This week has seen the superb The Rainbow Connection come to The Unity Theatre. A play that deals with the relationship between a gay man and a straight woman of whom both have suffered hurt in one form or another and who through time come to realise they need each other in their lives.
One of the stars of the cast is Angela Simms who plays the role of Shelly. Angela Simms has been performing for several years, starting with the New Everyman Youth Theatre and from there she then went on to train in The Stella Adler Studio of Acting in NYC. Her recent work includes playing ‘Sally’ in If The Shoe Fits on the Floral Pavilion. Angela played ‘Sue’ in ‘Rita Sue and Bob Too’ on the Theatre Royal St Helens. She played ‘Cheryl’ in Tontine for B.B.C .Radio Four, which was written by Karen Brown and starring Alison Steadman. Angela starred in a national ad campaign for Aldi Mayonnaise. Angela also devises her own sketch comedy, in her work as character ‘Beverly Bogg’. Angela is represented by David Daly Associates. Angela has loved working on The Rainbow Connection and has relished the challenge of such an intimate character study.
I was able to catch up with Angela before she went on stage for the second night of the play.
Well done for last night and the opening of The Rainbow Connection. How do you think the audience’s reaction to some of the issues raised within the play?
“We had a Q and A after the show and the feedback was really positive and I think that is down to the writing really in that the characters were on a journey and that it was believable, those moments, those emotional moments or more intimate moments were earned. I think the audience bought into it and it wasn’t scandalous in anyway, it is a viable situation. I think that the audience’s reactions were brilliant.”
It is one of those plays where you are concentrating so much on the play but you can’t help but pick up what is going on around you as well. There was an awful lot of sympathy in the audience for both characters.
“Yes definitely. You could hear that the audience were engaged and listening when they were supposed to be listening and where you hope they will laugh. You can feel the empathy for the characters, there were moments where you hear the audience go ahh, such as when Joe gave her the key to the flat and moments like that. I certainly felt as though the audience were on the journey with us.”
With the ending especially in mind, the way it was left open-ended, do you think the writer, Joanne has left it room to grow?
“Like a sequel? Certainly, I think also it’s the audience’s interpretation so where it didn’t end with them together, it was quite nice that the possibility was there that they would share something together. That was quite nice and I think the audience followed that with a bit of hope. What could have been quite grim and all sadness, it could have finished on a bit of a downer but Joanne wanted a romantic story, she wanted romance but she wouldn’t it to be different and against the grain if you like, it was just about two people finding each other who were never going to be romantically involved, it was the companionship that they both needed and the possibilities that the ending left that they are going to spend the rest of their lives together in form or another is quite nice.”
I think I called it undisguised 21st Century romanticism.
“Yes definitely, it is. You can have so much romance and get very stereotypical love stories. But you can love somebody in a number of ways and I think that is a love story. The way Joanne wrote it was that they grow together and found things in each other that they both really needed. She needed to grow up essentially and get a bit of independence and stand up for herself and Joe needed someone to bring him back from where he was heading essentially.”
He is heading for self-destruction really isn’t he?
“Yes definitely and he says thank god you came back and found me, I sort of drag him from the depths of despair and he is controlling but he isn’t leaving the house so he is not dealing with it all. She makes him confront everything to do with it and it’s quite cathartic as in the end he needed it.”
What I was really taken with was the comfortable way in which you and Daniel played off each other. There were moments of genuine sadness where I saw what I thought were natural tears and you looked across at Daniel and then this wonderful smile beamed across the audience.
“Daniel has been absolutely brilliant to work with too be honest and we have worked together before. We were in Rita, Sue and Bob Too! at the St. Helens Theatre Royal and I was Sue and he was Bob. Joanne Sherryden and the Director Paul were finding it difficult to cast the role of Joe and were searching for quite some time and we got him along. I think it’s a comfortable piece and if you really go along with the characters you can’t be awkward with each other as you have to be completely open and I think that’s what it is with the characters that you lay it all on the line and that’s what keeps it interesting. It all set in one room so else it could become very boring, there is nowhere to hide essentially.
I was going to ask you about that, obviously it is all set in one room and the audience’s attention are completely focused on this one layered piece. Is that difficult for an actor to get across to the audience?
“Well Paul directed it and I think that the most important thing he kept saying to us was that it had to be a journey. Each scene has got to have its own arch and we followed that and that’s the situation in each scene or else you lose the audience. Something completely different happens and the characters develop, the quick wit of the script is there and hopefully it will hold the audience’s attention. We have worked really hard on it and it such a fantastic opportunity really as it’s a great character study and as I said there is nowhere to hide, it’s a perfect showcase for an actor and I have been so looking forward to doing it for such a long time because even just reading it at home it evokes such feelings and that is a sign of good writing. It came quite naturally to do it and there was a lot of laughter through tears and it is really interesting.”
I think it reaches out more to an audience if you can have those two differing emotions in a scene that quickly follow each other. There is a moment as I said where the tears were quite genuine and I won’t ask what you were thinking to get that emotion up but it was quite startling and then a smile passed between you and Daniel, it was really nice.
“The way I tend to act, the way I was trained is that if I don’t feel it then I won’t force it. There is nothing worse than crocodile tears on stage, I hate it, I can’t bear to watch it. It might be different every night but if something touches you as a character then you should feel it.
Thank you so much for your time Angela, I know you are so busy and you have to get ready for the show. All the best for tonight and I hope all goes well for the remaining two nights.
Ian D. Hall