This Much Is True

It should never have been known that we had voted a certain way. Equity should not have let that happen. I’m a passionate trade unionist; I was on the Equity council for many years, but at that moment, my union let us down badly, and I will never forget it. Frankie and I collected our things and walked out, and everybody said their awkward goodbyes.

The show limped along for another six weeks and then closed. My dresser, James Villiers’s wife, Patricia Donovan, played my part; Fidelis Morgan played Frankie’s part. I’d had a rumbunctious affair with Fidelis which had started in the dressing room, when she sat on my knee to do my make-up. I’m afraid we now seldom speak to each other.

Getting into Character: Endgame

The best moment for an actor is the phone call that tells you you’ve got the job. For me, the second-best is the first read-through, when you get to meet everybody. We all gather round a table in a big room with the director, and in chairs behind us are the technical crew: costume, hair, make-up and so on. I like to make an impact on these occasions. So, when they go around the table and everybody says who they are, I say, ‘Miriam Margolyes, eighty-year-old Jewish lesbian.’ That usually raises a smile. I’m sure some people think, ‘Gosh, she’s brave!’ And the people who have heard it before groan, ‘Oh, God!’ But I think everyone is nervous and a laugh helps to dissipate the fears.

At that first gathering, you have to draw a careful line between delivering a performance — because you haven’t found your performance yet, so you shouldn’t be delivering — and giving an indication of what your performance might be. I relish those occasions and, once we start, I’m not nervous at all because I don’t have to worry about losing my lines: I’ve got the text in front of me. I also know that I’ve been cast for a reason and, in the first read-through, the challenge is to show that reason and to be alive to what the cast is offering — it’s a joint voyage of discovery.

The director’s role is vital but there are surprisingly few good directors. It is both their vision of the play and their ability to unlock an actor’s talent to achieve their full potential that marks a great director. In 1978, Max Stafford-Clark directed Julie Covington in Caryl Churchill’s great play, Cloud 9. Julie was having great difficulty with a long and crucial speech in the second act. She spent hours on it, and knew it wasn’t right. And then Max said, ‘Just sing it, Julie. Don’t speak it. Sing it.’ He knew that she was a singer, the original Evita. And it worked. She sang the whole speech and forever after that the speech flew and was illuminating and a high point of the play. I detest the man but I acknowledge his brilliance. The show was a great success, one of the Royal Court’s triumphs.

Why do I detest Max? In 1978, I too was in Cloud 9 at the Royal Court. The Joint Stock company, which Max had co-founded, had a particular rehearsal technique. The writer would sit in, while various improvisations were performed. The play was about sexual politics (among other things) and the cast was selected for their sexuality as well as their talent. I was the lesbian in the company, Tony Sher and Jim Hooper were the gay men and everyone else was straight. Max decreed that we should have a ‘truth’ session: one by one, members of the company would sit in the middle of the circle and answer questions posed by the other company members; the questions were deeply personal, often sexual, often unsettling. Max would sit in, taking notes. He insisted these sessions must be totally confidential. Heather came to answer questions, and so did Julie Covington’s mother.

In 2007, Max published a book, Taking Stock, a detailed account of the plays he’d directed. In the chapter on Cloud 9 he used the notes he’d made at the time, quoting great chunks from the supposedly ‘confidential’ sessions he’d attended. He concentrated on my remarks which were, as usual, totally uncensored and revealing. He sent me the proofs, but only after I wrote him a letter of sympathy following his severe stroke. I phoned the publisher, Nick Hern, and demanded these passages be removed. It shocked me then — as it does now — that Max felt entitled to use deeply personal information obtained in a professional context to sell his book, choosing to ignore completely the code of confidentiality he had himself established. He is a fine director, but his personal morals stink.