Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
CORRIE STAR
In a career spanning 60 years, Stephanie Beacham has brought her sultry looks to powerhouse roles such as Sable Colby in 1980s US show Dynasty alongside fellow icon Joan Collins.
And back on this side of the pond this week, she returned to Coronation Street as Ken Barlow’s former love interest, heartbreaker Martha Fraser.
While some roles, she says, are harder to play, she is thrilled to have landed the perfect part as an interfering mother to fellow glamazon Liz Hurley.
She admits: “I play the naggy mum – and I’m afraid that character is not a stranger to me.”
Stephanie, who has daughters Chloe, 45, and Phoebe, 48, with late ex-husband John Mcenery, laughs: “Chloe, in particular, has often made the sign of the cross, as if to say, ‘Devil! Back off !’
“It’s just that terrible thing of thinking, you’ve got all the best advice!”
Stephanie has teamed up with Liz for an upcoming Christmas rom-com. And even the story of how they came to work on it is about as showbiz as it gets.
She recalls: “Liz and I sort of re-met at Joan’s 89th birthday. We were nattering when Liz said, ‘For heaven’s sake, I’ve been wondering who should play my mother. Of course, it’s Stephanie!’
“She got her director to phone me. How delightful that was. Because I think Joan has often played her mother and I was more than happy to.”
Stephanie, 75, was not in the slightest bit insulted to play mum to 57-year-old Liz. She jokes: “I’m not fortunate enough to be able to wear bikinis like Liz.
“She’s a completely down-to-earth, lovely creature who happens to be absolutely beautiful, and we had a lot of fun.”
In the movie, Christmas in the Caribbean, Liz plays theatre critic Rachel Webb, who discovers Mr Right is Mr Wrong when he jilts her at the altar – much to Mum’s (Stephanie’s) dismay.
But when her mother also suggests she still goes on her honeymoon with some girlfriends, love blossoms, rather predictably, abroad.
Her own experience of being a mother and working actress has not been without its challenges, she admits. “It really was sink or swim,” she says. “If I was playing something incredibly serious I was not such a good mother because I was too involved. It’s hard to split yourself into six, don’t you think?
“I remember one time, we had an au pair who hadn’t returned from a class and I had a matinee at the Piccadilly Theatre in London.
“So I led my two year-old and four year-old over the road to the nunnery, knocked on the door and begged to the nuns, ‘Would you possibly look after my children? Hopefully for only 20 minutes, but I have to leave’.”
There were other times when she felt torn. She talks of lying awake at night praying her kid’s temperature of 104F would subside when work beckoned the next day. “When
you take on a role and you sign your contract, you do not have a clause that says you’ll work ‘unless my children are really ill’,” she says. “But things have probably got better now.”
Quitting was never an option. “At that time I had to have the money,” she says. “I wasn’t getting anything from my disreputable ex-husband.”
She split with actor John six years after they wed in 1973, later calling him an adulterer. Does she still resent him?
“He died three years ago but we became very good friends and I looked after him towards the end of his life,” she says. Stephanie also dated legend Marlon Brando, who she appeared with in