Actress Aisling Loftus told David Hennessy about starring in the regional premiere of Dennis Kelly’s Girls & Boys in her hometown of Nottingham.
Nottingham- Irish actress Aisling Loftus has returned to her home town to star in the regional premiere of Dennis Kelly’s arresting monologue Girls and Boys at Nottingham Playhouse.
Aisling Loftus is recognisable from her screen roles that include playing Agnes Towler in ITV drama, Mr Selfridge and playing PC Dawn Morris in Jimmy McGovern drama, Broken.
Aisling’s other credits include Sherwood, War and Peace and A Discovery of Witches.
Aisling is now returning to the stage after some years away raising her children.
She takes the compelling lead role in BAFTA, Tony, Emmy and Olivier award-winning Dennis Kelly’s Girls & Boys.
Girls & Boys starts as a typical love story – boy meets girl and sparks fly. A relationship begins. In time they settle down, have children and live ordinary lives.
But beneath the veneer of normality, a disturbing undercurrent is growing.
Their seemingly perfect world unravels, revealing shocking truths about family, violence and what really goes on behind closed doors.
Aisling Loftus told the Irish World: “I just think it’s a gut punch of a play.
“It’s absolutely remarkable.
“I am feeling very, very, very lucky that I get to do it.”
The Irish World caught up with Aisling on the very day that she had run through the entire play for the first time..
“I felt like I’d done the hard yards by learning the lines.
“Little did I know…
“I was just running the lines constantly, but it’s been brilliant.
“I really love working with Anna (Ledwich, director) and Dennis Kelly’s writing.
“The more we’re rehearsing it, the more I’m in awe of him because he’s just like a bit of a magician.
“So long as you honour the punctuation and exactly what he’s written, he does all the work for you.
“He is just amazing.”
You talk about learning lines and there is no shortage of them as it is just you onstage.
Is it hard going, is it emotional even in preparations?
“Oh yeah, definitely because as much as it’s not real, it plays for real so you have to really engage with the facts of this woman’s life, of what happens in her life.
“It’s hard to talk about without kind of giving it away, but I’ve done a lot of kind of reading in and around the subject matter, and it’s devastating.”
How does it feel that it is just you onstage and you have no one for support or just to bounce off?
“I can’t lie: I’m really enjoying it.
“I’m sure I will definitely enjoy doing plays in the future with other people but right now, it doesn’t feel as scary as it did before we started.
“So long as I have a cup of tea before we get going and concentrate, I’ll be alright.”
Was that challenge one of the things that brought you to this role? Or what were the driving factors?
“It was quite a few things really.
“To be doing a play at the Nottingham Playhouse was a really special thing.
“And to be doing a one woman show, you have it almost in your bucket list of things that maybe would be incredible to do.
“And because I’d had a bit of time out, being pregnant and having a baby, it felt like the most ridiculous challenge to take on, but consequently, the best challenge to take on.
“I’m just over the moon.
“I’m so happy that they thought of me for this, and that they wanted me to do it.
“How could I not?”
Let’s talk a bit about the content of it.
It is just you on stage going through this story.
I know it starts off probably light hearted and very, very ordinary until it eventually takes a very, very dark turn, is that right?
“Yeah.
“This woman is stood in front of you and she’s telling you the story of her life and her love: Her kind of becoming herself and how did that happen?
“And ultimately, how did life go the way it did, how did this horrendous thing happen?
“A way of looking at the play is perhaps that it’s an interrogation, is her own interrogation of her own memories, and she’s having to grapple with her life.
“I think when something really awful happens, it can become the only thing that your life is about but she really fights against that and I think she fights against it because she’s got no other option, because otherwise she’d just crumble, she wouldn’t be able to keep going.
“It’s interesting.
“When I was practicing the lines with my husband- It’s funny, she’s great craic and stuff but he could feel that there was this undercurrent of something that was going through the whole thing, this discomfort and I think Dennis very cleverly lays the foundations for that.”
As a character, is she hard to connect with?
“No, she’s just a really great storyteller.
“She’s funny and she’s irreverent.
“She’s just unapologetic and unafraid of herself, really she’s just super honest and that’s so refreshing and fun to inhabit to be honest.”
Aisling returns to Nottingham Playhouse after appearing in Stephen Lowe’s play Touched there in 2018..
“It was brilliant to work there then.
“It felt very special.
“And it was a play with Vicky McClure, and I’m a massive fan of her.
“She’s so incredible, such an incredible actress.
“It’s just really great to be back.
“And hopefully if it goes well, they’ll have me back again because I love the idea of doing a play in my hometown.
“I think there’s something incredibly special about that.
“And also, I think it’s just a shame when it feels like theatre is London-centric and that it’s inaccessible for people unless they’ve got someone to stay with overnight or whatever.
“I think what Adam Penford (Artistic Director) is doing at the Playhouse is really brilliant.
“He’s really made it a very, very exciting venue.”
Have you seen a previous production of Girls and Boys, or been aware of one such as when Carey Mulligan did it in London?
“Yeah, I was aware of that happening and I really wanted to see it.
“When it was on, I really wanted to see it but I was doing something at the time.
“There’s some reason I couldn’t see it but this is the regional premiere.
“The premiere premiere was with Carey Mulligan, I think in 2018, and then they took it to New York and then they didn’t release it.
“Adam was saying that they couldn’t get the rights for it for ages, that every six months he’d kind of check in and say, ‘Have you released the rights so that it can be done regionally?’
“He kept on trying, kept on trying, kept on trying, and then finally got the rights.
“I’m just so glad that he did, it could have gone somewhere else.
“It could have gone up to the Liverpool Everyman or something, and had a fantastic Liverpudlian actress or something. But I’m just delighted.”
The play can evoke some strong reactions, I think even some walk outs..
“I guess I can understand why it would evoke strong reactions.
“I think that first preview, that first night, will be really interesting to see kind of how it goes down but I feel very good about what we’ve made anyway.”
Is it emotionally draining in rehearsals?
“No, I think if this character was in a kind of constant state of despair or distress, yes, I would find that very draining but she’s got this desire to really live and to be present and consequently, I’m not feeling like I’m dragging myself home each day after work.
“She’s buoyant in spite of the content, I guess.”
Does it say something about the society we’re in or gender roles?
“Yeah, the themes and the subjects that she rakes over the coals are the things that are always in the air, the things that swirl around and that sometimes there’s big public discussions on.
“I think the subjects of the play are being grappled with constantly, but just in different ways, with different voices.
“I think it will still be as poignant in 10 years’ time and 50 years’ time.
“I don’t think we’re about to uncover all the mysteries of what makes humans human, what makes men men and women women.”
Rather than trying to provide all the answers, does the play give the audience questions?
“Yeah, definitely.
“I think that this woman is trying to puzzle out something that is completely impossible to actually understand. Eternal questions, I guess.”
Obviously you’ve done a lot of screen work but do yo you enjoy stage work much more than the other media?
“Yeah, it’s so alive and, as much as I really love doing telly as well, there’s just so much possibility with a play.
“And you’ve also just got a lot of power, because you’re like the editor as well as the actor. You’re editing in real time as opposed to, when you’re filming something, you hope that they might go with this particular take.
“You hope that they’re gonna use what you felt was your best or whatever but you’ve got no power over it.
“You just have to kind of go, ‘Right, I did my best’ and let it go whereas with a play each night, you can kind of mine the gold a little bit more and just work the material in a way that you can’t with telly.”
Acting since the age of nine, Aisling emerged from the Television Workshop which has also produced stars like Jack O’Connell, Vicky McClure and Samantha Morton. Named as a Star of Tomorrow by Screen International in 2008, Aisling came to prominence with roles in The Borrowers, Public Enemies and Good Cop.
I know you started acting very young but do you remember when you knew you wanted to be an actress? Or was it something you always knew?
“I knew I really enjoyed it.
“I think I was about seven and I did a school play of the Wizard of Oz.
“I played the Wicked Witch of the West and I just absolutely loved it.
“I kind of knew I loved doing it when I did that, and then I got into the Junior Television Workshop when I was about 9, 10 and I just always really loved it.
“I guess it wasn’t like, ‘Oh, this is what I’m going to do for my job’.
“But then when those kind of conversations come into the air when you’re around 15 or whatever, of course that’s what I wanted to keep doing.
“But it feels like a bit of a dare, doesn’t it? ‘Do I dare to try?’
“And actually I did dare to try and it all worked out, but I don’t know what I would have done if I got significant knockbacks early on, maybe it would have changed my course completely but I was just very lucky, and kept on getting lucky basically.
“I’m just really happy that I’m still doing it.
“I started doing it as a job job when I was, I think about 18, and I’m 34 now, so once I get to 38 I’m going to feel like a proper professional actor when I feel like I’ve had a 20 year career, you know?
“But I just love doing it.
“I want to keep doing it.
“As long as people want to hire me, I want to keep doing it.
“That’s how I feel.”
Aisling has acted in Irish films such as Death of a Superhero and Property of the State, the film that told the story of the 1994 murders of Imelda Riney, her three-year-old son Liam and Fr Joseph Walsh in Clare. Aisling played the sister of disturbed killer Brendan O’Donnell and was IFTA- nominated for her work in the film.
Your work has taken you to Ireland a couple of times, how have you enjoyed those experiences?
“Yeah, it was absolutely brilliant.
“I loved when we were doing Property of the State.
“We were filming in a tiny little place called Limavady and when we were filming there, I had a whole life set up.
“I bought a bike and I used to hang my groceries out of the hotel windows to keep them cold.
“I just really loved the life that I kind of set up for myself in Limavady.
“And obviously filming in Dublin was incredible for Death of a Superhero.
“I’d love to film there again, absolutely love to.”
Aisling’s parents are from Drumcondra, Dublin and Roscrea, Tipperary.
Family holidays as a child invariably included travelling to Ireland to see family there..
“We took my two little girls and we went over October, half term.
“It was the first time that I’d taken my elder little girl there and my god, she probably met about 20 family members.
“It was just so special and to be part of a big family is just a really beautiful thing, isn’t it?
“I was really happy with my little girls, particularly my elder, got to experience that.
“We went to Dublin Zoo in our Halloween costumes with their little cousins.
“It was brilliant.”
Aisling was also part of the cast for Brian Friel’s Aristocrats at the Donmar Warehouse in 2018, a cast that also included Elaine Cassidy, Eileen Walsh and Emmett Kirwan.
How did you enjoy that?
“It was brilliant.
“I loved that play. Loved it.
“And I would do any Brian Friel in a heartbeat.
“I’d love to do The Freedom of the City, I’d love to do that.
“I’d love to do Faith Healer.
“I’d love to do Dancing at Lughnasa.
“I would do any Brian Friel.
“I’m sure it’s been said a million times: He’s just one of the best, isn’t he?
“He’s absolutely incredible.
“It was brilliant.
“Me and Eileen (Walsh) are good pals.
“I just think she’s beautiful person, incredible actress so I’m very lucky that I have her out of that.”
I asked you if you found your character in Girls and Boys difficult to connect with, have you ever taken on a role that you found hard to connect with?
“I guess ultimately you get cast in things because there is something of you that you’re bringing to it.
“I think it’s only those big, big name people where there’s a real shape shift that happens.
“There’s only a certain number of Daniel Day Lewis’s, a lot of time people like myself, the reason that you get cast for that thing is there is an element of that character that exists in you, I think.
“I guess the easy thing to say would be where the character has been a kind of distasteful person. You want to say about those people, ‘Oh yeah, that was hard because I’m nice, they’re not’, do you know what I mean?
“The person I’m thinking of was a police officer in Broken.
“Jimmy McGovern wrote this series that was about corruption really and my character uses a stun gun on this young lad and then this lad stumbles into the street and is shot dead by a police officer.
“And my character, basically, has made the biggest mistake possible that’s resulted in the death of this young lad but she goes into self-protection mode.
“She doesn’t want to take accountability.
“She wants to keep her job so she tries to lean on the other police officer to get their stories straight.
“Now, I would hope that I would never be that kind of person in that situation but with that character I was able to go, ‘She’s panicked. She’s in a state of panic. She doesn’t want what she did to be true. She doesn’t want it to be her fault that this young lad has been killed’.
“There’s a way that you can figure people out.
“Even if you wouldn’t do what they do, you can go, ‘Okay, I see how you got from A to B’, and then you just have to do it.
“That’s the only example I can think of, really.”
Is it a little bit similar with your character in Girls and Boys?
“It’s really hard to talk about without spoiling the plot but I really admire the woman in Girls and Boys.
“I think that she’s just a pretty remarkable human being and I feel very happy to be her for two hours a night.”
Girls & Boys is at Nottingham Playhouse 8 February- 1 March.
For more information and to book tickets, click here.
