Ben Caplan is currently starring in the world premiere of Daniel Kanaber’s play Shiver at the Watford Palace Theatre.
Described as a “haunting, warm and funny play”, Shiver is about family, identity, and love. When Sadie dies, her husband (a lapsed Jew), their son (an atheist), and a trainee Rabbi, gather together to remember her in the tradition of sitting Shivah... what could possibly go wrong?
Ben is a familiar face on British TV best known for playing PC Peter Noakes in BBC period drama Call the Midwife. Just a few of his theatre credits include: Seven Jewish Children at the Royal Court, Two Thousand Years at the National Theatre, The Common Pursuit at the Menier Chocolate Factory and The Dwarfs at the Tricycle Theatre.
Recently I spoke to Ben about the joys of starring in a brand new play, why Call the Midwife is a dream job and why he thinks the series is going from strength to strength…
How is the run of Shiver going so far?
I think it’s going really well; it’s always interesting with a new play to see how it is received in front of an audience. For three weeks we had been in a rehearsal room with the writer, the director and the three actors. The response so far has been very positive and I think it is selling well which is always good, so fingers crossed it is going to be a good run.
How do you find doing a new play and creating a new role compared to doing something like a Shakespeare play which has been performed countless times?
Creating a role is definitely a draw. Doing a new play is always exciting because you are creating it for the very first time. The writer, Danny Kanaber, was with us for most of the rehearsal period and we spent quite a lot of time talking and dissecting the play before we got up on our feet. I felt like we were able to input our thoughts and feelings about the characters, some of which did impact on the final draft of the script. It’s really just a fantastic opportunity to be able to come to something completely fresh and be able to create something from scratch and certainly something I was interested in doing. I’ve done quite a few new plays before and it’s always very exciting to be the first person to tread that path.
How have audiences responded to Shiver so far and what do you think people can expect?
Audiences have responded very favourably. It is amusing and there is some warmth in the play. I think we were surprised that there weren’t as many laughs as we were expecting, but that’s because it is difficult subject matter to tackle. It’s basically about grief and how different people deal with grief, and about identity and about family, and I think there are certain things people will identify with to do with the relationships between fathers and sons, and how people deal with death. On paper it might not look like there are amusing moments in it but it does have heart and humour. I think there is something for everyone in the play and it’s certainly not just for Jewish audiences even though the subject matter is dealing with a Jewish family grieving and how Jewish families tend to overcome grief but, as I say, I think there is lots there for a universal audience and hopefully people will get something out of it.
David Horovitch & Ben Caplan in Shiver. Photo Credit: Manuel Harlan.
What are the cast like to work with?
They are great. I was lucky, I’ve actually worked with both David Horovitch and Ilan Goodman before. I’ve met Ilan briefly, he was in a play with a friend of mine a couple of years ago and then we did a short film together a couple of years ago. Also, he did an episode of Call the Midwife so I met him at the wrap party even though we didn’t have any scenes together. We talked about the fact we were about to work together in this play. David and I did a new Caryl Churchill piece at the Royal Court together a few years ago and we’ve also done a reading together at the Hampstead Theatre. So it wasn’t like we were coming together completely afresh without having had anything to do with each other before and we felt we were picking up from where we had left off which was lovely and they are fabulous. Both David and Ilan are wonderful in the show so it was a joy to be able to work with two fantastic actors.
Is it nice to be back on the stage after doing so much television recently?
It’s always nice to return to the stage. I’ve been doing a filming job for a few months and when I finished I wanted to get back on stage as quickly as possible. I did a play before starting the last series of Call the Midwife, and then went into six months of filming, and then this opportunity came up and I jumped at the chance to do the play. It’s fabulous. I think it’s really important for me because I started off doing mainly theatre and then moved into TV and film and if I’m lucky enough to be able to go from one to the other then that’s an ideal situation because they both offer different challenges. It’s been a real joy.
It seems everybody loves Call the Midwife, you must be so pleased with the response!
Yes, I am really pleased! The question people often ask is if I had any idea it would be such a massive success and the answer is “no”. You do things in your career you hope are going to be massively successful but you never know what the public are going to invest their time into. Things I have thought were wonderful before have, for whatever reason, not been as popular. I think that Call the Midwife has something for everybody. It’s one of those shows where the entire family can sit together and watch an episode. Actually I watched last week’s episode with some friends and we were talking about it afterwards, if you haven’t watched all of the series it doesn’t matter because you can watch just an occasional episode and enjoy the story in its own right rather than feeling like “if I haven’t seen the whole series then I won’t be able to join it.” Each episode is quite self-contained and I think it has all the ingredients – it’s about love and birth and life and death and family and marriage and love. I’m really thrilled to be part of it. I think it’s wonderfully written, we have a wonderful, wonderful cast and it genuinely moves me. It brings a tear to my eye even though I’m in it [laughs] and know what is going to happen! It’s a real honour to be part of it.
Miranda Hart & Ben Caplan in Call The Midwife. Credit: Laurence Cendrowicz/Neal Street Productions.
What’s it like working on the Call the Midwife? Is there any pressure now that it is so successful to keep it at the same level?
Yes, I think there is, certainly from the writers’ point of view there’s definitely pressure because it was successful as a series of books before we started filming, so there was pressure before we even started to do the books justice. But now that we have moved away from the original source material there’s even more pressure to continue in the same vein and keep the tone right. I think it’s gone from strength to strength, this series is now as good if not better than the last and that’s a credit to the wonderful writers we have working on the show. And we care about it so much, we care about the characters and are interested to know what is going to happen to them all, and that creates a very warm and collaborative feeling on set. There are no real egos, we get on really well. I love playing the character I play and I love working with the people I work with. It’s one of those dream jobs.
Going back your theatre work, you said you love doing new work but are there any existing roles you would like to play?
I like working on new plays but I trained as an actor at drama school doing lots of classical work so I would be equally excited to have a go at tackling one of the big classical roles. I’m a massive Chekov fan so every time there is a Chekov happening, if I’m around and available I’ll always see if there’s anything for me and go and meet the director. I love Shakespeare, obviously, and I think I’m always up for the challenge. If I’ve just done a new play I then go on to see if I can do something classical. I mix it up to make sure I’m challenging myself all the time because I think that’s important rather than getting comfortable in one particular area. I’d love to do some Shakespeare as I haven’t done any for a while and I’ve been talking to a couple of directors…
Finally, it must be amazing having so much support behind you?
It’s fabulous and really nice to be able to meet the people who have sat and watched the show. It’s wonderful to have that live response when you are on stage. You never know what is going to happen; every audience is different which is one of the draws of live performance. But also being able to talk to the audience afterwards is great. When filming we can spend a long time on something which will only turn out to be a few minutes of film and a lot of the time you don’t get to meet the people who have watched the show and hear their responses. I really do appreciate that live response, long may it continue!
Interviewed by Andrew Tomlins (Editor)
Shiver runs at the Watford Palace Theatre until Saturday 22nd February 2014.
Please visit www.watfordpalacetheatre.co.uk for further information and tickets.
Call The Midwife continues this Sunday on BBC1 at 8pm.
Photo Credit 1: Joseph Sinclair
No comments:
Post a Comment