This Much Is True

The two dames were playing sisters who both fall in love with a much younger man who washes up on their Cornish beach one day. They were the ladies; I was their housekeeper. It was an ‘apron’ role — and I give good apron. I made stargazy pie and beat carpets (Judi still remembers the ferocity of my thwacks) and peeled potatoes and occasionally gave the two sisters a homely piece of my mind. (Of course, I never do any housework in real life. I was ACTING!)

In the middle of shooting, a major investor pulled out and it was touch and go whether the film could continue. When word finally got out, I volunteered to suck off the money men if it would help. There were no takers. I don’t think the dames were asked.

We three shared a sitting-out space. Judi knitted or crocheted, Maggie did the crossword. They were always welcoming, but I felt intimidated, desperately reaching for increasingly unnecessary topics to keep the conversation going. My worst blunder was when I brightly said, ‘Shall we talk about acting?’ After a beat of disbelief, they lowered their knitting and crossword simultaneously and stared at me. ‘Oh no, let’s NOT!’ said Maggie firmly. They have probably never thought about it again but the memory of that moment still makes my toes curl almost twenty years on.

Although Susan kept me busy working in all these movies, in film — then as now — I have to admit I lack screen technique. In fact, it wasn’t until I worked with Annette Bening (Warren Beatty is very lucky to have ended up married to her) and Jeremy Irons on Being Julia (2004) that I began to get an insight into the art of acting for the camera. Jeremy Irons offered me some notes and rather than resenting it, ‘Who the fuck do you think you are, telling me how to act?’ I just thought, ‘Oh, please, yes! Thank you!’^[18]

I don’t quite remember what Jeremy’s exact words were, but it was about not doing too much too quickly, to reserve something different for each take. On set, you particularly shouldn’t turn fast; for film work, you have to move more slowly so the camera can capture your movements and gestures. Another nugget was, ‘Close-ups are everything. Always reserve your best stuff for the close-ups, because when the character is looking into the camera, or the camera is close, that’s when your audience can see inside your soul, when they look into your eyes. And don’t blink.’ He encouraged me to think about my advantages and build on them. I have big, expressive eyes and my face mirrors a lot, it expresses what I feel, and that can be useful. I tend to do things to excess, so it was a valuable insight to realise that it’s not a bad idea to rein it in, to save it for later. Jeremy gave me good advice — people are always more interesting if they’re hiding something.

I would love to be enigmatic. It hasn’t happened. My need for constant attention is the seat of the overacting. It is really saying, ‘Me, me, me, me! Don’t look at the others: look at me. I’m more interesting!’

Let me tell you about working with Streisand. The first time I met Barbra was in the early eighties when she was casting her 1983 movie Yentl, an adaptation of Isaac Bashevis Singer’s story about a Jewish girl who pretended to be a boy in order to study the Talmud. She had spent over a decade trying to get this film made, eventually producing, co-writing (with Jack Rosenthal), directing and starring in the film herself, which went on to earn three Oscar nominations.

I had to go out to Wembley where she was holding the casting. Barbra is a prima donna, but she has a right to be, so I was fascinated and excited to have the chance of meeting and maybe working with her. My agent told me that I was being seen for the part of a village woman, so I thought about how I wanted to appear to Barbra at our meeting. I decided to look the part. I came dressed in the sort of clothes one might wear to do the housework,^[19] and laden with two well-worn shopping bags.

I went into the casting room and there was this tiny little person sitting cross-legged on a sofa, a cap completely covering her hair so you saw just her luminous face. I plonked my shopping bags on the floor and then I sat down heavily, as if exhausted by life.

Barbra was extremely friendly. She said, ‘How old are you?’ I said forty-one. At that she exclaimed, ‘Oh, you’re forty-one! I’m forty-one!’ I looked at her and said, ‘Well, fucking hell, you look fantastic for forty-one. How incredible!’ I meant it, and she was quite pleased. Then she asked me what I’d been doing, so I told her about filming Reds with Warren Beatty. She asked what that had been like, and I said, ‘Well, he’s an absolute bastard.’ I told her about our meeting in his trailer and the ‘Do you fuck?’ story. Barbra loved all that gossip. I liked her; she was a huge star even then but she was approachable and fun, and I got the part.