I’ve never quite embarrassed myself so much in an interview as when I bellowed “Fraaaaaaaan” over the phone to Tamsin Greig, the British actor who played Fran Katzenjammer in Dylan Moran and Graham Linehan’s three-season comedy, Black Books.
I’m not sure what possessed me to do such a terrible impersonation of Peter Serafinowicz, whose deep-voiced, vowel-stretching character Howell reduces Greig’s Fran to a puddle by reading the shipping news over the radio.
Greig, the gracious Olivier Award winner, laughs politely down the line. Perhaps she shouldn’t have told me she’s aware that the wry Black Books had a big following in Australia – it’s what gave me the false confidence to test out my poor imitation, abandoning all pretence of professionalism and sanity.
Not wanting Greig to think I was a total imbecile, we pivot the conversation to her new TV role, as the lead in Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes’ latest project, Belgravia, which starts tonight on BBC First on Foxtel and Fetch.
Greig may be better known for her comedic stylings in Black Books, Episodes and Friday Night Dinner, but she has a considerable body of work in the dramatic sphere, which is why when she takes the screen as the restrained Anne Trenchard in Belgravia, it feels natural. You don’t ever expect her to ham it out.
Set across two time periods in 1815 and then 1840, at the start of the Industrial Revolution, Belgravia’s Anne is the wife of a well-to-do trade merchant whose financial success buys him and his family into the exalted circles of the aristocracy, but who will never be accepted by the blue bloods as one of them.
Anne doesn’t pretend to be one of her snobby neighbours in Belgravia, the posh London enclave south-east of Hyde Park where multi-storeyed stucco terrace houses line the streets, where nowadays you’re just as likely to run into a Russian oligarch as you are to a member of the landed gentry pottering outside their city pad.
Anne’s family is forever linked to the Countess of Brockenhurst’s (Harriet Walter) lineage after an event at the infamous ball thrown by the Duchess of Richmond two days before the Battle of Waterloo, but it takes 25 years for the secret connection to be unearthed.
Fellowes adapted the six-part miniseries from his own fictional novel, and like his two most prominent works, Downton Abbey and Gosford Park, it’s a lush, detailed and dramatic foray into a world of riches, classism and secrets.
As an outsider, at best someone on the margins, of that exclusive world, Greig said her character Anne functions as a guide to Belgravia, like Virgil in Dante’s Inferno.
“I was immediately hooked into who this character, Anne, is,” Greig told news.com.au. “Particularly as the audience moves into the story through the eyes of Anne. She’s the keyhole through which people then see the whole vista open up.”
While promoting a Harold Pinter play she was doing some years ago, Greig said in an interview that she didn’t see the point of doing something if it didn’t terrify her.
That fear factor in Belgravia was the responsibility of playing the lead.
“She was such a central character who holds the heart of the story and I think have to hold that story with very delicate yet robust hands, and to allow an audience to go along with you.
“It takes a lot of focus and preparation.
“It was also a material. It’s about a mother who loses a child and that’s really difficult to investigate so I thought that would be a challenge, artistically and emotionally.”
For especially emotionally dark scenes, Greig admitted it took some time and space to decompress after the day.
“What do they call it when deep sea divers come up for air? The bends. You have to take a bit of time so you don’t get the emotional bends.”
Greig was offered the role without the “proper song and dance” of auditioning by executive producer Gareth Neames, someone she went to university with.
“It’s taken him 30 years to offer me a job! But I’m not holding it against him.”
The appeal of working with Neames, reuniting with director John Alexander (with whom she worked on miniseries White Heat), and the other actors involved, including Walter and Tom Wilkinson proved too much of a draw.
“Harriet Walter has always been on my bucket list,” Greig respectfully gushed. “I saw her when I was very young at the National Theatre and I hold her in awe. I was really excited and a little bit scared.
“But from the minute I met her, I just thought she was magnificent. She’s a craftsperson, she’s absolutely brilliant at what she does, but she’s also incredibly playful and very naughty!”
Naughty how?
Greig explains with affection peppered with laughter, “She’s spot-on with line-learning, she absolutely knows how to handle the intricacies of the language, but she has a tiny blindspot when it comes to character names. You never quite knew what she was going to come out with next.
“If the line is ‘Yes, I am Lady Brockenhurst’, she would say ‘Yes, I am Lady Brockenbank, oh, that’s not it is it? Yes, I am Lady Brockleberry, sorry, Brackenberry, wait, who am I?’”
She laughed, warm memories of fun times on set flooding back.
Less fond were the memories of the costumes she had to wear, an experience she described as a daily marathon.
“I didn’t realise how physical it would be, wearing the corsets and those petticoats,” she said. “Because it was in 1840, and before the crinoline had been invented, so women used to wear three or four petticoats, which ended up being quite heavy.
“I was surprised at how physically intense it was and I suddenly realised why women of that time changed their outfits every three or four hours – so they could get out of their corsets and breathe for a bit, stretch out and move, and get some air in.
“That sort of constraint is very interesting politically because as men were getting more freedom commercially and societally, women were being more and more constrained.
“I was thrilled to see two very strong female characters be centre stage in Belgravia, a period piece at a time when the Industrial Revolution was placing power firmly at the feet of the male characters.
“But Julian chose to put these female characters at the heart of it because aside from commercial power and the power of industry, what he was interested in was looking at the power of compassion and emotions. I thought that was captivating, particularly for our times.”
Belgravia starts tonight on BBC First on Foxtel and Fetch at 8.30pm
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2020-05-24 07:30:22Z
CBMilAFodHRwczovL3d3dy5uZXdzLmNvbS5hdS9lbnRlcnRhaW5tZW50L3R2L3R2LXNob3dzL2JlbGdyYXZpYXMtdGFtc2luLWdyZWlnLW9uLW5ldy1qdWxpYW4tZmVsbG93ZXMtdHYtc2hvdy9uZXdzLXN0b3J5L2I2N2Y4MzZhNDYzY2FmNzVhODMwMmYxYzM5MmZhMjVm0gGUAWh0dHBzOi8vYW1wLm5ld3MuY29tLmF1L2VudGVydGFpbm1lbnQvdHYvdHYtc2hvd3MvYmVsZ3Jhdmlhcy10YW1zaW4tZ3JlaWctb24tbmV3LWp1bGlhbi1mZWxsb3dlcy10di1zaG93L25ld3Mtc3RvcnkvYjY3ZjgzNmE0NjNjYWY3NWE4MzAyZjFjMzkyZmEyNWY
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