The acting queen of Wales Siân Phillips speaks with Chris Williams about the Welsh language, Rufus Wainwright and damehood.
“No, in a word” laughs Dame Siân Phillips when asked if she feels any different now that she’s a Dame.
“I’ve been very busy ever since, so nothing has changed, no. It certainly hasn’t made any difference in my life. People said ‘Ooh, it’ll be lovely, you’ll find a lot of nice things will happen’, nothing’s happened so far. I’m perfectly fine about that, I don’t want anything to happen but nothing has happened.
If Dame Shirley Bassey is the singing queen of Wales, then Siân Phillips – after being named a Dame in the recent New Year’s honours list – is the acting queen of Wales.
Phillips grew up in a Carmarthenshire, in a Welsh speaking household, and she thinks the language is in a better position than it was: “I grew up in a naturally Welsh speaking spot in Wales. They didn’t have to make us do anything special about the language because everyone spoke it anyway. But I think there have been great strides, since I was a child, to preserve and promote the language.
“I go back to Wales a lot; my home is in London but my family is still in Wales.”
We began the interview taking about working with Rufus Wainwright, Phillips effused: “I met Rufus in New York some years ago. We met accidentally at a party, and he asked me to do something small on his new album he was writing at the time (Release the Stars), it was just pure luck that we met.
“It was a rainy night and I didn’t want to go to this party after the show, and so I made myself go because I had promised I’d go. I got wet, couldn’t get a taxi and I was tired, then Rufus came over and introduced himself and said would I like to do something in the studio; so that was how me met. We’ve been friends ever since, and I see his show whenever I possibly can, and he returns the compliment, you know, he comes to see me. I’m very flattered that he wanted me to read the sonnet on his new album.” In fact, Phillips reads the Shakespeare sonnet that opens Wainwright’s new album, Take All My Loves: 9 Shakespeare Sonnets.
“I love the sonnets. Believe it or not, four years ago I did Romeo and Juliet, and I played Juliet for the first time and I did love doing that.” In 2010 the then 76-year-old Phillips played Juliet in Rupert Goold’s production of the play at the Bristol Old Vic. “It was set in a care home,” she laughs “but we did the whole text. Except for the obvious lines about virginity, you know, we left those out, but we did the whole love story and tragedy, and it was terribly successful, it was really amazing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZccNFCsDaQ
“Otherwise, I’ve played Cleopatra and I liked that very much. I just adore Shakespeare.”
She has no plans of stopping, saying “One doesn’t know what one’s life will bring” in response to the subject of retiring. “At the moment I’m fairly energetic and able to do my job and work all the time – I rarely take any time off – but I could break a leg tomorrow, in which case I’d be retired.
“But, you know, you run out of women’s parts when you get middle-aged, there aren’t any parts for women after a bit. I was just beginning to work on King Lear this year. I was going to have a go at that – playing it as a queen not a king – but I opened the paper and Glenda Jackson was doing it. The minute you start thinking about something and working on it, somebody else picks it up.
“I won’t do the Lear, obviously that’s Glenda’s at the Old Vic. She’s doing it in October and I would’ve planned to have done it this winter. I’m planning to do a Noel Coward play, Blithe Spirit. So King Lear and Blithe Spirit.
“Mustn’t get those two mixed up” she laughs.
Take All My Loves: 9 Shakespeare Sonnets, Fri 22 Apr. Price: £13.80. Info: www.rufuswainwright.com
