Dive in... FASHION POOLS
EVER WONDERED WHERE THE WORLD’S MOST-STYLISH-POOLS ARE HIDDEN? FASHION WRITER AND AUTHOR OF POOLS (OUT 7 APRIL) LOU STOPPARD OPENS HER LITTLE BLUE BOOK
Awards the next day, where we met Brad Pitt, and it built from there. It’s like Phoebe said so beautifully in her speech at the
SAGs: “If I wake up tomorrow, it’s been the most beautiful dream.”’
She met Phoebe Waller Bridge, or PWB as Clifford calls her, at RADA, after travelling home together on the Tube after class. ‘I was very studious,’ she says. ‘It took me three years to get in, so I really wanted it. I was focused on learning everything.’
And after graduating came stage work, from the Bristol Old
Vic to London’s Barbican, along with some inevitable fallow periods.
The constant throughout was
PWB. ‘Our friendship and support of one another’s pursuits remained steady, through our ups and downs,’ she says. And so, when the BBC signed up Fleabag there was no one else Phoebe would have play her sister. ‘I really do owe her everything. And I’m enjoying reaping the rewards and riding on her coat-tails,’ she grins.
The show’s meteoric success has led to a delicious variety of job offers. ‘I’m surprised how varied the roles have been,’ she says of the fear of being typecast as Claire. ‘I think more interesting women are appearing in scripts. They’re more believable. They’re real. They’re multidimensional. I’d like to think that Fleabag contributed to that shift.’
And so, she’s taken work that takes her to new places.
First up: Quiz, ITV’s three-part drama with Matthew Macfadyen (Succession) and Helen McCrory (Peaky Blinders), which tells the infamous story of the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? coughing scandal. For those too young, or who were under a rock in 2OO1: British Army major Charles Ingram was accused of cheating to win £1m on the TV game show. Clifford plays the major’s wife and, while she admits she’s useless at quizzes, the story fascinated her. ‘The only things I’ve been able to watch myself in are Fleabag and Quiz; I hope that’s a good sign,’ she says of the show’s prospects.
In July comes Two Weeks To Live, playing Game of Thrones alumna Maisie Williams’ ‘very young’ mum in a comedy about the pair on the run. ‘She’s cheeky, funny and an absolute joy,’ Clifford says of her co-star. ‘I wasn’t sure what to expect, she started Game of Thrones when she was 14 and child actors are notorious. But she’s truly the most extraordinary actor, I learnt so much from her.’
Despite the accolades, awards and celebrity fans, Clifford says the nerves never wane. ‘If anything, they get worse, because the stakes and expectations get higher. When you’ve been in something that’s been so, so successful – where do you go? I feel the eyes on me to prove myself.’
And while Fleabag and Claire won’t be returning to our screens, she promises that she and PWB have more projects to come.
‘We will work together forever. She’s writing a film, which a few of the Fleabag team are involved with. This dream of hers to establish her production company, which we always sort of joked about. Well, apparently we’re doing it!’ They really are.
” WHEN YOU’VE BEEN IN SOMETHING so, so successful, WHERE DO YOU GO? I FEEL THE EYES ON ME TO PROVE MYSELF”