Felicity Kendal plays Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing at London’s Strand theatre. Her portrayal of Shakespeare’s amiable feminist is a far cry from the dotty blonde most Englishmen would like to cuddle under the duvet: the blonde being, of course, the eternally youthful, saccharine Barbara in the BBC series The Good Life.
Kendal points out that she hasn’t played a scatty woman in wellingtons in the theatre for 14 years – not since Annie in Ayckbourn’s trilogy, The Norman Conquests. Since then, she has done several Stoppard roles and now Shakespeare that will alternate in repertory with Chekhov’s Ivanov, in which she plays Anna, the dying wife spurned by her husband.
A meaty combination, and yet it might take more than a wig change to bury Barbara and her suburban cabbage patch. A recent rerun of the sitcom attracted audiences of over 12 million. Impressively unimpressed by such statistics, she tucks one thigh-length booted leg under the other and grins magnanimously. “It’s like someone has a photo of you on the beach in Barbados 12 years ago,” she says. “You don’t think, my God, I must destroy that, because it’s not you any more, but it was you. Anyway, it might draw a few people to the theatre.”
She’s a tiny woman, an animated face dominated by a large expressive mouth – she confesses she talks too much: fun to be with, but hardly a sex kitten. In England, she says, we have an odd idea of sex symbols: enormous chests and bikini clad, but that’s only one side of it. For a lot of men, Barbara became a dream woman because she was fun, reasonably bright but not wildly intelligent, not a threat of any kind, very gutsy, but finally, totally obedient and madly in love with her husband.
But: “No, I’m not obedient and nice and do what I’m told at all. I’m totally and utterly independent. On the other hand, I’m not a steaming women’s libber in the caricature sense. A lot of women do have that image because they have a very intellectual front, are very outspoken and say a lot of very frightening things.” She ponders the word feminist – she must look it up in the dictionary then she will know (rocking with laughter) whether or not she really is one. Does it mean being like a male chauvinist pig? It’s probably to do with blue stockings and tying yourself to something. “I’ve been divorced, brought up a son, can support myself and make decisions about my work. I don’t do that because I’m forced to – it’s what I insist on doing and I wouldn’t change it. Isn’t it just independence?”
It’s like Beatrice and a lot of the women Shakespeare wrote about 400 years ago: they weren’t labelled, they were just independent. There was, after all, a queen on the throne at the time. Gosh, now we’ve got Giro cheques, answer machines and computers. She can’t believe all that progress is thanks to the feminists: even without feminism, women wouldn’t still be having 12 babies and sitting washing socks by hand in the back kitchen.
Five years ago, she married Michael Rudman, the American theatre director. She calls him “my lovely Texan”, confessing, though, that she is the one who changes the light bulbs and washes the socks. She doesn’t always do it cheerfully, but in this relationship, that’s the way it works. “You shouldn’t feel you are being trodden on.” She admits it’s a difficult time for women – wonderful in one way, because you can combine children, marriage, a career, ambition, money of your own and, hopefully, a bit of romance – but a tremendous strain. “You make all these decisions and then it’s up to you to cope with the fact that the water heater has gone, nanny has got flu, you’ve had the baby and it’s your fault that you’re at work.”
No, it’s not the man’s responsibility, too. Thousands of years of traditional role models can’t suddenly be thrown out – it’s no good saying you can’t behave like that, let’s change all the rules because then you end up like a lot of kids who have no rules and are not necessarily any happier. When we want something, we have a way of using feminine wiles, and then bring in the guns when it goes wrong. Men are always men – they don’t pretend to be one thing and then change.
She fears the guidelines are in danger of being lost – one doesn’t want to lose the protective, romantic side of the male-female relationship. A true feminist would say there’s no difference between a man and a woman except physically - and even then, there shouldn’t be much. “I think there is every difference, and I don’t think women will flourish with independence with no chaps.”
Charley, the son from her first marriage, is now 16. Eighteen months ago, at the age of 41, she gave birth (entirely naturally) to Jacob. Within weeks she was back in harness, playing the title role in Stoppard’s Hapgood. Any resemblance to the blonde MI5 agent who looked as though butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth was, she says, purely coincidental, though Stoppard, who held up his production for three months while she had her baby, let it be widely known that he’d wanted “a bossy little blonde”. Well yes, she supposes, she is fairly determined and opinionated.
She’s seen little of Jacob during the past few weeks. Rehearsals during the daytime for Much Ado followed by nightly performances of Ivanov have meant getting up at the crack of dawn or rushing home for a snatched hour during the day. She calls it wanting to eat her cake and ending up with more than she started with. She worked when Charley was a baby because she had to. This time, she works because she wants to. Once Much Ado opens, she will be free during the day, and then it’s a very good job. For a baby, she takes at least half a year off, but that, she says, is not the answer. “If you have a baby you should be with the baby. You shouldn’t try and justify it – it’s totally selfish and you have to live with that guilt.”
She prefers being married, though by no means feels it’s right for all couples. She does, however, believe that most children flourish within the family unit. She is dismayed by what she calls the “puddle of anything goes. Children need a firm structure. I don’t believe you should ask them if they want to stay up until three in the morning or whether they want to get pregnant at 13 or 16.” She worries dreadfully about drugs. She disapproves of the belief that wealth, happiness, a home, a baby and a successful job is everybody’s due, instead of it being something you have to work hard for. She takes her own work terribly seriously and not only enjoys it, but sees it as an important part of her life. Learning lines doesn’t come easily (witness her “prompts” – scraps of paper tucked into her dressing room mirror) and appreciates other people who work hard and well at what they do. Hobbies are something she doesn’t understand. She loathes the attitude of passing the buck and blaming society: we are each responsible for our own actions. We can change things, women change things – they always have done.
She knows she will be accused of being old-fashioned and reactionary, but she believes in law and order and certain standards. It’s something that was instilled in her by her own parents. (No, she won’t say whether or not she admires Mrs Thatcher; she keeps her politics to herself, and certainly doesn’t want to see them splashed in the Guardian.) She grew up in India where they ran their own travelling theatre company. She describes her life as a child actress as a wonderful, romantic, gypsy beginning. She made her debut as Puck at the age of six, and by 15, instead of going off to parties, was working as an adult within the family. She has no regrets. She remains incredibly close to her mother – strong as an ox, but definitely not a libber, and, at nearly 80, she has spent only one week apart from Felicity’s father in her married life.
Kendal’s recent conversion to Judaism could, she admits, have a lot to do with it being a family-based religion with a firm stucture: she calls it a very grown-up thing to have done. Ironically, as Ivanov’s wife, she plays a Jewish girl who converts to Russian Orthodox Christianity, but the fact that Michael is Jewish had nothing to do with her decision in real life.
Her costume for Much Ado arrives neatly pressed. On goes the face paint, out come the heated rollers and the auburn plaits clipped into place on her already tinted hair. A pair of plain spectacles complete the transformation into the fiery Beatrice. A nice touch. “I love her. She’s a blind as a bat and doesn’t care a fig. You know, she’s a women’s libber in a way, but as soon as Benedick says that he’s fallen in love with her, she says, ‘Oh, all right, I won’t be bad-tempered, I’ll marry you.’ Which is actually behind a lot of us. The problem is to find the right chap.”
- Hapgood is being revived at Hampstead theatre, London, from 4 December to 23 January. Box office: 020-7722 9301