wood3:55

And that that's all I wanted to be. I wanted to be famous.

Presenter3:58

I I've got this theory about humour, that uh that it's a that all people are funny, it's almost a sense of vocation with them, that from the very beginning they have to be funny. It would seem from what you said that it's not true in your case.

Victoria Wood4:08

It's maybe true now. I don't think I mean, once you start you can't stop, I suppose, you feel an obligation to do it. But I think it's more just a love for it than an actual vacation. You just you just want to do it'cause you just enjoy it so much.

Presenter4:19

But when did you discover that you were funny? I mean at what point in your life, what was it?

Victoria Wood4:23

About fifteen I joined a youth theatre, Rochdale Youth Theatre, and I started to get parts in the plays and they're always the funny parts and that's when I thought, Oh, I can do this,'cause I hadn't been able to do anything before that.

Victoria Wood4:36

Oh, it was broke, but it was really lazy and not n Very happy with this. And I was at the bottom and used to

Victoria Wood4:40

you know, never do my homework and all that dreary sort of lifestyle. And then I just found that, you know, that I had a good knack for something. Instead of just being not very good at Latin and quite good at English, I was actually good at something.

Presenter4:51

And coming from this background that you do, so very ordinary middle class background, I mean, did what were parents supported that they thought that they've got a comedian in the family?

Victoria Wood4:56

Yeah.

Victoria Wood4:57

Yeah, yeah, I think they were just glad I found something I could do.

Presenter5:01

Another choice of record.

Victoria Wood5:02

Uh this is um

Victoria Wood5:04

Procoffia, the seventh symphony.

Victoria Wood5:06

And um this reminds me I used to play this all the time'cause I all the records I've picked I play all all the time. And uh I was I was in a place which I can't even mention. I rented a flat with my husband. We were working somewhere and uh my husband was dying his stage shoes black. on a pale green carpet and he spilt the shoe dye. This is while this record was playing. He very cleverly spilt the shoe dye all over the carpet. So that was a very jolly evening and we nearly got divorced after that. Of course it always reminds me of that, but it's a great tune anyway.

Presenter6:27

Part of the third movement of Prokofiev's Seventh Symphony played by the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Andrei Prabin.

Presenter6:34

You mentioned there that you wanted to be famous when you were a child. What kind of fame did you imagine?

Victoria Wood6:41

I don't know what I imagined. I d I remember just remember thinking it about the age of five, but later on I didn't want to be famous. I just wanted to earn a living because it looked like this was going to be very difficult to do'cause I was on the dole for so long. So my ambition changed to just wanting to be in the entertainment business and earn money at it. And that being famous went out the window, except sort of it's useful for selling tickets. But I mean it's not how you envisage it because it's a nuisance.

Presenter7:01

Yeah.

Presenter7:04

You think it is, do you?

Victoria Wood7:05

Yeah.

Victoria Wood7:06

Well, it's as I say, it's great because you have to have a certain amount of celebrity to be a sort of um going proposition, to be a commodity and to p to do your job and earn money. But uh, you know, as when you want to go and buy your knickers and things, it's just a bit of an irritation. People come up and poke you and things like that.

Presenter7:23

Do they actually poke you?

Victoria Wood7:26

They come up and they come and well, first mainly they want to know if you are who they think you are, which covers a range of people, from the woman who does the lip reading on Sunday mornings to, you know, Angela Rip and I think anybody, they know you're somebody that they've seen off television. You know, I guess in taxis and people say, You're that woman off Fresh Fields and they say, Oh, no, no And then I think, Oh, probably they didn't even mean Julia Mackenzie, they probably meant that other one that lives next door, you know, I'm not even that famous to be mixed up with Julia Mackenzie.

Presenter7:52

But there's nothing very much you can do about that, is there, really?

Victoria Wood7:54

No, it's part of the job, but I'm and I j what I mean is it's just it's not what you imagine, it's not sort of swanning about in a fur coat, it's people saying, Oh, my wife's seen all your programmes and she hasn't liked any of them yet, you know.

Presenter8:05

When you were a child, were you key on the drama? I mean, did you did you go on the school play?

Victoria Wood8:09

No, I wasn't allowed I was you couldn't be in the school pay unless you did your homework, so I let that out. I didn't get in the school pay until about seventeen and a half, by which time I was I thought too late to do me any good.

Presenter8:17

What did you play in the school play? Remember your first part?

Victoria Wood8:19

I was well, my first and only part was Autolycus in the Winter's Tale. I wore these really horrible brown ties and been washed for about a million years, like Ryvita.

Presenter8:27

And then you went to university, didn't you? And you read you read drama there.

Victoria Wood8:30

Yeah, it was the only place I could get into because I only had two O levels when I applied. It was the only place that was balmy enough to take me on.

Presenter8:35

And where was that?

Victoria Wood8:36

Birmingham.

Presenter8:37

And I mean what kind of course was it? I mean was it a good practical course or do you just lounge around drinking coffee?

Victoria Wood8:40

Don't leave.

Victoria Wood8:42

Well we did a lot of lounging about. I think there was a course called lounging about the deep coffee, which I would have passed.

Presenter8:46

Which

Speaker 18:46

Uh

Victoria Wood8:47

Um, there was lots of things you could you could do technical things like learning how to tie ropes onto things called cleats and all this sort of thing and pressing a button called the revolve and then the revolve would go around and you got a gold star for doing that. I could do that. And then there was a lot of acting and I never got to do the acting. That was all done by the very these very tall blonde girls. They got all the pots and I never got anything. So I just used to do stage management and sweep the stage and stuff like that.

Presenter9:08

Let's have another choice of record.

Victoria Wood9:10

Oh well this is Fat Swallow, but this is a brilliant tune called African Ripples which I've been trying to play for about two years and I can't play well I can play one hand at a time but not both.

Victoria Wood9:19

And he he plays it really fast and then about halfway through he suddenly whips into fifth gear and plays it nine times quicker. I don't understand how he does it.

Presenter10:26

Patswala and African Ripples.

Presenter10:28

Victoria

Presenter10:30

Just finishing off this this stint of yours at at university, I mean, what what attitude did your tutors have to you? Did they think you had a shiny career ahead of you on the on the stage?

Victoria Wood10:39

No,'cause they kept telling me not to do it. So they kept saying, No, please go into stage management. And I I auditioned for a part in Luke, well the only female part in Luke, Joe Orton's Loot, and I didn't get it. And they said, um, well what you can do is you can play the piano at the end of the the show while people are walking out. So I did that and I and as they were all leaving I stood up and said, Don't go and I wrote a song about how I should have had the part and that was what started me off doing the songwriting really. So I got my own back on.

Presenter11:01

Was it about this time too in your career when you met Julie Walters who's been associated with you now for many years? Many a long year.

Victoria Wood11:06

For many a long year. It's a very old person. I met her when I was seventeen. I auditioned for Manchester Polytechnic School of Theatre and she was one of the people showing people round. And I was ill with nerves the whole day, I'm not really taking any notice. And towards the end of the day, I suddenly sort of cleared up and felt better. And I suddenly noticed this strange woman with the smallest eyes I'd ever seen, talking 19 to the dozen, doing an impression of a nurse wheeling a commode down a ward. And I thought, this is odd, funny. And I didn't anyway, I didn't get in, so I never saw her again for years and years and years. And in 1978, I met her at Shepherd's Bush at the Bush Theatre. And I suddenly sort of glanced across the room, did a sort of double take, a cross fade, and I thought, oh, that's that woman, and that's what happened to her,'cause I always wondered what happened to her,'cause I thought she was so funny. And she said, Oh, you were that one that kept throwing up.

Presenter11:47

And that's a a partnership that has lasted for a long term.

Victoria Wood11:49

Lasted for long term.

Presenter11:50

What about you mentioned there you when you mention you're doing auditions for uh the drama schools. What what what kind of audition did you do?

Victoria Wood11:57

Well, we used to do a piece of Shakespeare's I used to do a bit of I used to do Juliet's death scene. It was so stupid. I did little glasses on and Lancashire accents and a midi skirt. It must have been really ludicrous. And I used to do an o you know an improvisation and a bit of movement and all that. It was terrible. I'm not surprised I never got it. And I'm glad I didn't really.

Presenter12:14

Another choice of record.

Victoria Wood12:15

Oh, well this is Ian Jury, who's one of my big favourites.

Presenter12:17

Why?

Victoria Wood12:18

Well,'cause I'm not a great listener to of songs and I don't like lyrics on the whole. But h him and Noel Coward are the only people's lyrics that I listen to. And I really love Chasjankle's music as well. And this is one of the tunes that I play over and over and over again. It goes to the groove on the record by itself now, this track, In Between Is.

Speaker 412:37

At least you put me on the team.

Speaker 412:41

And friends

Speaker 412:43

The roll

Speaker 412:46

Supreme.

Speaker 412:48

Okay, oh, what are you mean between this?

Speaker 412:54

With a carpenter sea

Speaker 412:56

Two years

Speaker 412:58

And who was that phone?

Speaker 413:01

Two years

Speaker 413:03

In the cabinet, no

Presenter13:05

The injury and in between is.

Presenter13:07

Victoria, after you left university, d what did you do then to earn a living?

Victoria Wood13:11

Well, I went in for talent competitions. I went in for the Pub Entertainer of the Year competition. I don't know why, because I never went in pubs and it wasn't entertaining. But I had this boyfriend and he ditched me. And I wanted to show him that I could get on without him. So I went in for this. I thought, well, I'll win and he'll come and see me being terribly famous and he'll be terribly hurt and wounded. Which I hope he is now, looking back. And I went in and I there were five acts and I came third out of five. The piano was bolted to the floor. I had to pose my back to the audience. I remember that's probably a blessing in disguise. And the first act that won, got the first prize was three girls in hot pants, enormous girls with enormous hot pants on. And the second prize was a man who was dressed as a skeleton, who climbed out of a cardboard coffin and sang, Take No Sins, Take Off Your Skin, Down Shine Your Bones. And I came third to them and I thought, I'm not going to get on.

Presenter13:53

Very classy acts, weren't they?

Victoria Wood13:54

Is okay.

Presenter13:55

So what happened after that? I mean, that'd be a very daunting experience. You'll be you'll be forgiven for giving it all up then?

Victoria Wood14:00

Well, then I went on New Faces and did win the first heat of a whole series. This is when New Faces was very big. And it w the whole series was won by Marty Kane, with Lenny Henry sort of coming a close second or third. And we were all given a most appalling television show together called The Summer Show, which I've never met anybody who's seen. Well, nobody's admitting to having seen it. And it was me and Marty and Lenny and a few other people. It was one of these really bad variety shows where they got the scripts out of other people's dustbins. It was just dreadful. And then and Marty I remember Marty Kane saying to me, the money's rubbish, isn't it? It was a hundred and twenty five pounds a week. I thought the money's marvellous. They never earned anything like that for years and years and years and years. She's taking a big drop in salary to do it.

Speaker 114:32

Yeah.

Victoria Wood14:37

And that didn't get me anywhere either. And then I did that slive, and that didn't get me anywhere either.

Presenter14:40

Well, it did. I mean, that's. No, it didn't. You see, I didn't work.

Victoria Wood14:41

No I didn't. You see, I didn't work after that's life, no.

Presenter14:44

Well, you know, I had this period yesterday.

Victoria Wood14:46

Yeah, but that was it was after that.

Victoria Wood14:48

So now I

Presenter14:49

Uh

Victoria Wood14:49

Nice.

Presenter14:49

It's a

Victoria Wood14:49

Uh

Victoria Wood14:50

That was the first time I could fit it in.

Presenter14:50

That's the best.

Victoria Wood14:56

Well I used to write these songs and a a producer at the BBC where where I first worked at Pebble Mill, he told me a song had to be two minutes ten seconds and something to fit some stupid format of his own. But for years religiously I thought all my songs were two minutes ten seconds. Pretty silly. Used to stop in the middle just so they could stop then. Choice a record. Oh, a record. Well this is um Gershwin and this is the concerto in F, which is another great piece of piano playing.

Speaker 115:13

Choice of record.

Presenter16:28

That was part of the first movement of Gershman's Piano Concerto, played by Andrei Preven with the London Symphony Orchestra. Victoria, you mentioned that that's life and said that that ruined your career or stopped it. But in fact, I mean, what what it did do, I mean, it it brought you to the notice of the public, didn't it, for the first time properly. I mean, you've got a big audience and it brought me

Victoria Wood16:37

Stop.

Victoria Wood16:44

Yes, it brought me to their notice, but they didn't like me. Didn't they? No, well they used to say you're Pameres. I mean they used to just get me mixed up with everybody else. It meant I mean even now people say you used to do that slife, but it because I had a a lunatic manager in Hove and I I and used to turn down all the jobs I was offered, I never worked after that, so that's when I really took a dive.

Presenter16:46

Didn't they?

Presenter17:02

Why did he turn down jobs?

Victoria Wood17:03

But I think he was mad. He was an ex-bandleader which may have had something to do with it. I don't know, he was just mad. And I was mad to sign up with him, but that that's, you know, it's one of those sad tales, what girls do.

Presenter17:12

And so what do you do then in this limbo land? I mean what

Victoria Wood17:16

Well I just sat around being miserable for for ages and then I met a radio producer who um isn't since died. He asked me to write a a radio script which I did and he sent it back and said there's too many jokes in it. I thought how can there be too many jokes in something? And that also got that got me going and I started working with other people like Roger McGough and John Dowie started working in the theatre and then I got discovered by somebody at the bush and I did a show with Julie and then somebody said write a play and it's went on from there.

Speaker 117:36

Yeah.

Presenter17:36

But

Presenter17:42

When you do the show with Julie, you're talking about now the the first television series, aren't you?

Victoria Wood17:45

No, this was a theatre show, wasn't it? Yeah. Well, this is the first thing I'd properly written apart from songs. They they asked me to write four songs and I wrote three and I said, Can I write a sketch instead of the fourth song? And because it was it was a very serious review called In It the Death, it was all about death and this was the only sketch that was really supposed to be funny, so I got all the reviews and that gave me a big lift after that.

Presenter17:46

Show

Presenter18:03

Were you thinking at this time that perhaps you might end up writing for the theatre?

Victoria Wood18:06

I hadn't thought about it. It wasn't till um David Leland, who's now a a filmwriter and director, who was then directing the in theatre plays, he asked me to write a play and I sort of said, Oh, why not? I'd not thought of it before.

Presenter18:06

As a career.

Presenter18:18

Was that talent?

Victoria Wood18:19

Yeah.

Presenter18:20

Mm-hmm.

Presenter18:20

And that was a great success, didn't it? I mean, it was very good for you.

Victoria Wood18:24

It was fantastic. Yeah, yeah.

Presenter18:26

And at that point then, perhaps when you got the award, the most promising young playwright, do you think then that that's my career ahead of me now?

Victoria Wood18:29

Right.

Victoria Wood18:32

I've only written one play since.

Victoria Wood18:34

It has to put me off. I keep meaning to write another one. I just I just hang around long enough to get the award and

Victoria Wood18:40

I mean, I once I'd done it, I wanted to do it again. I d I don't find it very easy. I mean, I think if you're doing two things in tandem, like being a playwright and having an act, it's very difficult to do them both and to be as good as you'd like at both of them. And one's got shoved aside lately.

Presenter18:54

Another choice of record.

Victoria Wood18:55

Oh well, this is Noel Coward, and the reason I've picked this particular one is it's him at Las Vegas, where he's obviously gone in to make a killing and make a few bob for his old age, and he's playing the most unlikely audience, and I'm sure he must have been shaken in his boots before he went on, but I mean he's just

Victoria Wood19:09

He was very clever and the the things that he's picked to sing to them about, especially in this song Let's Do It, he's really clever, the way he he works them up.

Victoria Wood19:17

And he makes a killing.

Speaker 419:19

Luella Parsons can't quite do it.

Speaker 419:25

But she's so highly struck.

Speaker 419:29

Malema might do it.

Speaker 419:32

But she looks far too young.

Speaker 419:35

Each man out there shooting crap does it

Speaker 419:39

Davy Crockett in that dreadful cap, does it? Let's do it. Let's fall in love.

Speaker 419:46

All famous writers in swarms do it.

Presenter19:50

No Cowden Let's Do It from the album Live Las Vegas.

Presenter19:54

Victoria, let's now talk about you and your television career, not the the the one that took off after that. The proper one. The proper one, yes. How did that start?

Speaker 119:59

That's a lot.

Victoria Wood20:03

Well, the play, I wrote Talent, which was done at Sheffield Crucible, was seen by a Granada producer, Peter Eckersley. And he said he couldn't really make head and tail of it because he thought there was probably something in it. And he bought it for Granada. And I said, So Julie and I worked there and did Talent. And then he commissioned a sequel, which we then did, and then he commissioned a film, which we then did. And then he said, Do you want your own show? And I said, No, I don't. I want my friend with me. So we did Wooden Walters and we did The Pilot and then we were just about to do the series and Peter went into hospital and died.

Speaker 420:36

Hmm.

Victoria Wood20:37

What can I say? I mean, that's that's he wa he was the the thing that that started me off and

Presenter20:42

You dedicated your book, which is a collection of your of your scripts called Up to You Porky to Peter. He obviously had a very, very deep influence on your life.

Victoria Wood20:46

Yeah.

Victoria Wood20:48

He did that when he was just one of the

Victoria Wood20:51

One of the funniest people and one of the cleverest, and just the perfect person for me to meet at that stage because you could bring a script to him that you thought was pretty good, and he'd sit there and he would tear half the pages out and hand it back, and you think, Oh, yeah, that's much better. But he wouldn't do it in a nasty way, it was fantastic. And I was just.

Speaker 121:07

Uh

Victoria Wood21:08

I mean, I was just really knocked back when he died because I'd only known him for about four years and I was just sort of looking forward to knowing him for about another 48. And I'm still feel.

Presenter21:15

Yeah.

Victoria Wood21:17

you know, disappointed about.

Presenter21:18

Yes, well I still feel a sense of loss too'cause he's a great friend of mine as as as well, as you know. I must ask you about that title though, but up to Porky.

Victoria Wood21:25

Well it's a line from one of the sketches. There's a sketch set in a boutique where a woman, who's supposed to be a normal sized woman, goes into a boutique where the assistant is sort of bone thin and she says, Have you got these trousers in a size fourteen? and the woman says yes and she says can I try them on? The assistant says it's up to you Porky.

Presenter21:43

Where do you get your your your your material from? I mean is it stuff either you hear or is it invented or what what proportion is invented?

Victoria Wood21:48

It's invented'cause I mean I often I write things down that I hear and I never ever use them because they never seem to fit in anywhere. I think it's much it's much better to just go off on your own tangent really. But of course it's I mean it's based some of it's based on real life, it's based on what you see, but then you

Presenter21:56

Dies.

Speaker 121:56

Uh

Speaker 121:59

Uh

Presenter22:00

Boop.

Victoria Wood22:04

You change it round in your brain.

Presenter22:06

You live in Morecambe?

Victoria Wood22:07

I don't live in Morecombe. I'm everybody thinks I do, but I don't actually live in the world.

Presenter22:09

But I just wondered, I mean I mean is that a deliberate ploy on your part because you you you need to get back up there to get sort of refreshed from what you hear or what? I mean

Victoria Wood22:19

Well, I think it's nice to be where everybody else isn't. I do like to keep away from other comics. I don't want to end up doing the same as everybody else. And that I and also I can get a lot more work done if I'm living in a place where there's not people ringing up and knocking on the door every two minutes. Whereas when I'm down here I have a much busier social life and there's more people around that I know.

Presenter22:22

Yeah.

Presenter22:34

Yeah.

Victoria Wood22:38

Uh

Presenter22:38

Yeah.

Victoria Wood22:38

Whereas at home I can just I can work all day and I can work all evening as well, which is great.

Presenter22:42

Your television series on BBC has just ended. I wonder how long does it take you to write that kind of show? Do you write it all yourself?

Victoria Wood22:48

Yeah.

Presenter22:49

Six shows.

Victoria Wood22:50

It's about six months.

Presenter22:50

It's three hours.

Victoria Wood22:52

Six months. I'll write twice as much as we need to um because some of it won't be funny and some of it people won't remember the words properly, so we have to have enough to throw away.

Presenter22:58

Do not

Presenter23:00

You do choose the difficult performing professions, don't you? Because I mean, you do that, the writing and the performing, and then of course you're your War Woman Show too. I mean, that must chew up material, eat it up.

Victoria Wood23:06

Yeah, sure.

Victoria Wood23:09

Well, you can cross over a bit from one to the other. You can u you know, if you do a little bit on the television, if you wait long enough, you can do it in the theatre as well. And then if you've when you've finished with the piece that's never been on television and sti and on stage, you can use it on the telly. But, I mean, but it does take a lot of work to keep it all going, to keep it all new, yeah.

Presenter23:24

What was the worst audience that you've had doing the One Woman show?

Victoria Wood23:28

Um

Victoria Wood23:30

I think the the London audience is the coldest audience because they saw something last night and they're going to see something tomorrow afternoon, you know, so you've got to be good. Whereas if you go somewhere where they you know, they've come especially to see you, not just because it's round the corner from their hotel. But since I started getting quite good at it, I've not had a lousy audience, but when I first started I used to get the most appalling, you know, people used to just fall asleep when I was on stage.

Presenter23:52

What was the smallest Obi did you play to?

Victoria Wood23:54

Um, I think there was about seven people and and a man on a life support system, a portable life support system outside Birmingham and that and I very nearly said, What is that dreadful noise? Well, somebody please switch the fans off and say, No, this is life support system, you're killing if you switch it.

Presenter24:09

Do you uh do you in fact of all the things that you do, I mean, I list them all, you know, you you you write, you write plays, you write scripts, you do television, you do live performance. Which is the one you enjoy most of all? Is it live performance?

Victoria Wood24:21

I think it it is because that's the hardest. That's where you really learn your job. You can I could do something on television and it might be really quite mediocre, but because it's awfully well lit and it comes, you know, as part of something else, you can get away with it. But if I come on on stage and do something that's not very good, then I instantly know. And you you really have to do your best because uh people are paying money to see and it's their night out. And that's when you're really tested, I think. And it's very hard to be on stage, you know, for an hour at a time.

Presenter24:47

The most difficult thing.

Victoria Wood24:48

Yeah.

Presenter24:49

Another choice to record, please.

Victoria Wood24:51

Well this is a this is a double thing'cause I didn't know which record to pick. This is Bunny Berrigan, but he's playing a Bix by the Beck tune'cause I love them both and this is In a Mist and this is what I used to play every morning when I was writing the series. I used to put this on. I play every morning.

Presenter26:00

There was Bunny Berrigan playing Bixpiderbeck's in a mist.

Presenter26:04

Victoria, looking back at your short career, it was incredibly so successful because you won awards as a as a playwright, you won awards as a performer on television and a writer on on television. My word, you didn't do the Raw Variety show.

Victoria Wood26:15

Ha ha ha.

Presenter26:16

The aquarium.

Victoria Wood26:17

My heart's still thumping.

Presenter26:19

Is it do you enjoy it, by the way?

Victoria Wood26:20

I did. It was a bit nerve wracking, it was a little bit crowded backstage, but it was a good laugh.

Presenter26:24

Yes. I just wonder, I mean, you've got all that behind you now. I mean, what what's the future? I mean, what about abroad, for instance? What about America? Have you ever thought about that?

Victoria Wood26:32

Well, I've just been talking to a man from New York who s wants me to go over there, but not in with a big sort of bally hoo, but just go over there in a little capacity, like take a job in a bank or crack jokes over the counter, something like that. And I d would like to do that. I mean, that's a bit frightening. It's always easier to do the thing that you know and stay here, but I feel I should try it and perhaps maybe go to Australia. The shows have been shown in Australia. Are they doing well there?

Presenter26:54

Are they doing well there?

Victoria Wood26:55

I think they did all right, yes. What what they're planning to do is um play the first series and the second series together next year and that give me a bit more of a following and I could maybe go and tour out there because a lot of our British chaps have done well over there.

Presenter27:03

Yeah.

Presenter27:06

Yes, indeed. You you'll enjoy it there as well. So, what what else apart from that? I mean, is is it so great uh play to be written yet or?

Victoria Wood27:13

Well, I'm actually going to play in January, but I I don't know if it's going to be great or not. And then I'll do a bit more television and I'll tour and then I'd like to do a film as well. I mean I've got lots of things I want to do but you know everything takes me so long I never get around to everything.

Presenter27:24

Final choice of red one.

Victoria Wood27:25

Well, I'm a mad walker and I walk all the time and I play my walkman when I'm walking and this is my favourite thing for walking to which is the weather girls who are two enormous black women with enormous black voices and they sing Lock Me Up and it's a great ski to moving to.

Speaker 427:41

Yeah, love.

Speaker 427:43

But you'll all be kinda

Speaker 427:50

Go!

Speaker 427:57

The Chinese

Presenter28:06

And that was the weather girl's, but it locked me up.

Presenter28:08

Victorian, you're now on this desert island, and you have to make this choice. You've got seven records that have been washed away. You're left with one. What would it be?

Victoria Wood28:10

Yeah.

Victoria Wood28:14

What would it be? Oh, I think fat swallow.

Presenter28:16

Why?

Victoria Wood28:16

Why? Well then I could try and learn and play African ripples a bit better than I can at the moment.

Presenter28:20

With both hands.

Victoria Wood28:21

They had

Presenter28:22

All right. And what about the book? You've got the works of Shakespeare, you've got the Bible.

Victoria Wood28:25

Well, Shakespeare Bible, I think, has to be Arthur Marshall, the collected works of Arthur Marshall, because nothing else is going to make me laugh if I'm on my own, and he's the only person that makes me laugh out loud when I'm on my own, so it has to be him.

Presenter28:35

and the luxury object.

Victoria Wood28:37

A cinema organ, a mighty whirl itself.'Cause they'd probably take ages to learn to play with having those bits and bobs and knobs and stops and things. I could have a good time.

Presenter28:45

Victoria Wood, thank you very much indeed. Thank you.

Speaker 128:55

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