MIRIAM MARGOLYES INTERVIEW (Mark Lawson, 2013)

[Music] immediately recognizable in both looks and sound Maria margulies has maintained two successful careers in parallel visible and invisible we've seen her in parts from the girls of slender means on TV through Martin Scorsese's film the age of innocence for which she won a BAFTA Award to Professor sprout in the Harry Potter movies we've heard her in numerous adverts and cartoon voice roles including James and the Giant Peach and babe she also provided multiple looks and voices in her one-woman show Dickens women which she's performed to acclaim around the world including the UK and Australia the two countries in which she lives in the last few years there's been a fashion in showbiz for abolishing the distinction between actors and actresses and calling men and women all actors I'm always interested in where the former's stand on this au an actor or an actress I'm an actress why do you prefer that I suppose it's because I'm what what I'm used to but I think it's a bit pretentious for everybody to be male have you ever regretted becoming an actress who have there been times when you felt you should have done something else never never I have never regretted it for one second I've had a wonderful time and I've given people a wonderful time to the periods of unemployment and insecurities about a lot of people point to you from outside the business you believe me have had those and everyone has oh yes yes I remember I remember them very well and I hope there won't be any coming up too because as you get older probably it's worse but when I was starting I sort of knew that I would get better and I'd get more work as I got older and that's proved true but there were great gaps in the beginning and then I used to do market research and sold encyclopedias that sort of thing I wasn't really competent to do anything else but as we know there are many people who go out of the profession or never really get into it we were you always confident that it would work out in the end do you know I think I was it's a bit shocking to have been so absurdly confident but I I really did feel that I had something to offer and that one day people would see it and hopefully they have because I have been working now for a long time you are and generally you always have been regarded as a character actress quite rightly supporting roles often comic rather than the the leads or heroines are you comfortable with that or do you regret that we've never seen your Shakespeare's Juliet or Strindberg's Miss Julie I think I'd have been a very good Juliet I might have been a Miss Julie actually I played Kristen the cook in Miss Julie but no I am a character actress I can see that doesn't mean that I can't do leads and occasionally I get offered them and I'm a lot better than some of the people that do do leads but I am a character actress no doubt about that and why does that why are you a character actress what is it that people would see you as the the maid or the cook or the nurse rather than the central figure it's because I'm not beautiful there is no other reason I'm fat and not beautiful and if you're fatter not beautiful you can't play the sexual interest because that's not the way people see women you have to be physically attractive to be a leading lady all the leading ladies are physically attractive and actually I'm getting more physically attractive as I get older which is maybe I shall have a as well October romance but I think that is the reason and you're I'm admirably frank about that have you ever felt angry about that because there is there to cut directors casting directors they make huge assumptions based on people's height weight is the kind of thing they should play I suppose I felt angry sometimes but not for very long really I I feel anger only when I see people that aren't very good getting parts that they shouldn't have got and that makes me angry and there's no point really in being angry because it doesn't make any difference but I hope I do get some nice parts even though I'm I'm older but actually which you've already alluded to if you are a character actress that the advantage you have over the juvenile leads and the beautiful looking young men and women is that the parts they they often get better as you get older there are more of them no question about that yes and you get better at it too I've got much better recent and I used to be are their roles that you he regrets not playing yes I think I would have liked to have done more more Chekhov I would have loved to have played Marcia and probably some Shakespeare but that may still come that the thing is you do need to be tall and beautiful for Shakespeare and I never was and never will be probably not well not tall anyway but but I I hope there are still areas that I can explore I don't want to feel that it's all just a tunnel now and one reason for doing a one-person show such as Dickens is women is vert and de facto you are the lead you are it I mean you are the what was that one reason for doing it no that wasn't a reason for doing it it was never written as a one-person show it was written for a two-person show and I never want to do another one-person show I keep getting off of them but I don't want to do them because it's lonely and I went into the business for for social joy working with other actors that's what I like doing and being on your own on the stage it's all very well because you do get all the attention but it's lonely and I I want to feel that interaction which is what I long for so although I'm very proud that Sonya Fraser and I achieved what we did with Dickens women I won't do it again but there must be a thrill in carrying a show like that isn't that oh yes yes there is because nobody will ever do it as well as I do it I know that and Dickens wrote so wonderfully for women and such sharp characterizations and that's what I'm very good at so I was able to show off gloriously which after all is what acting is do you have any may clearly vary from role to role but do you in general do you have a theory of acting when you're approaching a role do you have a way in which you always approach it no I don't and I think I probably ought I'm rather revealing myself to be a bit of a muffin at the moment but I don't I just read the script and I read it over and over and over again and then I think about my character and I try and find things that I can seize on and I work from there I never went to drama school you see so I'm not really a trained talent at all it's just instinctive it's worked so far but probably I should have had some kind of a method but I never did but famously those actors who they they say they want to go the shoes right or they want to know exactly how the character looks I mean either broad division is people work externally or internally but where on that would you be well it's not the shoes for sure I think it's the thoughts it's what you think that changes your face and the way you walk but the voice is very important and the voice has always been important for me I started in radio which was a wonderful way to start I met terrific people and I do focus on the voice a lot but I think it's the thoughts you think that that make your character and so when I for example and while I'm doing Dickens women people say how do you manage to change character so quickly it's because you think the thoughts and that changes your face and everything but do you have a show you've got this famously versatile voice which has done so many different things in the way that a singer and opera singer almost has a map of their voice they know where the notes are and they know the range and they know where it can go do you think of your voice in that way no I don't think about it a lot no I just think oh well it would be this kind of a voice and then I do it but I I don't practice a lot it just pops out but there is something musical about it isn't there I mean you have to have that you have to have any year to do I've got a very good ear I've got a brilliant ear probably the best ear in the business I think I don't think he's anyone can match me I mean maybe Rory Bremner but you'll see he's only impressionist and I don't do that I don't copy real people I create a person and work from there but I'm not I don't think I've got a musical voice it's it's a pleasant a light Pleasant voice but I can I can change it and that that's the fun of it did you say you're not an impressionist but if you if you if you're watching a queen on TV or whatever or I'm and I do watch a majesty but can't can you do anyone in the way that an impressionist can not anyone no I don't think I can but I can I can sees on a type or a region and work from that I'm not a genius but I'm very clever even at this stage of interview you have you've made many confident statements about I know that's terrified because it's such a scary thing to to be yourself you have to you have to create who you are and then be it you know because it's it's such a it's a it's a phony thing to have this deeper conversation I don't know you Mark you don't know me why should I tell you about myself just for the camera so I've got to invent a person you see that's that's the thing but I are you naturally confident yes I think I am quite but I do have moments of desperate insecurity like everybody does and even now when I go into a room and there's lots of people I don't know or perhaps people I want to impress I do feel a bit scared I feel a bit nervous partly because I'm very very short and I'm always irritated because people say oh you're much shorter than I expected and indeed I am much shorter than most people expect but you know that's it that's what I've got so it's difficult to dominate when you're short and I suppose that is what I want I want to dominate don't drive told you a lot I've taught me a great deal and in the way that many activators they have roles that they walked away from him in their actors who leave during rehearsal or and or actually go through with the role but actually hate it and say I was useless have you ever had that a couple of times I was in a thing called the white devil you know the the Webster John Webster yeah a revenge tragedy and I played zhanchi the moor and I've always called it zamp Sheva less because I was dreadful in it and I wish I'd never done it and Glenda Jackson played the lead and she was horrid I really didn't like her and I've never liked her since even though she votes labor and does good work I've no doubt in hampstead but goodness me she was a pain to work with and I remember I was sacked from that because I wouldn't take a pay cut because I won't take pay cut so it's no good offering little to me do we get any money for this by the way I can't really know I do and I was I once played was offered queen Christina by Pam James and I did walk out of that because I couldn't stand the director was called Pam Brighton she was horrid too but most people are nice it just you've asked me about do people I can bear and I've told you in both these cases where you had the so the the famous creative differences or professional clash did you tell Glenda Jackson for example yes I told her she was a cow what did she say I can't remember but she seemed to imply that I was something of an amateur and she may well have been right about that but there was certainly a frost in us are you in general they were input in productions on sets your you quite a convivial figure oh very I mean you would expect that wouldn't you know I'm adorable basically yeah do you feel an obligation or an instinct to only you've been in this business a long time to give advice to younger actors well I don't know if I feel obliged to if I think someone's going wrong I might say something but no I don't feel obliged to I find on the whole I learn from watching younger people they've got so much energy and and they're very good at being in the moment and I think that's what we have to be as actors can you still at this stage can you still learn things about acting oh my word yes of course I can oh I'd be dead if I couldn't learn anything yes it's very important to be open to things and I hope I am I'd like to be I'm a bit didactic sometimes I'm sure but no I am open yes very much so one of the auditors in your list of credits a huge amount of work for children from Jackanory in 1968 up to BM Harry Potter films more recently and yet you've um you've said that you don't really like children no I don't like children I don't I don't I don't like children much but I would never hurt one you know but I I don't like them no I have worked with them quite a bit and I just say now behave yourself you see and they do so I don't have much trouble with them but you know if I'm visiting people and they've got children I always ask them to be put put somewhere else I don't want to be bothered with them and the fact you've done so much work for children a the example that and there are lots of character roles in children's literature and they just did yes yes there are well I don't mind taking money for working with children but and I've I'd done Harry Potter for example I had I was surrounded with children then and then when you make the best of it you know you you sort of make jokes and make them laugh and they're all right then but it's not my choice I'd rather be with grownups and one of the consequence of being an Harry Potter which many actions have talked about is being recognized in the street or yes it's lovely because people usually say nice things in fact nobody's ever said anything awful sometimes when I read these on the internet you know blogs and Twitter's or tweet tweet whatever it is sometimes they say what a ghastly person Miriam margulies is and how how arrogant and stupid and and that is of course distressing however true but but when people meet me in the street they often just kiss me or hug me or say I love you or or you've made me laugh and you know really lovely things and of course I love that I love it because it's it's a firm affirming and and it's it's not what I do it for I don't I don't need it but it's just a lovely little present as I'm walking along the street although some of them must be children from he recognized you from Harry oh yes a lot of them are children and and then I'm calm and pleasant with them I'm not nasty to children because that's absurd but but I just wouldn't I don't choose to be with children but if they come up to me and say can I have my photograph and then of course I would say yes with pleasure and I do you say you don't do it for to make people laugh but I've always been interested in this but when you're in a theatre particularly and those huge laughs you get I mean that it must be an extraordinary thrill for now oh it's wonderful making people laugh is it's like cream cakes it's gorgeous it's just the most heavenly thing and it's always been like that ever since I was at school I love to make people laughs and I think it's partly because it's it's an absolute sign of contact and what I want in my life is contact with people that's what I need I do need contact and when you're up there on stage the contact is partly the silence which is a kind of contact and also the laughter I was going to say the thing about comedy which is what makes it rewarding but also frightening is that you know whether it's worked in a tragedy there's the silence there might be sobbing occasionally be you never you don't know in the same way how the audience is responding not in the same way but you can feel it you know if you're getting across if the if the tragedy is getting across you can feel that too that's why I love theater more than any other medium because you can feel that what I call the golden thread you can feel it tugging between the audience and the stage and it's it's very thrilling but they're also nights where the thread is broken or not there presumably yes that there there are there are those nights but I haven't had very many of them I can't I can't really recall except in the white devil that was that was pretty bereft of golden threads that was patters that was and you say you've said you don't do it just to make people look people off why do you do it and why do you want to act so this is a kind of psychoanalytical discussion as well or parts that are on I can see that yeah I'm trying to get to my people do what they do I can't totally answer that but but truthfully I think it's because I want contact and I know that that is an area where I can command it and I can't command it in other ways in life but when I'm on the stage I can command domination again using [Laughter] but there is as you well know there's a psychological theory that some people have about some actors that that it's disguise as well we've all met them we won't name them there are some actors who scarcely exist out of the role I mean they're just sort of husks and then they become something quite different on stage your key not like that but but but is there is there um a pleasure in being able to be somebody else yes I think there is I I don't know how how deep a pleasure it is I'm I'm not interested in disguise exactly because I'm comfortable with who I am but I'm fascinated by other people and I think one of the jobs of being an actor or an actress is to show what it's like to be that person to the audience who might not know and that's why for example ray Fiennes when he was in Schindler's List and he played that hideous character that was fascinating because we saw inside the mind of someone who was truly evil and he made him understandable and I'd like to do something as clever as that and that's another interesting area to me that's why I'm notoriously a lot of American actors will will not play unsympathetic roles and that's my British actors get so much work in America they will not play Nazis or even doctors in weather malpractice see they want to be liked by the audience that's um but that's limiting for an actor isn't it it's completely ridiculous no I think you you should never just want to be liked that's pathetic I mean I want to be liked as a person but I don't want to be liked as an actress or as a character that lets you need therapy then going back to childhood as child you did presumably I'm like the the young Maria Mowgli's do you generally have positive memories of childhood yes I do I had a wonderful childhood and I I was born and brought up in Oxford and I went to the Oxford High School which is the best school in the world and clearly teaches enunciation but I loved it and I had wonderful friends there and I they're still my friends now we have a group from my form at school and we have reunions and I'm still in touch with them and they're very important in my life I'm very good at friendship that's one of my best things and you went back and opened the new building there didn't you I did yes it was the most enormous joy to me well what really happened was that Maggie Smith went to the same school Rockford High School and when they were having a studio space named they wanted to name it after Maggie of course so the headmistress asked me would I ask Maggie would she come back and open the building and you know do the stuff and so I asked Maggie whom I I know from Harry Potter and and you know darling I don't want to do that don't you do it I did never liked the school anyway so I I went back and I had to say look she doesn't want to do it did you tell them that she didn't like the school yes well you have to tell the truth don't you so they must have been a bit well well it's too late to be her because it was as years ago but then they said well would you like to you see which of course I've desperately wanted to and I had the most wonderful day and it was a real thrill because I opened the new buildings and the whole school were there and in the in in the auditorium and I had I gave a speech and I went round the building it was thrilling and then I went to see the Miriam ah Calise studio which is which is there in in my school and I don't think I've had a happier day it was absolutely wonderful so I was really pleased that Maggie didn't do it because I got to and weather black-and-white photographs of you in the knee the lacrosse team and all that kind of around the walls not in the lacrosse team I was never a sporty girl you know never know I I was all right on the hockey pitch because I used to make people laugh so much they let me dribble pass them no I there were black and white photographs of various things and school plays and so on but it was a wonderful school and it gave me my love of English literature which has informed my whole life and I'm very grateful to the school and yes it was snobbish there's no doubt about that there was town and gown and verus stack who was the headmistress of the time is a great mistress she'd been I think the English tutor at the Holloway jail and she used some of the same methods on us I think but and she adored anybody who was at the University she was a bit of a snob and we weren't at the universities we were town not gone but it was a terrific school nonetheless and it's given me wonderful friends that I that I love now and so I'm very grateful to it and it started me off with words and words of my business I love words and so that was where it started at Oxford and presumably when you were there well Maggie Smith wouldn't have become Maggie Smith by then presumably she wouldn't have been famous but well did you know that she had gone to the school before you I I knew not at the time because I think she's about seven years older than me and there's that's quite a big gap when you're little it isn't so much now but when you're little I didn't know who was above me at school so she wasn't known then but she very soon became known and I've always known that she was at school you know after that I knew and I she's one of the ornaments of profession and and I love her she's she's she's dreadful sometimes I mean not dreadful as an actress just mischievous yeah I'll say but freely she's thrilling and she's mostly right about the things she says so I just I was just grateful that she she didn't stand in the way of my being at my opening my new school buildings that's another it just drives me that's another division between performers some people muck around on stage and muck around on film sets others insist you have to take it very very seriously and you mustn't do that well where are you on that spectrum I don't think you should muck around on stage because people have paid to come and see you so I think it's quite wrong to do that and I'm sure I have done it in my life but I don't think it's right but I think afterwards you could muck around as much as you like and I know on on film sets I've mucked around but not when the camera was on me or to upset somebody else but I remember mooning at Warren Beatty and Rex showing him my bottom because I was cross with him and what was his response I think it was laughter from well when you when somebody shows a bottom a bottom isn't like a front bottom you know if you show a front bottom it's a bit yucky but if you show a back bottom it's it's funny I don't know why but it is and very English as well I must check my bottom and clean iam a decent acting tradition at your school because Maggie Smith and then you and what was it taken seriously their acting when we were doing the school play it was taken seriously but I think that it wasn't regarded as a proper job and I remember both at school and Cambridge where I went to university afterwards that it was considered I was doing too much extracurricular stuff and that if I didn't stop I would have my exhibition taken away or I would you know be be gated in some way because at that at that time there's a lot of snobbery about actresses it was virtually synonymous for a lot of people with prostitute wasn't it I've never seen a reputable profession I I don't think it was quite that bad actually I mean probably years before but in the 50s and 60s I don't think we were considered prostitutes we probably should have been some actresses of your generation his parents were horrified when they said they're going to become actresses because it seemed they thought he was somehow it was not a proper thing to do well for many years I'm sure that was the case my parents my mother wanted to be an actress and wanted me to be my father did not he thought it was I don't think he thought it was being a prostitute but he thought it was insecure and of course he was quite right about that but they never stopped me see your parents here your father was a doctor your mother which was an unusual design she was a property developer she's always described as such what she did she wanted the developer what she did was she bought houses and rented them to students which was a very sensible thing in Oxford because there's no shortage of students and there was a great shortage of accommodation and we had some very remarkable people as our tenants we had Ken Loach and Frances Hope who was killed in the car in the in the plane and Paul Beckman who was the son of John Bettman and Lord Rothschild who my parents wanted wanted me to marry of course I think the thought probably appalled him this fact schoolgirl leering at him ghastly yes No we had a very remarkable list of tenants and but she wasn't a developer she was just a hard-working shrewd woman who made quite a lot of money and worked bloody hard although it's interesting that because certainly at that time a lot of women didn't work but your say your mother in that way she was unusual she was unusual she left school at 14 she worked went to work in a hat shop which was owned by her mother and her father my grandfather was a second handful dealer so she was always very good at furniture and the most exciting thing that we ever did together was to go to Harrods auctions on a Thursday in London and I would watch her bidding for tables and cupboards and chairs and things it was thrilling and I've always loved it ever since I loved that program you know going for a song and cash in the attic and all those kind of things Antiques Roadshow yeah I love it love it and GPS our doctors then I mean he indeed manor were wealthy members of the community saying it was quite a well-heeled upbringing was it I think it was comfortable you see might my father only was remunerated by the National Health Service from 1948 so all the years from 1929 when he graduated from Glasgow and till were not counted in in pension so he never made any money and he was in single-handed practice which doesn't give you much money and he was a Jew in Oxford Knox was a very anti-semitic place it's a snobbish anti-semitic place and people there during the war were horrid they may have changed the school was lovely but the people around anti-semites all of them nice very interesting this because growing up a family of Jewish immigrants just I mean conceived during the and born during these how did you know when I was conceived I suppose I'd say it's nine months before you were born what time at matically I was conceived during an air raid Wow my mother told me that yes that's amazing well it is quite I think it accounts for the curly hair but more seriously though because some Jewish immigrant family growing up after the Second World War but the Second World War had a particular weight did it in your family yes it did when you say immigrant I have to be a little bit prissy here my parents were both born in England we were Jews and we were they were bombed out from London and they came to Oxford to find a haven from from the bombing and I was always conscious of the war and I still am it's it's like a star across all our lives all of us who were born in that in that time I was born in 41 and so my awareness of the war has grown as I've got older of course I didn't really know about it then I remember VE Day because we I remember my mother made sandwiches for the bus crews and we stood out in the street in Banbury Road and I was handed up to the to the cabin of the bus with sandwiches and tea it was a lovely memory and were you conscious at the time of anti-semitism or is that something that you've read into the event subsequently I was conscious of it only twice once was when we were having a picnic in a field somewhere in Oxfordshire and the farmer came out and said get off my land you people I remember that and my parents got off of course immediately but it was a subdue a moment and you understood what he meant I didn't then but my parents told me and once at school I remember a girl said you killed Christ and I said I didn't I didn't and she said yes you did and I went I went home and told my parents and they visited mistak and I had no doubt words were exchanged I don't think she was an anti-semite but you know look everybody is nobody likes Jews it's just the truth of course it's true if you're honest you'll you'll admit it you don't like Jews but sometimes I I can't blame you sometimes well I wouldn't I wouldn't admit that in fact but it's but why am why do you think that is the case because it is because because all the literature goes to prove it and the things people say that's why the the the terrible way that Israel is behaving is is just giving weight to people who want to be able to say ghastly things about Jews it's just something we have to live with and well we shouldn't have to but at the moment I think I think we are living with it but that's another issue which we should talk about that you've had the paradox of being accused of anti-semitism by some Jewish people because you are one of those people in the Jewish community who support the Palestinian cause did that was that decision I mean has that caused you torment of that decision torment I I think would be too harsh a word it has made me very unhappy because I know that I'm seen as a betrayer of my people and that makes me very sad because I think it is they who are betraying the ideals of of the Jewish faith I've lost my faith I don't believe in God anymore and I think that religion is a waste of time but I'm broadly speaking I suppose I'm a humanist but I have to accept that people see me in the Jewish community they see me as a betrayer they are wrong I am NOT a betrayer I am upholding what I believe with all my soul to be the right the right opinion the right attitude which is that people must be treated as people do would I like terrorists to stop of course I would I don't support terrorism in any way at all but I understand why it's happened the chief rabbi made an interesting distinction in a row he had with Richard Dawkins where he said there are Jewish atheists and Christian atheists which I thought was quite fascinating in that sense believe me you are you are a Jewish humanist is that what you would say well yes I think I'll I'll accept those labels yes because you can't even once you've lost your religious faith and indeed it's a huge issue you you can't ever reject the whole thing no and I never would want to I'm extremely proud of my Jewish background it's very important to me more important anything probably and that is why I feel so profoundly ashamed when fellow Jews behaved with such shocking stupidity and cruelty to another group of people who by the way were not responsible for the Holocaust in any way at all what about misses another issue here is specifically Jewish casting which sometimes you you are specifically cast to play Jewish roles is that something that you think about I mean does it concern you or is it an issue ever no I don't think so I think I would be annoyed if I was described as just a Jewish actress which would imply that I wasn't able to play anything that wasn't Jewish I hope I've demonstrated clearly that I can but to play Jewish parts of course I should be cast because I do it very well it's just your confidence again but that's good yes we do you know do you think it's misplaced at all I think you are it's just there is a tradition of people being self-deprecating and saying do I just turn up and I give a turn and that kind of thing I don't think I'm self-deprecating I'm I'm self-deprecating about my looks but I'm not about my talent I honor it too much I'm grateful for it I respect it my talent so I'm not going to be ashamed of it or apologize for it in any way nor for my confidence in it if it is misplaced I must be told if it is not misplaced I shall continue your fantastically distinctive voice which we've spoken about did you have elocution lessons of school I did actually my parents wanted me to speak perfectly and you have to admit I do you do but I went to a wonderful lady called Miss Plowman and she taught me about diphthongs and things like that which I've completely forgotten what they are but I think it helped me to be very very clear and I believe that it's very important to speak clearly and I do and did you take acting seriously of school I mean did you ever think of it as something that did you feel you were good at it I loved it I loved doing it I don't know that I thought I was particularly good at it then but I liked showing off and I think acting is a kind of hopefully discipline showing off the other thing that famously traditionally happens in adolescence is sexual feelings and experimentation and all that where you confuse sexually or did you always know I've ever been confused successfully the sex has never been a problem for me it's only a problem if you have to hide it and I didn't hide I I'm gay and I was gay I suppose when I was three I think I had an orgasm I think it was an orgasm it certainly was rather nice in when I went past one of my teachers houses and I had a crush on her and I remember feeling most peculiar but it was it was nice so I didn't talk about being gay when I was in America because they really can't handle it there you know they get very nervous we're even now I'm talking about now yes absolutely which is why there are virtually no gay lesbian actors officially in America are there there's very few very few I mean we all know who they are but I wouldn't dream of outing them on television because I think that's mean but no I don't think sex has ever been a problem for me and I've been very fortunate because I have found the person for my life and I found her in 1968 and we have been together ever since so I haven't been bobbing about in a sea of lust well not so as you'd notice anyway although your partner who we went talking about because as people used to do on the pool scoop and she's put a cross on the coupon for no publicity Angie yes and I think that's fair enough because her life is her life but the truth is that life is sweeter shared and I have been very blessed to find someone to share it with and I I therefore I'm not desperately looking and there was a time when I was not faithful but I have been faithful for many many years and I I will continue to be so an interview you gave was let's one of the more striking tabloid headlines my lesbian confession led to mother's strokes as Harry Potter star I'm I'm fairly sure it was the Daily Mail but it it probably was it's a ghastly paper um was that literally the case I believe that it was I hope it wasn't because it's a terrible guilt to have but it's the reason that I I say that people shouldn't come out as homosexual to somebody who cannot deal with it because it's an indulgence now Ian McKellen wonderfully in who's worked so hard to help people who are troubled by their sexuality he disagrees with me profoundly and I know that but I think that you shouldn't tell people things they can't deal with and I believe that my mother who gave so much of herself for me could not bear the fact that I was gay and very shortly afterwards she had a stroke and I I've always feared that I might have caused it and her stroke was a very terrible thing and I wouldn't wish that on anybody you were also an only child now again some people glory in that and other people resent it and invent brothers and sisters out of plasticine or all that kind of thing well you were a happy only yes I think I was I certainly would have liked brothers and sisters and I think it's hard when you're looking after your elderly parents if it's just you but look you know you that's how it was so I didn't know any different the other thing about coming out I think I'm Ian McKellan has quite clearly said that he believes he became a better actor once he came out and there is an implied rebuke to those actors who haven't in this series when I interviewed Graham Norton he said something very striking on this I thought I said didn't he feel lucky that he wasn't in the generation of TV presenters who had to pretend and hide it and he said he wouldn't have gone into it if he had had to hide it because he didn't believe you could be a decent performer if he were hiding something so fundamental do you think that that is the case everybody's different you can't generalize about something like that I I don't know I Graham is is wonderful he's an extraordinary and wonderfully happy and gifted person and obviously for him it was important to be able to be gay but I I get a bit bored with people who can only be gay now I'm not just gay I'm everything else as well and I don't want people say oh look there's a lesbian as I walk down the street I feel a bit uncomfortable about that now I may be very gay I don't know whether I am or not I think that I'm just very Miriam and that's what I would rather be you went though early in your acting career you were part of gay sweatshop which was part of the political new to the times and was very specifically stated did you ever think about some actors did about the career implications of identifying yourself as gay I don't think I did I probably should have done I remember wearing a gay lib badge at in the BBC and it was frowned on rather and thought it was a bit exhibitionist which no doubt it was no I I don't think I've thought about my career in quite the way perhaps I should have done hasn't been so planned as perhaps I would have should have done but you can't really plan a career you you just take what comes and I've been very lucky with my agents who were they called United agents by the way they're very good although there is a point in which you have to decide to go into acting was it was that that was at Cambridge that happened I don't know that it was at Cambridge it might have been after Cambridge Cambridge was a wonderful joyous explosion in my life and I think it's where I became a person really and I I met wonderful people who are still in my life and I had tremendous opportunities there but I don't think I really thought I was going to be an actress until I'd left Cambridge and then I had nothing to do I left just left and then I thought well what will I do so I became an actress but who's that Cambridge you did more acting you did comedy crucially as well no I didn't do comedy darling no I didn't I did I did the footlights revue is that how comedy lacks it is really sorry maybe you were in the non comic year I but that was more or less the only comedy I think I did I did serious stuff apart from that maybe know I did some Noel Coward that's true I did some I I'm good at comedy I think I've got a knack for it but I didn't follow in the light entertainment direction which many of my colleagues in footlights did like pleased and chapman and so on so I went a slightly different way but you were part you were part of that generation I was part of of the footlights revue of 1962 I was yes it was called double take and it was directed by Trevor Nunn who has never used me professionally I wonder what that means have you ever raised that with him constantly what does he say he hugs me heat rent which is known as being Trev yes well maybe he doesn't think I'm quite good enough I don't know might be you must he must have been discussed at some level as MIT after all well I haven't I haven't talked to him with him directly about it but you know maybe he will maybe he will one day but maybe I'm difficult to cast I don't know it's possible the other crucial thing at Cambridge was an early TV appearance University challenge you were in yes that was great fun we we won one and then we exited on the second round and Bamber Gascoigne was the question master and all the people who are still alive who were in the team I still know and it is it true that you swore during the recording well I did say the F word because I got a question wrong and you would wouldn't you and there was a close-up of me of my mouth enunciated no sound however because Ken Tynan I believe was the first person to say the word with sound but I merely went these days they pixelated because they worried about lip readers being offended they pixelate them and they are very sensitive for an often-cited early credit of yours is sexy Sonia leaves from my schoolgirl notebook you've been doing your research I'm Chuck a cheeky boy well you know when I started in radio and somebody told me there was a job going he's doing a porn tape audio not visual so I went along and I recorded it and it was very exhausting because you have to breathe a lot headache but there is a tape sexy Sonia leaves from my schoolgirl diary I can't remember any of it but there was a lot of heavy breathing and and sort of her that kind of stuff very tiresome have you heard it subsequently I haven't heard it for many years I don't sit and listen to past trial but I believe it sold quite well and court gave a lot of people a minimum amount of happiness so what what looking about what do you regard as the breakthrough roles early on I think probably the girls of slender mean as I'm come to that 1975 adaptation of Muriel Spark novel which I watched just yesterday I eat that it stands out amazingly well I think isn't it good it's really good George will have a fit when he sees it'll be worth about 50 pounds to you on your contract very good yes guilty I have to ask Tilly to come to something you better let me pay for a meal would you like some Thanks no no it makes it more authentic actually if I have received a letter from telling me I'm a genius I'm gonna spend a lot of time reading it anywhere else which is bound to get a bit more only question is you sure George would be impressed with Morgan's name very you mean you're very sure that George would be very impressed I mean put me off if I were George you're not I'm nobody except myself yeah have you watched it again no I haven't I don't watch my own stuff it's better not I think because either you get depressed or you become smug so I think it's better just to let other people watch it that's another device certainly shall watch this another significant film role we haven't mentioned age of innocence edith wharton adaptation now that was i mean again you won an award for that that again was a significant step oh yes that was a wonderful a wonderful experience Martin Scorsese was the director and there was a great assembly of talent both British and American in that particularly British actually I asked mr. Scorsese why he wanted to do that novel and he said because I'm interested in brutality and it is about brutality only brutality in a rather exalted circle of people but underneath the polish and the refinement the knives are out and that is is wonderful wonderful yet wonderful film and I think better than people allowed it to be at the time what what is he like as a director intense focused crackling nervy and and when he gives you a note just focusing on you talking to you quietly he is not an extravagant director he's a detailed director and clearly you know one of the best in the world I I was thrilled to work for him it was very scary meeting him actually I went to his house and I did I was so desperate to get the job you know as sometimes you really do want to and I didn't know how to to convince him that I could do it but somehow I did and I was cast did we read for him it no no we just talked we just talked and I think that the performance was made so good by the dialect coach Tim Manik who is an American dialect coach wonderful one and he helped me to find the voice for that character who was a very Tony New Yorker of the 1890s 1870s and I remember that the key was how to say the word pearl it had to be elongated pearl and so I practiced doing that then I I got the voice right so that's somebody can example what we talked about earlier of getting to it through the voice yes because it was set in a very specific social media it was very important to get that right and he helped me to get that right and so I I feel that I owe my award at least to him as well as to myself the Harry Potter years it's been called the Harry Potter pension scheme and indeed sir Derek Jacobi has publicly regretted that he was one of a few British actors not to be involved in am Harry Potter series but it was I mean this huge cultural juggernaut but presumably it was them I mean apart from financially it was a good thing to be involved in it was fun I didn't feel quite so messianic about it as maybe some people do I think it's a very good piece of work and it was a thrill to be part of it and I liked those children they were very nice kids those three those main three people but did I feel it was special at the time now I didn't I just thought it was a rather lovely job as I can say you've recently passed the the landmark of seventy which invites people to look back at our um are you satisfied with what of course I'm not don't be bloody silly some people are no course I'm not satisfied I'm very unsatisfied and that's how it should be God if I was satisfied I'd be a complete fart what do you still want to do everything lots lots of different things I haven't got specific things I want to do long day's journey into night and and some Shakespeare and and mrs. Klein and and goodness Queen Margaret loads of things loads of things don't you dare say I'm satisfied very Motley's thank you very much coming up on BBC four Ian Hislop goes off the rails as he unravels the repercussions of the Beeching report next [Music] you

Channel: ppotter

Views: 175,125

Keywords: miriam margolyes, bbc, interview, tv, mark lawson, harry potter, fat, marigold hotel, comedy, lesbian, lgbt, gay

Id: _ERVz4C7UfI

Length: 59min 21sec (3561 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 30 2020