Family Business

TIMOTHY West grew up in the wings of various theatres while his parents performed in rep. So being on stage is second nature to him. Having said that, only the greatest of actors can tread the boards so prominently for nigh on half a century and show no sign of slowing down.

Take the next few months for example.

He opens in The Winslow Boy at the Oxford Playhouse Monday week and is then back next month ‘en famille’ with wife Prunella Scales and their son Sam for A Family Affair, as part of The Playhouse’s 70th anniversary celebrations.

And Timothy West is as charming and as much of a gentleman as you would imagine, choosing his words carefully even though he’s been interviewed countless times over the years.

“Yes, the play’s going very well. We’re really enjoying it. It’s a great production, a marvellous play and everyone’s loving it.”

So is it hard playing the classics?

“I just do it. You can’t try to be different to someone else because you’re you and they’re them.

“But learning the lines takes a little longer these days,” he chuckles.

So what about when both he and Prunella are both learning their lines. Do they help each other out?

“Prunella likes to be heard,” he says, without a hint of irony, “and I don’t, which is fine.”

But the West/Scales household never let their acting get in the way of their family. So when the children were little, wherever the parents were in the world, the kids came too.

“Either we took them with us and brought an au pair or a nanny, or we left them behind, which was unthinkable,” Timothy says.

“So we had great holidays and great times.”

And when you consider his credentials include major parts in films such as The Thirty-Nine Steps, The Day of the Jackal, Cry Freedom, Iris and Endgame, as well as numerous TV parts and a constant stage presence, you get an idea of how busy they were.

“I doubt we came out of it in profit, but we managed. These days, child care costs have rocketed and I don’t know how young couples manage to work at all,” he says.

But nowadays, with his three children grown-up, Timothy has more time to spend with Prunella and they travel widely and enjoy weekends on their houseboat in Newbury.

So who opens the locks?

“Pru’s not very good at steering, so she tends to open them, but some are a bit stiff and I have to give her a hand.

“But sadly we don’t get much time to go narrow-boating because we are both always working,” he says.

Couldn’t they tour via narrowboat then?

“Well it would have to be a slow tour because it only goes 4mph,” he laughs.

For Timothy, touring is as natural as breathing, because not only has he lost count of the number of plays he’s appeared in, but having grown up travelling around provincial theatres it was almost inevitable that he became an actor too.

“Yes, inevitable is the right word, but it wasn’t what I thought I should be doing or what my father thought I should be doing,” he says.

“So I went and got a proper job for a while, but I was in so many amateur dramatic companies, I kept falling asleep.”

More chuckling.

“In those days, parents said ‘I don’t think you should go into acting – you should have a profession’, but now they probably say that about business.”

So, he didn’t try to deter his son Sam from acting, then?

“No, we neither encouraged nor discouraged him until we were certain he was talented and nice to work with.”

And so the acting dynasty was born.

“I hate the word ‘dynasty’. I see it more as a family business,” Timothy says gently.

“And my other son is a translator in France and my daughter’s a hairdresser, so two have escaped.”

So do actors ever retire then?

“Well, we don’t,” he insists, referring to him and Prunella. “I’ll still be on stage until I start bumping into things or knocking over furniture,” the 74 year-old chuckles.

The Winslow Boy opens Monday week at the Oxford Playhouse. Box office on 01865 305305.