When I am singing Goldfinger, it’s like Shirley Bassey is on my shoulder
MUSICAL THEATRE STAR LOUISE DEARMAN IS TURNING BOND GIRL TO CELEBRATE 007 MOVIE ANTHEMS. MARION McMULLEN DISCOVERS WHY AUDIENCES WILL BE LEFT BOTH SHAKEN AND STIRRED
You are taking to the road soon with The Music Of Bond Tour. What can audiences expect?
THE Bond concerts are one of my favourites. I love these absolutely huge and iconic Bond songs.
It’s really fun. I’m performing with Tim Howar and I can often see the audience miming at concerts and I feel they want to sing along with us.
West End Live, a free weekend of musical theatre, took place at Trafalgar Square recently and performers from every musical came along.
Tim came in all his Phantom Of The Opera gear and he has just the best voice. It’s mind-blowing.
He can change styles for the rock stuff in the Bond movies and the ballads.
Do you enjoy the glamour of the Bond concerts?
(LAUGHS) I have to find a spectacular frock, put on the red lipstick and be the best Bond girl I can be.
I always take spare dresses because sometimes you pull on a dress you usually love and you just know it’s not working this time so I pick out one of the other five I’ve brought along instead.
I try not to take too much with me for concerts, but I do have a steam inhaler. It’s great if your voice is tired or you’re feeling under the weather.
Is it easy to feel overwhelmed by legendary songs like Diamonds Are Forever, Goldfinger and Moonraker?
I FEEL a bit of pressure. I love Goldfinger. It’s tremendous and as soon as the orchestra starts playing it you can hear a sigh in the audience as they go ‘I like this one’.
(Laughs) Goldfinger is often my first song and it’s like Shirley Bassey is up there on my shoulder saying ‘Come on there, open up those lungs’. She’s so epic and she’s still got it.
There’s been talk that the new 007 should be a woman. Could you see yourself with a licence to kill?
(LAUGHS) I’d love to say yes, but I’d probably be the comedy sidekick in a 007 movie. I’d probably go down that route.
As I get older though I feel I am open to new challenges. I’d really like to do a play. I’d like to do something that challenges me in a different way.
I rely on my voice and bursting into song, but I’d love to do something a little bit different and unexpected.
I did my own radio show on Magic FM and loved that and it would be great to do something really fun and unexpected.
Maybe I could black out a tooth and play Madame Thénardier in Les Misérables.
You are the first and only performer to have played both leading roles of Glinda and Elphaba in the hit musical Wicked! What was it like being green?
WEIRDLY I felt really wonderful. The make-up covers everything up but you have to find the right shade of green to suit you.
You put it on and suddenly you feel like you can take on the world.
Mind you, later you’d still be finding bits of green behind your ears or in your hair and you’d have a greeny twinge to your skin on the train travelling home.
I would cleanse twice. Once in the theatre as soon as I came off stage and again when I got home.
My skin was probably the best it had been in years because of the show ... but you would look down and see green fingernails.
You have appeared in many famous musicals. What have been some of your highlights?
I HAVE had so many wonderful moments – Wicked!, of course, and Guys & Dolls at Piccadilly Theatre in London with the lovely Patrick Swayze playing Nathan.
The whole cast was so close and we had such a good time on that show.
I also returned to the musical later to play Miss Adelaide on the UK tour.
(Chuckles) I have a habit of going back into musicals. I’ve not done musicals recently and have been dipping in and out of work because I now have a little two-year-old girl called Willow Rose. She’s adapted to going here, there and everywhere.
She’s my priority now and she comes along with me in my car when she can and she’s been backstage at the Royal Albert Hall.
We didn’t know anyone with the name Willow when we chose it, but now there seem to be so many dogs in the park called Willow and tonnes of girls with the same name.
It sounds clichéd, but you have a very different outlook on life when you become a parent. It’s so much more than just performing.
Did you start performing yourself at a young age?
I STARTED dancing when I was three. It was a lovely little hobby that I loved doing.
My parents were of the notion that you can stop when you don’t enjoy doing it. At 12 I auditioned for the choir in Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at the Palladium and that was the moment for me. That’s when I realised I want to be doing this for my career.
I left school at 16 because there was nothing else I wanted to do. There was nothing else I loved more.
It could have been a disaster, but I was very lucky. I had lots of career teachers telling me ‘it’s too hard, you won’t make it’.
Where do you now feel most at home?
WE’VE just moved to Brighton and I’m loving being outdoors.
Willow is running outside and getting fresh air.
We even went to Devil’s Dyke recently for a nice walk and a picnic. It’s lovely.
■ The Music Of Bond tour begins on September 28. Go to raymondgubbay.co.uk for venue and ticket details or call the national ticket hotline on 0844 847 2319 (booking fees apply). Calls cost 7p per minute plus your network access charge.