Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Theatre director known for War Horse, Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Angels in America; only woman director with two Tonies.
On the island
Eight records
I absolutely love a good boogie. And if I ever hear this, I just have to get up and hurl myself around. I'll try not to do it in here. It's sort of an anthem, I suppose, for me. I always push on if I'm feeling like I need my heartbeat to race a little bit faster.
I had an incredibly large woman in my life. She was hugely colourful. She had a big, loud laugh. She worked in a pub, and I would go and stay with her. She was like a kind of child carer, I suppose. And we kind of adopted her as our godmother. She baked cakes and she loved flowers, and we would go on long walks with her, and she would tell us the names of all the wildflowers. And she loved this song.
I would just play the style council cafe bleu again and again and again and again. It was beautiful jazz, sort of a sense of yearning and a sense of sophistication and style.
So this is the Stone Roses. This is the one I did a production of Port by Simon Stevens, who I've worked with a huge amount. We are very close. He was brought up in Stockport, I was brought up in Stockport, and it is about a young girl and her brother who are brought up in Stockport. And this is absolutely what I mean about subtext because it's all about what isn't said or what's said between the lines, I suppose. And they're sat in this car overnight, and she's really there to ask permission if she can leave. And nobody says in the scene, I love you, nobody says, I forgive you, nothing like that is said. But actually, it's full of love. And the very last lines of the play are, The Sun's coming up. Look, up over hills, the sun's coming up. And we played this as the sun came up. We had a big bank of huge bank of lights, so that the lights would slowly rise up to the top of the ceiling of the hall outside and change colour as they did while the Stone Roses is playing. So basically, it's about the beginning of hope and the beginning of joy and understanding for both of them, even though she's leaving.
Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want
This was played as I walked down the aisle getting married to my husband Nick Siddy. And he's also a Northerner also loves the Smiths and we thought it would be very funny. But it also depicted exactly how I felt at the time I was getting married to this amazing man and yeah, I was getting what I wanted.
This is a song that my sister taught my daughter at a really early age. My daughter loves singing, and my sister was the same. And they both are very talented. I am not at all musically talented. And I think watching people sing is a bit like watching an alien fly to me. I just don't understand how they can do it. But anyway, every time they're together I'm always nagging them so, please, please, please sing that song and they will do it and they know the the lines and they just throw themselves into it with such abandon. It's beautiful.
Northern SkyFavourite
I'm a fan of his beautiful music, but he was the brother of Gabrielle Drake, who was a great friend of our family. And I once plucked up the courage to ask her how she felt about his death, because he took his own life. And she said the most remarkable thing. She said, Well, it was his choice, so I have to accept that that's his choice. And I thought that's just the most extraordinary thing I've ever heard, and people are just unendingly fascinating. But I think that it also because I'm not very good at saying what I what I feel about myself or talking about myself, I think it says everything that I want to say to my husband.
this reminds me of the Women in My Family because it's very witty, it's very irreverent and it's slightly mad and it's hedonistic and quite joyous and I love Bjork because she is the opposite of conventional and that's how I would say all the women that I've known in my life and all the women that I've heard about in my life from my family are.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:03When you talked about fundamentally changing who a person is, are you talking about the people doing it or the people watching it?
Oh, yeah. I'm talking about people watching it. I don't really think there's much point getting out of bed unless that's what your aim is because. It's so what I call emotionally expensive. It's so difficult to do. It costs so much emotionally of yourself to do it that why do it if you're just doing something that's easy or just a bit of light entertainment? It does have the potential to fundamentally affect people hugely.
Presenter asks
3:17What specific skills do you need as a director to be good at the job?
From my point of view, I think you need to be able to manage people really well, because sometimes you'll have hundreds of people working for you. You need to have a great imagination, so you can be comfortable with visual statements. But you I think the high end of directing, which a lot of directors would negate, is the acting. It's a really skilful craft and it's very difficult to quantify as well. You know, a critic coming to a show might think an actor is a good actor because they're acting it really well, or they might think it because the writing's really good, and they rarely will think it's because of the director. But you know, the director does have a huge amount to do with the acting and should do, and empathically understand what that skill is and how to help guide it and help it blossom.
The keepsakes
The luxury
a bath with three taps (cold, hot, and wine tap)
I love a bath. And so yeah, cold tap, hot tap and a wine tap.
Presenter asks
Your father left the family home when you were how old?
I think I was about fifteen. He was in lots of ways the person I was absolutely the closest to. But when he left I found that very difficult, so I did I just wouldn't speak to him for it for about a year. And I couldn't believe that he would leave. Looking back on it, I think he should have left probably a lot earlier because I think maybe they weren't very happy. I don't know. But. He had a very strong sense of duty, so he stayed until we were old enough to understand.
Presenter asks
15:04When you were directing at Hull University, what was the sensation of it? Did you feel like a fish in water?
Yeah. Yeah, I think I did. I felt an enormous sense of belonging and maybe power as well. And I've worked out as I've got older that what I probably love subconsciously about directing is the fact that the work speaks for me. I'm not very good at speaking for myself. And so to be really at the heart of imagining something that's creative with a group of other people, it's very much a family. And what you say is vital. And so I mean how glorious. People actually listen to what you have to say.
Presenter asks
23:02Explain the workshoppy thing – why does it matter? What is it for?
Well, if you're doing a huge project like that, which is it, you know, hundreds of people involved, you you start off with the book and you're thinking, well, how the hell are we going to do a battle with hundreds, if not thousands, of horses. I mean, how are we going to portray that with one puppet horse? Or how are we going to tell the story that this foal Joey that you've spent a bit of time with then grows up into this big horse? How do we do that? So you can literally go into a room with actors and just throw out ideas and try things. And you don't have to worry about doing a production at the end of it. So it doesn't have to be polished. It doesn't have to be good. It can be terrible. In fact, sometimes if it's terrible, it's really helpful because you go, Cryke, let's not do that. Let's go to the other extreme.
Presenter asks
29:32How much has your work throughout the last twenty odd years helped you understand more about your father and about who he was and why he was?
Wow, that's a good question, isn't it? I think I empathise with who he was and what he was dealing with. And he got so much out of life that, I mean, for example, I wouldn't have gone into directing if he was still alive because he was too inspiring. I needed to find my own way. And, you know, as they say, the child is father to the man. The child feels always that they have to develop and move forward from their parents. It's quite hard if you're coming from famous parents doing really extraordinary work because you don't feel like you can be any better than them. And why would you even try? So I sort of feel thankful to him for everything.
“Oh, yeah. I'm talking about people watching it. I don't really think there's much point getting out of bed unless that's what your aim is because.”
“I sat under the table a lot. We had a big uh table tennis table that was our dining table and I would sit at the very far end of it near the wall. I think I was a bit overwhelmed really because I was aware from a really early age that there were undercurrents going on.”
“I felt an enormous sense of belonging and maybe power as well. And I've worked out as I've got older that what I probably love subconsciously about directing is the fact that the work speaks for me.”
“I stood there in this ridiculous costume on this ridiculous stage thinking, What the hell am I doing? I hate it, I feel really exposed, I want to do what you're doing, sitting in the stools telling people what to do, that's what I want to do.”
“Yes, I have, yes, I have, yeah, many times. Because I don't find it easy, you know, it's not an easy thing. And I think maybe it costs me more than most because I was that quiet girl under the table.”