10 Questions
for Jan Ravens
Jan Ravens has acted with the Royal Shakespeare Company, directed Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry, appeared on Strictly Come Dancing, and made her name as an impressionist on Spitting Image and Dead Ringers. Her one woman show, Difficult Woman, is at the Edinburgh Festival Gilded Balloon until August 27.
CAN YOU DESCRIBE BEING IN YOUR 50S IN THREE WORDS?
Sad. Happy. Excited. Sad because my second marriage has broken down, happy as I’ve met someone else and I’m enjoying being in my own skin, and excited because I can now put so much into my work. It’s a great time to be doing what I do.
WHY HAVE YOU NEVER DONE THE FESTIVAL, SOLO, BEFORE?
I’m a working mum, and summers were for school holidays with the kids. Now they’re older it’s time for me, although it’s a bit scary with so many great performers there.
WHY IS THE SHOW CALLED DIFFICULT WOMAN?
Ken Clarke called Theresa May that. Did he mean she wouldn’t go to the bar after work? Wasn’t interested in going to a lap dancing club? Men and women have different attitudes to work. Male comedians talk about “killing the audience” which is very aggressive. I just want people to enjoy themselves.
WHO WILL YOU BE IMPERSONATING?
Everyone from Theresa May and Angela Merkel to Nicola Sturgeon and Ruth Davidson. Women of a certain age are in positions of power now like never before, so the time is perfect for this show.
ARE YOU ALWAYS PERFORMING, EVEN WHEN OUT?
No. Loads of impressionists will give you their whole repertoire as soon as you say “hello” but not me. I think of impressions as acting. No one asks Judi Dench to do her Cleopatra every time she’s on a chat show or at the shops, do they?
EVER READ A SELF-HELP BOOK?
Billions of them. The best is The Road Less Travelled, which starts: “Life is difficult.” Once you accept that everything else follows.
WHAT WOULD YOUR MUM HAVE MADE OF THAT?
She would just have laughed at me. My mum’s generation didn’t have Prozac, or therapy, or self-help books. They just got on with it.
HAVE YOU EVER TRIED THERAPY?
Yes. I think it worked for me, but maybe you’d have to ask those around me if I’m right (laughs).
WHICH SHAKESPEARE ROLE DO YOU COVET?
I’d love to do Cleopatra, or Beatrice, but casting
directors might say: “You’re 10 years too old, love.”
YOU HAVE 24 HOURS LEFT TO LIVE. HOW DO
YOU SPEND IT?
On a Corfu beach with my family listening to The Killers, Bruce Springsteen and James Taylor. We’d eat and drink until the sky went pink. I’d like to believe there’s something afterwards, but
I’m not banking on it.