PAUL: Hello and welcome
to Regrets I've Had a Few.

I'm Paul Hunter, Artistic Director of Told
by an Idiot, and this is a podcast where I

talk to friends and colleagues delving
into what made them

the person they are today.

Hello and welcome.

My guest this month is one of Britain's
leading disabled theatre makers.

He's a writer, director, performer,
and activist whose work has been seen

at the RSC, the National Theatre,
and Shakespeare's Globe.

Over the last 30 years,
he has remained a playful provocateur

with a truly mischievous spirit.

Welcome, Simon Startin.
SIMON: Hello, Paul.

PAUL: Welcome, Simon.
Hello.

Thank you so much for joining us.
SIMON: Thank you for having me.

Delightful.
PAUL: Not at all.

It's a real delight to catch up.

I am - we'll touch on many things over
the next half an hour,

but I'm going to start where I always
start, which is I ask my guests their,

their memories, if they can,
of their first theatrical experience,

by which I mean the first thing you kind
of saw in a live theatre context,

whether that's with your family or with
the school and what you recall about that.

SIMON: Oh, it was very exciting.

It was at the Birmingham Rep
and I was taken to see Pinocchio starring

none other than Wayne Sleep.
PAUL: Wow.

SIMON: And it was marvellous.

I was just blown away by the
Pocket Rocket's dancing on stage.

It was fabulous.

I've never really recovered
from that influence in my acting career.

It's been fantastic.
It was really good.

I think my grandparents took me, who were
on my, on my parents, my mother's side.

It was very much theatre was something you
went to, and they,

um, and panto every year.

We went to panto every year, and that was
the first one I, I remember anyway.

And that was it was very good.

And I don't think I thought I wanted to be
an actor at that point,

but I probably wanted to be Wayne Sleep.
I was -

PAUL: well,
while we're on the subject of Wayne Sleep,

um, and I've, I've been in, uh,
uh, Pinocchio.

I played Geppetto many years ago.
That's enough about me.

I'm more interested in Wayne Sleep.

Was Wayne Sleep playing
Geppetto or, or Pinocchio?

SIMON: He was Pinocchio.

Of course, this was in the '70s,
so he was a young Wayne Sleep.

Yeah.
And hadn't, hadn't graduated to Geppetto.

I'm not saying if you're in any way
past Pinocchio, obviously.

I'd love to see your
Pinocchio, but the, um,

PAUL: No, I, I think the world doesn't - that's
a very different theatrical experience.

SIMON: It is, it is, it is.

PAUL: I can, uh, I can, um,
relate to that Birmingham Rep being

my early, uh, theatre experiences as well.

So how old would you have been then,
roughly, Simon, do you think?

SIMON: About 7.

PAUL: About 7.

So you went Did you go fairly
regularly with your grandparents?

Was it a yearly trip, or—
SIMON: it was a yearly trip.

Um, it wasn't always with my grandparents.

I think my parents cottoned on as well.

And, um, yeah, we went to - I
saw all the greats- Les Dawson.

PAUL: Oh wow

SIMON: Danny La Rue.

Rod Hull and Emu, you know,
we didn't like him.

We didn't like him.
He's too violent.

Um, I liked him, but my parents
said we don't like him.

PAUL: There was always something
slightly unsettling, wasn't there?

I suppose about Rod Hull
and Emu and in many ways.

SIMON: Yeah.

And I remember seeing John Nettles as the,
uh, what's the Sheriff of Nottingham.

PAUL: Oh, he would have been good.
SIMON: He was.

But our evening was marred
by a family of Brummies who just were

shouting right behind us all
the way through, go back to Jersey!

It was just, yeah,
that was, that was the time.

PAUL: That is, I have to know now,
as you say that, um,

SIMON: you have to explain it.

PAUL: Well, I, I have to,

SIMON: for the younger audience

PAUL: Of course, for our younger listeners.

Um, but I also have to hold my hands up
being part, I think, of,

um, a similar incident at Birmingham Rep
when I was taken as a group of teenagers

to see Hamlet starring Simon Cadell.

Wonderful actor.

And sadly,
he was a wonderful actor and playing

a great part, but whenever he came on,
of course, the chant was, "Hi-de-Hi,"

which wasn't a great look really.

And I could see, even though I didn't know
him, I could sense a deep frustration

in this long matinee afternoon.

Anyway, the perils
of being famous, I suppose.

SIMON: Yes, indeed.

PAUL: So tell me about,
so obviously, You see some theatre,

it doesn't at that point ignite
the idea of theatre, but when did

you first get a taste of performing?
School plays?

Where, how did that happen?

SIMON: It was school plays.

When I went to secondary school,
the English teacher was an avid

drama director and she was wonderful.

She was, I mean, she definitely set
me on this path, so it's her I blame.

She was, um,
um, I think my first role was in The Card.

It was

PAUL: Arnold Bennett

SIMON: yes.

And I played the waiter Grovel.

Um, obviously that's been
my casting ever since.

And, um, I, I remember that the,
the giddy, um,

drug of laughter during that when they say
"Grovel, Grovel,

and wine for this customer", and then
I'd just whine and stuff like that.

So it was - I think it was the,
the laughs that got me,

and I probably- girls,
seeing girls and stuff, that was good.

Um, uh, I think I was about
12 when that first happened.

PAUL: Ah,
and then I suppose you're - and I can

again relate to this immensely,
but the perfect kind of show business

cocktail was being mixed there
in a sense for you, I suppose.

The laughter and and, uh, and all
the other stuff that goes along with that.

SIMON: Yeah.

PAUL: Um,
like many of our guests, and even myself,

there's often a teacher behind,
uh, a lot of this who's inspired

or provoked you in some ways.

Um,
were they also

instrumental in you starting to think as
you went through your teenage years,

or is this a possibility, or,
or where did the, the kernel of this idea,

can I do this, or I want
to do this, come from?

SIMON: I think it was Mrs. Dorothy Tracy,
I think it was her, that kind

of said that was a possibility.

Um, I don't know, I don't have a specific
memory of how, I just remember getting

just more and more into it and, you know,
moving my way up the billing in terms of,

uh, school plays and stuff like
that and getting really into it.

Um,
I think, and then I started to think

seriously about what
the world of theatre was.

I started reading, you know,
Simon Callow's Being an Actor and A Year

of the King and all that sort of thing.

Oh, but that was probably not
till I got to secondary school.

When I went to secondary -
not secondary school,

to sixth form- where I went to, um,
King Edward VI in Stratford-upon-Avon,

which of course is Shakespeare's school.

So it was kind of very
much in the blood then.

And, and I was starting to take it very
seriously, uh, as something I wanted to,

much to the displeasure
of certainly my father.

But, but, and everyone was trying
to discourage me from doing it,

and to a certain extent they succeeded
because I went and went to Edinburgh with

my eye on the Edinburgh Festival secretly.

But, um, I did computer science
and artificial intelligence there.

PAUL: Wow.

Yeah.
So I didn't know that about you.

That's extraordinary.

SIMON: Well into AI.

PAUL: So, so were you,
um, was that a a feeling of,

as our parents' generation often said,
having something to fall

back on, that kind of -

SIMON: I think so.
PAUL: Yeah.

SIMON: Yeah.

I think I agreed with them
to a certain extent.

I think, don't think,
um, it turned out I never fell back on it.

Well, until recently when I got a
Developing Your Creative Practise grant

into looking at AI,
but that's another story.

That's a whole other podcast.
PAUL: Yes, it is.

And one that we should think about.
SIMON: Yeah.

Um, but, uh, Yeah, I certainly,
uh, went to Edinburgh

and didn't do much on my degree.

I have to say I spent most of my time
in the Bedlam Theatre in Edinburgh

just doing everything I could do.

And, um,
and it's been - a more internecine,

bitchy,
cliquey environment you could not imagine

than the Edinburgh University
Theatre Company at that time.

And, um, I was a receiver of
hate and probably the deliverer

of hate during that time as well.

It was - the place was an amazing
seedbed for artists, really.

I know quite a few people have gone
on from there to do things, and it's - it

was because it was completely student-run.

Uh, we just did everything
that went on there.

Accounts, cleaning
the toilets, everything.

And it was, it was a marvellous,
horrible place, and it was great.

PAUL: Well,
I, I, I can only imagine some

of the productions and some of the, uh,
evenings and late, early mornings

that went on at the Bedlam Theatre.

So you do that degree.

Again, I'm asking another question,
I suppose,

and there might not have been a specific
point, but at what point did you go,

I want to give this a shot, I'm going
to give this a go professionally?

SIMON: I think during Edinburgh,
I already decided, but I got

the safety net of a degree.

PAUL: Yeah.

SIMON: Um, and then came out in the middle
of a recession, so there wasn't any

computer jobs at that time in 1991.

Yeah, so I happily was thwarted in
possibly getting a safe

job and never looking back.

Um, my bank balance obviously disagrees
with that, but it was -

yeah, I came out and I went,
I moved to London and did a bit of fringe

theatre The White Bear in Kennington.
PAUL: Yes.

SIMON: And then I auditioned for 3 drama schools, and there's a tale in that actually.

It was quite interesting because
I hopefully changed the attitudes,

but I remember auditioning for 3 drama
schools, uh, Drama Studio,

East 15, and Welsh College.

Drama Studio took me aside in the audition
and said, um,

you definitely - we'd definitely have you,
we definitely have you, but you're

disabled, so we're not going to.

PAUL: Wow - that directly?

SIMON: It was as blatant as that in those days.

East 15 gave me a place, but said,
sort of said you have to be cured

by September,
which basically meant I had to do lashings

of, um, Alexander Technique,
which they thought would cure me.

How little their medical
knowledge stretched to.

But that - and then Welsh College said
just to turn up and do your thing.

And that was the best place for me because
they were didn't have - they weren't so,

um,
bound to an aesthetic of what an actor is,

which has loosened off in the course
of my career for everyone now.

But then, yeah, I mean, I, I
just - I'm a disabled actor,

but probably my casting then -
disabled wasn't something I would have

used as a selling point,
whereas what now you might do,

uh, because theatre has changed
its meaning a little bit.

But then, no, I just,
I got all the odd parts, the strange,

the weird, the lonely, and the lost,
which is quite a nice place to be cast,

to be honest with you.
PAUL: Exactly.

And in some ways,
not that I know Arnold Bennett's The Card

very well, but maybe connects
right back to Grovel.

SIMON: Oh, indeed.
Yeah.

Yeah.
In fact, I'm available for Grovel anytime.

PAUL: Anyone reviving The Card, Simon is
happy to return to the role.

SIMON: I think there's nuances I
missed in the first time.

There's much to explore.

PAUL: But I suppose also in a sense, and I,
you know, knowing you well and chatting

to you over the years,
you know, you, you,

you go to that drama school,
but presumably there's no one else

like you in that drama school either.

SIMON: No, no, there wasn't.

Um, in fact, when I left,
I heard a rumour cos I went

to the postgrad there and the rumour I
discovered later on was that,

and it was circling
amongst the third years who were

a different course, so didn't actually
bother to actually ask me the question.

And apparently I'd been allowed
into the drama school because, um,

I, I'd had a car accident just before
and they felt sorry for me,

but they couldn't let me - say no to me.

That was, that was the,
the rumour that went around then.

I'm just like, I mean, there's always
over the years absurdisms that crop up.

Yeah, people want,
they want to know the story.

This is the problem with disabled artists,
is disability as a story

trumps all stories.

PAUL: Yeah.

SIMON: And that's, that's, and you want to escape that, but you have to sort of embrace it

and turn it on its head
in order to survive in it.

But that's essentially what it trumps.

Trumps, interesting use
of the word now, isn't it?

But yeah.
PAUL: Yeah.

No, it's a, and also,
well, we'll talk, we'll talk more of, of,

uh, uh, how things you feel,
maybe things have changed or not changed

or whatever as it moves on,
but You come out of Welsh College.

At what point do you become involved
with companies like Graeae?

Where does that happen in this journey?

SIMON: Almost immediately.

Um, I came out of drama school.

I think I did another fringe play, um,
in a wonderful place called

the Arch Threshold in Paddington,
which was run by the little-known

Rufus Norris at the time.
PAUL: Yes.

SIMON: Um, and that did something there.

And then I auditioned, uh,
I auditioned on this.

I, I, this is kind of a very bizarre
story, which I won't go into the full

details of it, but my mother died
and 3 days later I had 2 auditions.

Um, and I got both of them and that got me
off my career for the next

year or 3 or 4 years.

So Graeae was one of them
because they were doing Ubu.

Which was, um, a fab - well,
kind of a seminal production

in Disability Theatre, I think.
PAUL: Yeah

SIMON: You know, disabled people behaving
extremely badly for money.

PAUL: That's a good title -
SIMON: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I should do that one as well.

PAUL: So was that - did that -
because obviously you do, you know, you,

you cross many mediums,
you do many things,

you're obviously a great performer,
but was it around also being

working and collaborating with different
people, you know, within Graeae?

Was this where the kernels of maybe
writing and stuff, or had

you already written things?
SIMON: Almost certainly.

Yeah, definitely it was because, um,
I discovered bouffon in that show

and, and thrived in it and loved it.

And also saw this is a way of framing
disabled people where we take this

narrative, which we can't escape from
and kind of throw it

in the faces back at them.

So it's - you are in a very
powerful position as a bouffon.

And that's a great place
for a disabled person to be.

So that, that has completely
been a through line in my work.

And I think I'd started off as a,
at least initially, the first piece I did

was a, a bouffon piece around disability
called Revolting,

which told the storey of Happenstance,
the cripple that Christ never cured.

He turned up late
and Christ had died on the cross.

He said, what the fuck
am I supposed to do now?

And,
and, and he gets reincarnated through

the generations in various forms of
disability trying to, um, get, get cured.

And it was satirising the able-bodied need
to cure us,

whereas about they often,
we just want to cure able-bodied people

of the ideas rather than
the other way around.

And that was, that was a big success,
but that was a writer being a bouffon.

And some of the work I've done on my own,
and like with Caroline Horton,

for example, I've been with Caroline,
did a piece called Islands,

which was again, the writer was as much
the bouffon as the performers

were during that.

PAUL: Well, also, we've talked about this
before, and I've mentioned it

with Caroline,
and having worked with not just yourself

but other actors - John Biddle, you know,
people who are in that show - and I -

and directed by the brilliant Omar,
of course, who I was lucky enough

to work with last year in Rhinoceros.

And I, as you know, I absolutely adored it
because

certainly at that time you don't get
the chance very often to see bouffon in,

in this country, you know.

So no, much more
known as a form in Europe.

For me to see that level of play
and anarchy and satire and grotesquerie,

as you say, and power was wonderful.

But inevitably,
because of the way the British theatrical

establishment was then,
maybe it's changed a little bit,

I don't think they knew how
to take it or respond to it.

Was that the case with Islands?

SIMON: Oh, with Islands, certainly.

Uh, I mean,
it probably suffered from some,

uh, very confusing marketing
of the show at the time.

I won't name names, but it was,
it was a bit confusing for the audience.

So we got the wrong audience initially
anyway, but the national press went

for it and hated it with a passion.

You know, really kind of one-star reviews,
which is kind of, you know, I mean,

it's easy to say this,
but you kind of think you're doing

something right as
a bouffon when that happens.

Um, but within kind of a week,
the, the blogosphere came out and

absolutely backed it 100%,
and we sold out from that point onwards.

So it was, you know, it found its right
audience, and we knew it was a great show.

We just knew it was.

PAUL: Yeah, no, it did.
Yeah.

And also, I think what was so special
about it, which again, I suppose is,

is, is a very,
it's an obvious thing to say, but was

the kind of confidence of the show.

That's what struck me.

SIMON: Yeah.

PAUL: But it requires immense comfort,
as all performing does, I suppose.

But something about that confidence just
shone out in a way

which inevitably some people are going
to find unsettling or uncomfortable,

which again is the whole point of it.
SIMON: Yeah.

Yeah.

PAUL: I was reading an interview, I don't know
where it was from, but this is, I suppose,

touching on more, uh,
you know, your activism, I suppose,

where you said if you want to make change,
be a constantly dripping tap.

And I thought it was a very good way of,
you know, presumably you have to be, and

for a long time, very, very persistent.

SIMON: Yes, you do.

You just have to
be a stuck record with people and just

until you, you feel like
you're being boring.

And, but my life story, if you like,
activism's proof of that,

and it does work.
The change happens in shifts.

It doesn't happen you spend a long time
dripping into infinity, if you like,

but the, the eventually you, um,
something shifts

and things start to happen.

PAUL: And where do you think the kind of
theatre culture is at the moment?

Uh, in sense of, uh, as you say,
it's changed, but does that feel—

SIMON: Oh, I think it's really complicated
at the moment and fragile.

PAUL: Yeah.

SIMON: I think it's, that's what scares
me the most is the fragility of it.

With, you know, with - because
disability performance and allowing,

well,
creating the framework for disabled

performance and disabled performing
artists to thrive,

it's essentially a very civilised act.

It involves empathy,
it involves working together.

It's, you know, it's - I've, you know,
I find it personally unfathomable,

but you can't be,
to be disabled in the right wing because

you require a structure behind you
in order to do the things you want.

So with the rise of the far right,
who have been quite

clear in their desire to basically
regard us as useless eaters and pack us

off to the gas chambers
as quickly as possible.

And I'm not exaggerating that.

Reform might be a little bit more
dampened down in terms of its major

message, but UKIP was out and out coming
out with that crap for most of its period.

And I fear that maybe there's certainly
the structures that allow

things to happen, it will be eroded there.

But it, or even the,
the current government,

supposed to be a Labour government, ha ha,
um, uh, and they're cutting access to work

secretly from thing saying we want
to support disabled performers,

we want to support disabled people
into work, but absolutely undermining

daily the, um, uh, ability to do that.

And, you know, even like Jenny Sealey and,
um,

and others, people
in kind of top of organisations are having

their Access to Work cut,
which is absolutely profoundly

stupid and kind of crazy.

PAUL: Yeah, outrageously crazy.

SIMON: But it's kind of a thing
of this is what happens when crisis occurs

is disabled people are like the Aztecs
used to sacrifice their children

to the gods to appease the gods.

Neoliberalism sacrifices disabled
people to appease the gods of money.

And that's what's happened
since 2010 really.

PAUL: And I suppose also
not just in an extreme political sense,

but theatre, you know, feels at times
innately conservative at the moment.

And, and

SIMON: yes.

PAUL: The idea of taking risks and,
and creatively,

and whatever those creative risks are,
become harder and harder in a world

in which people are terrified of doing
anything that sits outside of, uh,

some safety net, whatever it might be.

SIMON: What do you think that is?

Is that financial, or is it actually
political in its nature as well.

PAUL: I think, I don't know,
it's obviously driven, I think, by

a worry about finance and money.

But I think
it's an interesting thing because

I think
once people buy into that sense of not

taking risk, it kind
of seeps across everything.

It becomes something that goes into the
sort of psyche of people making theatre.

And we've always considered ourselves
at The Idiots to be, in our own small way,

a risk-taking organisation.

But I think you suddenly become
aware of it at every level sometimes.

So I think it's crucial
to keep taking risks.

And I've always found you a very
risk-taking performer.

SIMON: A risky actor.

PAUL: A risky actor.

That's what I've always
thought of you, Simon.

SIMON: Yes, it's been said before.

PAUL: I suppose - I mean, we could chat all day,
but we come towards,

we drift towards the end of our session,
Simon, and I just wanted to say,

what would you,
and again, I'm not placing all this

on you, by the way,
it's just us having a chat.

What do you think
you would like to see happen more

within theatre in terms of disability?

Are there certain things you still think
this could happen, this could happen?

Your tap is still dripping for,
if you pardon the expression?

SIMON: Dripping tap.

I think,
uh, the, the main thing now is we've made

advances in saying, right, okay,
disabled people deserve to be on stage,

and not only if you exclude them
and you're sort of lying about life and,

and worsening your art as a result.

But I'm really,
as particularly as an actor, kind of,

let's move away from seeing actors
as playing that disabled story.

The disabled story is boring.

You know what it is, blah, blah, blah.

But let's allow actors to play all
the other myriad of characters

and not even necessarily through
the - I'm very interested,

I've had directors say to me,
I'm very interested in your disability.

To which I said, really?

But in my head I went, fuck off.

But it's because that, you know, there's
some kind of voyeurism going on in that.

Just open your minds to the fact that,
and this goes for all kinds of other

identities as well,
the fact that I limp a bit and bump

into furniture is,
I hope, about 0.1% of my identity.

And yet I have to
put that as the main thing of my identity

in order to kind of work
in mainstream theatre.

When I do disability arts,
I can do whatever I like.

It's kind of a very free place,
disability theatre,

because we're freed from that because no
one - people have low

expectations perhaps.

But yeah, the ability just to open,
see people,

see beyond the iceberg,
the tip of the iceberg, and see a person

for the full richness that they are.

PAUL: Well, brilliantly and eloquently
put as ever, Simon.

We're gonna end on something much
more trivial, if that's all right.

SIMON: Please, finally.

PAUL: I'm going to ask you finally,
7 quickfire questions to which you respond

with your first answer,
and you can always pass as well if

you feel that, so feel the need.

Tom Waits or Nick Cave?

SIMON: Uh, Nick Cave.

PAUL: Motorbike or sidecar?

SIMON: Sidecar.

PAUL: Excellent.
I always wanted to be in a sidecar.

The Coen brothers or the Safdie brothers?

SIMON: Coen Brothers.

PAUL: Hot cross bun or simnel cake?

SIMON: Hot cross bun.

PAUL: Carol Churchill or Sarah Kane?

SIMON: Carol Churchill.

PAUL: Mastermind or University Challenge?

SIMON: Mastermind.

PAUL: What would your subject be?

SIMON: Theatre.

PAUL: Of course, perfect.
Theatre.

From Dionysus to, uh, the character
in The Card, that'd be a broad spectrum.

Laurel and Hardy or Charlie Chaplin?

SIMON: Laurel and Hardy.

PAUL: Excellent.
Simon, it's been a joy.

I know we're going to meet up soon
to start cooking things up,

which I'm looking forward to.

But thank you so much for joining me.
It's been a pleasure.

See you soon, Simon.
SIMON: See you soon.

Take care.

PAUL: If you've enjoyed this Idiot podcast,
please spread the word.