Ep 1: How do you know if you're a grown up?

Along with heated discussion about cows who can use tools and how people falling over is never not funny, Sarah and Cam work out when they first realised they were a grown up. Any minute now...

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:14

Hello, and welcome to Middleview Club with you Sarah Simons and you and me, Cameron Jack. So this is also Walter the dog. This is he's he generally doesn't shift once he's lied down. You might see Betty the whippet. She keeps wandering in and out as well. Yeah, so if you see a tail just knocking something off, it's very likely to be Betty. Betty. Um so Ooh, Betty.

SPEAKER_01 0:44

Sorry, showing my age there.

SPEAKER_02 0:46

Taking us to What's Midlife Youth Club, Cameron Jack?

SPEAKER_01 0:50

It's a podcast about navigating midlife, Sarah Simons.

SPEAKER_02 0:54

It is.

SPEAKER_01 0:55

What else is it?

SPEAKER_02 0:56

Well, it's us trying to be grown-ups, I suppose.

SPEAKER_01 1:01

Oh God.

SPEAKER_02 1:02

And I still don't properly Well, there's been this is what we're talking about this week. How do you know you're a grown-up?

SPEAKER_01 1:09

Oh.

SPEAKER_02 1:10

But this is what the whole podcast's about, isn't it? Navigating grown-uppery.

SPEAKER_01 1:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:16

You know, all these things that we didn't expect.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Trying to understand the young people and their dilemmas.

SPEAKER_02 1:22

Yeah, so it's it's midlifers. Yes. Middle-aged people.

SPEAKER_01 1:27

Yeah. Speak for yourself.

SPEAKER_02 1:30

He's only 27.

SPEAKER_01 1:32

Um stone.

SPEAKER_02 1:35

But it's also for the youth as well. Because when I was a youth, I thought people our age were ancient and totally past it. And nowadays I just feel like I'm 52 and I'm just getting started. I feel like all my years before have been like my apprenticeship. I feel like my 20s, 30s, a bit of my 40s were my apprenticeship to getting started now. And I don't feel like as a middle-aged person that I'm written off.

SPEAKER_00 2:01

No.

SPEAKER_02 2:01

I feel like I've got my knowledge, I've got a lot of my understanding, and I've got all my I've done my groundwork and you've done your apprentice. Now I'm ready. How do you feel about that, Cameron?

SPEAKER_01 2:12

I think that they are some of your best years where we're at, and but also some of the most challenging.

SPEAKER_02 2:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:19

So that was a bit deep, wasn't it? Deep.

SPEAKER_02 2:21

It was, and you you you you were a little bit on the fence. Was I? You were a little bit. Well, you said best years and also most challenging.

SPEAKER_01 2:29

Well, uh yeah, so I I found them to be quite tricky, some of them. Break up of a relationship, became a dad very late at 47. Best thing that ever happened to me. She's my world. Um Living on My Own. That's a song, innit? Freddie Mercury. Living on my own.

SPEAKER_02 2:58

Anyway, anyway, carry on.

SPEAKER_01 3:00

I've enjoyed getting older in some ways, learning new things. Um, I keep saying enjoying living on my own, but I do.

SPEAKER_03 3:08

Living on my own.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

And um, we'll talk about where we met in a bit. I've had some lovely career moments through my forties and into my fifties as well. Perhaps the best career moments.

SPEAKER_02 3:25

Well, what do you do for a job, Cameron?

SPEAKER_01 3:28

Well, I don't like to talk about it, but I am an actor.

SPEAKER_02 3:32

What sort of acting do you do?

SPEAKER_01 3:33

Right, so we met at the drama school, didn't we? Um, so which was very much about the musical theatre. Um, I was trying to think of a musical theatre song. I've got a question for you, but I'm going to ask you it later. Bring me back to it, your job. Um, I've got ADHD. So I am an actor, but mainly uh in television and film.

SPEAKER_02 3:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:56

Partly because I don't function well with repetition. So when I do shows, I find that yeah, having done a couple of contracts that were a year or two years, within three months, I don't like to repeat. I like to do different things. So with TV and film, as you know, having been in many, many TV shows, Coronation Street, for example, you know that every day is different. Yeah. And that's what I like. So I I haven't done a theatre job for about 12 years.

SPEAKER_02 4:25

What's some of your best telly jobs, you've been telly and film jobs?

SPEAKER_01 4:29

I've done all the soaps.

SPEAKER_02 4:31

Where would we know you from? Um, sorry, I jumped in then. All the soaps except what?

SPEAKER_01 4:37

Coronation Street.

SPEAKER_02 4:40

I've done none of the soaps except Coronation Street.

SPEAKER_01 4:42

I've done the Emmerdale, I've done the Enders, I've done the Hollyoaks, I've done the Doctors, I've done the casualty, I've done the Bill, I've done the Scottish One River City, but I have never done Cory. Where would you know me from? I don't know. Right, so I was I get killed by Tom Hardy in a Batman film. Um I am in the Were you one of were you one of Bane's Rob? I was one of Bane's henchmen. Um very small henchmen. Um what happened to Monday? I shot a movie in Los Angeles that Guy Ritchie directed with Jason Statham called Wrath of Man, which is a brilliant heist movie. TV wise, um What was that one about?

SPEAKER_02 5:21

Um that I watched on the Netflix that was really frightening and set in like in Scottish Scottish woods and stuff, but it was really frightening.

SPEAKER_01 5:33

That movie is called Calibre.

SPEAKER_03 5:35

Calibre, that's it.

SPEAKER_01 5:37

Shot that um god six or seven years ago now. It's a great film, Stephen King, the writer, absolutely love caliber. TV wise, as I say, I've done most of the big British dramas, just appeared in Silent Witness, going back into Unforgotten, back on that next month. Uh Call the Midwife, all the sort of um classic shows.

SPEAKER_02 5:59

Talking about Silent Witness and think about bodies and that. I watched an Agatha Christie recently on the Agatha Christie, it was all sorts of really famous people in it. One from like probably early 90s, yeah. And my favourite bit, I think, of anything I've watched in a long, long time, was when Elaine Page, who was brilliant in it, when she she was brilliant in it, but when she died, she laid on the floor, and Zoe Wanna Maker, who was the main part, she came in and looked over and was talking, doing this monologue about her dead friend. And not kidding, Elaine blinked very obviously. She was on the floor, yeah. And you can it's as if you can hear her saying to herself, don't blink, don't blink, don't blink, don't blink. Oh god. And then, oh, I'm gonna blink, I'm gonna blink, and then she does this massive blink. And I thought at first time I thought I thought, nah.

SPEAKER_01 6:52

I've seen I've I'm seeing things.

SPEAKER_02 6:53

Oh, it's absolutely brilliant.

SPEAKER_01 6:55

They don't call her Elaine Page in the West End, do they?

SPEAKER_02 6:58

What do they call her?

SPEAKER_01 6:58

Elaanopasia. When I did Drowsy Chaperone with her, um Summer Stralin used to go over the Tanoy and say Alanopazia to the Stasia.

SPEAKER_02 7:09

Um I love I love little tiny Elaine Page, but her blinking as a dead body was one of my highlights for this year.

SPEAKER_01 7:17

Proper pocket dynamo. Yeah, oh man, she's incredible. So yeah, I just uh finished a show last year called The Wheel of Time. The Wheel of Time, which has been cancelled. I had the great joy. Don't stop your fault, yeah. Yeah, I had the great joy of doing two shows in one year. One had been running 20 years, one was on series three, they both got cancelled. So actors are like, You're a fucking jinx, mate.

SPEAKER_02 7:40

And you're a proper job intern, aren't you?

SPEAKER_01 7:42

Yes, I am touch with touchwood. I didn't get a series regular gig till I was 50.

SPEAKER_03 7:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:49

And that bizarre, having played numerous gangsters, drug dealers, arsonists, and murderers, was on a kids' TV show called Jamie Johnson FC. So I've done three seasons of that, and the good news is back in the summer. My dream hopefully will come true in September. Um I've written a film called A Darker Game, which is a very intense drama. We are half financed on that, but I will have written, co-produced, and I'm playing the lead in that, and that's a dream, but it's a tiny budget for a movie, it's gonna be just under 100 grand.

SPEAKER_02 8:23

It's gonna be an adventure, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 8:24

Total roller coaster right, and it's a wee thing where and I think this is really important, particularly for our demographic, which is not old but not young. I said to people, thank you. Um that made you laugh. Um I've remembered what the question is, Eddie H D, I remember what the question is I was gonna ask you, but I'm gonna talk about a darker game first.

SPEAKER_02 8:46

It's building this frigging question.

SPEAKER_01 8:47

I'll tell you what, it might better be my I'm speaking, I need to do it because I said to somebody, and this is a bit glum, I said I don't want to be on the deathbed going, I should have made that film when when I was young enough. Here's my question for you.

SPEAKER_02 9:03

Go on.

SPEAKER_01 9:04

We met where?

SPEAKER_02 9:06

Mountview Theatre School.

SPEAKER_01 9:07

Yes. Do you remember when you were in your group, you had to do a solo song? I remember being in a group. Were you ever in my were you in my first group?

SPEAKER_02 9:17

I can't remember.

SPEAKER_01 9:18

But we all It was the 90s, I was drunk. Yes, yes, yes. We had a lot of that, but you everybody had to get up and do a song on the first or second day in front of the group. And I remember I did because I sang it all the time, Why God Why from Miss Saigon.

SPEAKER_02 9:35

Miss Saigon.

SPEAKER_01 9:36

The tiniest little man singing a leading musical theatre role that he would never play. But do you remember what you sang?

SPEAKER_02 9:43

Did did I sing Don't Cry for Me Argentina?

SPEAKER_01 9:45

Yes, you did.

SPEAKER_02 9:46

Did I?

SPEAKER_01 9:47

Yes, yeah. Getting back to Alana Pasia.

SPEAKER_02 9:49

Oh yeah. Well, you see, I I love Evita. And after I love Rai Vita, it's brilliant. Rivita. After uh finished drama school, I had about six or seven auditions for the film.

SPEAKER_01 10:02

Before you got into Coronation Street.

SPEAKER_02 10:04

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:04

But I did you go in for the film?

SPEAKER_02 10:06

Yeah, yeah. And they kept calling me back and calling me back, and then I was on a pencil to play Madonna's sister.

SPEAKER_01 10:12

It won't be easy, you'll think it's strange, but that's brilliant that you got that far.

SPEAKER_02 10:18

I'd I'd uh auditioned with um Alan Parker.

SPEAKER_01 10:22

I thought you were going to say auditioned with Alan Partridge.

SPEAKER_02 10:25

No, I auditioned with the the big guy, yeah, yeah. I got that far away.

SPEAKER_01 10:29

Brilliant director.

SPEAKER_02 10:30

And then um I got a call, set my agent got a call saying it and it was for a substantial kind of backing role, sort of, but to be with the Vita character all the way through. With Maradona. With Maradona, yeah. Um and Alan Parker was very keen, and Madonna did not like me. She saw saw a tape of me and didn't like me. So I was devastated, and then the next week I got Cory.

SPEAKER_01 10:58

So let me ask you a question. If the two had aligned and you had to choose one, what would you have chosen? Rivita or Cory?

SPEAKER_02 11:07

Corey.

unknown 11:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:09

Happy you did.

SPEAKER_02 11:10

Yeah, it was a good experience just doing Coronation Street, but I it was too young too soon for me.

SPEAKER_01 11:16

You didn't like the you didn't like the fame, did you?

SPEAKER_02 11:19

No. I mean Fame! We've we've actually gone into how do you know you're a grown-up and talking about our grown-up array. But before that, we need to go into one of our regular segments, which is Oh, sorry. It's you, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:32

Is it icon?

SPEAKER_02 11:33

It is it is.

SPEAKER_01 11:34

We're new to this, it's episode one. Um, this is icon of the week. So each week we will both choose an icon. It can be a human, it can be a thing, it can be an animal, but um it's something, it can be a smell. Can it be a smell? Nice. Well you can't smell. We'll get to that in a later episode. Our sense of smell went wonky after the COVID after the COVID. So the icon of the week is just something that jumps out at you that you want to talk about.

SPEAKER_02 12:08

Do you want to start? Yeah, I will do. My icon was in the news a few weeks ago. Um and it's a cow. And it's a very special cow in Austria.

SPEAKER_01 12:20

Right? What? Just down under. Oh sorry Austria. Oh sorry, sorry.

SPEAKER_02 12:26

Probably it was getting personal then. Um it's a cow in Austria that has started using tools to scratch its back. So like it picks up, picks this cow, it picks up like a brush and head over the shoulder, hoikes, hoikes it over the shoulder and scratches his back with tools. And it isn't just that this cow is is scratching its back. It to me it feels like evolution's taking a little step forward. Why? Because it's using tools, it's a it's an animal that doesn't usually use tools to do things, has made that leap.

SPEAKER_01 13:03

That's amazing.

SPEAKER_02 13:04

So I can you say that once again with feeling, please? That's a moving proper move me that. Here we go. Any more while we're here?

SPEAKER_01 13:16

Any other ideas of icons of the week?

SPEAKER_02 13:19

Thank you. No, so my cow, I think that's I think that's really exciting that an animal's kind of in in full view taking a step forward in the evolutionary path.

SPEAKER_01 13:32

I mean it's not it's not you can tell you've done psychology.

SPEAKER_02 13:35

It's not a f it's not a chuff. You haven't even asked me what I do for a living yet, have you?

SPEAKER_01 13:40

No.

SPEAKER_02 13:40

We've talked about Cameron. We went we've talked about that.

SPEAKER_01 13:46

So we've milked we've milked the cow.

SPEAKER_02 13:48

There we go.

SPEAKER_01 13:48

Let's do your icon, then we can get to we'll Yeah, we'll do icon and then we'll edit round it and I'll go, what do you do for a living? My icon of the week is drumroll, Mr. Billy Conley.

unknown 14:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:03

So as it's ep one, I I I panic a bit when we talk about icons. I go, like I can't think. Sometimes nothing's jumping out at me. But I have read his books, I've had the good fortune of seeing him live twice. I loved him as a straight actor and things like the deck collector and um Mrs. Brown.

SPEAKER_02 14:27

Is that that one with Judy Den?

SPEAKER_01 14:28

Yes. Oh yeah, that was brilliant. Because he's Glaswegian and because he comes from the same bit of Glasgow as me, lovely Partick, as in Partick Thysle, or as he calls him Partich Thistle nil, um he's just someone that uh feels like he's been there my whole life, and Glaswegians, Scots, but particularly Glaswegians, he's an absolute hero and an icon. Yeah, and he's not the easiest life, um, but he is and not in the best of health now.

SPEAKER_02 14:58

Why why is he a hero and an icon, particularly to Glaswegians?

SPEAKER_01 15:02

I think it's that whole thing of you look at somebody because my both my brother and my dad were shipbuilders. My dad, not shit builders, shipbuilders. My dad was a welder, my brother was a plaiter, right? So they worked on the ships on the Clyde, and that's what Conley did. But he was a very talented musician and he was an iconic stand-up, he's like the stand-up stand-up, and yeah, yeah, and what he said often, interestingly, is that there were a number of men that he worked with who were funnier than him, but he was the one that kind of built the craft around it. Um I wobbled my mic there for the first time. Um he was the one who had the courage to go on stage. And having seen him live, once pre-Parkinsons and one once post-Parkinsons, he just has this wonderful way of storytelling. He's been an icon for me since I was a little boy.

SPEAKER_02 16:00

But can he pick up a brush with his teeth and scratch his own back with it?

SPEAKER_01 16:05

And hoiket.

SPEAKER_02 16:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:06

I think Pamela Stevenson, his wife, would do that for him.

SPEAKER_02 16:09

Oh, okay, I'm very.

SPEAKER_01 16:10

Do you like her? Because she's psychology-based, isn't she? Uh I mean she was a brilliant actress, brilliant comedian. She was brilliant.

SPEAKER_02 16:17

I like that she's she's done something else.

unknown 16:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:19

I find that really inspiring that you can, you know, change pathways. Just drop it and go, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:24

But you did that. You were a actor, you were doing well, and then you decided to go a different path. Tell me of this path. What do you do now?

SPEAKER_02 16:33

Well, I was an actor for about 10, 15 years, and I was getting less and less work. And so me and my friend Anthony Cotton, who's now in coronation street, been in coronation street twenty one years. Yeah. Because the first episode of his like ongoing contract was on the day my son was born. Wow. Yeah, so I know exactly what day, what day.

SPEAKER_01 16:59

Um proper soap icon.

SPEAKER_02 17:02

Yeah, he's he's wonderful. Um he really is really funny, really clever. Um, Anthony Cotton, MBE. Yes, for his charity. Yeah, he does loads of the military charities.

SPEAKER_01 17:13

Good lads, well done.

SPEAKER_02 17:14

We'd done panto together. He was stoke on trends.

SPEAKER_01 17:17

So it was glamorous, glamorous, stoke on trend.

SPEAKER_02 17:20

But me and Anthony got on really well. He was only like 19 at the time, and I was 22, 20, 23. And um this was like years later, and we'd stayed really, really good pals. Years later, he was he was going through a bit of a a quiet time, and so we both decided to try and write something. Neither of us had written before. I failed my A levels, you know. He didn't have like training as far as writing is concerned, and so we just had a go. And this thing that we wrote got made by the BBC.

SPEAKER_01 17:51

Tell us the title.

SPEAKER_02 17:52

It was called Having It Off, which was about hairdressers.

SPEAKER_01 17:56

Clever.

SPEAKER_02 17:56

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 17:57

Where did you get the idea for the title from?

SPEAKER_02 18:00

Oh, it was Kathy Burke.

SPEAKER_01 18:02

Name drop clang.

SPEAKER_02 18:03

Kathy Burke, who was one of Anthony's friends. Oh, lover. It was watched by about 12 people. It wasn't very good.

SPEAKER_01 18:09

When you say it wasn't very good, what was it about it that you have an issue with on reflection?

SPEAKER_02 18:15

The writing, the story, the characters. But it started me on my writing career, and Anthony carried on with it with his acting, and not long after that went into Coronation Street. I carried on with the writing and had quite a lot of commissions. Didn't have anything made after that, but um had quite a lot of commissions and was, you know, essentially a a a jobbing writer for a while. Um until I had my little boy, and then I started doing less writing then because it meant I'd to go all over the place.

SPEAKER_01 18:44

You wrote on Corey for a little while, didn't you?

SPEAKER_02 18:46

I went back for a really short time as a story associate. Yeah, associate, yeah. Um, but it was when my son was like six months old, and it it it wasn't right for me. Um and after I had my son, I started doing different things. I said I I've you know, I was just with him for a couple of years, and then um I went to started at university and I did an English degree and I did a degree various teaching qualifications and lots of qualifications around um disability, inclusion. I've recently done a master's uh degree in psychology. And um in I'll shortly be starting a PhD in psychology. I just like learning stuff, yeah, and you know You're smart though, you've always been smart. It's just learning stuff, innit? And I I've said before, the more I know, the more I realise I know fuck all about anything, and I find that really, really exciting that there's all this stuff to know about. This is why I love my library, because I've maybe read about a third of the books I have in this library, yes, and I love the idea that there might be one of these books that I haven't read has a sentence or an idea, or you know, the just the way that some words are put together that might blow my mind and send me in a completely different direction. I like the possibility and the potential around knowledge and around learning.

SPEAKER_01 20:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 20:16

Um yeah, so I started doing loads of education and I was teaching, um, was and I wrote for the Times Educational Supplement. I had a I had a column in that, so I had uh 400, 500 pieces published in in that. So I was still writing, but it just in a completely different way. Yeah, things changed a few years ago. Uh it was during COVID actually where my son became very, very famous, very m popular online, uh worldwide sort of thing.

SPEAKER_01 20:46

Insane level of fame.

SPEAKER_02 20:48

Yeah, insane level of fame. So he's I think he's got he's got fifty odd, fifty-five, fifty-six million uh followers across all his social media.

SPEAKER_01 20:57

Do we have that many on Midlife Youth Club yet? Almost. Yep.

SPEAKER_02 21:01

Yeah, yeah. How many? 55 million. Yeah. Yeah. Across all his social media, yeah. So and um so he's like at the age of 15, 16, his career just kind of began and uh all of a sudden had this like child star. Um and at the same time my dad had was really progressing into his Alzheimer's and came and lived here. Terry Terry Terry Moff. Terry, yeah, handsome old bugger. Yeah, so he lived here and I was looking after him.

SPEAKER_01 21:30

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 21:31

Um that was interesting. Yeah, that was really, really interesting. My dad was an old rascal, kicked out of four nursing homes for escaping, for you know, doing all sorts of nakedness. No, he didn't he was never naked. He used to cut no, he went through a big phase of cutting his all his trousers, arms and arms and arms and legs off.

SPEAKER_01 21:50

Why did I think he was walking around naked?

SPEAKER_02 21:53

No, no, he wasn't naked. Right, sorry, I'd just no, he but he did have he he escaped so many times from different places. He had the windows out. I don't mean smashing windows. He took the he'd knit knives and forks.

SPEAKER_00 22:04

He was handy, wasn't he?

SPEAKER_02 22:06

Yeah, because he was a plumber and he built those all his life. Yeah. And he used to s steal knives and forks from dinner and put them down his trousers so he'd rattle round. Sometimes he'd sit down and go, ooh, because he'd stab himself. But he he was using them as tools, you know. Yeah. And so he'd take the the outsides of windows on the floor.

SPEAKER_00 22:25

So how long was he here?

SPEAKER_02 22:26

He was here on and off for about a year.

SPEAKER_01 22:29

Was it stressful?

SPEAKER_02 22:30

Really, really stressful. It was like 24 hours looking after him. And at the same time, Tom was going really, really famous. So and there was lots of things that came with that, which was, you know, we got doxed, which means if to those who don't know, which I don't know. Don't you? What does it mean? Where they f we found our address. Put all our some some people who were I won't say they were fans of Tom's because Tom's fans are lovely. Um people who wanted attention. Uh they found where we lived and put all our information online and published. So we had lots of death threats and kidnap threats and rape threats and everything and and uh every day, you know, and things sent to the house, people come into the house, and so we have to have loads of security and cameras everywhere and and and uh you know have walls built all around the place and panic. You know, it was mental mega stressful, and that's at the same time as my dad being l absolutely loony before he went into living in a a uh uh nursing home. Yeah, he he thought the front room was a train station. It was one of those things that was really heartbreaking so seeing somebody kind of die slowly in front of you and at the same time hilarious.

SPEAKER_01 23:46

Yeah, you know, she said that. Yeah. So he thought that that was a train station.

SPEAKER_02 23:52

There was one time where we wouldn't come to the park because he s he said he can he he was very definitely gonna get bitten by a shark if he went in the went to came to the park to walk the dogs with me. Whoa. He was very worried that the park was absolutely rife with sharks. Yeah, and his f my son's favourite thing was when my dad used to slag me off to me with no barriers with the dogs. No, he didn't know he was talking to me. There was one time I was I was I was cutting my son's hair in the kitchen and my dad was there. Cut your son's hair. I'm not um I'm not a great hairdresser or anything, it was just a just because you wrote a sitcom about hairdressing the second bit of COVID.

SPEAKER_01 24:36

Yeah, so you wrote a sitcom about hairdressing, and now you think you're a hairdresser, right? Yeah, go on.

SPEAKER_02 24:41

It was not long after COVID, and also my son was really famous, and so it would have been to get him to a hairdresser's at that point would have been a bit of a nightmare. So I cut his I cut his hair in the kitchen and ball. And my dad was there, and he said to my son as I was cutting his hair, oh do you know that Sarah? Don't let her cut your hair. It'll be like you've done it with a knife and fork. Do you know her? Oh, she's a right bossy article. He said to me, Do you know Sarah? Do you know when I'm with Sarah? And my son was like, and he was encouraging my dad to carry on slagging me off.

SPEAKER_01 25:15

I don't want to say cliche, but you have to laugh, don't you?

SPEAKER_02 25:17

Yeah, yeah. I mean it was yeah, and my dad passed away it's almost a year ago. Now, and he was he was very poorly for those last few years. He didn't he didn't talk, he didn't he, you know, he had to have you know he had no independence at all. Um but in those early years when his Alzheimer's was really upsetting but also hilarious, there was a lot went off. Yeah, there was one time he incited a blooming well, I wouldn't say a riot, but as near as in one of the nursing homes before he got chucked out of it, which was um he convinced all the other inmates residents that they were all working there and none of them were being paid.

SPEAKER_00 26:02

You're joking.

SPEAKER_02 26:03

And I got a phone call really late at night saying, Can you come down, please? Because you know, we have residents who've been here two years who've never had a peep off, and they're all furious. And they had to it was late at night and they had to trip there. He had all the people's uh relatives were being called because everybody was kicking off, nobody would go to bed, nobody had it was big time, nobody would go to bed. They all wanted to be paid and they'd worked there a really long time and had not been paid. This is what my dad had convinced them all.

SPEAKER_01 26:33

You need to write that.

SPEAKER_02 26:34

Because my dad absolutely believed that that they'd all been working there and they were being done over.

SPEAKER_00 26:38

But working as what? Just residents.

SPEAKER_02 26:40

Just people that don't know what they've been working on. But they were all furious and had like a strike.

SPEAKER_01 26:47

Whoa! Yeah, challenging time though.

SPEAKER_02 26:50

Challenging time, yeah, there was a lot that went on. Yeah. And then not long after that, um my marriage of of going up 30 years broke up and uh quite quite abruptly and was quite surprised. So um my life changed a lot from having a house full of kids and you know, because all my friends use YouTube friends were coming up and staying all the time, and it's mates from around here, really busy house, um, my ex-husband and my bonker's dad, to just me. So all of a sudden I was in this position that I hadn't expected before. Obviously, dogs that goes without saying, Big Walter, who is lying next to me, and Betty Whippet, who's wandering around.

SPEAKER_01 27:35

Gorgeous.

SPEAKER_02 27:36

Um yeah, so my life changed completely, and I had a com a real like rethink of what I was doing, and I went I've gone back into writing again.

SPEAKER_01 27:46

Which you're brilliant at, and I'm really glad you have. Thank you. Yeah, and I think that's gonna be very successful for you. It's a long game though, innit, it's a long game, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:54

But it feels it feels really exciting to be kind of starting again at I was 50 when everything changed, and I'm I'm 52 now. Um so yeah, having a brand.

SPEAKER_01 28:04

You don't look at kids. Oh, thank you. She bought me an energy drink to say that. I'm addicted to energy drinks. If you watch the socials, I do do a little video about energy drinks. Anyway.

SPEAKER_02 28:16

So have we kind of gone into our theme, which is Question of the Week. How do you know you're a grown-up?

SPEAKER_01 28:24

Oh Jesus Christ.

SPEAKER_02 28:26

We've talked about that a little bit already.

SPEAKER_01 28:27

Yeah, we have, we have. Um so we're doing it in kind of blocks, we do like 20s, 30s, 40s or two.

SPEAKER_02 28:35

Oh, we can just we can just riff. We can riff that musician.

SPEAKER_01 28:39

How was it like when How was it like psychology about to do anything?

SPEAKER_02 28:45

I got a first in my English degree.

SPEAKER_01 28:47

How was it like?

SPEAKER_02 28:48

How was it like when you were a young people?

SPEAKER_01 28:52

When I was a young people, I was very conflicted. I had a lot of angst and anxiety. I was a terrible worrier.

SPEAKER_02 28:59

What were you conflicted about?

SPEAKER_01 29:01

I don't know. I just had this enormous fear that I've never spoken about this. I had this enormous while having therapy, I had this enormous fear that something really bad was gonna happen from a very young age. Yeah, and I was life and soul of the party, report cards, which I'm sure you had, very chatty, class clown, always entertaining people, juxtaposed, big word, midlife youth club, with this very sort of anxious dark side.

SPEAKER_02 29:30

What did what was the bad thing that you thought was gonna happen?

SPEAKER_01 29:33

I think God, it's getting it's getting dark now, innit? I think I thought I was very fearful that the people I loved would be not there one day, taken away. Um, which is an odd thing for a kid to and a lot of health anxiety as a little boy as well. Worrying about lumps and bumps and thinking, oh god, I hope I I hope I survive. It was really, really quite um quite odd. But this whole thing is a lot of people.

SPEAKER_02 30:02

I don't know if it is odd though. I think lots of people have had this, and especially people younger people tend to talk about it now.

SPEAKER_01 30:13

Especially people who are weird like me. No, right, go on.

SPEAKER_02 30:16

I think younger people there's more language available to talk about this. Yes, it isn't that it was never there, it's just there's now that there's ways of communicating about it because people know more about anxiety and more research done on it, yeah, and you know, different inclusion and neurodiverse kind of issues in a way that just didn't exist when we were young. And also counsellors and therapists when we were young, if you were depressed, you'd say, Oh, I'm fed up. Yeah, and normally somebody would tell you to go for a walk.

SPEAKER_01 30:50

Yep, or snap out of it.

SPEAKER_02 30:52

Snap out of it or go for a walk. Be grateful, get outside, be grateful for what you've got.

SPEAKER_01 30:55

Yeah, and as you know, that doesn't work.

SPEAKER_02 30:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:58

Walking's good, but being told to snap out of it.

SPEAKER_02 31:02

Yeah, go outside, go out and play. Yeah, that was yeah.

SPEAKER_01 31:05

Yes, so I was very, very anxious as a kid, and then uh this kind of performance side took over, which led to us meeting at drama school. Um, so I kind of found my way in my twenties, made the decisions that I needed to make for so I mentioned earlier brother and dad were I've probably gone off on one here. Brother and dad worked in the shipyards. That's not what you tangent. Uh mum was she was a cleaner and she worked at Joyce. We rolls Royce, Housewife's Joyce, is my big pal Joe McFadgen used to call her. We rolls Royce. Um can't say that till she'll kick you in the balls. I'm your mother, call me mother. And I call her Joyce now to wind her up. Alright, Joyce, don't you call me that? Um Joyce Um So basically, Joyce and Billy. We rolls Billy. So but so Joyce and Billy, um, where was that? Billy was my dad, yeah. He passed away a few years ago. I missed him terribly. He was a beautiful man. He was uh so he was known as Willie the Weeping Welder because he was very emotional, my dad. I spoke about it at his funeral. He was the most emotional man I'd ever met. Andrex Puppy on the telly, get worked in the shipyards, liked liked a bevy, but Andrex Puppy on the telly cut enough and and the grandkids, and he was a very emotional guy. So I was Oh god, I've gone off on one. No, I like it, I like it. So I was kind of surrounded by all these people, but I had no barometer for what to do. I was not academic and I wasn't good with my hands and I wasn't sporty but I could sing because I was starting to do I did arm drama and I did school stuff, and it was considered back then, even in the 70s and 80s, it was considered to be a bit effeminate to be an actor, and coming from a family of shipbuilders, I thought, well I can't do that, and then I realised it was the only thing I could do. So I did a bit of arm dram and a few people said I was early, late teens, early twenties, a few people said you could do this for a living. I never thought I could, but a couple of other people who I respected said, try it. I had no idea about drama schools. I worked with a woman in the council whose sister was an actor, she guided me, picked a couple of speeches. I went for a drama school audition, did a couple of songs, did a bit of dancing, which was never your dancing, which was never my favourite thing, as you might remember. And then uh did a couple of speeches and I got in the same day, and then I got a scholarship, and that was my twenties. I found my path.

SPEAKER_02 33:59

Um what were your twenty-few and did you feel like you were a grown-up when you'd gone to drama school?

SPEAKER_01 34:03

No, no. And you moved to London. No, I hated London. Um I never took to London at any point, and I lived there for 27 years. Now Buckinghamshire, I was in Essex for four or five years. I was much more comfortable in Glasgow, Essex, and now in Buckinghamshire than I ever was in London. I found the pace of it terribly intense. I found the environment that we were in at Mountview quite competitive. That didn't sit well with me. I found the bitchiness quite intense.

SPEAKER_02 34:34

I think we were. I think we're encouraged to be competitive. We're encouraged that you know if there's one role and there's five people going for it, you've you've got to you know you've got to beat those other people.

SPEAKER_01 34:45

You do, but it yeah, it's not psychologically.

SPEAKER_02 34:49

I think maybe nowadays it will be taught in a more nuanced way.

SPEAKER_01 34:53

Yeah, there'll be much more of an eye on the mental health rather than kill or be killed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I teach screen acting and I think I have to be careful what I say here, but I do think young actors are led to believe that they often will have a lot of choice when they leave drama school. As you know, that's not the case. Oh it's panto, it's TIE, it's trying to get a day or a tele job if you're lucky.

SPEAKER_02 35:16

If you're lucky.

SPEAKER_01 35:18

So I on reflection, again, I I was just very anxious, 20s and 30s. I was anxious. What were your twenties like?

SPEAKER_02 35:28

Um, well, I left home in Yorkshire to go to drama school when I was 18.

SPEAKER_01 35:34

Like Dick Whittington.

SPEAKER_02 35:35

I did, yes, and the streets were paved with Elaine Page. Piss. Right. So yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:42

Not Elaine Page, Elanopaja, yes.

SPEAKER_02 35:45

Yeah. Uh well the the streets were paved with her. Um I just felt like at drama school I just didn't fit in, which is weird because I've got so many friends now who I was at drama school with then, um, who I think of as wonderful, brilliant friends. So I don't know what it was that made me feel like a total outsider.

SPEAKER_01 36:10

I always thought you fitted in, because I never felt like a fitted in.

SPEAKER_02 36:13

I always felt like I was not good enough in any way, shape, or form.

SPEAKER_01 36:17

Um that's an actor thing though, sometimes, isn't it, as well?

SPEAKER_02 36:22

Yeah, I just felt I don't know, I just felt like I was get comfy, love. I am, I'm just getting comfy, just leaning, swapping my legs around. Oh, I've been doing a lot of exercising, you know. They twinge if I don't shift them.

SPEAKER_01 36:33

Paddle reformers, pilots, and swimming. Is it what else? Horse riding you've been doing? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:39

Yeah, what did I do? Oh, I did a Pilates yesterday, it was brilliant, it was really, really good.

SPEAKER_01 36:44

Middle class, yes. So, yeah, getting back to drama school, you felt odd one out.

SPEAKER_02 36:49

Yeah, I even though I was aware that lots of other people also felt like an outsider, which I think is why I I was so kind of drawn to the LGBTQ community. Most most of my friends were gay, a lot of my friends are gay now, um gay or you know, I well the the full alphabet, the LGBTQ, yeah, LGBTQ, you know, all of the acronymed community. Um, and I just felt very at home in that community, then in the straight community, and I I always kind of have felt very accepted.

SPEAKER_01 37:22

Um tell us of some of your obsessions in that world, Liza Manelli, right?

SPEAKER_02 37:28

I think because of that, it's that well, that's more camp than gay, innit? It's the camp. I like the campness of it. Okay, you know, I I like the idea of glamour, I like that anybody can be glamorous because glamour isn't about looking a certain way, it's about creating an artifice.

SPEAKER_01 37:46

All right, okay.

SPEAKER_02 37:47

It's about creating a a look or creating an environment from kind of almost artificial things, and I love that whole artificiality, the on-purpose artificiality of glamour.

SPEAKER_00 38:02

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 38:02

You know, that it isn't by accident, glamour's done on purpose, and anybody can be glamorous at any, you know, regardless of how much money you have, regardless of what you look like, regardless of how old you are, because it's a it's it's dress up, it's pretend.

SPEAKER_03 38:19

Whoa.

SPEAKER_02 38:19

I love that about about glamour, um, which fits in with all the camp stuff that I like that is, you know, is that is you know very much kind of accepted by elements of the LGBTQ community. But yeah, that in in my twenties and and even now I've even been like more drawn to that sort of community than in in the heterosexual one. Interesting. And I'm furious that I've never been in I've never been any of the acronyms. I'm desperate to be gay. I'd love to be a lesbesian. I would, I'd absolutely love it. I'd love to be bi.

SPEAKER_01 38:59

I'm just not. You're not. Make your own acronym up, make your own wee bit for yourself.

SPEAKER_02 39:05

Well it's kind of like bi jealous, in it. Because it's not even that I'm bi curious. So no, it's not for me. But it's like I'm yeah, I'm bi envious. Yeah, never say never. Les Lesbion envious. Or if you're from where you're from, you're a Leswegian.

SPEAKER_01 39:21

Yes, we are. Yeah. We're all Leswegians up there.

SPEAKER_02 39:24

Yeah. But we've chatted before about when you feel like a grown-up. The first time that I felt like, and it wasn't even that I felt like a grown-up, it f it was kind of a shock was not long after we'd graduated drama school, and I remember being in my flat in London, it was maybe about two weeks after, thinking, oh shit, if I if I want to see another person, I have to make an effort to call them and meet up with them and do all of that. It's not just gonna I'm not in a community anymore where you know, because you go from be it going to school when you're about four or five, yeah, through you know, through the rest of your school career and then uni, uni or college, drama school, finishing when you're 21 or 22, and that whole time you've been in some sort of structure.

SPEAKER_01 40:15

And I know what you mean about that pivotal moment where you're like, oh fuck, is this it? I'm on my own.

SPEAKER_02 40:21

I'm on my own, yeah. I and I remember it, I remember it so clearly.

SPEAKER_01 40:25

But I remember saying to you once, and this is really I don't think this has ever gone away from me, that the thing that I think defines being grown up, and if people have the luxury not to have this good on you, but I think when you start to worry about money and finances, getting on the property ladder, considering having kids, trying to run a car, dealing with tax as a self-employed person, um I think all those things make you go, alright, so I'm I am not a kid anymore. Yeah. Um and I was just like, oh, this is overwhelming. And that for me, my 30s was starting to 20s and 30s, starting to worry about money.

SPEAKER_03 41:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:11

And in this game that that I'm in, it doesn't really go away.

SPEAKER_02 41:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:17

As wonderful and glamorous as it is working in Los Angeles and Cape Town and meeting famous people, I always kind of end up back in a place where I'm going, oh shit, there's no jobs in the diary for four months, five months, six months, years that are scarce. And that's that's the grown-up bit for me.

SPEAKER_02 41:36

So my twenties uh teens and twenties were kind of working out what my identity was, and and and I just don't think I really got there till I was in my 60. I don't think I really got to she does the editing, she'll cut that out.

SPEAKER_01 41:57

Go on.

SPEAKER_02 41:58

To like feeling m more comfortable about m my own identity and feeling more secure in very eloquent until I was like maybe mid-40s.

SPEAKER_01 42:11

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 42:12

Um and a lot of that was to do with my appearance. Um it was actually younger than that, it was maybe late 30s, early 40s, where I was started getting much more secure about my appearance because I was always big, I was always fat. And I s when I say father. Absolutely, we can say that. Fat for me, and I'm quite feel very passionate about uh fat passionate You feel fashionate. I feel very passionate about this that fat is just a description, it it has judgment on it when we put judgment on it.

SPEAKER_00 42:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 42:52

And I was very fat for a long time. If you're comfortable with using the what and yeah, I I really don't like how how fatness is kind of weaponised.

SPEAKER_01 43:02

Yes, okay.

SPEAKER_02 43:10

Yeah, a little scratch on the chest um yeah, a lot of it was to do with feeling less than because I was bigger than. Um and I kind of this is another pivotal point actually where I felt like a grown-up was and this sounds much more depressing than it actually was. Um when my I w loved my nana, my mum's mum, I was very, very close with her. I thought she was absolutely brilliant. Nan.

SPEAKER_01 43:42

What was her real name?

SPEAKER_02 43:43

Margaret.

SPEAKER_01 43:44

Mags.

SPEAKER_02 43:44

Margaret, Margaret, yeah. And uh she had a long, eventful life, and she had a few near misses towards the end when when she was very poorly thought she was gonna die. My son was maybe two at the time, two or three at the time. There was lots of like quick legging it up the motorway up to Yorkshire to to go and see her. And she was 95 by this time. You know, she'd had a long, eventful life, done lots of lots of stuff. Um, and me and my ex-husband and my son, who was probably three by that point, were at Legoland, were having a brilliant time in Legoland, Windsor. It was absolutely ace. And um got phone calls from my mum saying, I think you need to come up, she's very poorly. And I was like, What is is this it? Do you think? She's like, Yeah. So we got the son in the car and raced up the motorway. So it was about a five-hour drive. Yeah. And by the time we got there, got to the hospital, she'd died. Um, so we got to the hospital and uh my mum took my little boy, and mi me and my husband, mm m my my ex-husband, uh, they said, Do you want to see her? And it it just felt like, yeah, I do. I felt it felt like the right thing that I wanted to see my nan. And I loved my nan. And so went into the hospital room and she was she was in bed and she she was, you know, she'd passed away, and it was the first time I'd seen a dead person, and it was really profound because it this this like body on the bed looked exactly like my nan. Yeah, but it wasn't my nan.

SPEAKER_00 45:29

No.

SPEAKER_02 45:29

And everything that made my nan her had gone. It just wasn't there, it just wasn't in the room. There was this beautiful like porcelain figure of my nan that looked very peaceful and very beautiful and very young, you know, um but it wasn't her.

SPEAKER_00 45:50

No.

SPEAKER_02 45:50

And it really, really made me think about well, if that body isn't my nan, what was my nan? What is my nan? And it made me think about how all the interesting stuff, all the important stuff, all the really all all the stuff that I loved was absolutely nothing to do with her appearance.

SPEAKER_03 46:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:11

And it got made me think it's really made me think, made me change my own attitude towards my own body and my own appearance. That all the interesting stuff, all the stuff that makes me me has nothing to do with my appearance.

SPEAKER_01 46:25

That's an epiphany, that is.

SPEAKER_02 46:26

It was, it was an epiphany, and it doesn't mean that you can't have loads of fun with your appearance, no, and you know, you can have some anxiety about your appearance or some worries or or some pride, or it can be a really interesting way to creatively express yourself, but it's just the outside, yeah. And that was a real turning point that made me think if somebody doesn't approve of what I look like, that's absolutely fine. I don't need a review from them, and I don't need their approval.

SPEAKER_00 46:54

No, none of us do.

SPEAKER_02 46:55

And so it was a real like being able to take charge of my own appearance and my own attitude to my appearance and my own kind of understanding that it doesn't define me.

SPEAKER_00 47:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 47:07

Um, so that was in my 30s. What was that that I had that kind of moment, and that you know, that kind of changed things a lot for me. Um, yeah, so my twenties were like acting and you know, all of that, my thirties and that kind of big oh yeah acceptance. Yeah, acceptance. Um and being a mum and doing all that sort of thing in my 30s.

SPEAKER_01 47:32

On the acceptance thing, I just slightly go off on a tangent. I think in my 30s I found I found a gym. I I I you know I love the gym, I love training at the gym, I love listening to music in the gym, I do video clips from the gym for our midlife youth club. Midlife youth club. Um Midlife Youth Club. And so I found like physical acceptance through my body changing, but the effort that I put into it, and I'm still at 54. I know I don't look it. Um she never said it, she never fucking said it. Um I still get a thrill from I I I've often said to people in a boring way, never I've trained all over the world in gyms, I try anywhere I work, I try and think a gym. There's never a moment where I've left a gym after a session and gone, that was a waste of time. I always feel better. And it's like a the in mental, it's not just the physical thing, it's the mental endorphin release.

SPEAKER_02 48:38

Um I'm really jealous of that with your weight training because I'd love to really enjoy that. And Sarah, me my best pal, she loves her weight training as well. And and I just she finds it meditative.

SPEAKER_01 48:50

Yeah, it is it is I'd agree with her on.

SPEAKER_02 48:53

But listen.

SPEAKER_01 48:54

You've been horse riding recently. Yeah, you've got paddle, you've got reformers pilots, you're doing it just in a different way. Looking back over it all, before we get to present day accents. Um multifaceted. What do you mean? Multifetted. Do you have any um mistakes, regrets that jump out at you?

SPEAKER_02 49:15

Oh, I've got loads and loads of mistakes. And that's partly why we're doing this podcast because we've made shit loads of mistakes and kind of learned from them. Yeah. There's lots that I haven't learned from, and I will make again and again and again. But there's lots that I have learned from. Um my biggest regret is that I didn't stop drinking when I was when I went to drama school when I was like in my teens. Right. Um I'd be tomorrow is my nine-year sobersary.

SPEAKER_01 49:45

Round of applause, please, for that.

SPEAKER_02 49:47

Thank you. Yeah, I've been sober nine years tomorrow. Um drinking was a big problem for me. Um more binge drinking than kind of constant drinking, but it wasn't just the the it wasn't just the bad things that drink did to me and made me the the way that I behaved, it was more afterwards, it was the hangovers that anxiety that made my mental health really, really deteriorate, and that could last for weeks. The fear, yeah, and it could I could have been absolutely fine, completely well behaved when I'd had a skin full. I mean, I obviously I wasn't most of the time, but or similarly behave to my friends, and they would wake up the next time be like, Oh, we're all daffed, and I would wake up and think I'm the worst person ever. Yeah, I'd be full of shame, full of anguish, full of you know, I'd and I'd hate myself.

SPEAKER_01 50:46

But on reflection, you've misread that, haven't you? Because you sh you you hadn't done anything particularly bad about it.

SPEAKER_02 50:54

I never did anything to do. Yeah, I think I was looking for a way to kind of shame myself.

SPEAKER_01 51:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 51:01

But if I was constantly doing I mean, and I was the person who, you know, I'd go out for a drink with a friend, and I at four o'clock in the morning I was still like a choving pirate. Come on, where are we going now? You know, um I fell out with a load of people on my 40th birthday because they were going home early um and leaving me. And it was what you know, we need to cat we need to carry on drinking, we need to carry on.

SPEAKER_01 51:27

What time?

SPEAKER_02 51:27

4am. Whoa. And I was cross with everybody because they were going home early.

SPEAKER_01 51:31

On your birthday.

SPEAKER_02 51:33

On my birthday, yeah, it was 4am.

SPEAKER_01 51:35

Uh did you miss it?

SPEAKER_02 51:36

No, no, I knew you were gonna say that. Don't miss it at all. And I'm dead proud of myself that over the last few years, where that you know, as I've spoken about, there's been some real challenges in my life that I haven't gone back to it. And there has been the odd time I've been tempted, but I haven't gone to it. And the only the times and this can count on on one hand, really, where I've been tempted to have a drink of is when something so terrible's happened that I've thought I just want to check out, I just want to be out of it for the rest of the day. I want to be home, I want to be I just want to be gone. Did you give me a game? And in those situations, I've just gone to bed. I've just thought, right, well, I don't care what time it is, the day's over, I've gone to bed.

SPEAKER_01 52:16

Did you do EE? Did you do or did you find your own?

SPEAKER_02 52:19

Uh I had a lot of therapy, I have a lot of therapy, and yes, I go as well. And um that's something which I think I'll you know I'll have for the rest of my life because I just think it's it's really healthy. Yes, it is. Um my GP was brilliant, um and yeah, just a lot of reading, a lot of reflection, and things like during my marriage breakup and my dad dying, um, I was doing my masters, and so there was a lot of a lot of learning, a lot of reading, a lot of essays, a lot of that kind of stress, which I absolutely loved because it was like I'm gonna focus all my stress on this essay, which doesn't really matter, but that's where I'm gonna put sorry, that was just Walter hitting the microphone.

SPEAKER_01 53:08

Um give you somewhere to put energy.

SPEAKER_02 53:11

I absolutely could put all my energy into this thing that I was learning and that I was trying to get better at and that I was finding complicated and overwhelming. I could focus on that and my my education stuff, me um like continuing learning has been a real source of structure for me when things have seemed completely random and shocking and structureless where I had no control. I had some control over what essays I wrote, what essays I read, what went on the page and what I was learning for me.

SPEAKER_01 53:47

Mistakes and regrets, I don't have a lot. I I think I think I would like to get back to the acting. I I have a kid now, um I I I regret not trying to go to America when I was a younger actor and maybe just blagging it out there, yeah, like some of my mates did and did really well from it. Talented people, but I I have that's one slight regret, but you know, never seen ever. I've worked in LA, I got there eventually, only for a couple of weeks, but box was ticked. The big regret is a lack of financial stability, yeah. But I guess there's not a huge amount of control I can have over that because of what I've chosen to do for a living. There's no real regrets, maybe not having kids a kid younger because I was 47 when Alba was born. Um greatest gift, she's my life, she's the best thing that ever happened to me. But I yeah, I just maybe would have liked to have done it when I was a bit younger, yeah. So that I would have I don't know it sounds a bit grim, more even more time with her. But my god, what a gift she's been. Oh I love her with every bone in my body.

SPEAKER_02 55:04

Oh she's just and you know, and and there is the argument that you're a better dad because you're older and because you've got more experience.

SPEAKER_01 55:12

Um yeah, that's the do you know what else that and I've never really spoken about this. The acting stuff's a sideline to being a dad. Nothing I don't have the same goals as I had. I'd love to buy a place for me and Alves when she's with me. Um we do live in a place um that I rent. Um it's not like we sleep in the car.

SPEAKER_02 55:35

But basically, I don't think anybody thought you were sleeping in a car.

SPEAKER_01 55:38

Well, you can kind of stay at me. But um very small. Thanks, mate. Very smart, very jazz it. I'll give you an energy drink for saying that. That's the regrets. Those that's the regrets. That's bad England. Um, those are the regrets. But I'm very comfortable with the decision I made to do what I do for a living. I just would love more financial stability from a little girl. But her mum is brilliant. Um we co-parent, we get on very, very well. She's a very talented, smart woman, her mum, and her gran is amazing, and she's got a lot of love around her, so she'll be fine. Yeah, but I'm still hankering for that financial stability. And and I think it from the outside, if you look at the socials, because agents and managers and all that, they're like, post on your socials, get your you know, you know, and you look prolifically busy and very successful, but it's not like that most of the time. Um, and I'm very open about that. Like I people are only seeing a slice of what I think that's helpful though.

SPEAKER_02 56:43

Yeah. That that you know, you're an actor, you're a working actor, you have been for 30 odd years.

SPEAKER_03 56:48

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 56:48

And you know, that's just how it how it is that you go for lots of auditions, some you get, some you don't. Yeah. Sometimes that you're working non-stop, yeah, sometimes you're not.

SPEAKER_01 56:57

I think I've been lucky, I think I've hustled, which I think is a really important word for creative, you know, in in all aspects of life, but particularly creatively, you need sidelines. And I came into this year going, hustle.

SPEAKER_02 57:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 57:12

And I've always been quite good at that.

SPEAKER_02 57:14

Do you know what I've been looking at? And I think this might be quite a grown up. Men's bottoms not all men's bottoms, no. Um, but really, really thinking about what makes me happy, yes and what makes me happy is uh some sort of stability.

SPEAKER_01 57:32

And people.

SPEAKER_02 57:33

People stability um friends cottage cheese. Cottage cheese.

SPEAKER_01 57:43

You love cottage cheese, dogs, dogs, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 57:46

And learning shit.

SPEAKER_01 57:47

But do you not think as you get older on midlife youth club, yeah, talking about aging, you need less things and just more people and routine. You like routine.

SPEAKER_02 57:59

I like experiences. I mean that is something that you know I am quite expensive to run because I like me horse riding and my pilates and all of that kind of thing. And I like a holiday, I like travelling, I like seeing things around the world and all that kind of thing.

SPEAKER_01 58:14

I've not been on holiday since 2018. Partly because I think oh, if I go away, obviously there's childcare responsibility. If I go away and might miss out on a job, I've got to change my attitude on that because I need I could do with I'd love to take the little one away and just chill for a week. But I always think oh it's a luxury, can't do it.

SPEAKER_02 58:35

Yeah, I and that's I was like that for a long for a long time. We're in different places because you've got a little one, and my my boy is nearly 22. Yeah, but yeah, and it's it's different when they're little.

SPEAKER_01 58:47

So at the weekend, Friday we went to a water park, Saturday we went bowling, did a couple of movie days. I I lot she just keeps me young. She's such a little ball of energy.

SPEAKER_02 59:01

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:01

So it's a guest.

SPEAKER_02 59:03

Yeah, and it is really you're in a different place because you've got your little girl, yeah, you know, and she's little.

SPEAKER_01 59:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 59:08

Um I'm little. You talk as if you're two foot three and you're not. You're completely normal. You're two foot three. Completely normal sized.

SPEAKER_01 59:18

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 59:19

How tall are you?

SPEAKER_01 59:20

Five seven.

SPEAKER_02 59:21

He's five foot seven, that's normal sized.

SPEAKER_01 59:24

Same as Sylvester Stallone.

SPEAKER_02 59:26

Oh yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:27

And er Tom Cruise, although some say five's six.

SPEAKER_02 59:31

So now we're grown. Are we saying that we're grown-ups now?

SPEAKER_01 59:35

We are.

SPEAKER_02 59:36

Yeah, I don't always feel like a grown-up though.

SPEAKER_01 59:38

Do you mean in terms of your humour and your attitude?

SPEAKER_02 59:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:42

But you've got to hang on to that. You've got to retain that because that's what keeps you sane, I think.

SPEAKER_02 59:47

I feel like I'm responsible now. I'm a responsible person.

SPEAKER_01 59:50

I think in some ways I am as well.

SPEAKER_02 59:52

In a way that I've never haven't felt like for most of my life. Now I feel like I'm responsible. I feel like I've got my shit together in a lot of ways.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:00

Good for you.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:01

But I don't necessarily feel like I'm a grown-up because I can't help making rude jokes about everything. You do like a rude joke. I do like swearing. Yeah, I love a swear.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:10

I love a swear.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:12

One of my big surprises is this whole is menopause thing.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:18

Oh.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:18

I did my dissertation on on stuff to do with ident female identity and to do with menopause and to do with fertility and and all that kind of thing, because um you know, from starting periods to ending periods. And this whole idea of getting to a certain age and then just going, I don't give a fuck.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:38

I just don't give a and I've read with that.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:42

In the la maybe in the last few years, certainly since I've been I've I've no longer been married and and I've gone from a place of being part of a partnership for almost all my adult life to being independent.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:58

Brilliant, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:59

Yeah, absolutely brilliant. And um it really it's it's made me feel very strong and very capable because there's lots of things which I didn't know that I could do. Which I I believed that I couldn't do, and then it turns out I can. There's lots of stuff that has made me feel very independent, very very um powerful. Yeah, very powerful in a way that I didn't think I I could be, and I don't think it's a a coincidence that it's tied with my menopause years, and as I say, I I've gone off I'm getting off pretty lightly so far with my menopause, and I have friends who it's d absolute nightmare for in lots of different ways. But so far mine's been okay. Yeah, and I think reaching that phase where I'm it doesn't matter whether or not people find me attractive, it doesn't matter or not um whether I've got people's approval. Yeah, I have my own uh set of values and my own boundaries and my own things I will accept and I won't accept. I've got my own ambitions or lack of ambitions, and I've got my own ways of feeling comfortable and meeting my own needs.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:15

So it's like you had a lot of challenges but you've found your groove for want of a better phrase.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:20

Absolutely. What about you?

SPEAKER_01 1:02:21

What um how do you surprises becoming a dad at 47? Best thing that ever happened to me. Yeah, came with challenges, um but I have a very clear goal now that she's the single most important thing in my job. Yeah, I do a bit of acting. Used to be the be all and end all, get in the movies, doing the TV shows, it's just not anymore. Um it's lovely to be able to do it. I care deeply about it when I'm doing it. I love the social aspect in the community, but nothing is as important as Alba and hanging out with her and spending time with her and making sure that she is okay. So the surprise is like a good, it's like a positive, brilliant, best ever surprise.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:16

Like I I found with when I had my son that it was somebody in my world is like.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:21

How old were you when Tom was born?

SPEAKER_02 1:03:23

30.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:24

Somebody in my world was more important than me.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:27

100%.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:28

And there was it was it wasn't uh is there any question about it? No, this other person is more important in my world than I am, especially when the little and they rely on you.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:38

As he's an adult now, things you know, the dynamic changes, but when the little Yeah, I used to think things like, Oh, you're such a good actor, you're a good actor, I really like your acting. I used to think things like that were important. The most fucking important thing that anybody can say, the most treasured thing is you're a good dad. Yeah, and I know that's a bit cheesy, but that is the goal and will continue to be the goal. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:01

And I still make the odd mistake, but what's the thing though, innit, with being a parent that you know it's your it's your first go at it, and it's your first go with that child. So you might have six children, it's your first go with each individual child.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:15

Jumping back slightly to regrets, maybe not having another one, but the opportunity just wasn't there, and I am blessed to have her.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:25

Yeah. Yeah. How do you see yourself as an old person? What do you think you're gonna be like? And when are you gonna be an old person?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:33

I'll give you three words creaky, energized, happy.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:41

Yeah. And we're gonna have our farm, aren't we? We have talked about this and with our friend Ledge the Legge that we're gonna get because we all kind of like our own company. I mean, it's spoiled a little bit now. I've got this this partner.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:54

Yeah, Mickey's just ruined everything. Ruined everything. He can come, he can come up.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:58

Yeah, he'll have to have his own cottage.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:00

Um, and the rule is that we have this massive place in Scotland near Loch Lohmann preferably. Yeah, with loads and loads of land, and we have maybe four cottages on it, maybe about a quarter of a mile in between each one. Yeah, but it's all of our communal land, so I have my own place, you have your own place.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:20

Ledge.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:20

Ledge has her own place, and there's a guest place as well, but it might have to be for Mickey.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:25

Um, but we all live separately. It's got to be somewhere within about 45 minutes drive of an airport. Yes. It's so we can fly off where we want, but it's very remote. Yes. And in all this land, we're gonna have um load of rescue dogs. Ugh. I want a pig.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:41

A wee horse would be nice.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:42

A wee horse.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:43

A wee shirtling pony.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:44

Yeah, pony would be nice.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:46

I could ride that.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:47

I would like a pig. Can I go on my pig, birds? Yeah, boba saddle on it. They grow very big, they're pigs.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:53

Oh, I love pigs.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:54

Um, yeah, just have lots of animals that we all communally share and we're around for each other. If we want to, but we're not in each other's faces.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:04

I like the idea of that.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:05

Yeah, so we can be and in in some parts of Scotland that costs about forty five pence, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_01 1:06:10

Yeah, it's a much cheaper to level there.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:12

In London it'd be ten billions of pence.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:17

But up in Scotland it's it's doable. Do you know what just got before we move on to our rabbit holes?

SPEAKER_00 1:06:22

Rabbit holes?

SPEAKER_02 1:06:23

One of the big shop one of the big shocks of these past few years for me in being a grown-up is having a lot less ambition.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:36

Yeah, I can see I can understand that.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:38

And and the type of ambition. So I still want to my ambition is to be really good at stuff. Yeah. So to be r a really, really good writer, to be really good academically in my, you know, in my my learning and my um uh you know scholarly work.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:54

Get the P scholar done.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:57

And and enjoy the process of doing that. More kind of focused ambition rather than this, to have that. It's not that.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:08

It's not materialistic, it's more spiritual, maybe and educational.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:13

Yeah, it's it's definitely educational, but it's just you know, kind of letting go of some of the things that were used to be important, and you know, you know, and a big it's a big shock not being ambitious like we used to be.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:27

Let it go, let it go. Sorry, we always come back to musical theatre.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:33

Let it go, let it go.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:36

Walter the dog has very much responded, by which I mean he's lifted his head up. Yes. Shall we wrap up then? Uh how do you know you're a grown-up?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:43

Yeah, I've I've enjoyed it. On reflection, uh it was more roller coaster-y than I thought. I thought it would be more well, it was fine, but it's it's ups and downs, really ups and downs.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:54

Yeah, but if you get to our age and you haven't had all if you haven't had all sorts of shit go on and all sorts of challenges and things that you've to get past and get through, you're not paying attention or you're lying to yourself.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:07

No. Which brings us to holes, namely rabbit holes. So every week on what's podcast?

SPEAKER_02 1:08:14

Midlife Youth Club with me, Cameron Jack. And me, Sarah Simons.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:17

We are going to discuss the rabbit hole of the week for each of us. So this is something that you've become a little bit obsessed with. Maybe it's an internet-based thing, maybe it's in a newspaper, maybe it's a TV show, like you've said about the icon of the week, ideas, thoughts, it can be anything. So, what has been your rabbit hole, madam?

SPEAKER_02 1:08:39

Earwax.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:41

Fucking hell.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:42

I love those videos on the reels, on the on the tickerdy talks, on Instagram of people getting earwax out of their ears. And it's quite specific, it's not just any old person getting earwax out there, it has to be the video from an audiologist who has picture who has like a camera down somebody's earhole, and then you see them going in with I've remembered what the tool's called, a jobson horn.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:10

Jobson horn?

SPEAKER_02 1:09:11

That's what it's called.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:12

Sounds like a sex toy.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:13

It's not, it's it's like a bit of metal that they like pikele about down your ear hole and pull out a load of a load of stuff. It's called a jobson hole, and sometimes they use like a tiny little tiny little Dyson vacuum, and they shove that up your ear hole, and you can see all the yellow stuff coming out of it, and it sucks it all up and you see it all, and I find it very, very relaxing, very meditative. People getting earwax out of their ears. Jesus. What about you, Cameron Jack? What's up your rabbit hole?

SPEAKER_01 1:09:44

That's like my worst rabbit hole that you just described. Right, so I have recently been very much enjoying on the line um tint uh video clips of people a falling over. But I would say the thing I enjoy most is when people jump out on other people.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:06

Oh, people jumping out on other people.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:09

I find it hilarious, but also if somebody wants to do it, does it to me, I want to punch it in the neck and kick them right in their bits. Nice! Well, I think we have come to the end of uh Midlife Youth Club.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:21

Thanks, guys.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:22

Of episode one. So I hope you've had a relaxing, enjoyable time with us.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:27

Me too. Listen, if you want to see anything offer any ideas, themes, rabbit holes, icons, please. Yeah, is that what you do? The young people do. Please leave comments.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:41

Down below.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:42

Down below, madam. Please leave comments.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:45

But for the people who are listening, we're pointing downwards. You can leave comments somewhere too. Right on a toilet wall, never be mine.