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.

Today I'm joined by a dear friend and writer and artist and for my money, one of the greatest British actors of recent times, Edward Petherbridge. Edward, welcome.

Edward:
Well, after that, what can I say?

Paul:
Well I just thought it was long overdue, I think. First of all, can I say it’s lovely to see you and also lovely to see you in your extraordinary house with all your artwork behind you. Are you painting during lockdown?

Edward:
Well, because I'm now you know, invalided out of the acting profession I spend my time drawing and painting mostly, and writing poetry. I meant to write a limerick. I thought you'd accept a limerick.

Paul:
Of course, I like your limericks.

Edward:
I got out of bed and I thought, I’ll do a limerick about Zoom and it rhymes with everything doom and anyway, I haven’t done one.

Paul:
We could always add that in at a later date.
I wonder if we could begin by going back to Bradford where I know you were born in West Bowling, I believe it was, I seem to remember from our time together.

Edward:
Well, I've got a picture of myself that I was looking at this morning and joking about with my daughter. It's a picture of me at about the age of, and I remember the photograph being taken, because it was and I'm, I must be two if I'm a day, and I'm sitting on a step looking like one of Charlie Chaplin's waifs, with a very, very morose look on my face. And I remember it, absolutely clearly. They say you can’t remember anything until you're three, but I remember that. And the other thing I remember, I’ll just give you one more picture of me as a boy in Bradford, pulling a Noah's Ark, a little wooden Noah's Ark with very unsatisfactory flat figures that stacked, you know, sort of two dimensional thing, over the nicks in the, on the pavement in front of our back-to-back house and thinking, I don't think I used the phrase, but though I distinctly remember feeling, “there must be more to life than this”

Paul:
I suppose my next question is, was there a moment in your childhood, where you kind of got the showbiz bug so to speak, can you identify a moment when you thought wow, what is this theatre thing?

Edward:
Absolutely and incontrovertibly there is. My parents took me when I was seven, to see my first pantomime at the Alhambra in Bradford, or the ‘Al-ambra’ as we called it. And it was the great Norman Evans who seemed to me to be wonderful, fairy dust and carbolic mixed, you know, and Kirby's Flying Ballet. I've got a picture on the wall behind me, which is kind of inspired by it, which I drew the other day. So. Anyway, we were sitting right behind the limelight man who had two big lights, and all the sliding of the different coloured things, we were behind him on the front row or second row or something of the gods. And so we were right at the sort of, sort of lighting, engineering heart of the pantomime because we could see whether, which colour he’s going to put in next, whether it was the demon or the fairy. It was a wonderful noise when he did it, the trimming of the wicks and all that kind of and, and of course, down there, far down there, well it was the best view of Bradford that I've ever had, you know, if Bradford can look like this! I decided then, I’ve got to be down there. And in fact I got a job quite early on, which toured to the Alhambra and I played a leading part in the very early 60s and appeared on that very stage. And of course, I'd had two friends who had got backstage during the pantomime when I was young, very young indeed, one had some high up sort of person in management, because he was in the A stream of the grammar school. I was in the C stream, but another friend of mine went to a secondary modern, his mother cleaned at the Alhambra so he got behind as well, so that they spanned the social possibilities and got backstage. And I didn't. However, I walked through the stage door and got a key to a dressing room eventually, didn’t I. It would have meant so much to me when I was a kid.

Paul:
I'm interested when you talked about the Alhambra and you said it in your Bradford accent. You obviously lost or made a decision or were persuaded to lose the accent. Did you ever regret losing your Bradford accent?

Edward:
[in Bradford accent] No, I don't, because I’ve still got it. I heard a young actor on the radio talking the other day about how actors used to pretend they came, you know, you had to, I believed, in order to get a job as an actor, you had to to be able to come through French windows, convincing people that you could play tennis and had a private income and went to public school. And nowadays he says this guy, he said the other day that the profession is full of people like that, who are all pretending they come from the lower reaches of society, so that's been the reversal in my time. My first radio was a wonderful script by Bill Naughton, who wrote

Paul:
Oh yes, Spring and Port Wine

Edward:
All that, yes. And he wrote a wonderful thing called November Day about a young working man getting a job, a day's work as a coal bagger. And suddenly, I was on Radio 3 in the very early 60s, talking for the first time professionally in my own accent.

Paul:
Wow.

Edward:
Oh, it was good. It makes me cry. If I use my own accent to myself, I wouldn’t. But when I do it to other people, it makes me feel frightfully sentimental.

Paul:
And did your parents hear you in that play on the radio?

Edward:
Yes.

Paul:
And what did they think?

Edward:
I don't remember. My father was a man of few words. And when I went to the Alhambra in the play that I did with Jean Kent, who was a famous film star, he thought I was made when I was working with Jean Kent, whereas she was having to take a provincial tour of a west end play because there was nothing else for her. Anyway, my father came to see it. And he said, “did the director tell you to do it like that?” And he came again, he came round to see me and he said, “I came again tonight, I went to sit in the gods, eh I do like that chap who plays the old fella.” He’d come to see him!
I had to play the kind of part in rep and elsewhere, where, you know, you would have had as a child, a stage child, a corner of the drawing room, where you did your plays and you had a dressing up box with rather fabulous stuff in it and you would do bits for distinguished visitors, you know. I didn't do any of that, I had a little cardboard thing and a clothes horse in the passage and used to get people to, you know kids to come off the street and see my little shows. I've had the odd postcard from them, letters down the years, saying do you remember your little shows in the passage? And of course, it's wonderful. It's wonderful that they’ve remembered them.

Paul:
Well, that is that is a really brilliant glimpse into your childhood and early beginnings in Bradford. You obviously, when you started as a professional actor, you did a lot of, I presume, weekly rep around the country, most places.

Edward:
Oh, yes.

Paul:
And at what point did you actually sort of find yourself in London for the first time?

Edward:
Well, I think my first job was at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre. In those days it was just a kind of field. There was no amphitheatre and there was a sort of crude mic system, and the wind in the trees was very dodgy. In fact, I met the Queen as the result of having been a veteran there at one stage. And I said to her, “Your Majesty, we were very fortunate there because we didn't have any planes passing”. A plane coming over, usually quite low, takes the time of a Shakespearean soliloquy, and I've seen various soliloquys completely ruined by one plane. And I said, “but perhaps that was your influence ma’am”, and she said, “it’s very kind of you to say so, but it doesn't seem to make any difference at Windsor”.

Paul:
What was that first play? What did you play?

Edward:
The first play - I did two plays. And it was something of a renaissance because it had been run by the Old Vic veteran Robert Atkins, who would say things like, “what do mean” when Ophelia, not Ophelia but whoever it was, the juvenile lead said, “this doesn't fit, Robert”. He’d say, “that’s strange, it always does”. We were the first new management taking over. And David William was a rather talented director. And we did Midsummer Night's Dream, in which I played Demetrius, the least effective of the lovers, and Dumaine in Love's Labour's Lost, and we got the most sparkling reviews, even the lovers got sparkling reviews and I never think the lovers are the best bit of Midsummer Night's Dream. So that was a lovely launch into London.

Paul:
Obviously you've worked with some extraordinary people over the years. But how did you come to the attention of Laurence Olivier?

Edward:
I didn't come to the attention of Laurence Olivier, really. What happened was, I was in a show that transferred to the west end from The Mermaid and I saw on the noticeboard when I was coming to the end of this very short curtailed run in the west end, The Royal Court studio advertising for actors to come and do classes for a nominal fee. And I thought, The Royal Court I must do that. So I got to know, I was taught by Bill Gaskell and Chagrin, who taught mime, I loved that. And suddenly, Bill said, we’re auditioning for the first new intake of actors. They'd started the year before at the National in ‘63 and in ‘64 they were going to take in a new intake and he said, “you can come for an audition. What will you do?” And I said, “well, I think I'll do Richard II.” He said, “oh don’t do that” I said, “yes but I’m doing Rookery Nook as well”, a wonderful Aldwych farce,“You're very late and very late. If you can't come here at all, don't come at the proper time” “I don't understand your meaning”
“Luckily for you!” Anyway, I did that piece of duologue and Richard II. And the audition was Laurence Olivier sitting, part of a long line in front of me, I mean, so that when I got laughs, for the farce bit, I had to wait for them! There was an impressive audience.

Paul:
But it's interesting, I think, you know, for people listening of, you know, younger listeners or whatever, not only was he our most famous actor, but he was one of the most famous men in the land, wasn't he? I mean, he was extraordinary

Edward:
When I went to see his...it was awesome to being in a rehearsal room with him because I’d seen him first when I was a tiny boy in the film of Henry V, and although I didn’t understand much about it, I was predisposed to approve the film because it started in a theatre, and of course, anything to do with theatre, I though was ace. I still remember the magical moment, I daren’t look at it again, because it never works when you go back to moments in film, but the camera goes into the room and pans round at all these actors, and suddenly, it’s Olivier...I’m going to cry again! Working out his star entrance into the film, by just being an actor class is standing by the door waiting to go on. To play Henry V. And he’s very quiet, and then he just very softly clears his throat and then walks on, and you walk on with him! There are the audience, and it’s such a cunning...anyway, we’d seen all this kind of thing. And suddenly there he was, and he came up to me. He was ill for a bit. He often did this strategy. He goes ill for about a fortnight and lets the actors get on with it. And then he comes in and does his thing. And when he came back, he was moving down left and he showed me the script and said, “what does that say?” I said, “it says move down left to Petherbridge”. “Ah, thank you”, he said. We went to Birmingham to kind of preview it really. And I was standing literally six feet away from him doing, " Most potent, grave, and reverend signiors, my most approved", and so on, doing that big speech to the Senate. And it was his first night as Othello. And he sort of somehow went into a slightly different gear. Slow, slightly slower, as if he was shedding every possible suggestion to himself and the audience of nerves. And it was like watching, you know how a Rolls Royce, you’re meant to be able to put a sixpence on their hood and start the engine and it won't fall. And it was like that, the sixpence would have balanced. It was extraordinary.

Paul:
While we're on the subject, because in a sense that kind of extraordinary period in British theatre history that you were a part of, we can't really not talk about the ‘60s without touching on Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. When you were first sent that script for the first time you know, we know this play so well it's a classic play now but you presumably were given it to look at, what was your reaction on a first reading? Can you remember?

Edward:
Absolutely. And I wasn't sent it. I was called in to see Laurence Olivier and given it personally by him. I mean, he’s not only a consummate actor, he was a consummate politician. He’d done this thing of calling me especially to give me the script personally but it was also the end of the afternoon and he had his hat and coat on and the chauffeur purring in the car outside. So you could see that I was interim measure. And he said, “marvellous part. Marvellous play. Guildenstern.” And that was all he said practically. I read it on the bus, back home to Peckham. And I was absolutely thrilled from the first moment. And although this does sound like a piece of self aggrandisement, but if any part was destined to a grand issue, you know, that seemed to be it to me, because it seemed to have so many attributes that I had been trying to work at. I mean, it was comedians cross talk, there was an undertow of anxiety and drama and mystery. Anybody who does the play without, you know there’s a story that Stoppard wanted to have Morecambe and Wise in it, but I don't believe that, I have never asked him. But they wouldn’t have done, there's this undertow of mystery and anxiety about their situation. And there are some very poetic speeches about autumn leaves and things.

Paul:
Were you surprised by its success or not?

Edward:
Oh, no, not at all. I found out when we’d opened that there was a huge amount of doubt about the play. And Olivier said, he was astonished that it had the best reviews of a new play that he remembered. And I think he was rather shocked. And I never had any doubt. In those days, we used to do one public dress rehearsal and then on - to the world, or the country's press. So all this business about cutting bits and giving you a chance to break it in with an audience, you'd had a very willing full house of friends, and then the public, and the old coin tossing and cross talk - never off. But I was completely confident that the thing was, and, and I worshipped him and the play ever since. And I was in it for three years in repertoire.
Paul: And the rest is history, as they say, and if I can, I'd like to jump forward in time but still with the National Theatre in the 80s obviously you very famously ran a company there with Sir Ian McKellen. And my question is not connected to that particular thing, but you've often entertained me in the past, you've always made me laugh when you talk about the notion of certain people receiving awards, or honours, so to speak. And I just wonder whether there's any regrets for you around any of that.

Edward:
Well, I could do my riff about that which I find it is a riff now because I, Ron Pickup who was in the company, of course, at the National in the Olivier days, played in Long Day's Journey with Olivier and was the best Rosalind I ever hope to see, I don't want to see As You Like It again, having seen him and Jeremy Brett. Oh my god. Anyway, he rang me up out of the blue, he’s been a bit of a recluse and standoffish over the decades, but he rang me up and I said, “I haven't dared look up to see whether you have a gong or not”. Most of the actors we grew up with have gongs. And I said, I can count up to six women who I have played the husband or the lover to, who are Dames, and I have run out of counting MBEs, and that's just the women! And there is a monk, he played Alfred, a little boy player on the road to Elsinore, in Stoppard’s play, Rosencranz and Guildenstern and various other parts and then he left and became a monk. He's got an MBE, and my ex wife has got the Queen's medal for services to theatre in New Zealand. So what's this conspiracy to leave me as a commoner? I don't give a damn of course.

Paul:
I know, but it's a very entertaining riff. Well, Edward, we’re drawing to a close. I mentioned regrets a few times. One regret that I don't have was going to the audition for the musical The Fantasticks. I was persuaded to do so by my wife because my wife was pregnant at the time with our second child, and I've never done any musical theatre. And she said, “you should go for the audition. You know, if you get this, it could be six months in the West End, it's good money”. And of course, as we both know, it lasted much shorter than six months. But I have absolutely no regret because you were a big hero of mine. And then, of course, out of the ashes of The Fantasticks came the phoenix that was My Perfect Mind, and it is without a doubt one of the biggest joys of my life.

Edward:
Why we were so lucky, was that the two parts, it was a kind of Lear and fool relationship anyway. And we never had to discuss gags and things. It all just happened instinctively and collaboratively and you know, one has met competitive actors in one’s time, rather too many of them, and worrying about where the laugh comes. The wonderful thing about John Stride, who played Rosencrantz, was that the laughs used to occasionally migrate from one to the other. And he was absolutely scrupulous and true, and didn't give a damn about that. Whereas Tom’s told me that he went round to meet Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in New York, and he used to have to stand outside their dressing rooms and knock with both hands at each door at the same time, so as not to be accused of any kind of favouritism! Can you imagine! To bring us up-to-date with Tom Stoppard, I suddenly bumped into him as it were in the foyer of the National Theatre about two or three years ago. And he said, “Edward, every time I meet you, I think, I see you as a character that Chekhov would have written a part for”. And of course, I was too slow to say, “well, why don't you write me a part?

Paul:
On the subject of parts, Edward, is there any part that you regret that you never played? Or got the chance to play?

Edward:
Well, I don't regret now. I don't...you'd be amazed I get my succour from being, suddenly finding I can do proper painting and that so impresses me. But because I nearly went to art school, I would have been wearing gold lamé with David Hockney because he was from Bradford as well. But anyway, might have been, might have changed everything. Anyway, I was cast as Hamlet a couple of times and both productions fell through for various reasons. And that’s...I regret not playing Lear. But it's well, regret’s too strong a word now. It was terrible at the time.

Paul:
Yes. But also, I think, and I know this, this kind of, what I'm about to say, in some ways was part of the tension in My Perfect Mind, which I think worked wonderfully comedically, because I obviously always felt that you did a rather wonderful King Lear in My Perfect Mind. It was such a beautiful chamber performance of that role.

Edward:
I always got the impression that I spent the rehearsal period trying to get as much of King Lear in as I could, and you spent the whole time trying to tone it down a bit! I've been looking up various bits of ephemera and throwing them away. But I've come across this postcard I got. I was in this play with Jeffrey Archer, and he writes about that, at the Churchill Theatre in Bromley. “Your portrayal of Sir James Barrington in The Accused...the whole performance was wonderful entertainment, but I believe the rest of the cast, our audience was enthralled by your Sir James. You have given me so much to work on for my forthcoming appearance as Widow Twankey with the West Wickham pantomime society.” It’s perfect, it’s completely straight-faced. “Not that I’m recalling your performance to a pantomime, but you did so much, with the occasional raising of an eyebrow and timing that most can only do with pages of text.” Well, I'd like to have seen him raising his eyebrows as Widow Twankey, I might have learned a thing or two.

Paul:
That is a brilliant place for us to end this conversation. Edward, thank you so much. And I
also hope that it's not long before I can come and sit in your garden in the sunshine and we can have one of our lunches and a glass of something nice. Thank you very much and I'll speak to you soon Edward.

Edward:
Thank you bless you

Paul:
All the best, take care, lots of love.