‘On screen, older men get distinguished while older women get extinguished’
AGE is of no importance unless you’re a cheese, a wise person once quipped. But try telling that to those who think you’re not even a nicely mature Parmigiano-Reggiano. Hit 50 and there is a sizeable chunk of society who regard you as more ancient than that hunk of 3,000-year-old Egyptian cheese found inside the tomb of Ptahmes in case he fancied a snack in the afterlife.
Thankfully, there are big cheeses in the cultural life of Wales who continue to defy these stereotypes. It has been a joy to see how three Cymric octogenarians have been bossing it lately.
Anthony Hopkins, 83, became the oldest-ever best acting Oscar winner for his powerful performance in The Father. Aged 80, Tom Jones is enjoying some of the best reviews of his career with the release of his 41st album, Surrounded by Time. And 87-year-old Sian Phillips, currently on screen in Keeping Faith, is preparing for the National Theatre’s exciting new production of Under Milk Wood.
In recent interviews all three have described what drives them professionally in their ninth decade.
“I’m confident in my age,” Sir Anthony told the New Yorker. “It’s no good saying, ‘Oh, by the time you play King Lear you’re too old to remember the lines.’ You have to say, ‘I’ve got a perfect memory.’ It’s a form of self-hypnosis. I knew I had all the muscle to play King Lear in my way, without playing him with self-pity. And The Father the same.
You have to have absolute confidence. I don’t mean arrogance, but confidence, as a tennis player has.”
On Surrounded by Time, Sir Tom combines new vocal approaches with a connection to lyrics that can only come from an older person’s perspective. In the spoken-word track Talking Reality Television Blues – an interpretation of the Todd Snider original – he narrates the history of the small screen from the moon landings to the presidency of Donald Trump over a repeating indie guitar riff.
“An old man with a comb-over came along and sold us the moon / And we stayed tuned in, now here we are / Reality killed by a reality star.”
Sir Tom told the BBC he related to the song’s message. “I was there from the beginning of television, you see,” he said. “In 1952, I had tuberculosis and I was quarantined in my house for two years so my mother and father bought me a TV set, and we watched the coronation.
“And then I witnessed the moon landing when I was in the States, and then Donald Trump, I used to sing at his hotels in Atlantic City. I thought he was just this playboy businessman.
“So I saw these things unfold – and that’s why this song appealed to me.”
Asked how he keeps himself – and the legendary voice – in shape, he says: “I’ve got an exercise bike in my bedroom. And I’ve got this inversion table, where I hang upside down for about five minutes every day. It gets the blood rushing to your head, which is great, and it elongates your spine as well – so if you’ve got any problems with your back, I highly recommend it. So I might be old myself but my voice is still young.”
Dame Sian Phillips, meanwhile, surprises her Daily Telegraph interviewer by being on the move rather than cocooned like most of us at home: “Oh, I love working,” she says, “I adored the first lockdown [she spent it reading Homer for the first time] but I’m very happy to be back at work.”
There has been no sign of retirement for the Gwaun Cae Gurwenborn actor who has been treading the boards since her first schoolgirl Eisteddfod triumph in 1944. From an experimental production of Romeo and Juliet, which portrayed the starcrossed lovers as elderly rather than teenage, to playing Lady Bracknell on both sides of the Atlantic, via arthouse film and musical theatre, she hasn’t stopped throughout her eighties.
“A lot of actors won’t do theatre after a certain point in their lives; it really is the sharp end of the job,” she says. “But I adore a live audience.”
This summer brings the return of people in the auditorium, and what a treat they have in store as Dame Sian shares the stage with Michael Sheen in a National Theatre production which promises a new take on Under Milk Wood.
As she embraces yet another creative challenge, she explains why she’s still at the top of her game.
“There are fewer lovely leadinglady parts around where you look good, but if you’re prepared to get older at work as well as in life, then there’s no reason not to keep working. Even if it means acting older than you feel.”
These are words younger actors can take heart from, but are those of us who work in other fields allowed to “get older at work as well as in life”?
Ageism never bothered me until, well, surprise, surprise, I got older. Past 50 to be precise. It’s not so much feeling any different in yourself, of course, it’s about how other people now perceive you.
Before you reach this milestone, generations are compartmentalised as fairly narrow age groups – 16-24s,
If you’re prepared to get older at work as well as in life there’s no reason not to keep working DAME SIAN PHILLIPS
Millennials, thirtysomethings, etc. A 49-year-old would never be put in the same bracket as a teenager. Hit your half-century, however, and suddenly your whole world is defined as The Over-50s.
And you will be targeted as such by everything from advertising to employers. You can be born in 1968 but to the companies who think you’re now decrepit fair game you might as well have been a World War II evacuee.
My friend Helen, who is a freshfaced blonde glamourpuss, opened an email on her 50th birthday from a stairlift company. Switch on the telly and I’m now eligible for pre-paid funeral plans while I keep checking whether Carol Vorderman is lurking in the corner of my kitchen attempting to release the equity from my house.
And with popular and consumer culture stereotyping 50-plussers in this way it’s inevitable that the same prejudices seep insidiously into the workplace. I’ve noticed in my own conversations about creative projects how people who might once have been described as “vastly experienced” are dismissed as “oldschool” or “traditional”. These are euphemisms for “past it” and are discriminatory terms but ageism remains an acceptable form of discrimination – particularly when it transects with sexism.
On screen, older men get distinguished while older women get extinguished. Behind the scenes in broadcasting and journalism, I’ve seen too many of my talented female peer group nudged towards redundancy when they hit their fifties. As one friend who has switched from broadcasting to PR recalls, assumptions are made about the outlook/ approach you are deemed to have in the creative industries just because you’re middle-aged.
“I definitely felt this,” she says. “I was put ‘at risk’ of redundancy at the same time as four other women of similar age in the same department. I continued with the employer for three years before deciding to leave – after 25 years’ service – and felt more valued on the ‘outside’.
“Since leaving I’ve been approached by the same industry and offered work, and been employed in other workplaces where age has not felt an issue and experience is valued.”
And it’s not just a case of fiftysomethings needing employment – when the demographic timebomb explodes employers will need older workers. Yesterday, Business in the Community Cymru – in association with Age Cymru – launched the Age at Work programme. It provides a range of support for businesses to ensure they are embracing the benefits of an age-inclusive workforce.
They spelt out the issues society will face as the age-spectrum of our population changes: “By 2030 half of all adults in the UK will be over 50. This means that understanding the challenges and opportunities presented by an ageing workforce will be vital for your business to thrive.
“It is important that employers are supporting their older workers to remain or return to work. We’re all living longer and as a result there is both a desire and a need to remain in work later in life, for both financial and wellbeing reasons.
“The Age at Work programme is a three-nation project that supports businesses in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales to be more age inclusive in their approach to their recruitment, retention and retraining practices.”
As well as preventing our economy and labour market from realising the full potential of older workers and consumers, ageism can be damaging for young and old. As The Centre for Ageing Better declares in its mission statement, it’s a divisive force:
“Ageist themes can include pitting age groups against each other, reducing people to stereotypes, and portraying later life as a time of frailty and decline. Ageism is bad for individuals and bad for society. It means that people potentially limit themselves in how much they can enjoy their longer lives and the activities they do.”
And imagine if Sir Anthony, Sir Tom and Dame Sian had been limited by the shackles of ageism. If they’d felt past it at 50 we’d have missed out on more than 30 years of sublime Welsh talent. They are all especially gifted in their field, of course. But even we mere mortals contemplating our later work life know the experience, wisdom and resilience gained en route is a precious and valuable skillset.
So perhaps age really is of no importance unless you’re a cheese – and you don’t chuck out the whole block when a bit of mould appears!
If they’d felt past it at 50 we’d have missed out on more than 30 years of sublime Welsh talent CAROLYN HITT