Cosy is
not an adjective that readily springs to mind to describe
Stephanie Beacham. But it is is the word that Beacham, back in
Britain to play opposite Jeremy Irons in the RSC production of
The Rover (which opens at the Mermaid Theatre today)
repeatedly uses in connection with herself.
The star of The
Colbys, Connie and Tenko insists that
beneath the glossy exterior lurks "a cosy convent girl,
destined by her upbringing to be a cosy wife and mother",
had not fate (in the shape of separation from her husband, the
actor John McEnery) given her an uncosy shove.
"Somebody
has to grow up when you have children, and I knew it had to be
me," she says meaningfully. "It's funny: children ruin
your life, and then become the most important thing to live for
- they put it all into perspective."
Being left on her
own with two toddlers (Phoebe, now 12, and Chloe, 10) and
suddenly having to be a breadwinner, forced her into stardom,
she believes. She has worked hard, triumphing over the
challenges of single-parenthood and the spectre of deafness -
she has been deaf in one ear since infancy. She lipreads
skilfully to supplement her partial hearing, but recalls with
regret that she was the cause of the sacking of three sound
engineers in California before it was discovered that her
deafness, not their daftness, was the root of a seemingly
inexplicable problem with the synchronization of the sound.
The role of Sable
Colby brought her money (a reported $20,000 an episode),
security and international fame. Now Aphra Behn's feminist
Restoration romp, in which she takes the part of the courtesan
of Angelica Bianca, is bringing her a little anxiety. "The
rest of the cast is rather relaxed and jolly because they've
done it before at Stratford," Beacham explains. She tends
to be a worrier, she says, and there is so much to learn.
"If my
marriage hadn't been so frightful, I wouldn't be doing this,"
she says. "We bought a seven-bcdroomed house and I thought
I was going to have seven children to fill the house and that
his work was going to be the most important thing and mine would
fit in around it."
She remembers her
eager reaction to Irons's telephone call. suggesting that she
join the cast of The Rover at extremely short notice: "The
whole idea of doing a stage play with the RSC was so cosy, so of
course I said yes at once."
Beacham's
daughters are at boarding school in England, "The
Triumvirate," as she refers to herself, Phoebe and Chloe, "decided
no more nannies - since we had a horrid one who frightened all
of us to death."
Her daughters
already share her attraction to the theatre; they spent Easter
in Paris with her. where she was filming Napoleon and
Josephine for Warner Brothers. "No, I don't play
Josephine," she says - stalling the inevitable question. "I
play her friend, Thérèse Tallien, the woman who
was responsible for keeping that wretched empire-line going
because she was constantly pregnant. She had 10 children and was
never certain who the father was."
She took some
time to get used to the life of an American soap star. and the
make-up artists who fingered imaginary pads of fat above her
eyes and recommended plastic surgery she says, squinting
nevertheless to make sure the light is "Dynasty Light"
- sun not visible on her nose - for her photograph. But the
money was heavenly, she agrees.
Despite eight
years' separation she has never bothered to get divorced. "Partly
because John and I both loathed lawyers more than we loathed
each other, and partly because I didn't want anyone to feel I
was 'on the market'," she says. "But I really must get
around to doing it. It's on my list: must get the shoes cleaned,
must get a divorce..."
