Jane Asher

Speaker 20:00

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

Speaker 20:08

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

Presenter0:29

My Castaway this week is a woman who has kept pace with her times. She began as a glamorous child of the sixties and grew into an admired actress. Today acting is still her main profession, but she writes as well, explaining in her books that other aspect of her varied life, the domestic pleasures of being a wife and a mother. She is Jane Asher.

Presenter0:53

Jane, it seems to me that you've always been well known, whether it's as a a child actress or a trendsetter or a cake maker or a columnist. I mean, do you actually like being famous?

Presenter1:04

Well, I suppose if I am honest, I can't dislike it that much, or I would have stopped doing all the things that uh get notice and get you written and talked about. But there are certain aspects of it I dislike intensely.

Presenter1:15

Being famous in itself

Presenter1:18

can be pleasing. I mean, if you do a play or you do a film or television, whatever it is, and you get letters saying they enjoyed it and that they watched it and

Presenter1:27

Please do some more. It's it's very cheering and I mean and that wouldn't happen if you were entirely unknown and nobody knew who you were. So there's certain aspects of it that, yes, I like. And what are the aspects that you dislike intensely? Well, I think the obvious ones like uh if you're up at the supermarket and you're looking dreadful and shouting at the children and then you suddenly notice some people staring at you, you know, obviously thinking, ooh, she's not like she's on television, then that's miserable. You feel shy and embarrassed and

Presenter1:51

Or if, um

Presenter1:53

You get written about in an unpleasant way. Of course, that's not very nice in the newspapers, which is an inevitable part, I think, of being famous.

Presenter2:00

So how will you cope on this desert island, stripped of your your fame and your success, and perhaps alone with your depressions, but uh perhaps alone in the sun? Is the prospect bliss or or purgatory? I think leaving the fame and all that, that genuinely wouldn't worry me, because as you well know, one doesn't feel famous. You know, I don't feel any different than anybody else feels. I I f just feel like Jane and I would feel like Jane on a desert island.

Presenter2:23

Well, you mentioned the sun. I mean, that's an interesting point. Being so horribly fair-skinned and freckly and red-headed, I do have to be so careful in the sun. And it's one of the miseries of my life, in a very small way, that I never go brown. I just get red and burn very easily. So, if I was allowed to take my Factor 19 sun cream, that would make life slightly more bearable. We haven't got to the luxury. Oh, that's not a luxury, that's practical use. I would.

Presenter2:48

I think I'd cope all right. I don't think I'd like it. I don't think I'm really a loner. I like being alone some of the time, but only because I know I don't have to be because I know that the family will come bounding back in a minute.

Presenter2:59

I think I'd be reasonably practical. Yes, I think I could probably survive. But there are silly things like I don't particularly like pitch dark.

Presenter3:06

Uh I always sleep with a bit of light somewhere, even if it's just from the passage outside or the street lamp through the window. So I hope there'd be a bit of moonlight and starlight. Otherwise I I wouldn't like it. And they won't entirely be silence because you've got these eight records with you. Now how important will that music be to you? Oh I think very important. It's difficult to imagine life without music. I was brought up in a musical family and it's just always been around. So I would hate to think I couldn't have any music. Shall we have your first record then? Yes. I've chosen this because it's the first record literally as a disc that I can remember putting onto our wind up grammar phone at home when we lived uh in Great Portland Street in London.

Presenter3:48

And on the red label of the'seventy eight' my father had written Good for Dancing. So I always think of this piece as just called Good for Dancing because we used to all leap around to it. In fact, it's called Penguin Parade, and this version's played by the London Promenade Orchestra.

Presenter5:00

Penguin Parade played by the London Promenade Orchestra, to which the ashes of Great Portland Street gyrated around with their dad. I have this image of the three of you, you and your brother and sister, all with copper-coloured hair, dancing to that. Is that what went on? I think we did, yes. I was just trying to imagine what sort of dancing we did. It was rather march-like, wasn't it? But I remember sort of leaping and flying.

Jane Asher5:11

Add answering to that.

Presenter5:20

What sort of household was it? Was it was it busy? Was it fun? Was it happy? Very happy. Yes, and very busy. My father was a doctor, and he worked in the NHS and private, so he saw quite a lot of patients at home.

Presenter5:33

Coming home from school, there'd be a message saying patient, which would mean we had to be terribly quiet and tiptoe round the house. And my mother, although she gave up orchestra work when she had children, she taught the oboe still at the Royal Academy and at Westminster School, places like that, and had a lot of pupils at home. So there was a lot going on, yes. But your mother did take you off and and get you into films and into television. Now, why and how did she do that? Well, I know how. I still don't quite know why. It's a strange thing. It's not until you're in your forties as I am, I think, that you really begin to analyse exactly what went on your young childhood.

Presenter6:06

I think they had some friends who had children who'd done little bits in films and television, and thought it was great fun.

Presenter6:13

And the three of us had, as you say, bright red hair, and looked rather cute.

Presenter6:17

And my mother and father took us along to an agent who said, Yes, wonderful, we'll get them little bits of work. It's sort of unlike them. I still don't quite see why.

Presenter6:26

I was really the only one of the three children to take it seriously. I en enjoyed it so much that

Presenter6:32

I really became hooked. What was your first film?

Presenter6:35

Mandy, uh a very good film with starring a girl called Mandy Miller about a deaf and dumb child. Very moving film with Jack Hawkins too and Phyllis Calvert. And I had a tiny part of one of the deaf and dumb girls in the school.

Presenter6:48

And I can just remember being on location. But I think the thing that really sticks in my mind is being left there, you know, my mother driving off. That's the memory that

Jane Asher6:56

How

Presenter6:57

Well, I was five, five and a half, six, something like that. Pretty little, really.

Presenter7:02

Let's pause there and have your second record. Well, talking of my mother, as I say, she was an oboeist. So I've chosen an oboe piece she must have played a thousand times when it comes into a um an orchestra piece. Quite difficult to play. She always says the second oboe part is harder than the first, although you wouldn't necessarily know it listening. And she also played under Beecham many times and adored him. So I've chosen The Arrival of the Queen of Sheba.

Presenter8:16

The Arrival of the Queen of Sheba with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Sir Thomas Beacham.

Presenter8:22

So, Jane Asher, you began at this very young age to act in films. What about television?

Presenter8:28

Well, in those days, as far as I remember, you weren't allowed to do live television, which of course it all was then, or live theatre, under the age of twelve.

Presenter8:36

So the television I first did was filmed. They used to film things to go on television, like the Robin Hood series, The Buccaneers, William Tell, there were a lot of them then. And I think probably one of the Robin Hood series would have been the first thing that actually appeared on television. What sort of parts did you play?

Jane Asher8:49

It looks

Presenter8:51

Oh, little children in Sherwood Forest or peasants or um

Presenter8:56

the occasional Lady So and so, perhaps, moving a bit more upmarket. I did one with my brother Peter, where we were called, I think, the Children of the Greenwood, or something. Must have played havoc with your school life.

Presenter9:07

Well, yes and no. I think my parents always made it a rule that if I got too far behind I would have to stop the acting, that I just had to keep up. And it's funny if you really want to do something you can. I was really enjoying it tonight. Oh, I loved it. I loved it. I mean, this is the trouble about uh show business. It is very addictive.

Jane Asher9:17

I think it's a really good thing.

Presenter9:24

And especially for a child, I think. You're with adults and you're treated in a much more adult way and you're pampered and made to feel special. It's wonderful. It's time off school, you know. What more could you want? Now, you've got three children of your own, haven't you? How old are they? This Katie, who is. Katie's thirteen, and the two little boys are six and four, Alexander and Rory. The big question is, would you let them do it? Oh, no, I I wouldn't. I mean, I haven't. There have been many tempting offers, as you can imagine. Usually when it's something that they've wanted to have a daughter of mine in the play or whatever it is, that they've asked if I would use Katie or one of the boys. No, the answer is I wouldn't.

Presenter9:58

I think it's much better to go through a relatively normal childhood and then make your own decision.

Presenter10:04

When you leave school. I I mean, I would rather, I think, they didn't go into acting anyway, but if they really want to when they leave school, of course, I wouldn't stop them.

Presenter10:11

That begs all sorts of questions. First of all, why would you rather they didn't go into it? Mostly because I think the chances of getting work and making any sort of reasonable career are so remote that I'd rather they were in something with a little more prospect of success and happiness and fulfilment.

Presenter10:26

And the other thing is I think secretly, deep down.

Presenter10:30

I have a guilty feeling that it's really rather a silly job.

Presenter10:34

No, I wouldn't say that to anyone but you.

Jane Asher10:34

No, I wouldn't

Presenter10:36

Not a proper job. Not a proper job.

Presenter10:39

Although I know it brings a great deal of pleasure and and all those things, I just have a feeling that uh well, I think in myself that should I have done something a little more sensible. It implies uh what you're saying, that you you wish you hadn't been pushed by your mamma and papa.

Presenter10:55

It's hard to say, because I love the work I do, and who knows I might not have been doing it if it wasn't for them, and I've been very lucky to be able to get work.

Presenter11:03

So that I in a way don't regret it. And I always think it's a bit unfair on my mother to say now, oh, I wish you hadn't done this or that. It's hard enough to bring up children anyhow, I think.

Speaker 411:10

Anyhow.

Presenter11:12

It would have been interesting, I think, to know what I would have done if I hadn't been pushed into it. That's the the only thing. I I suspect I might have gone into medicine like my father.

Presenter11:21

Or something scientific. That's the other leaning I've always had. Now, in the meantime, when you were twelve, you played Alice in Through the Looking Glass at the Oxford Playhouse. That must have been quite a plum part. Oh, it was. I was absolutely thrilled to to get that and to do that. I think I had sneakily appeared at Frinton Summer Theatre in a couple of plays, possibly underage, before that, about the age of eleven.

Presenter11:41

But certainly Alice was the first big part, and I really enjoyed it. And at that point, the sixties dawned, and we'll talk about that in a moment. But first, let's have your third record.

Presenter11:51

Yes, if the second one was really in a sort of homage to my mother, this one is very much for the memory of my father. He loved Gilbert and Sullivan. I was brought up with a lot of it playing in the house. And he also loved to get the family round the table and do four-part singing. And this is one of the songs that we all had to sing together. My father, Peter Clare and I brightly dawns our wedding day.

Speaker 412:15

Thus are we give thee greeting, With a with our hearts confleeting, Feel warm and breathe stay, Feeble warm and breathe stay.

Jane Asher12:19

Yeah.

Speaker 412:31

Course for mortal joys behold, Let us carry slow swallow, Though the clock sins are never

Speaker 412:44

But I'm going to switch.

Speaker 412:58

Yet until the shadows fall over one and more.

Presenter13:05

Brightly dawns Our Wedding Day from Gilbert and Sullivan's Mikado, sung by Margaret Eales, Jean Templey, Edmund Bowen and Michael Wakem.

Presenter13:14

So, Jane, the sixties dawned and there you were where it's at, as we used to say, bopping away, presumably, to your dancette record player like the rest of us. Oh, yes, absolutely, I was. And to Radio Luxembourg.

Presenter13:27

What are your abiding memories of those days? Because of course the difference between you and the rest of us was you knew all the right people. I mean, you knew The Beatles, you knew Marianne Faithful, you knew Mick Jagger.

Presenter13:38

I had fun, undoubtedly. I think at the time I just felt I was a teenager having a good time. Whether I felt that it was especially exciting, wonderful period, I I don't think I did. I had all the insecurities and anxieties that one does when you're a teenager.

Presenter13:52

Looking back now, I think it was a very special time, probably.

Presenter13:56

If only that there wasn't this awful shadow of unemployment and recession that that has been hanging over young people now, which I think has changed

Presenter14:05

Enormously, the climate. I mean, the atom bomb was sort of creeping around then. That was my biggest fear, I suppose. You were on CND marches and anti Vietnamese. I had a brief flirt with CND, yes. I think I I was frightened. I was desperately trying to do something to stop us all being blown to bits.

Jane Asher14:11

You

Jane Asher14:13

I had a brief flirt.

Presenter14:21

Now whether one's resigned to it or just thinks perhaps it won't happen after all, I'm not sure.

Presenter14:25

You you also of course were the envy of us all because you were on Jukebox Jury. Yes, I was on Jukebox Jury. That was um that happened quite by chance, but I really enjoyed it and had enormous fun. It was a strange sort of sideline that came out of nowhere. Kind of made em or slayed em really, that uh that's it did really. I don't think we had much power, but it was

Jane Asher14:44

He told me if it did

Presenter14:48

I just like to hear the awful thing that went so when it was a miss. But do you think that you will look back on those days? I mean, if you if we reach the end of this century, would you look back and think that was the right period in which to be a teenager?

Speaker 214:50

Yeah, when it was a miss

Jane Asher14:51

Uh

Presenter15:03

The sixties.

Presenter15:04

Of this century I suspect yes, possibly. Although it's getting a little bit brighter now. Who knows? There could be when my daughter she's now thirteen when she reaches eighteen, nineteen, maybe things will feel a bit brighter. I hope so.

Presenter15:18

I'm quite sure you want to take a record from that era, you must.

Presenter15:22

Yes, I do. Uh my dear brother was very much involved in the rock scene at that time with his partner Gordon, Peter and Gordon, had a lot of hits and had terrific fun. And there's one of theirs I particularly like, called Woman.

Speaker 415:43

May I need you to be my woman?

Speaker 415:50

You take your time and tell me

Speaker 415:55

Love will come home if I won't give up my word.

Speaker 415:59

If you say that my girl is my

Presenter16:06

Woman sung by Peter and Gordon. Peter as in Peter Asher, brother of Jane Asher. Jane very much a sound of its time there. Yes, it is, isn't it? I love it.

Presenter16:15

Let's talk about your acting career now, Jane. In nineteen sixty five you joined the Bristol Old Vic company. Now had you had any formal training as an actress at all? No, I hadn't. By the time I left school at fifteen, I took my O levels and just left.

Jane Asher16:21

Now had you

Presenter16:30

I was so enmeshed already in the profession that I suppose I couldn't bear to take the time out to go and train at at Rudd or Central or wherever. I just wanted to keep on working. Has that ever been a drawback?

Presenter16:41

I think I slightly regret it in some of the practical aspects. I'm not quite sure if you can teach people to act as such, but I think it's useful for some of the fencing.

Presenter16:51

Voice training, those sort of things that take time to learn by experience. I think I learnt as I went along from d director after director, which is perhaps a slower process. What did you do with the Bristol Old Vic?

Presenter17:04

I did some Shakespeare. I originally went there to do a Frank Marcus play called Clio, which was very interesting. And I stayed on to do Romeo and Juliet and Measure for Measure and a couple of other plays. Great expectations. So you knew by then that you wanted to be a serious actress. What would you say was the turning point in your career? What production would you point at? What part? And think that is when I knew I was going to make it?

Presenter17:28

Oh, knew you were going to make it. That's far too difficult to say. I still don't feel I've made it. Seriously, I'm I'm not just saying that. I don't think there's ever a time when you think, Ah, that's it, I've arrived I mean, actors are always insecure, as you know.

Presenter17:39

I think every first night you think I'm going to give this up and never do it again. But I think talking of turning points, something like look back in anger at the Royal Court, I think that was there was a certain fork there, I think, at that time, and I took that route, going to the Royal Court, rather than some of the more sort of perhaps glossy options that were open to me. And I think that

Presenter18:02

Made me realize what I really wanted in that I did want to be a series actress and do a lot of theatre. I didn't particularly want to be a film star in Evoticomas for its own sake. Now, since then, I mean, there have been so many performances that we've all seen. I remember particularly in Whose Life Is It Anyway? with Tom Conte, You Were the Doctor, and very much a two-part play, really. That must have been fun.

Jane Asher18:20

Thank you very much.

Presenter18:23

Yes, it was. There have been a lot of plays I've enjoyed, and I think always my favourite thing is to do a new play like that, that you work on and shape as you go. It's very, very exciting. I mean, the rehearsal period of a new play is wonderful. And then on the television, of course, Bride's Head Revisited. You were Celia, the wife of Cride's. That was enormous fun, very stylish, beautifully done. And Evelyn Ward was one of my favourite novelists anyway, so that was a delight.

Jane Asher18:41

That was enormous.

Presenter18:48

There were strange things happened in doing that production, because in the middle of it the Granada went on strike for a very, very long time.

Presenter18:54

And there was one particular scene where I was in the bedroom with my husband and then had to walk through into the bathroom. And I was in the bedroom.

Presenter19:02

one year and then walked through into the bathroom a good year and a half later to continue the scene, which is quite strange. And my hair had grown so much and I didn't want to cut it'cause I was working on something else that I had to put on a bath cap, which in fact added to the scene enormously, but that's why I wore it.

Jane Asher19:06

The scene which is

Presenter19:15

And then of course latterly in in The Mistress on the television, it strikes me that there's a certain theme in the kind of role you're playing in all of those parts actually, that rather efficient. I mean if you had the white coat on as the Doctor in Who's Life, slightly chilli as that was and in The Philanthropist too, which was another play that I loved doing, Christopher Hampton's first huge hit.

Jane Asher19:30

Yeah.

Jane Asher19:31

This

Presenter19:37

I was very cool, um very English and slightly cold.

Presenter19:41

There's c certainly there's something in me that seems to come across as that, which I tend to be cast as, which I don't mind at all. I mean, it's obviously something that I fit into.

Presenter19:50

I don't feel like that at home. I don't come out with sort of cool wise cracks at home at all. But obviously it works on stage. Not a frosty bird. I don't think so.

Presenter19:59

Shall we have your fifth record?

Presenter20:01

Yes. Well now we come to the man in my life, my husband, Gerald Scarfe. And this song we always felt was our song. I suppose it was playing at the time we met, but it's very, very sort of emotional. And if we always said we'll never be able to split up, it would be too unbearable to hear this song. It's called Without You.

Speaker 420:23

Can't give anymore

Speaker 420:31

Uh

Speaker 420:32

Without you

Speaker 420:34

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 420:37

No, I can't give it.

Speaker 420:43

Well, I can't forget this evening Uh

Presenter20:47

Without You, sung by Harry Nielsen. Strong stuff, actually. It is, isn't it? Makes a shiver go down my spine.

Presenter20:54

Now, as you say, you're married to Gerald Scarf.

Presenter20:56

I'm sure that people often say to you, to outward view, why does someone as as as nice and demure as you fancy is attracted by, nay, is married to, this kind of savage cartoonist? Well, you think his drawings are savage, but he's not. I think this is where people get confused. Gerald draws the things that he hates, that he's frightened of, that worry him, that upset him. He is not like that himself.

Presenter21:19

I'm glad to say.

Presenter21:21

Do you, I wonder, resent the fact that because you're well known you're both well known in indeed that that you have to answer those kinds of private questions about where you met and why you like each other?

Presenter21:31

It depends how far it goes. There are times that it c certainly goes too far and one sees often in the papers people going through horrendous times when they've just had a personal tragedy or some which and those sort of things have happened to me.

Presenter21:44

And it's at those times that you wish you'd never done anything that could have brought you into the public eye, of course.

Presenter21:50

But I think, yes, it's an inevitable part of it. I mean, we're all paraded when we're doing a new play or new film or written a book. We're all paraded to get publicity to sell whatever it is they want us to promote. So inevitably, you can't expect the public interest to switch off when you want it to. But if you had your time again, Jane, would you wish yourself well out of the public eye?

Presenter22:10

Well, no, because I wouldn't wish myself not an actress, and I'm afraid the two go together.

Presenter22:15

People need to know that a play is on to come and see it, unfortunately. So that's that is part of the job, I think. But I wish I could have two or three lives. I would love to try a life of being a doctor, a nice quiet, private doctor that nobody knew about.

Speaker 422:27

Yeah.

Presenter22:29

And things like I'd like to try being a farmer's wife. You know, there are all sorts of dreams one has. This is a luxury we can't grant today. We shall grant you the luxury of your sixth record.

Jane Asher22:33

Yeah.

Speaker 422:33

Beams one

Jane Asher22:33

Uh

Presenter22:39

Well, now this is um a piece of opera. It took me quite a long time to get to opera. I've always loved classical music, having been brought up, as I said, surrounded by it, but I was sort of scared of opera. And I think once it hit me, I really

Presenter22:54

I lo I love opera, and I think if I had to pick one it would be Don Giovanni as my favorite opera of all. And this particular tenor aria is quite beautiful. Dalla suapace.

Speaker 423:13

Lord help me die.

Speaker 423:19

I'm not sure if I can do it.

Speaker 423:26

Yeah.

Presenter24:03

The Aria Dalla Suapace sung by Keith Lewis from Mozart's Don Giovanni, with the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Bernard Heitink.

Presenter24:12

Well, Jane Asher, you run a house, a husband, you have three children, you have this acting career, and you also write books. I mean, how did all of that happen? I don't know if Gerald would like the idea of being run. He he fairly runs himself. Well, the books happened because I'd always enjoyed doing cakes long before I had children of my own, for the family.

Presenter24:34

Novelty cakes, special cakes. I don't know why, it was just a hobby of mine. And when I was in a play with Phyllis Calvert a few years ago called Before the Party.

Presenter24:42

She, like me, enjoyed the domestic side of life. We used to show each other bits of sewing or cookery that we'd been doing.

Presenter24:49

And she suggested that I put the cakes together in a book. She said they're quite unusual. And so I I thought, well, it might be fun just to try. And I wrote to a publisher.

Presenter24:59

and expected a sort of cable come come back saying, Right, we want worldwide rights immediately. Here's a huge advance. And of course I got a letter saying, No, thank you. We're not at all interested. There are plenty of cake books. Forget it.

Presenter25:09

I think that inspired me to fight. That sort of turned down can either make you give in completely or fight on, so I fought on. And I wrote to about four or five other publishers who also turned it down, and finally one was brave enough to take it on.

Presenter25:21

And that's how it all started, and and that one did very well, and it's been going ever since. But what happens in the middle of all of this when you've been commissioned to do a cookery book and the children are, you know, running out to school and coming home again, they've all got their problems, and then the offer of a really plum part comes along.

Jane Asher25:31

No

Presenter25:38

Who takes what takes priority?

Presenter25:42

An acting part and a book. If it was a wonderful part, I I would take the part, undoubtedly. I mean, it would probably throw deadlines into confusion, but I'm always sort of muddling too many things along at once anyway.

Presenter25:53

If it was between children in part, that's quite different. I do have to consider the family really first before I can then look at a script and think, do I want to do it? In other words, if something comes up, my first thought, I suppose, is when is it, where is it, can I fit it in? Or is it going to take me away? Have you ever turned on a really plum roll? Yes. There have been a few that I had to grit my teeth a little. I mean, you do have, to an extent, the image of being a kind of superwoman who, as I say, runs this household, husband and all. Well, it appears to be a sort of current image. As you well know, images come and go. There'll be one thing.

Jane Asher26:22

Well it depends

Presenter26:27

for a few years and then another thing. Of course I'm not. I mean I'm as hopelessly disorganized as most people. And it's only because I do, I think, take on too much and let things get rather muddled that I appear to give the impression of doing all these different things. I mean it's if I was really a person who was wonderfully tidy and organized, I couldn't do all the things I do. It's because I do let things go and there are piles of this, that and the other in corners and

Presenter26:51

Dirty brown grapes rolling around the bottom of the fruit bowl, you know, the sort of thing. It's wonderful to hear, Jane. Go on, go on. Tell us your seventh record. My seventh record.

Jane Asher26:54

It's a

Jane Asher26:55

Ah

Jane Asher26:57

Unless you have seven

Presenter27:00

Oh, well this I thought it would be good to have a bit of a laugh on a desert island,'cause one could get really quite grim in introspective.

Presenter27:06

And Bill Cosby is one of my favourite comedians.

Presenter27:09

And talking of children, I think once you have children, you join a sort of club, really, where anything about children is immediately interesting, funny, sad. You know, you tune in to the way everybody else feels. And he seemed in this particular track of one of his records to really sum up

Presenter27:24

Going to school is called kindergarten.

Jane Asher27:27

The big thing I remember the most of about uh growing up as a child was kindergarten. Now to me, the only thing uh uh kindergarten, the only good thing about it is that it it teaches you how to say goodbye to your parents without crying. That's all. After that, forget it. They got nothing else for you to do. I remember standing in that schoolyard with twenty seven snowsuits on.

Jane Asher27:47

And uh my idiot mittens, you know. The idiot mittens are the ones with the string that go up your arm and around your neck. And the only cool thing about it is that you talk in the left hand, you can listen in the right. Hello, how do you have that? That's all right.

Presenter27:59

Kindergarten, as recalled by the American comedian Bill Cosby. Jane, you said you're a practical person. I mean, can you knock up a a shelter for yourself on this island? I mean, can you skin a rabbit? Oh, I think I could if I had to. Yes, if it was starvation or skin a rabbit, I could do it. Knocking up the shelter I'm not exactly an engineer, but I think I'd construct something. Yes. And will you try to escape?

Presenter28:21

Yes, I think I probably will. I shall start building a raft immediately.

Presenter28:25

Can you swim? Yes, I'm quite a good swimmer.

Presenter28:28

You know, for someone who once had this image as a kind of trendsetter and a freewheeler, you're a very orthodox bod, aren't you?

Presenter28:35

Well, I suppose so, yes, if being married with children and all that is orthodox. Yes, I suppose I am. Do you think th there's still a

Jane Asher28:40

Do you

Presenter28:42

Some surprise is left in you for us.

Presenter28:46

Personal ones, I hope not. But um, what about the professional ambitions? I mean, do you look forward to playing Lady Macbeth, or or is it Lady Bracknell you hanker after? I don't think I any more hanker after specific roles. I just hope to go on doing, as I said, my favourite thing, new plays. I'm doing a new play this autumn, which I'm much looking forward to. That's when I'm at my happiest, really, I think. What is that? A new Alan Aykebourne play that we're we're doing in London, which I'm very much looking forward to, that he's directing it, because I think he's not only one of our most brilliant authors, but a a stunning director, too.

Presenter29:19

Let's have your eighth and your final record.

Presenter29:22

I thought one might need to be lifted out of

Presenter29:25

the glooms on an island. I think you could get very miserable and also lose perhaps moral perspective. I think it'd be difficult to keep your standards when you're all on your own.

Presenter29:35

And I mean moral standard.

Presenter29:37

So I thought a bit of Beethoven was essential. If I had to pick two favourite composers it would probably be Mozart and Beethoven.

Presenter29:43

And the ode to joy, I think, cannot be bettered.

Speaker 430:07

Say buddy old very finest, finest coins, coins, fine old men, he says, I am.

Presenter30:47

Beethoven's Ode to Joy performed by the Vienna State Opera Chorus and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Claudio Abardo.

Presenter30:56

Jane, at some point on this island a great wave will come along and wash away seven of your eight records. Which one do you hope it leaves behind? I think the Beethoven. I think for moral uplifting that couldn't be better, and I think that's what one would need.

Presenter31:10

And then the next question, you have the Bible, and you have the complete works of Shakespeare with you. What other book would you like to take?

Presenter31:17

I'd like to take the novels of Thomas Hardy. I'm sure. I'm sure you can get it in one big book, Sue. I'm sure you can. You can't. This is breaking the rules. You're allowed one book, no complete works. All right. If I have to take one, I'll take Tessa the Derbervilles. I think that's the book, well, one of the books I've enjoyed immensely. I love books. How do you pick one book? But that one will do nicely to be going on with. And your luxury.

Speaker 431:20

Or you could

Presenter31:38

My luxury is a hot bath, preferably with a little extra tap that has cold champagne coming out of it. I know this may be asking a bit much, but I think if I could squeezing a lot out of the system, if I could lie in a hot bath with a glass of champagne listening to Beethoven.

Jane Asher31:45

Give my sword.

Presenter31:51

It might be bearable. Jane Asher, have a lovely time, and thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island discs. Thank you.

Speaker 232:06

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