Imelda Staunton

03/06/2009

If I knew then

At 16 I was pretty sure that I wanted to be an actress.  I had done all the school plays, and done drama outside of school with an inspirational drama teacher. I wasn’t angst ridden in any way because I knew my purpose. I was always pretty gregarious, the fun one in my group.

If I met my young self now I think we’d have lots in common. We’d have the same sense of humour, the same group of friends, and we’d live in the same apart of London. I would be glad I didn’t have her spots though.

I didn’t mind being an only child when I was a kid but as I’ve got older I’ve become aware of the adjustments I had to make which brothers and sisters would have helped with earlier on. I didn’t have the emotional vocabulary that sibling rivalry teaches you, so had to learn I couldn’t have my own way all the time and that when friends say that hate you then they love you in the same breath I shouldn’t take it too seriously.

I was a lapsed Catholic by the time I was about 14. My parents were both first generation Irish and they had taken me to church as a girl and sent me to a convent school, but they were starting to lapse by then too so they didn’t mind too much.

I’d tell my young self to get tough quick. You spend your whole acting life being rejected. There was a job I really wanted to do two years ago and I wrote to the director, which I’ve never done in my life before, and I didn’t get the job. I thought ‘Right, okay – they weren’t interested at all’. Part of you thinks “But I’ve got to this stage in my life, surely someone would show an interest?” but no, they didn’t. I remember wanting desperately to work at the Royal court and not getting that. I knew I just had to take whatever the next job was.

I’d tell my young self to have the confidence to fail. You have to go through your own struggle and survive it. I think the most important thing is having the confidence to fail. It’s all very easy to be successful but if you can fail and carry on and learn from it, you’ll learn a lot more from that experience. If things are bad, they won’t be bad forever, if things are good they won’t be good forever.

I’d love telling my younger self that one day she will meet a very tall dark handsome Yorkshireman and one day in rehearsals he would look at you and he would know that he wanted to marry you.

I’m very proud that I didn’t miss anything when Bessie was growing up. Her father and I were around all the time. If one of us wasn’t there, my mother was there, so there was no real guilt. I’m very happy about that and I’m extremely proud of her now. It wasn’t perfect by any means but we were there.

I’d assure my ambitious younger self that in the end, she will value her marriage over her work. When we got married we decided there was no point being married if we were going to be apart so in 25 years the longest we’ve ever been apart is very recently, for 5 weeks. Some people spend their lives apart – it simply doesn’t work.

I’ve had my dreams fulfilled in the last few years. Vera Drake was the ultimate experience for me. It was lovely that so many people liked the film and it was a huge success but that year of work was the best year in my working life.