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[0:06] Gordon Cox: Welcome to Stagecraft, Variety's Theater Podcast, bringing you backstage and behind the scenes with the stars and creators of the hottest shows on Broadway, off Broadway, and beyond.

[0:17] Gordon Cox: I'm your host, Gordon Cox.

[0:19] Gordon Cox: On this episode of Stagecraft, I'm talking to two of Britain's acting greats, Eileen Atkins and Jonathan Pryce. A regular presence both on stage and on screen, Atkins has done everything from joining the Royal Shakespeare Company to co-creating the TV series Upstairs, Downstairs, to playing Queen Mary in The Crown. She's appeared on Broadway in shows including Doubt, Indiscretions, and The Killing of Sister George. Pryce, meanwhile, is well known both for screen roles in movies like Brazil and TV shows, including Game of Thrones, and he's won Tonys for his performances in Miss Saigon and Comedians. The two of them are now back on Broadway, playing the central couple in Florian Zeller's play The Height of the Storm. Atkins and Pryce are both here with me now to talk Broadway controversies, favorite roles, and the play the two of them want to do together next. Hi, Eileen and Jonathan. Thanks for being here.

[1:15] Gordon Cox: And for quite a bit of it, we as audience members don't quite know what's going on. Are we what's real, what isn't? Are we in someone's head? And if so, whose? You know, for quite a lot of it, I feel like the only thing really anchoring us is the relationship between your two characters, even though there are elements of your stories that we are not quite clear on. Um, well, first of all, how do you describe to people when they ask you what is this play about? Because it's hard to describe to people.

[1:46] Jonathan Pryce: Well, you try not to describe it because you try to, uh, it's there as a piece of theater for the audience to come in and discover. Um, if you say too much about it, it could possibly mislead them, or you know, it might not be what they're seeing. Um, essentially it's a love story about a long-lasting relationship and what happens to the one partner when the other one dies, and what it means to the family and the reverberations within the family's setup. Um, and it's presented in a way that the audience can, uh, they're asked to discover for themselves what the play is about and, uh, on a basic level, who is dead, who's alive, um, who's surviving, what one daughter thinks of the other daughter, and um, it's a wonderfully satisfying puzzle.

[2:45] Eileen Atkins: Yeah. Do you, as actors, particularly in those early scenes when we as the audience don't quite know what's happening, what was important to you to sort of hold on to and to get across to us? Um, did you talk about sort of what we, the audience, needed from you as actors to sort of help us navigate what was going on?

[3:10] Jonathan Pryce: Um, I never think consciously what does the audience need. I'm just given a part and try and do what the director guides me to doing if I'm muddled. I don't know. I just had an instinctive feeling for this play, and that's all I can say.

[3:32] Eileen Atkins: Do you know why? Do you have a sense of why?

[3:36] Jonathan Pryce: Well, I can only say one, uh, and this isn't the question you've asked me. But I can't explain how things work. We just work together very well right from the beginning. But I'd like to say that if you, Jonathan has just described brilliantly how you should come to this play and what, but if you say it's about old people and things like that, I just want to tell a story that happened with one of the understudies who's up front watching it when we were on tour, and there were an old couple came in and sat in front of her. And the usual thing, you know, they'd been married for years, they weren't talking much to each other, the man wasn't talking at all, the woman was talking about how you got a program, he was irritable. And by the end of this play, they walked out with his arm around her, and she very close to him. So that is the feeling I got when I originally read the play. I thought, thank God it's not depressing. And somehow it isn't.

[4:50] Jonathan Pryce: Yeah. Do you, is there a, I, when I saw the show the other night, um, and as we were leaving, my companion said, uh, you well, and wow, we still don't really know what was real. And I thought, well, don't we? I feel like I was given by the end of that show, I had a very clear idea of what was being depicted on stage. Am I right? Do you have a, without telling us what it is? Do you have a?

[5:14] Eileen Atkins: I think that final image does tell the story.

[5:18] Jonathan Pryce: Right. If you don't know what to do.

[5:19] Eileen Atkins: I think so too.

[5:20] Jonathan Pryce: I thought so too, but I mean, to answer your question about what the audience needs and what, uh, I mean, like Eileen, you don't really, uh, obviously you have an ear to the audience all the time and, uh, hope they're getting what you're doing. But what we are doing, even though the play is fragmented and jumps about a bit, you're playing it in the moment. So there's no hint of I'm playing it like a dead person. We are playing, we are alive and, uh, and well in that moment and then the moment changes to something else.

[5:56] Eileen Atkins: Right. That's what makes it interesting, actually for actors. That that's what makes it very interesting to play because you're endlessly just putting yourself in another situation.

[6:07] Jonathan Pryce: Yeah.

[6:07] Eileen Atkins: It's not all growing gradually. You just go into it. And that's fun.

[6:13] Jonathan Pryce: Oh yeah.

[6:15] Eileen Atkins: Had you two ever worked together before?

[6:15] Jonathan Pryce: No, sadly.

[6:17] Eileen Atkins: Well, I mean, I'm a lot older than him. I'm only an old age can we manage to be husband and wife. And what, how did you find each other as co-stars? Uh, Jonathan, how would you describe it?

[6:28] Jonathan Pryce: Well, I've always been a co-star as an actor. How would you characterize her?

[6:32] Eileen Atkins: I have always admired Eileen's work for the many, many years we've both been at it. Um, and, uh, it was an absolute delight to know that she was going to play my wife. Um, and that's it really. And we've, uh, we hit it off as actors, as coworkers, and also personally we get on together really well. We're very fond of each other, I think.

[7:01] Eileen Atkins: Absolutely.

[7:02] Jonathan Pryce: And, um, and it makes it a lot easier to be on stage when the relationship is like that. The interesting thing is you don't know how you are gonna work with someone, do you? You can admire someone very much in the theatre. And then when you come to work with them, it's just wish you weren't. In this case, it was terrific because I had admired Jonathan from when he was a small boy. And, uh, I'd seen his, you know, the first time I noticed him was The Comedians and I always went and watched him after that. And I was, I did say to our director, is Jonathan all right having me as a wife? I mean, I mean, I'm awfully old. And I was switched out of the way. No, it was fine. So I've got a dodgy knee so it helps my aging process.

[7:57] Jonathan Pryce: I see.

[7:58] Eileen Atkins: It's just about walk.

[7:59] Jonathan Pryce: I see. Did, um, as the project first came to you, was there something in it, uh, theme or a subject matter or something? What do you, do you have a memory of what in particular you responded to that made you want to, uh, to work on it?

[8:14] Eileen Atkins: Well, I knew I liked Zeller's work.

[8:17] Jonathan Pryce: Uh, and you're the playwright, yeah. And, um, and so I was very, and also Christopher Hampton, who I've worked with before, who translated it.

[8:26] Eileen Atkins: Right.

[8:26] Jonathan Pryce: Uh, we did Carrington together that Christopher wrote and directed. So I was really interested to get this script and, uh, and after the first reading, uh, disappointed to get this script because I didn't know what on earth it was about. And, uh, it took a second reading when I began to, it began to be clearer. And by the third reading, I was in tears at the end of it when I knew exactly what it meant to me and what it, you know, what the play, excuse me, um, what it was going to be like to perform. Um, so, uh, I then leapt at it really.

[9:06] Eileen Atkins: Yeah, yeah.

[9:07] Jonathan Pryce: Yes, I, I, I didn't immediately jump on the first reading. I thought I don't quite know what this is really about at all. Um, but I, there's very young people in my agency, and, um, had one of them read it because my older agent was a bit dodgy about it. And I thought, let the young people read it. And, um, and they loved it straight away. So I thought, and what, and then I went back to it and really liked it a lot. Well, when we worked on it, I began to like it a lot. That's when I began to like it.

[9:47] Eileen Atkins: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you enjoy working in New York? Being on stage in New York?

[9:51] Jonathan Pryce: Oh, I love New York.

[9:53] Eileen Atkins: Yeah. I mean, um, I think this is my seventh or eighth year. Something like that.

[9:58] Jonathan Pryce: Yeah, yeah.

[9:59] Eileen Atkins: Um, so everybody knows I love New York and lived over here quite a bit.

[10:03] Jonathan Pryce: Right.

[10:04] Eileen Atkins: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, me too. Yes, I, I enjoy being in New York, and I really wanted to come back and do this play because on Broadway at least, I've not done a straight play since Comedians in '26.

[10:18] Jonathan Pryce: Yeah.

[10:19] Eileen Atkins: Um, I gave myself to the musical theatre. Um, but I did at BAM, I did The Caretaker and a few years ago, not many years ago, three or four years ago, did, uh, The Merchant of Venice at the Lincoln Center.

[10:34] Jonathan Pryce: Right.

[10:35] Eileen Atkins: Um, but it's, I'm, I do enjoy working in the theater here. It's really interesting. I mean, you asked me earlier before we started recording about the audiences here. And, uh, whether we're doing the play is the same as we did in London. I think the play is, uh, ultimately the same production, but the audience feels, uh, very different.

[11:00] Jonathan Pryce: Right.

[11:00] Eileen Atkins: Um, and, uh, I think maybe it's because we, I had taken for granted the London response that they got things immediately or they laughed immediately. And I'd taken that for granted. And I sort of, when this audience was a bit more listening and a bit slower to laugh, I was thinking of just, it's not as good. But, uh, it's just my expectation is different.

[11:27] Jonathan Pryce: And uh I think the more confident we get as we're playing, and we are finding new things here, even after playing it for three months in England.

[11:35] Eileen Atkins: Right.

[11:36] Jonathan Pryce: Um I'm finding new things in the in the character. Uh new nuances really, not many new things. Um and the um I just know that uh by the end of the play, whatever uh I think of the response, that the response from the audience at the end of the play is uh heartfelt and genuine and uh and really you know it's it's wholehearted from them.

[12:03] Eileen Atkins: Yeah.

[12:04] Jonathan Pryce: Do you have uh when you think of the the work that you've done on Broadway, do you have any memories, fond or otherwise, that uh really stand out for you in terms of what you think of as your uh I don't know, um your sort of signature Broadway experience for you, sort of emotionally?

[12:20] Eileen Atkins: I I I've loved I've loved nearly nearly everything. I knew one play I didn't like doing it.

[12:25] Jonathan Pryce: Oh but we'll keep it.

[12:26] Eileen Atkins: Oh, you're you going to talk about that?

[12:30] Jonathan Pryce: No, um what I really what I loved most was shown the example of it was shown most in when I played Doubt. Because never in England would you get the audience responses as you got that because they seem to forget here that they're in a theatre.

[12:49] Jonathan Pryce: And and there is a bit of fact that they're very almost more than Britain. They're used to television and and and they come in with the same feeling. So they shout back at you and uh as they did in Doubt, which was wonderful. But the response from the audience is always more either way, whether they like it or they don't like it. Here and I quite like the directness of it. I I I quite like that. And my goodness, if they like it, they really show you.

[13:22] Eileen Atkins: Yeah.

[13:24] Jonathan Pryce: That's lovely too.

[13:25] Eileen Atkins: Yeah. I can I remember seeing Doubt. I didn't get a chance to see you on it, actually, but uh I do remember there were gasps.

[13:31] Jonathan Pryce: There were we're we're we did plenty of gasping on the us, we Americans.

[13:35] Eileen Atkins: Yeah.

[13:36] Jonathan Pryce: What about you, Jonathan? What do you think of as your uh kind of favorite part of the experience?

[13:40] Jonathan Pryce: Oh well I've uh uh I've done so few, each one each one's a favorite. Um Comedians in 76, 77 was uh that was a very exciting time to be in New York. It's uh it was in New York that you you don't see now.

[13:55] Eileen Atkins: No.

[13:56] Jonathan Pryce: Um uh Eighth Avenue was uh an absolute cattle market. And uh but um kind of thrilling in a way. And uh doing that play, which was uh socially quite hard hitting. Um and the audience had to find their again, had to find their way into it because it was essentially about uh British political issues, but the some issues were universal. Um and I remember like Eileen, the the audience uh responding vocally um when I would do the the second act stand-up piece, and uh people would start crying and sobbing and moaning and uh and I'd have to backpedal a bit because I thought I was just inducing terrible things in the audience. And one night um when I was attacking the dummies, um the two figures, uh one man started blowing his whistle rather loudly, and uh the producer was in the theater and went to him and said, What are you doing? He said, I I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I thought I was being attacked.

[15:02] Eileen Atkins: Oh my god.

[15:06] Jonathan Pryce: So it had quite an effect on people. And then Miss Saigon was uh I mean, the best way to be in New York is if you're in a hit show, there's nothing better.

[15:16] Eileen Atkins: Yeah, yeah.

[15:16] Jonathan Pryce: And uh and that was just a wonderful experience. You know, Miss Saigon's sort of interesting because we the conversation that uh wish I had brought it up now. We're having a lot of people. I just want to know what you think of it. But you uh just because we're spending a lot of time now talking about sort of you know diversity and representation and the when you were initially going to come over in uh Miss Saigon, there was uh it was sort of a flare-up of what became uh something we talk about more regularly now uh in terms of diversity. Do you looking back on it, what what do you think?

[15:50] Jonathan Pryce: Well, you see, the the the uh uh extraordinary thing that happened at the time was I'd been playing it uh in London for a year. Right with a completely diverse cast everybody of any ethnicity was playing anything um and not one of them was Vietnamese and still in New York not one of them is Vietnamese um but uh you know so it was a bit of a shock to uh be told that you couldn't play this because you're not uh Eurasian whereas I I'd come from a background in theatre in England where they're working with the Royal Shakespeare Company who are pioneers in diverse casting yeah and I I had played Macbeth with a multiracial cast and um I expected the same thing to to happen in New York. So it was a it was a bit of a shock um but it was a gr a really good and worthwhile argument to have had and very very good things have uh come out of it so that uh there is uh blind cast to colorblind casting and uh everything else that goes with it and opportunities for everyone are opened up but at the time it was a bit uh hurtful to say I imagine.

[16:40] Eileen Atkins: Yeah, yeah well I just remembered I I had a smidgeon of that when we did um one of my big flops here um I'm now I'm gonna forget the name of the show with Ian McKellen and Ian McShane uh a Russian play uh uh um this was about 15 years ago right yeah yeah and okay we were playing we know what you're talking about.

[17:34] Eileen Atkins: Not the promise.

[17:35] Jonathan Pryce: Yes.

[17:38] Eileen Atkins: The promise and um to our horror. We got to the theatre and there were um Nante Police and a a huge crowd saying don't enter, don't enter. And uh, you know uh why should English people being play playing Russians?

[17:41] Jonathan Pryce: It was a Russian play and we were not the promise.

[17:59] Jonathan Pryce: Yeah.

[17:59] Eileen Atkins: And we were it was a horrible uh business. Um, you know, pushing your way through the crowd. We only lasted uh three weeks, so um that was that. But I mean I was just pleased we only lasted three weeks because I didn't want the writer to go on and it was unpleasant and um much. But we've got a similar thing in in England now with uh um a play that is uh uh it's an American play, uh but Jewish falsettos.

[18:31] Jonathan Pryce: Oh, right, yes.

[18:32] Eileen Atkins: And there is it's about a Jewish family and there isn't one uh Jew actor.

[18:37] Jonathan Pryce: Oh yeah, I've read a little bit about that, yeah.

[18:39] Eileen Atkins: And so a large number of Jewish actors, performers, writers subjected to this. And uh all I could think of was, well, there goes my career. Go from Jewish character to Jewish character. But it it's it it does it it's a very narrow argument to have that if you can only play your uh your own ethnicity, then uh theatre's dead. I mean we're it's not gonna survive. And any in anything, you should just have the best person you can find for the part anyway. That that is the answer, as far as I'm concerned, anyway.

[19:17] Eileen Atkins: Yeah.

[19:19] Jonathan Pryce: Uh I feel like both of you throughout your careers have moved very easily from theatre to TV to film, and I have thought that uh at least traditionally UK actors have an easier time of that thinking sort of more holistically about the kind of media they can appear in because you can live in London and do all three. You can do stage and theatre and uh film and then at least it's changing a little bit, but in the US, you know, you used to have to choose what I'm gonna go to the coast that has the uh TV to the city.

[19:46] Eileen Atkins: Well historically we didn't have that choice. That's why, you know, you um

[19:51] Jonathan Pryce: Right.

[19:51] Eileen Atkins: There wasn't enough enough film. Obviously there wasn't enough television to to for you to focus on one.

[19:57] Jonathan Pryce: Yeah.

[19:58] Eileen Atkins: Um and it was uh by by necessity you m you move between film, yeah, and TV theater. Do either of you have a preferred medium?

[20:07] Eileen Atkins: Yes, I do, absolutely. I'm I'm not too happy on film. I mean, I mean I um I'd I've sometimes been happy with if I get with certain wonderful directors. Um but mostly I'm much much happier on the stage.

[20:23] Jonathan Pryce: But Jonathan, I think, is brilliant on film and happy, I think, aren't you?

[20:27] Jonathan Pryce: I am happy on film, yes.

[20:30] Eileen Atkins: It's brilliant. I just seen his new film, The Two Popes.

[20:32] Jonathan Pryce: Yeah, the two popes.

[20:33] Eileen Atkins: It's simply wonderful. Watching Jonathan and Anthony Hopkins together is a dream.

[20:42] Jonathan Pryce: It's all and it's a wonderful movie.

[20:45] Eileen Atkins: Yeah. Is it the process that you don't like, Eileen?

[20:48] Eileen Atkins: Yes, I'm quite happy with TV when we used to have we started out having no ordinary like four weeks rehearsal for TV when it started out. Right. I like having a rehearsal. I don't like going in somebody else having decided what I look like completely, having things stuck on me, going meet someone that I might not even have met before. Right. And do a scene. And I I just I I cope uh I I do the best I can, but I'm not happy.

[21:15] Jonathan Pryce: Right.

[21:16] Eileen Atkins: Yeah.

[21:17] Jonathan Pryce: Uh and do you do you have a preferred medium?

[21:20] Jonathan Pryce: I don't. I I I kind of uh separate them. They're very different disciplines in a way. Um but like Eileen, the best experiences come when you can uh spend time with the script and and rehearse that like we did with uh Glenn Close and I doing The Wife.

[21:37] Eileen Atkins: Oh yeah, right.

[21:37] Jonathan Pryce: Uh huh. Um we spent time together with the director and the writer, um, table rehearsals, and those rehearsals went on uh throughout the filming. We'd meet after dinner often and go through the next day's work. Um and that was a hop you know a fulfilling experience. And The Two Popes um quite similar, but it's uh it's really a two-hander that's opened up in flashbacks to Argentina. So it's uh it's a conversation between Tony Hopkins and myself.

[22:12] Eileen Atkins: Right.

[22:12] Jonathan Pryce: Um and uh I think we because Tony hasn't been on stage for a long time, but he does have a theater background that we we worked at at it as if it was a a play, you know. Um we should say that this movie comes out, it just premiered at uh a couple film festivals earlier in the fall and comes out later this year, yeah.

[22:32] Eileen Atkins: Yeah, it's uh on screen uh November 27th, and then it's streamed on Netflix after that.

[22:38] Jonathan Pryce: That's right. It's uh uh it's a Netflix used film.

[22:41] Gordon Cox: So yeah, you each have roles that you are particularly known for. Are there roles that for you personally really feel important and special to you, that we might not associate with you?

[22:46] Eileen Atkins: Well, I'll go first while I think. I, uh, "Comedians" was a very important play for me in itself, and it was great for me.

[23:21] Jonathan Pryce: It's kind of introduced me to America and all that stuff, and um there's like a series of stepping stones which you um Hamlet in 1980 and then uh doing Miss Saigon uh when I'd never done a musical before, and that was uh that was a great experience. I absolutely loved doing it.

[23:42] Gordon Cox: And um why were you interested in uh pursuing musical theater?

[23:46] Jonathan Pryce: You sort of decided I wasn't really I had no desire to uh um it wasn't an ambition. Yeah. Um I'd uh two things happened. I was playing with Beth at Stratford and did uh uh uh organized a cabaret after the first night in the Dirty Duck Theater.

[24:10] Jonathan Pryce: And I sang Witchcraft uh backed by my three witches and uh with uh Simon Russell Beale accompanying us on piano. And my agent at the time, Jimmy Sharkey said, I'd forgotten you could sing, you should do a musical. And I said, Yeah, I'd quite like to, because I'd just been to see Limiserab.

[24:30] Jonathan Pryce: Right. And uh I thought they are having the best time. It's very emotional, it's very moving, all the audience are in tears, and it doesn't seem to be costing them anything. And I was playing McBeath and kind of felt like beating my head against the wall, trying to, you know, uh do that part.

[24:49] Gordon Cox: Right.

[24:50] Jonathan Pryce: Um and it then it was a coincidence that uh Michael Crawford, uh you can edit this story down as much as you like. This is my own. Michael Crawford was leaving Phantom.

[25:00] Gordon Cox: Right.

[25:01] Jonathan Pryce: And my agent also represented Michael, and he said, How'd you like to uh do Phantom? And I said, Well, I I don't know, I don't know. And uh I went and uh met with the musical director of Phantom and I worked with him for a few sessions and he reported to Lloyd Weber and Hal Prince that I could sing the role.

[25:21] Gordon Cox: Right.

[25:21] Jonathan Pryce: And then I went and met them, and uh they were kind of offering it to me, and they said, Have you seen it? And I said, No, I haven't. So I went to see it the next night, and uh this will shock and horrify uh millions of people. I didn't like it.

[25:41] Jonathan Pryce: I didn't think I could, I mean, they would everyone was wonderful in it. It was a fantastic production, but I didn't think I could uh bring anything different to it, and uh I would just be become part of the machine.

[25:55] Gordon Cox: Right.

[25:56] Jonathan Pryce: So then we cut to a year or so later, and the casting Miss Saigon, and Nick Heitner, who I didn't know, said the person we need for this role of the engineer is Jonathan Pryce, if only he could sing.

[26:08] Jonathan Pryce: And Cameron McIntosh said, I know for a fact, yeah. So uh so I went and met with them, sang for the composers.

[26:16] Gordon Cox: Right.

[26:16] Jonathan Pryce: And uh they um I I remember auditioning on the stage of the London Palladium, and I was thinking to myself, if this goes no further, at least I've sung on the stage of the London Palladium.

[26:30] Jonathan Pryce: Which I grew as a kid grew up sort of watched seeing on TV and great variety theatre.

[26:36] Gordon Cox: Yeah.

[26:36] Jonathan Pryce: And then they came up on stage and they said, Yes, we'd like you to do it. And I I remembered my agent's words, don't say yes to anything. So I said, I'll think about it.

[26:49] Jonathan Pryce: So anyway, that was uh it happened. It was great.

[26:52] Gordon Cox: Yeah, yeah. Um what about for you, Aileen?

[26:55] Eileen Atkins: What what uh feels goodness, nothing as good as that. Well, except that uh I I I think like Jonathan, you uh uh started out talking about your your first thing that makes everybody notice you, and the first thing for me was, and I don't think anybody remember it because um we played it in England in 1965, so I must have been here with it in 1966.

[27:19] Eileen Atkins: And it was called The Killing of Sister George, and it was, which it didn't strike me at the time it was, but it was the first gay play. The children's are by Lillian Hellman had sort of touched on the subject, but not it wasn't explicit.

[27:34] Eileen Atkins: Yeah, this was very explicit. Um I just thought it was vaguely funny play, but I didn't particularly want to be, I was desperate for a job when I went up for it, but I thought I was quite wrong and didn't like the play, and kept telling them I was wrong, and then the third callback, I I said, I don't know why you keep seeing me.

[27:57] Eileen Atkins: I you need a little tiny China doll of an actress to play this. And they said, Yes, we know we do, but we can't find one, and you're the best of the rest.

[28:08] Eileen Atkins: And um, and then I had no idea which I mean, when we opened at the Bristol Old Vic, um we heard the seats going up as people left and drove to seeing something so shocking.

[28:20] Eileen Atkins: And then we'd played it in London for a year, so we got totally used to it. And then coming here, the excitement about this play, um, and the word there wasn't gay, of course, it was lesbians.

[28:34] Eileen Atkins: And as we got into the first cab we got into, the cabman said, I hear you two are playing lesbians.

[28:41] Gordon Cox: Right.

[28:41] Eileen Atkins: I mean, it didn't stop. Um, and and because I was the only one, I I was the youngest in the company, and uh I was the first person to turn up here in a real mini skirt.

[28:53] Eileen Atkins: Um and I, you know, double page spread in women's wear daily with all my clothes and it it probably went to my head. I probably was disgraceful while I was here.

[29:05] Eileen Atkins: But I that first time I will never ever forget. Um it was so exciting.

[29:12] Gordon Cox: Yeah.

[29:13] Eileen Atkins: Um nothing. I'm having a lovely time here now, but it could, you know, well just wait for the mini skirts.

[29:24] Gordon Cox: And you're also a writer, I mean, do how often tell me about sort of what your inspiration is and how you think about writing fitting into your acting career.

[29:34] Eileen Atkins: I I I don't call I don't call myself a writer. No, I think I'm I have very good ideas because upstairs, downstairs.

[29:40] Eileen Atkins: I mean, that seemed to work, yeah. That's what that seemed to work. It didn't work.

[29:44] Eileen Atkins: It was a very, very good idea. I mean, yeah, Gene Marsh and I were the first people to think about the lives of the servants.

[29:51] Eileen Atkins: Servants' lives have not been on the screen at all. So I'm very proud of that idea.

[29:57] Eileen Atkins: Um we did um uh a storyline for it, but they wouldn't they wouldn't because we'd never written, they wouldn't let us write an episode.

[30:06] Eileen Atkins: Um we chipped in all the time. Um and of course Jean made a big success by it.

[30:11] Eileen Atkins: But I I never wanted to be in a series because I didn't want my time taken up playing one part for too long.

[30:18] Eileen Atkins: Um there was I always felt there wasn't enough time I'd gotta get other things in.

[30:22] Eileen Atkins: And it wasn't my cup of tea in those days.

[30:24] Gordon Cox: Yeah.

[30:25] Eileen Atkins: Um and then I had another good idea, which was um uh The House of Elliot.

[30:34] Eileen Atkins: Um and I think there's a third one in there somewhere.

[30:38] Eileen Atkins: And uh of course uh but I call myself an adapter because the two things that have uh gone on screen have been adaptations.

[30:47] Eileen Atkins: Um uh Mrs. Dalloway, yeah, which I love that film.

[30:53] Eileen Atkins: Yeah. And now there's just been V from Virginia, but that is not my script.

[30:57] Eileen Atkins: So okay, right. Uh it I did have a script, but the director preferred to have her own.

[31:03] Eileen Atkins: Right. And I couldn't be bothered to argue.

[31:06] Gordon Cox: Right.

[31:08] Eileen Atkins: Right, right.

[31:09] Gordon Cox: Yeah.

[31:10] Eileen Atkins: Um so you think of yourself more as an uh as an actor or do you it's your primary activity actor?

[31:15] Eileen Atkins: Uh I I think about I'm afraid I like the old word actress. I really like her.

[31:21] Eileen Atkins: Um no, but it upsets people.

[31:23] Eileen Atkins: Um yes, I don't think of myself as a writer.

[31:27] Eileen Atkins: Right.

[31:27] Eileen Atkins: Yeah.

[31:27] Eileen Atkins: I scribble away a lot of the time, but I'm I'm I'm not a great writer.

[31:31] Gordon Cox: Yeah.

[31:32] Eileen Atkins: Um and what's not we talked about uh the two popes. What's next for you uh after In the Height of the Storm and the Two Popes?

[31:38] Jonathan Pryce: Uh I don't know.

[31:39] Eileen Atkins: Yeah, okay.

[31:40] Jonathan Pryce: I don't know. It's quite a nice feeling.

[31:42] Eileen Atkins: Um I'm looking for I've done a lot of promotion for the two popes, and I'm looking forward to doing more.

[31:47] Gordon Cox: Right.

[31:48] Eileen Atkins: Um and then we'll see.

[31:49] Gordon Cox: Yeah.

[31:50] Gordon Cox: And do you know what's uh next for you, Eileen?

[31:52] Eileen Atkins: Or well, I'm afraid I do a very funny series.

[31:55] Eileen Atkins: I mean, it's not very funny.

[31:57] Eileen Atkins: Well, I mean, any a very enjoyable series called Doc Martin.

[32:01] Eileen Atkins: Yes, which is uh that's been on for a while now.

[32:03] Eileen Atkins: Which yeah, which is good fun and to do.

[32:08] Eileen Atkins: And uh I mean they they've asked me for uh we do it every other year, and I've just done an a set of eight.

[32:15] Eileen Atkins: And they've already asked me to do another set of eight in eighteen months, nearly two years' time.

[32:21] Jonathan Pryce: Wow, all right.

[32:22] Eileen Atkins: Which is right, uh well, but I may or may not be.

[32:26] Eileen Atkins: It is nice. It is nice to have something to look forward to.

[32:29] Jonathan Pryce: So I may or may not do that.

[32:32] Gordon Cox: Yeah, yeah.

[32:33] Gordon Cox: Um final question. What is the next play that the two of you would like to star in together?

[32:39] Jonathan Pryce: I would well I would have loved to have done.

[32:44] Jonathan Pryce: I've been close to it a number of times, and it's never happened.

[32:47] Jonathan Pryce: Uh I did it on stage, a rehearsed reading with Uta Hagen playing Martha, and I think we'd be a very good uh Virginia Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf.

[32:56] Eileen Atkins: Yeah.

[32:56] Jonathan Pryce: Yeah.

[32:57] Eileen Atkins: Well what do you think about that?

[32:59] Jonathan Pryce: Oh, is that who is afraid of Virginia Wolf very old people?

[33:08] Eileen Atkins: Um I wish I I I've been actually I have been trying to think of uh plays uh with wonderful thoughts for uh an old couple, and I've not been able to think of anything.

[33:20] Eileen Atkins: So uh I don't know, that sounds a good idea to me.

[33:24] Jonathan Pryce: Yeah, yeah.

[33:25] Gordon Cox: Well, we look forward to seeing it. Please bring it to Broadway after after it's a big hit on the West End.

[33:30] Gordon Cox: Um, thank you both. Thanks for taking the time and I appreciate it.

[33:33] Eileen Atkins: Thank you.

[33:40] Gordon Cox: That was Eileen Atkins and Jonathan Pryce, now starring together in The Height of the Storm, running a Manhattan Theater Club's Samuel J. Friedman Theater through November seventeenth. If you like what you're hearing on this and other episodes of Stagecraft, I'd very much appreciate it if you took the time to rate and review us on Apple Podcasts.

[33:58] Gordon Cox: Or tell a friend. Next week I'm talking with another big Broadway name, Kristen Chennewith, returning to Broadway later this fall with a concert engagement celebrating the release of her new album for the girls.

[34:09] Gordon Cox: Until next time, see you at the theater.