Tell us how the rehearsal process is going for The Forsyte Saga Parts 1 and 2?

We are currently in week 5 of rehearsals; thus far it has been a real joy. Despite the colossal task appointed to us, Josh, the director, has created a rehearsal room free from panic. He has assembled a cast of solid gold dreamboats (and me). Thanks to him, we can try, fail, play, and share theatrical anecdotes, with no sense of impending doom. Alice, our stage manager, is always doing 14 jobs at once with good grace and elan. Patrice, our movement director, is helping us achieve period authenticity without compromising a grounded humanity, AND choreographing and teaching us magic dances too. All in all, I feel very grateful to be in this room, making something wonderful. I can’t wait for people to see what we’re cooking up.

What can people expect from the show?

9 actors playing approximately 20 characters over a span of 40 years. It’s both a sweeping, sumptuous period drama, and a profound, human study of characters and relationships. It challenges some of the morals and inauthenticity of the past, while confronting our own sense of modernity by making us question, how much has definitively changed? 

You have three different characters in the show, Philip Bosinney, Polteed and Jon Forsyte. Could you tell us a little about each one?

Bosinney is frequently described in the play as a handsome buccaneer, which is how he’s seen by the Forsyte family generally. That’s part of it, but he’s also sensitive, artistic, straightforward. He is a great catalyst for change in the play as he can cut through a lot of the Victorian convention and rigidity. Claud Polteed is an obsequious private investigator; he holds his cards close to his chest. Jon Forsyte is one of the next generations of Forsytes in the 1920s - progressive, romantic, moral. He wants to be a good man, but through the second play we see him mature and get tested. 

This is a newly dramatised version of The Forsyte Saga by Shaun McKenna and Lin Coghlan performed in two parts. What differences might audience members notice from the original?

Shaun and Lin have done an astounding job of adapting 9 (!) books into 2 wonderful plays. A gargantuan task done with the lightest touch. The only difference really is a distillation. Some amalgamations of characters, the trimming of some tertiary segues, but it all serves to capture the brilliant characters and essential thread of Galsworthy’s work.

Where did your love of performing come from and what has been your favourite role to date?

When I was 4, I went with my parents to the amateur drama group at my local church, because they couldn’t get a babysitter. They were rehearsing for the panto, I volunteered for a minor role, and never looked back. Being in front of an audience and getting live feedback - that released some fun chemicals in my brain. I worked my way up from Goblin Number 3 to Prince Charming. A real Cinderella story.

My favourite role was one of my first roles in London, playing an awkward plumber called Pete in The Kitchen Sink at the Bush Theatre.  It was my first time working with the incredible writer Tom Wells, and it was just one of those shows where everyone became absolute best friends. It also helped me turn my awkwardness into a bit of a superpower, so did wonders for the old self esteem.