THE BIG SUNDAY READ
SIOBHAN Hewlett says she’d take Lahinch over Hollywood any day after being warned to steer clear of sex offender Harvey Weinstein.
The actress and producer was on her way to stardom, almost landing the lead role in Pirates Of The Caribbean, when tragedy struck and she had to mind her sick parents.
With Irish grandparents, Siobhan comes from a fascinating theatrical dynasty dating back to the 1800s.
Siobhan, 36, told the Irish Sunday Mirror: “I hadn’t been back to Lahinch for years. We went through nine years of all my family dying over in London.
“My dad was very sick in hospital, so I needed to support mum, as soon as he passed my mum was diagnosed with stage four cancer.
“They were really dark times, I was terrified and overwhelmed.
“Mum had this rare lymphoma. I googled specialist lymphoma and found this professor at Royal Marsden.”
Siobhan begged the secretary to help them and they saved her mother’s life.
Being best friends with famous actor Benedict Cumberbatch helped matters, getting her transferred for specialised care. She explained: “Benedict loves my mum, he’d sit with her when she was having her chemo.
“We’re both celebrity ambassadors for the hospital. It makes me so happy that out of something so dark and painful there is hope and I can help people in a similar position.
INCREDIBLE
“My mum survived, she’s incredible, she’s only 64.”
Benedict and Siobhan go way back. She said: “We did our first TV series together, Sherlock, when I was 22. It was with Hugh Laurie, Anna Chancellor and Stephen Fry. We instantly clicked, we’re both from acting families – an actor’s life is a strange existence, it’s feast or famine.
“I chose to pursue this as my career knowing there’s a lot of uncertainty and heartbreak, you have to be pretty resilient to handle the amount of rejection.
“One minute you could be here with a lovely boyfriend, next week you could be off filming on the other side of the world, so it can mess up relationships.”
Commenting on the Me Too movement, Siobhan told how it was “well overdue”. She added: “When I was in LA, I was warned by a top female producer, if Harvey Weinstein ever asks to meet you or at a party and he wants to talk to you, run.
“I was 22 at the time and I was like, ‘But he’s a top producer,’ and I even had a top casting agent saying that to me too, she was being very protective.”
After her parents got sick Siobhan’s attitude to her acting career changed.
She said: “I came back to acting in a different way, people are dying who you really love and people are really sick.
“I’ve got no control, I don’t think all of the scripts are actually that great that I’m getting but I still have to do it because it’s a job.” And Siobhan revealed she was almost cast alongside Johnny Depp. She said: “I got quite far in Pirates
My dad was very sick and my mum had this rare lymphoma, I was terrified SIOBHAN HEWLETT YESTERDAY
of the Caribbean when I was 18 and really I was genuinely like, this looks like a load of old rubbish. Kiera Knightly went on to get the role.
“Just as my star was rising, dad was getting really sick, but I wouldn’t change caring for my dad. Now I’ve travelled and I’ve lived, I know more of who I am. I’ve got my own production company, I write and produce and I’m living the life I’ve chosen rather than being dictated to by the acting Gods.”
Siobhan will next be seen in ITV series Mcdonald & Dodd, a detective comedy drama with Jason Watkins. She added: “It was a complete dream to shoot this, it was just before Christmas in Bristol and I got to see mum.