Thanks for the lovely pics of (the even lovelier) Dame Maggie. Sorry for adking, but you have the time, would it be possible to have a short (long would be even better) report of the event, for those of us who couldn't attend? I ask, because you always do that so well... Thanks
I’m not sure I’m going to do it all that well this time. There was a lot to take in, and I suspect I might need a few days to process and remember it all properly, but as an immediate-ish post afternoon recall, here goes…
To preface, I’m not much of a fan of Gyles Brandreth, so I feared the worst when he was advertised as Maggie’s interviewer at the Orange Tree Theatre. He’s always struck me as being of the same mould as Julian Fellowes - pompous, full of his own self importance, and an upper class Tory too. That all probably still applies, but it turns out that he’s actually a rather good interviewer - certainly the most accomplished of those who’ve had the opportunity to lead an “in conversation” with Maggie. He was well researched, had a rather charming way of steering the conversation, and best of all, he left Downton and Potter to just a cursory mention at the end - he even joked that they’d gone nearly two hours at that point with neither juggernaut getting a mention.All in all it was a great afternoon. The Orange Tree is a small, in the round theatre. Maggie said that it was in fact her first experience of being in the round, which is extraordinary when you consider the length of her career. What was particularly nice was that not only did the small size make it feel intimate for those of us in the audience, but Brandreth and Maggie swapped seats half way through so that everyone at some stage had a face on view of her. That kind of consideration means a lot to an audience. I was lucky enough that I had an amazing view of Maggie regardless of what seat she sat in. The conversation very much stuck to her career (unlike the second Purbeck one, which still remains the most personal in nature), but it was a thoroughly charming look back - helped enormously that Brandreth, having clearly done his homework, was able to ask Maggie about plays and experiences that other interviewers tend to gloss over. There was a sizable focus on her Oxford days and how she ended up going from there to Broadway in revue and then back to London as a serious actress. If anything, Maggie still seems adorably perplexed by how her career has panned out, and not quite sure how she did make the transitions from revue artist to straight actress. They spoke at length about the early days at the Old Vic and then at the National, and of her experiences with directors; Orson Welles was pretty much permanently drunk during Rhinoceros, Zeffirelli was mad, and Bergman was gentle but booted Olivier from the Hedda Gabler rehearsal room because he was too concerned with the furniture and not the play. We also got to experience Maggie doing an impression of the latter two. Her Swedish accent is particularly sweet.It was all so in depth that ultimately they ran out of time - we only managed to make it to Peter Pan with regard to her stage career, although I am so glad we did get to that production because Maggie talking about it is hilarious - truly. Evidently she considers it all a disaster, but in true Maggie style, her telling of the disaster sounds hysterically funny. The cue for the guy in charge of hoisting her up into the air to fly as Peter was apparently a tap on the shoulder, but of course people tended to come along, see him, and give him a tap on the shoulder as a greeting too, and so up Maggie soared, entirely at the wrong moments.She is as perplexed at her film career as she is the stage one, and to be honest, we got as far as Travels with My Aunt in discussing that aspect of her life, which is a little bit of a shame because what we did get was fascinating and I would have loved more. Intriguingly, during the later audience Q&A, she said she’d like to redo Brodie of all her film roles. Speaking of the audience Q&A, it made a lovely change to hear some actually really interesting questions asked, and not the standard tosh of what advice she’d give or favourite parts. One guy asked about her experience working with Bette Davis, which was great - it wasn’t a probing question but it was a genuinely fun one. It turns out, not surprisingly really, that Bette was no fan of faking things, even physically, so when it came for all those scenes with Bowers dragging and yanking Mrs Van Schuyler along in Death on the Nile, Bette told Maggie just to go for it. I think Maggie admired her a lot - admired her no nonsense attitude. She also loves the language of Albee, and was able to joke about Dubuque and it’s not exactly stellar run - she actually told a cracking story of the BBC completely mis-pronoucing the name of the play, as well as having some words with Albee who was displeased that she was not playing her part in Three Tall Women nastily enough. The part was based on Albee’s mother. Maggie shot back that she thought the woman was a saint.As for the future, she remains cagey about new work and maintains there’s nothing in the pipeline. She also said that she’s really not that picky about what she does, but that with one script she got she drew the line. Apparently after searching for her role in the script, the description of her entrance was “lady jumps up startled from the bath”. She said she knew right then and there that that one was a noooooooo.I’m going to leave it at this for now because there’s a few personal things from the afternoon that I want to take some time to process, but it was a genuinely terrific few hours. I think interviewers could learn a thing or two from Brandreth, who was as about as prepared as anyone I’ve seen interview Maggie. It could have easily gone on another hour, even longer, which I think is a better illustration about the quality of the talk than what my words can conjure.
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