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 equally at home
on the stage or in the world of music,

and she's a truly captivating presence,
whether making our own solo work

in the show Elephant or appearing
in an acclaimed award-winning musical such

as Jesus Christ Superstar and Oklahoma!.

I was lucky enough to share the stage
with her earlier this year

at the Almeida Theatre in Omar Elerian's
production of Rhinoceros, and it's

a delight to welcome Anoushka Lucas.
Hello, Anoushka.

ANOUSHKA: Hello, Paul.
What a lovely introduction. Thanks

PAUL: You're very welcome.

It's really nice to see you.

I'm going to kick off.

We've got lots to touch on, I'm sure,
but I'm going to kick off as I always do

with my guests and ask you about
the memory you might have of your first

theatrical experience,
what you remember of encountering

performance, seeing it
with family or school or whatever.

What was that?
ANOUSHKA: This is a great question.

I have two, and I need
to know which one came first.

But the first one...

the first one is going
to Regents Park Open Air Theatre.

PAUL: Excellent.

ANOUSHKA: Because this story has got a bit of a clang

at the end of it,
but our neighbours who lived three doors

down, they had two kids who were a bit
older than us, and their dad

was in a show at Regents Park.

PAUL: Excellent.

ANOUSHKA: We got tickets to go and see him,
and he was in the Music Man.

I actually don't remember the show at all,
but I remember the seats outside and being

so shocked that, I must have been quite
little, and being so shocked

that there was a theatre
inside a park and that you could still see

the trees, but that there was a stage
and people were going to come down.

It's only years later that I pieced
together that my friends,

my neighbours' friend,
their dad is Brian Cox.

It was actually a very good performance,
but I don't remember it

because I was about six.

But the one I do remember vividly is
maybe a couple of years later, I think.

My parents were like,
Oh we're going to go into town,

into London, so we need to put our nice
clothes on, which we accepted

for some reason, my sister and I.

So we put our nice dresses on and went
into Soho and we were walking down a big

street in Soho and we happened to bump
into our godparents and we were like,

God, what are the odds of this?

They were like, Well, we have
tickets to Oliver at the Palladium.

Then it turned out it was all
a big ruse from our parents.

I must have been about eight or nine.

I remember properly understanding what was
going on and understanding that the people

on stage were actors pretending to
be the characters that I knew from the

movie so well, l because I loved that movie.

I was just obsessed with Nancy,
who had this red dress.

I just remember leaning forward because we
were in the circle and wanting the feeling

that was on stage to come into my body.
It's really vivid.

PAUL: Wow.

Do you remember anything in retrospect
about who you saw, who was playing Fagin?

ANOUSHKA: I think it was quite...

It's quite a famous production.

It was at the Palladium, I think in
somewhere between 1996 and 1998.

I wonder if...

Because Rowan Atkinson did one, didn't he?

PAUL: Oh, yes, he did.
Yes, you're right.

ANOUSHKA: I think he might have been that one,
but I actually have never looked it up

because I didn't want
to take away the magic

PAUL: No, why should you?

ANOUSHKA: It was like physical memory a bit.

PAUL: Yeah, and you were having quite a visceral
experience by the side of it

in your connexion to Nancy.
ANOUSHKA: Yeah.

PAUL: Absolutely.

Am I right when we chatted before that you
grew up in a house that was quite

performative or certainly quite musical?

ANOUSHKA: Yeah, I had... My parents met because they
were both trying to be, sort of

half-heartedly trying to be pop stars.

My dad's a drama.

My dad was a drama.

He went to art school, learned to paint,
and then came out of it a drama,

and was in a series of bands,
and then moved to London,

and then went into a rehearsal studio one
day and saw a beautiful woman going

into the rehearsal studio next door,
and that was my mum.

My mum came over from France and actually
got headhunted to join the band because

she answered the phone
for her then-boyfriend.

She had a very thick French accent.

Her German boyfriend was a pop star,
and then his manager was like,

who was that who answered the phone?

Then
the manager said, Well, she's got really

sexy voice, why doesn't she join a band?

Then my mum got put in a band where she
mostly just recited things in French.

That's how they met.

They did that for years.

They had this punk pop band called True Life Confessions, which was just quite…

There's a lot of pictures of my mum
in Girl Scout outfits,

covering my dad in ketchup.

I'm quite glad I didn't see it.

PAUL: Can I just ask one second?

I'm very intrigued by your parents.

This sounds extraordinary.

What period are we talking about?

Is this the '70s?
ANOUSHKA: The '80s.

I met in 1981 and I was born
in 1987, so across the '80s.

They supported The Clash.

Yeah, there's a famous family story about
how they were almost put on Top

of the Pops and then somebody bumped them.

They were hovering on the peripheries
of success for about five or six years.

That's a good title
for your autobiography.

Yeah, I think so.
I mean, it's also very related.

They had a child who did a similar thing.

They were also living a very free rock
and roll lifestyle, a lot of wild parties.

Even when I was growing up,
they were not conventional parents.

When I was at school,
I went to a posh private school because I

got a scholarship, so I went to a private
school in West London and everybody else's

parents worked in the city
or the mum didn't work.

My parents, by the time they had a few
kids, they were like, we're not going

to cut it on this free rock'n roll income.

My dad became painter decorator,
and my mum became a French teacher,

but all of their friends
were musicians and artists.

The behaviour, I'm not going to give away
my parents' secrets on the internet,

but behaviour at parties,
sometimes I'm like, oh, that was just…

My nickname at home was Saffy after
the character in AB Fab,

which I think is a good insight.

PAUL: I think that's very good.

Am I right in thinking that in terms
of your own connection to performance,

you talked about seeing performance.

Was your first introduction to performing
yourself more music than it was acting?

ANOUSHKA: Yeah.

My dad was in, but my mum,
in quite a classic gendered way,

my mum stopped when we were born.

I'm the eldest, and then my sister
was born three years after me.

But my dad didn't.

My dad was working the day,
but was still in a few bands.

My first memories of performing and watching

my dad on stage,
we would go and see my dad gig in pubs

and church halls and small venues.

It was bands.
Yeah, it was all bands.

A lot of his friends were in bands.

Also, I think everybody knew quite famous,
successful people,

but the bands that my dad was in and his
friends were in were not

famous, successful band.

I also had this idea from quite early
on that there is this whole ecosystem

of musicians, and it's not just the ones
that you see on Top of the Pops

who are out there doing it.

That actually you can sell out a gig
to 200 people in Putney

and nobody knows who you are.

I think it was really...

I grew up definitely around that.

We would see my dad perform,
I don't know, a few times, definitely

once a month, at least, I think.

PAUL: That's quite an interesting...

It sounds like quite an interesting
introduction to performance in quite

a grounded way, really, the sense
that it's not all about fame and show biz.

There is a sense of an ongoing gigging,
playing, performative thing.

Because a lot of people don't have that.

They have a perception of performing as
being this glamorous thing that a few

people get to do sort of thing.

ANOUSHKA: Yeah, I think it was really…

My dad's a complicated man,
but he's an extraordinary man.

My cultural landscape,
the first 20 years of my life,

my dad's main task, I think,
that he took upon himself was to make

us as culturally curious as possible.

In retrospect, I'm so grateful that he was
like, oh, you've got to listen

to Randy Newman and here is Jeff Buckley.

Also, let me take you to see Erykah Badu.

Then we've got to go to the Tate,
and then I've got to take you

to the Serpentine Gallery.

Because also we didn't
have very much money.

I think from a really early
point in my life,

it was really clear to me that you made
art to make art, not to make

money, not to be famous.

Although you could also...

There's also the people who did get famous
or who made money were visibly

having a different experience to my dad
and his friends, and there were

some attractive things about that.

But there was very much art for art's
sake is what I was raised in.

I think I'm so grateful for that as
a grounding as I've gone

through my own career.

I've been doing this, variations
of what I do for 15 years now.

I think the fact that I came from a house
that was like, it's worth doing,

even if you're not making any money,
has really stood me in good

stead through very dry periods.

PAUL: No, I'm sure it has.

It sounds like a wonderfully,
as you say, curiously cultural growing up.

You go through school, and at what
point does performing in a more of a…

The music obviously is
continuing and all that.

At what point do you start to think about
the notion of, oh,

I quite like to be a performer.

Does that come later
at university or how does that...?

ANOUSHKA: I think it's singing.

I wanted to be,
I started playing

the piano when I was seven.

First, we had a little Casio keyboard,
and my mum always had a two-octave Casio

keyboard, and I started messing
around on it when I was about five.

Then by the time I was seven, my mum
was like, oh, she's quite into that.

And so some friends of ours
gifted us their old piano.

Then we got a piano in the living room,
which was quite a big thing in our...

Our flat was small.

At that point, there were four of us
in a one bedroom flat when we got it.

PAUL: Wow.
And then suddenly you get a piano as well.

ANOUSHKA: Then suddenly you get a piano, and the
piano was very clearly my thing from the…

My sister played, but she
was never that into it.

I started playing when I was seven.

Then when I was 14,
I think because of my dad,

because of my dad being like,
listen to Tim Buckley,

listen to you know Josephine Baker,
or Hoagy Carmichael was very big in our

house, the notion of songwriting was
really close and it was

completely demystified.

I just started writing songs when I was
14, and I just really

didn't think anything of it.
I was like, oh yeah great.

I've got feelings and I've got a piano,
so I'll just write a song.

And my parents, I guess around that time,
I got enough feedback from people.

First, I only played it to my parents
every now and again,

but also I would spend hours in my living
room just playing the piano

on my own and singing.

Then I got enough feedback.

People were like, oh, that's quite good.

You sound good and your voice is nice.

I'd already song.

When I was 10 years old,
I sang Crazy by Patsy Cline,

at one of my dad's friends' bands
at their big 50th birthday party.

And I was like, oh, yeah,
this feels nice singing in public.

I just thought, great,
I'll just write loads of songs and then

I'll be Adele or Amy Winehouse.

How hard can it be?

Now there's no plan.

I started gigging.

There used to be this night called
Clappy Hour at a place called the Dance Attic

in West London, where I grew up.

On Saturday nights, they used
to put these variety nights on.

From about 13, I would sing one or two songs there.

I was really used to sing in public.

Then when I was 17 is the first
time I gigged my own songs.

Is that true?
Yeah.

Then I remember the second gig I got paid
and I was like, oh right,

okay, this is quite nice.

Then I went to university,
but university was a trade with my mother

who, my mum didn't finished school, and as
you heard, had quite a precarious 20s.

She turned into a classic French mother
when she raised us and was like, You will

receive the education I didn't receive.

We had to go to university and we weren't
allowed to do music or anything artistic,

mostly because I think in our family,
it's always been like, Well,

if you're going to do that,
you're going to do that anyway.

It doesn't matter.
PAUL: Okay.

In a sense, your university time was a bit
of a departure into

something else in a way.

ANOUSHKA: I found university quite stressful,
and I disappeared into music.

Every time I had to write an essay,
I would end up writing a song, and I was

always doing sing a songwriter night.

Then I came back to London when I was 21
with a completely useless degree

in Russian and Italian
and was like, Right,

I'm going to be a singer and a songwriter,
and I'm going to try

and get a record deal.

That was the plan.
That was the plan.

I was the naivety of youth.

I was like, It'll probably take one or
two years, and then I'll win a Grammy.

Then I set out and I put the band together
and I had a residency I liked

the Troubadour, and I was playing upstairs
at Ronnie Scott's, and I was playing

in these really lovely venues.

PAUL: Wauw, Anoushka this is fantastic.

So this is you out of university.

You're playing those kinds of venues.
ANOUSHKA: Yeah yeah yeah.

And I was really like...

We had a little following,
and this is also the dying days of CDs.

So I made a whole bunch of CD EPs.
PAUL: Yeah, of course.

ANOUSHKA: That there's no trace of on the internet.

And I was selling my CDs.

And I got, to be honest, quite horribly
close to a record deal a couple of times.

PAUL: Oh, gosh.

ANOUHSKA: It was really painful
for a little Anoushka.

I met with Sony and then Decker.

PAUL: Oh, wow.
That's extraordinary.

ANOUSHKA: Yeah.

It was happening,
and then it wasn't happening.

I wanted it so much, Paul.

I wanted it so much that I didn't really
notice that I was developing a career

in theatre alongside it because
that was my side hustle.

PAUL: Was that, to bring in as that…

I mean, that's astonishing that you
obviously were

able to get that close to that thing
and be part of that performative world.

Wow, I didn't realise that.
That's amazing.

I could have seen you.

I spent a lot of my time
in Ronnie Scott's, perhaps.

ANOUSHKA: Well, I was usually upstairs.

PAUL: I often go upstairs as well.

I don't just go to the downstairs.

ANOUSHKA: You probably did see me.

There was one time I had a residency
there, so I was playing there once a month

for one or two years when I was 23, 24.
PAUL: That's amazing.

But let's talk about what you refer to as
your side thing, which is your theatre.

How did that come about?

Was that meeting people like Ché Walker?
ANOUSHKA: Yeah.

PAUL: He feels quite a formative
theatre relationship for you.

ANOUSHKA: Yeah, he was instrumental.

I was bumbling around,
trying to be famous singer.

A friend of my mum's was running

a masterclass at the Riverside,
and she said, Oh, will you come in?

Ché was writing musical for this
masterclass in the summer, and we met.

I don't normally tell people this,
but actually, she asked me into audition,

which I didn't really understand.

I went into audition,
and I was really bad at that point

because I didn't know what acting was.

I thought you had to pretend
to be someone else.

I never tell anyone this.

At the end of my audition, Ché said,
so you're clearly not an actor,

so what do you do?

I said, I'm a song writer.

And he said, Oh, well,
there's a piano there.

Why don't you play me a song?
So I played him a song that I'd written.

Then at that point,
Omar Lye Fook was attached to write

the music, and then he got distracted.

Then I got a phone call two weeks
later saying, Hi, do you remember me?

I'm Ché Walker.

Will you come on board
and write the music for my show?

I think your songs are really good.

That's how it started.

Then we ended up writing a musical
that got picked up by The Bush

that never went on.

Then Ché had a show on at the Globe.

He was developing a musical
and he got me into the workshops for that.

Then when it went to the Globe,
they needed a piano player in the band.

He was like, Come and play the piano
in this musical at the Globe,

and Matthew Dunster was directing it.

This is like 2013.

I remember being on stage.

Well, I remember being on stage down
stage, and Matthew Dunst is saying,

Can you come down stage?

And me being like, Where's down stage?

I didn't know my ass from my elbow,
but I was so excited by two things.

The first was I was
getting paid every week.

As a singer songwriter is unheard of.

You just make no money as a giging-
PAUL: No, I'm sure.

ANOUSHKA: Once you've done the rehearsal,
paid for a taxi to carry your keyboard

there, paid for positions,
you've usually made a loss.

Then I was like, Oh, my God,
when I play in the band of a show,

I get £600 a week because
the globe is so generous.

The other thing was I thought
the actors were so cool.

I was like, These are the coolest people
I've ever met in my whole life,

and I want to be all of them.

PAUL: But I think the interest, the two
things you say there that interest me.

One is I can totally relate to what you're
saying about the fact that a gigging

musician must be really difficult.

Sometimes when I think, Oh, God,
theatre's hard, you know, I think

it's hard, at least I'm not
a jazz musician or a poet.

It could be harder.
I think a poet is the most difficult one.

However, it's interesting you say
that you thought the actors were cool.

I always feel that when I think
of musicians, that's really cool.

A while ago, a taxi driver looked
at me and said, Are you a musician?

I felt really pleased with myself.

I felt so proud that he'd obviously looked
at how I was looking and he felt,

He's obviously a musician.

I almost lied and went, Yeah,
I'm just off to do a gig, I didn't.

ANOUSHKA: I have to say, though,
having been on both sides,

my experience is that all actors secretly
want to be musicians and all

musicians want to be actors.
PAUL: I'm sure that.

ANOUSHKA: I think you're the closest cousins
because we're the two performed.

Of all the artists, well,
the dancers as well.

But the fine artists and the poets
and the photographers are all over

there and we're all performing.

PAUL: I think you're right.

I think there's a little burning thing
there, even if you just want

to look like a musician.

I think also when you mentioned The Globe,
but I always love when I've played there,

is obviously how brilliantly
adaptable and fluid the musicians are.

You go on station to warm up and then
someone will say, Oh, we've got

someone depping on drums tonight.

Then this person is absolutely amazing.

He just sat in and played.

I suppose as someone
who loves spontaneity.

I love that about musicians that they
could often just go, I can play that.

How on earth do you do that?

ANOUSHKA: Theatre musicians are extraordinary.

I'm currently making an album
at the moment, and I'm going to be

going into the studio in three weeks
to record horns and strings

on top of my own stuff.

Half of the musicians I've hired are
theatre musicians because they're so

reliable and they're so good and they're
so used to being called up and being like,

Can you come and dep this gig at 6:00PM,
I'll give you the note.

Then they play it
fantastically with like verves.

Yeah, there's theatre musicians are…

PAUL: I'm often in envy of that when
I'm in shows, it's true.

You get this introduction with Ché,
and then obviously that becomes

a thing that takes you further.

At what point do you start thinking, Oh,
I'm maybe going to get an agent and

go for auditions as an actor?
How does that happen?

ANOUSHKA: That was a complete accident as well.

Katie and I wrote a musical called
The Etienne Sisters that was

on at Stratford East,
and it was like a chamber musical.

Nicky Yeoh, the jazz pianist,
was the pianist on our show.

It was a three-hander.

I was MD and composer.

Shouldn't have been MD,
but didn't know that then.

We got a casting director.

He was a musical theatre casting
director called Will Burton.

We ran auditions, and then he took me out
for lunch, and he was like,

Why are you not in the play?

At that point, I was about 26, 27,
and I was like, because I don't act.

Then I remember he was
like, No, you can act.

I was like, I can't act.

I haven't acted since I was
in school play when I was 11.

Then he said, Can I put
you up for auditions?

I think you could get a part.

I thought he was just really funny.

I was like, Yeah, you can put me
up for an audition if you like.

I don't know what I'm doing.

Then for that year, he called me up and
was like, There's this or there's that.

I was like, No, I'm trying to make
my album, and this is silly.

Then one weekend, I'd just
broken up with my boyfriend.

I had nowhere to live,
and I was working in a dress shop on

the King's Road, and I was so depressed.

My phone rang, and it was Will Burton,
and he said,

Listen, they're looking for someone
to play Mary Magdalene

in Jesus Christ Superstar, who's not
a traditional musical theatre actress.

Will you come in?
I don't think...

If I hadn't been that depressed,
I wouldn't have said yes,

but I was like, Yeah, fine.

I mean, what have I got to lose?
And then I got it.

PAUL: It's a brilliant story.

Also, doesn't it bring us
full circle to Regents Park?

Was it that?
ANOUSHKA: Well, exactly.

There we are.
There we are.

And it performing first at the
first theatre I ever went to.

Well, the first theatre I remember.

That was a real baptism of fire,
but it was amazing.

I had four rounds of audition.

Andrew Lloyd Webber approves
every single person who's in it.

PAUL: Oh, Oh my God, really?

ANOUHSKA: Yeah, he gets fun.
PAUL: Wow.

At what point do you meet
him in the audition process?

ANOUSHKA: Didn't meet him.
They just sent a video off to him.

I went four times.

I remember the first time, I prepped
because I was like, Oh, this is sick.

But in retrospect, I think a lot of my

advantage was that it wasn't

my world and I didn't really care.
PAUL: Yeah, that is...

That is so true, Anoushka, I think.

Someone said to me about
performing in general, that for them,

performing is giving a shit and not
giving a shit at the same time.

I think when you, on one level,
don't really care.

There's an immense liberation.

ANOUSHKA: I miss that now because I've
been doing it for 10 years.

But now I'm an actor.

But the first three or four years,
I thought

I thought it was funny that people kept
giving me jobs because I didn't

think I was any good, really.

I also still was finishing an album
and trying to get a record deal.

I think about the rooms I went
into and the people I met without knowing

who they were because I got signed
by pretty good agents immediately.

There's a couple of auditions that I think
at and still wins at how unprepared I was.

I also think that that lack of care was
such a superpower

at the beginning of my life.
PAUL: Definitely.

Obviously, now you play
this astonishing part.

It's very acclaimed,
and you go on to do more of that.

But it feels like a point in which
you're the two worlds merge in a very,

maybe a more personal way
with the creation of your own show.

How did that start to manifest itself?

When did you start thinking,
I want to do something that's about me?

ANOUSHKA: I hate to say this, but that,
again, was somebody else's idea.

One thing that happened after
Jesus Christ Superstar was I got put up

for a lot of musicals,
and quite quickly I was like,

I don't think this is the world for me.

Because I think actually to be in musical
theatre, it helps to have

musical theatre training.

I'm a fine dancer,
but I'm not a good dancer.

And I also, you know...

I started acting 10 years into performing
and performing my own stuff, which means,

I think you probably can relate to this,
it means that I

was used to having a certain amount
of creative control of what I did

and what the thing looked like.

A lot, particularly musical theatre,
can be quite prescriptive.

I just shrink in an environment like that.

If you tell me where to stand, what to do,
and how to deliver the line, I will

become quite a bad actor quite quickly.

I was like, Okay, I need to try and move
into straight theatre,

which means I need to learn how to act.

Then for a few years,
and actually this is related to Elephant,

the first person to put me in a play,
the play with music, but not a musical,

was Lynette Linton at The Bush.

In her first season,
she put me in a play called Chiaroscuro,

where I had a bunch of songs
and it was really beautiful music.

But I also had 50 pages of dialogue
and a nervous breakdown and a monologue.

I was like, Okay, let's see if
I can actually do the thing.

I was fine.
I wasn't great, but I was fine in that.

Then from then on,
Lynette and I became quite close friends

because that was her
first show at the Bush.

Also, we're both mixed-race women.

At that point, we were both
in our late 20s, early 30s.

We were making, I mean
she was higher up than me,

but we were both ambitious
in making a name for each other.

We always say that we're
also both Capricorns.

She and I got on really well.
I stayed in touch.

I did a few other things at the Bush.

Then in the pandemic,
George Floyd got murdered,

and there was this massive explosion
of the Black Lives Matter moment.

The Bush reached out to me and four other
writers of colour and said,

We'd love for you to write a response
piece to this in digital form

because all the theatres were closed.

It needs to be 10 minutes long.

We'll give you £100, do it in five days.

I sat down to write a song
thinking that I would write a song about

the experiences of racism in my life.

Then I realised that what was starting
to come out was how because I'm light

skinned and because I'm middle class,
I've always felt like I can't really talk

about racism because it doesn't impact me
in the way that it impacts darker skinned

members of my family or
more working class members of my family.

But then I was like, well, hang on,
the reason with me not talking about it,

what that means is it suggests that it's
not active in the middle classes in the

way that it is in the working classes.

All this really complex stuff came out
and I was like, I can't fit

this into a song in four days.

I wrote a speech alongside the song
and I sent it to the Bush and they

put it up and it went viral.

It got like 35,000 hits in one day.

Then they came back to me the next week
and they were like, There's just been

an extraordinary response to this.

Have you ever thought
about writing a play?

And again, Paul, it was the pandemic
and I was close to being broke.

They were like, We'll give you
a few grand if you write a play.

Being the chancer that I am,
I was like, Yeah, all right.

I mean, how hard can it be?
I'll write a play.

It took me two years.

The maths didn't add up because
that money did not last me two years.

But yeah, that's how I wrote a play.

Then it was really…

From quite early on, I was like,
I don't want to write musical, and I

also don't want to write something...

you know, I've seen a lot of one-person
shows, particularly amongst my generation,

that don't go very deep below the surface.

I was like, I want to write a play
that just happens to have one person.

PAUL: Now, I think that's a really
good way of looking at it.

I really do.

Because also that, I think,
inevitably, when you look at it like that,

then you open up much more
theatrical possibilities.

You're not restricted
by the sense of it's just me.

Looking at it right from the very
beginning, creatively, as a bigger thing.

ANOUSHKA: That's been extraordinary because
I've come back to it three times now,

which I really didn't
expect when I was writing.

When I was writing it...

It was the first time I was making it,
so I was like, Maybe everyone's

going to be like, This is shit.

The reaction was really...

It was bigger than what I expected,
and it's had a longer life,

which I'm really proud of.

But I've also been able to come back
to it three times across four years.

Each time, the work that I've done in the
interim has really informed how I do it.

PAUL: Of course.

It's interesting when you say that,
the returning to something fascinates me

because obviously,
we hopefully return to something

because people are excited by it.

But I think the returning
to something is so…

I'm going to go back to what your
dad said as well about the curiosity.

I think for me, it's always an opportunity
to re examine what it is rather

than just put it on again.

It's a chance to go, Oh,
does that still work?

Or should I look at it like this?

It's great to have the opportunity to
look at something again, isn't it?

And see what changes and how
it moves on, I suppose.

ANOUSHKA: I think I learned that on, Oklahoma!

was a big learning curve for me because
it's the longest stint I've ever done.

We did three months at the Young Vic,
then it was a hit,

so it went to the West End, and then
we did seven months in the West End.

PAUL: Wow.
The whole year with that show.

ANOUSHKA: Yeah.

I essentially did a year
of my life on that show.

And I...

I mean, you know,
a whole year of my life also actually

happened, so I had to do it when I was
happy and when I was sad

and when I was annoyed.

But also, you're not protected
in the bubble of a show

when it lasts for that long.

But the other thing is I learned
so much about the necessity

of curiosity in performance.

Because as soon as you're bored,
the audience is bored.

PAUL: Totally, totally agree with you.

ANOUSHKA: There was a bit in the middle where I was
having a terrible time in my personal life

and everyone was quite bored of the show.

There was a bit in the middle where
we lost it and then we got it back.

But on a solo,
on a personal level, I had to be like,

I have to find a way to still
find this interesting.

PAUL: Yeah, definitely.
I think that is so…

It's interesting once you
acknowledge that to yourself.

ANOUSHKA: Yeah.

PAUL: That actually I've got somehow this has
to be reinvigorated otherwise it's going

to be not very pleasant for me or anybody.

I think also, Anoushka,
as we come towards the end of this lovely

conversation, and I think you're also
a brilliant example of something I

really admire, and it's not always easy.

It's that sense of following your nose,
following your instinct,

not being pigeonholed.

We have a culture,
certainly in this country,

where people tell you what you should do.

I get it a bit as someone
who directs and acts.

Over the years, people will say,
if I've been in something as an actor

that they like, they go, Oh,
you should just focus on your acting.

ANOUSHKA: Isn't that funny?

PAUL: If I direct something, the other way,
I think- I think, Well, no.

I think one informs the other.

You're a fantastic example
of that with what you do, your music,

your writing, your performing.

It's been so lovely chatting to you.

We must do it again over a glass or
a cup of coffee or something soon.

But I'm going to wind up by something I
always do, which I'm going

to ask some rapid fire questions.
ANOUSHKA: Oh, okay.

PAUL: You just give your first response.

There is no right answer.
ANOUSKA: Okay.

PAUL: Because these questions are based around
my experience of getting to know you.

Some people might go,
Why has he asked a weird question?

The first question is,
Alan Titchmarsh or Monty Don?

ANOUSHKA: Monty Don.

PAUL: Excellent.
Very definite.

I remember from Rhinoceros rehearsal
observing you, you always seemed a keen

partaker of the biscuits
that were on offer.

ANOUSKA: Yes, thank you very much.

PAUL: I ask you, Digestive or Hobnob?
ANOUSHKA: Hobnob.

That question goes out to Joshua McGuire.

PAUL: Excellent.

I know it would go a little more high-brow
with Nina Simone or Aretha Franklin.

ANOUSHKA: Nina Simone.

PAUL: Wonderful.
Portobello Road or Camden Market?

ANOUSHKA: Well, Ridley Road Market, I'm afraid.
PAUL: Excellent.

I like that.

Severance or Succession?
ANOUSHKA: Severance.

PAUL: I knew that.
This is about movies of musicals.

Movies of musicals.

West Side Story or Avita?
ANOUSHKA: West Side Story.

PAUL: The new one or the old one?
ANOUSHKA: Do you know what?

I held off watching your new one
for a long time, but it's just as good.

But actually, the old one for my own sake.
PAUL: Excellent.

Finally, an escape room or a Turkish bath.

ANOUSHKA: Definitely a Turkish bath.
PAUL: Excellent.

Anoushka has been an utter joy.

ANOUSHKA: Thank you so much for having me, Paul.
PAUL: Not at all.

I hope you have a lovely rest
of the summer and let's get together soon.

ANOUSHKA: Yes, lots and lots of love.
Speak soon.

Bye.

PAUL: Lots of love.
Bye, Anoushka.

Bye, bye.

PAUL: Dear listeners, if you've enjoyed this
Idiot podcast, please spread the word.