20 Questions With ... Dawn Steele
14th April 2008
Actor Dawn Steele – now touring in David Harrower's controversial Olivier
Award-winning play Blackbird – talks about high emotions, Monarch of
the Glen, National Theatre of Scotland’s impact & the links between
football & Shakespeare.
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Dawn Steele is perhaps best known for playing Lexie on the BBC television
series Monarch of the Glen. Her theatre work includes Tutti Frutti for
the National Theatre of Scotland, Rainbow Kiss at the Royal Court, The
Slab Boys at the Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh and Electra and Medea
for Theatre Babel.
Steele's other television credits include True Dare Kiss, Sea of Souls
and The Key. She has also appeared on film in Gregory’s Two Girls, The
Debt Collector and Surveillance.
Steele is currently travelling the country in a nationwide tour of David
Harrower's Blackbird, which premiered at the 2005 Edinburgh International
Festival – directed by Peter Stein and starring Jodhi May and Roger
Allam - and won last year’s Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Play
following that production’s 2007 West End transfer.
Harrower's play follows Ray and Una as they meet for the first time
following a passionate love affair 15 years earlier, when Una was just
12 years old. Blackbird had its US premiere at New York’s Manhattan
Theater Club in October 2007 and recently premiered in Sydney directed
by Cate Blanchett. In the new UK touring production, directed by David
Grindley, Steele stars opposite Robert Daws.
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Date & place of birth
Born 11 December 1975 in Glasgow.
Lives now in
I live in Notting Hill, west London. I’ve been there about four, nearly
five years.
What made you want to become an actor?
I would say I’ve always wanted to do it from a very young age. I know
that’s quite a cliché, but I think it’s got to be in you from
that young age to want to do this kind of weird job. I danced when I
was younger, I did tap since I was about eight or even younger and we
had lots of dance displays. That’s the only thing I can think of that
it came from as my mum and dad aren’t remotely interested in acting
really.
If you hadn’t become an actor, what might you have done professionally?
I spent a lot of time in the art room at school. I wasn’t really good
at anything else, just drama and art, and English I suppose. I still
like to draw - very occasionally, when I remember that I can actually
do it. Maybe I would have gone to art school, though I don’t know if
I was good enough. I’m quite a good waitress too - I think you’ve got
to be to be an actor!
First big break
Monarch of the Glen definitely. I was so lucky to get it - I was straight
out of drama school. I did it for five years. We filmed in the Highlands,
a beautiful setting in the middle of nowhere with great people.
Career highlights to date
I did a play at the Royal Court recently which Richard Wilson directed
called Rainbow Kiss. Well, I say recently but it was about two years
ago now. The Royal Court is a great place to work, I had such a great
time. Richard Wilson is definitely one of my favourite directors I’ve
ever worked with and the cast were great as well. There were only four
of us. All my scenes were with Joe McFadden who is one of my friends.
Favourite co-stars
I was very lucky to work with Ken Stott in The Key where he played my
very horrible husband - but he isn’t a horrible man at all, he’s absolutely
lovely. I was working with loads of other great people as well, like
David Blair and Kevin McKidd. It was great. I also worked with Joe McFadden
on Tutti Frutti, which was just great for all different reasons. There
were 13 of us in the cast. It’s about a band and we really were a band
by the end of it. It was with His Majesty’s Theatre in Aberdeen, where
we first opened it and then we went to Glasgow and Edinburgh. We rehearsed
in Aberdeen for six weeks and then ran there for two weeks. We had quite
a few good nights out bunched up there! It’s odd doing Blackbird when
there’s only two of you so nowhere to run really.
Favourite playwrights
I’ve thought about this a lot. I’ve done some theatre obviously, but
not absolutely loads. One playwright that I absolutely love is John
Byrne who wrote Tutti Frutti. I also did Cutting a Rug, which was part
of the Slab Boys Trilogy at the Traverse theatre in Edinburgh with John.
He is just one of the most lovely men I’ve ever met. He was a huge part
of Tutti Frutti. He was there absolutely every day of rehearsal continually
changing, giving new lines, cutting lines as it was always a work in
progress and I think it still is. The way he writes is just unbelievable,
I’ve never come across anybody else like it. It’s very difficult to
learn as an actor, but once you have it, it’s satisfying. It takes you
back almost to drama school days where you’ve really got to think about
your breathing and inclination. You’ve got to take a big breath before
you get through any of John’s lines. He is just so fantastic, so original
and wacky. A lot of it’s very Glaswegian and that’s why some of it works
so well.
Favourite directors
In theatre, I have worked with Richard Wilson who I love and Tony Cownie
who did Tutti Frutti and a panto at the King’s Theatre in Glasgow which
I was in recently. Tony’s very good to work with. We get each other
really. I think that’s true of a lot of directors, they only have to
say a couple of words to you and you’re like “oh right, I get what you
mean”. Television wise, I think David Blair has been totally brilliant
to work with. I’ve done a couple of things with him, including The Key.
What was the first thing you saw on stage that had a big impact
on you? And the last?
I remember the first thing that had an impact on me was at drama school
in my first year. That’s when it all really starts getting opened up
to you. It was a production of Oedipus which the second-year students
did and an actor called Mark Bonnar was playing Oedipus. I ran into
Mark the other week at the Olivier Awards. I’ve literally not seen him
since drama school and it made me think about the production. I remember
being first year and having just started, and then being completely
blown away by it. The last thing I saw was probably Wicked which I totally
loved. I was in tears throughout the whole of it. I suppose it’s talent
that really makes me get all teary-eyed, especially with musicals. People
that can do all that … they’re just so good. I can’t wait to go and
see it again.
What's the best advice you have ever received?
My mum always say “what’s for you, will not go by you”. I think you
have to try and keep a level head like when you’re doing acting as a
job. There will be lots of times when you won’t be working and it’s
difficult - for your confidence and for your mortgage. There are so
many things I’ve gone for and not got, but when you actually see them
you think, “oh yeah, I wasn’t actually right for that, you know”. You
just have to trust your instincts and go with the twists and turns in
this job. If you don’t get one thing, there’s probably something else
for you out there which will be just as good.
Are there any parts you would particularly like to play?
I’ve never done any Shakespeare professionally. I did some at drama
school. We toured around schools with Romeo and Juliet, but we put a
different twist on it. It was updated and we based it a lot on Rangers
and Celtic for the Montagues and the Capulets rivalry. It was for the
13- to 16-year-olds and I played Mercutio, which is usually played by
a man. In my professional career, which has not been very long, only
about ten years, I’ve not had a chance to do any Shakespeare. If that
came along at the right point, I would love to do it.
Favourite books
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. I’ve seen the film recently as well
and thought it was amazing. It was quite a difficult one to put onto
film. I wondered how they were going to do, it but I loved the film
just as much as I loved the book. I read so many books on holiday and
I’ve come back and I’ve not read anything because I’m so busy learning
lines. It goes in stops and starts with books.
Favourite holiday destinations
My boyfriend and I went to Goa and had a fantastic time. We went for
two weeks after I’d finished panto. In this job you don’t really get
your two weeks holiday every summer so I’m always going away about Christmas
time and I always have to try and go a bit further away to get the sun.
I’ve been to the Maldives and Barbados but I really, really fell in
love with India. I didn’t want to do the backpacking thing as I’d just
been doing so many shows, so we really had a relaxing laze on the beach
all day.
Your career has taken you to both stage & screen. Do you have
a preference?
I don’t really have a preference. In the past couple of years I’ve done
loads of theatre. Sometimes you’re never happy. When you’re doing telly
you want to do theatre, and when you’re doing theatre you want to do
telly. The two of them are so different you can’t really compare them.
I think it’s just good to try and have a mix and that’s what I am trying
to do in my career – I try to remember it’s a marathon and not a sprint.
You appeared on Comic Relief Does Fame Academy. Was it strange to
be appearing as yourself rather than taking on a character?
Very strange. I probably would think twice about doing it again. It
was for Comic Relief and you have to keep telling yourself that. I know
everyone says “oh it was for charity”, but you know for me I had to
make a pretty quick decision whether I wanted to be involved with it
or not. I didn’t quite realise how nerve-wracking it would be, but when
you heard how much money was raised just from getting on stage and singing
it was worth it. I must admit, it was one of the most frightening things
I have ever done. I can sing a bit, but I’m not a singer.
You’ve worked with the National Theatre of Scotland on a few productions.
What affect to you think it’s had on Scottish theatre?
The NTS has been totally amazing for Scotland, brilliant. Black Watch
has been all over the world, sure, but it’s been great within Scotland,
never mind travelling about. My experience within the NTS has been with
Tutti Frutti mainly and also Home Edinburgh. I think it’s opened this
whole new world for people that maybe wouldn’t normally get to the theatre.
They’ve taken things like Venus as a Boy all over Scotland, way up to
the Highlands and to the islands which is great.
Why did you want to accept the role of Una in Blackbird?
I read the play before, and really loved it, but I didn’t see the original,
the Peter Stein production. It’s an amazing piece to read, you don’t
want to put it down, you want to know what happens. I went for a meeting
with the producer and I went and met the director, David Grindley, who
was absolutely lovely. It was one of those things that would have been
very silly of me to turn down because it’s just such a great part in
a great play with a great director. Fear nearly made me not do it because
it’s quite an undertaking and there are a lot of lines, probably the
most I have ever done. But I’m up for the challenge.
What’s the play about?
It’s about a man and a woman who haven’t seen each other for 15 years,
and 15 years ago they had an illicit love affair - he was an older man
and she was an underage girl - and they’ve not seen each other since.
She comes to find out if he remembers her, what he does remember, what
he doesn’t. I suppose she wants to try and sort out a few things in
her head. It’s about them. It’s almost like a boxing ring with those
two flogging it out and raking over the past.
How does this new production differ from the original?
I can’t really comment as I didn’t see Peter Stein’s production, but
I know it was quite stylised. We’re taking a different approach, including
a different ending. Even if you have seen it before, it would be worthwhile
coming to see it again because it’s such a different take.
What’s your favourite line from Blackbird?
There are loads of brilliant lines in this play. I would say probably
the main one is Una speaking to Ray when she says “You left me, you
left me in love”, which is very resonant to the whole play. It’s one
of the bits that really gets to me every time I say it.
The play is intense & emotional. Is it difficult to summon the
energy to perform the part every night?
That’s the challenge of doing theatre as opposed to television. You’ve
got to keep doing the same thing every night and try and get that head,
that emotional state every night, but you’ve got the whole play to do
it in, if that makes sense. On television, you have to just turn up,
do your scene and then move on to another scene which is maybe four
episodes down the line. It’s a different skill.
- Dawn Steele was speaking to Kate Jackson
From here
