Off-Cut Twenty Four

In March 2001 Michael Parkinson interviewed NIGEL HAWTHORNE (The Winslow Boy) and JANE HORROCKS (Little Voice) with some interesting results.

JANE HORROCKS spoke about the fact that she didn't like her own singing voice very much and therefore it was more interesting to be someone else when she was singing. She indicated she was inspired by the achievement of others and the difficulties they had overcome in their lives. Often these qualities could be detected in their vocal performance. She used her connection with these qualities to find her way to recreating their performance. In fact when singing in her own voice she said, that she often couldn't hit the high notes she could achieve if she was 'being' someone else.

NIGEL HAWTHORNE was very interested by this. And he wondered if JANE ever did anything as herself. "Do you ever do anything as you," he asked. "No, no," was her response. Michael Parkinson queried why this was the case and she explained that she didn't feel particularly comfortable with herself and that she felt much more liberated when she was being someone else. Parkinson thought this was strange and NIGEL jumped into explain that he thought actors did 'hide' from themselves. When he first started he was very shy, he explained and so he "jumped into all sorts of characterizations, like OLIVIER did, with false noses and the hair, everything was false… and I thought that was acting," he said. "And then as I got to middle age I realized it wasn't…the more you find in yourself the more interesting you are."

Michael Parkinson asked about whether this was a manifestation of uncertainty with ones self. JANE HORROCKS thought there was an element of that sort of discomfort. She explained for example that she was now more comfortable with herself as a sexual being than she was in her twenties. But she agreed that she had still never played a sexy part.

So there was tacit agreement that although the need to hide was obviously very strong for some actors, the ultimate goal was to explore the self.

March 2001