Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Actress who won a BAFTA, Golden Globe and Cannes Best Actress for Mike Leigh's Secrets and Lies, and earned an Oscar nomination for Little Voice.
On the island
Eight records
Lay Me LowFavourite
Actually, this record is from The Mystery Plays. It's Lay Me Low, arranged and performed by John Tams, the Albion Band.
My second record is the is Cherry Ripe, sung by uh Jennifer Vivian here. But when my mum was a girl she would tell me um at dinner time Gran would tell my mum to go look for Dad, dinner was ready. And he had a habit, rather a good habit actually, of singing cherry ripe from whichever pup he might happen to be in.
Is Doris Day, The Deadwood Stage. And why do you want that? Oh, I love this film. I went to see it when I was about eleven, I think, a young girl.
Well, it's just one of those songs. It was at a time when there was a a romantic awakening in me. I was a young girl and just these feelings of like a swelling feeling of warmth and romance would come across me.
My partner now, Michael, uh just lives for music. I said to him one day, actually, Michael, what is there one thing that you could never live without in this world? and fluttered my eyelids. And he said music.
Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Eugene Ormandy
Yes, this just reminds me of that wonderful exhilaration I felt in being given this part against all the odds and making me, you know, the first person to come up through the ranks at the National Theatre to play leading parts.
Neil Sedaka and Howard Greenfield
When we were making Pride and Prejudice, the name Carol came up and spontaneously Sinead Matthews and I started singing O Carol and then we got some of the other girls involved and we worked out this wonderful dance to the tune of O'Carol.
One of the singers in the Stutts Bear Cat is my new best friend. We both have a holiday home in Broadstairs and he is the best company in the world. And I can't think of Tim Clark without smiling.
In conversation
Presenter asks
10:12Were tears and laughter always close in you as a child?
I suppose that my mother had a wonderful, wonderful sense of humour, and so did my dad. But my parents, being the youngest of nine, were always the same age as other people's grandparents, and I was always fearful that they were going to die, even from a young age, and that would make me cry. I would be very, very sad about it, and tried not to dwell on it, but it would keep rearing its head.
Presenter asks
16:58Did your acting get more of your attention than your marriage?
Yes, I did. When um we were in Chichester I um joined the Amateur Dramatic Society and I was out most of the time and um my husband fell in love with the lady opposite and um I wished them well.
Presenter asks
23:44Has working with Mike Leigh affected the way you approach other roles?
Absolutely no question about it. Prior to working with him then in nineteen eighty, I was a bit lazy. I didn't know I was lazy. I thought I was very diligent and doing all my homework. But no. It's taught me such a lot, so now I do quite a lot of work to see where the character's been before page one.
The keepsakes
The book
I'm a crossword fanatic. The harder the better. Beat the clock on the Internet on the Times or I can't help it. I race my brother, I race my sister.
The luxury
Karaoke machine with microphone
Would I be allowed a karaoke machine? ... With a microphone. The microphone's the important bit. So I could sing like a cabaret star on the beach.
Presenter asks
27:24Why are you thinking about marriage now after thirty years together?
Oh, I don't know. It's a good idea for a party. It'd just be easier if one of us pops off, wouldn't it? You know. I mean, that's to be uh morbid about it, but He's such fun. I love him to bits.
“I'm always confused on the red carpet and things like that with people with people screaming, Brenda, Brenda over here. I don't get it really.”
“I was happy I'd found my niche.”
“You don't know how happy you are unless you know how sad you can be sometimes.”