Timothy West talks about The Handyman

Timothy West is back in controversial play The Handyman and loving every moment, totally undeterred by the subject matter. He does, however, find the part more than usually tiring, something he blames more on the content than his age. “It’s funny, but when a character in a play has closure or a natural end, (and the best is to die of course)”, he chuckles, “that’s when you go off afterwards and have a Chinese takeaway. But when you’re not sure of the ending, I’m less inclined to go and talk to punters in the bar about what a wonderful evening it’s been, because I am that much more tired. Perhaps I’m getting on a bit... Well, I am getting on a bit.” So is it the storyline that drains him? “Well The Handyman is about what happens when a nice ordinary, comfortable couple for whom nothing has gone dramatically wrong are exposed by an explosion in their lives, which brings forgiveness, fidelity and prejudice to the fore.” As Timothy West is playing ‘the explosion’, a Ukrainian odd-jobber with a shady past, perhaps playing the baddie has got to him? The 77-year-old almost splutters in indignation but is too well-mannered to let it show: “You don’t feel that when you play Macbeth!” he says before taking a breath, “so you have to look at it from their point of view and go through their traumas. You can’t make judgements. “We all have inner souls, so Romka’s own dilemma is something he has to work through.” So is it hard to be so enigmatic? “All people are enigmatic up to a point otherwise it would be rather dull. But this play is saying something worthwhile and should at least get people thinking anyway,” he smiles encouragingly. Immensely likeable and fervently respected, Timothy West has led the way in British theatre for decades. His wife Prunella Scales is equally revered, and their son Sam West is becoming as famous as his parents. They are a clan, a firm, and Timothy West talks of the Wests’ mutual profession as “a family business and a pool of encouragement, advice and cash.” There are two other children — a hairdresser and a translator — to whom they are equally as devoted, which is why when son Sam decided he wanted in, Timothy says they were as “cautious and encouraging as possible in equal measures”. “I suppose Sam secretly hoped he’d be an actor and we were not as discouraging as my father was, but we wanted to see if he was any good and if people liked working with him. He discovered that at Oxford, so we said ‘go ahead.’ Not that you need your parents’ blessing by that age.” The “family business” is also viewed as a well of advice, and the Wests always confer on work. “Sam is terribly busy now,” his father says, “but we call each other and say ‘what do you think’ when we are offered something. Pru reads scripts and tells me what she thinks and I do the same for her. We usually come to the same conclusion, but sometimes we want to do things that the other person doesn’t.” They understand each other, because for all of them acting is not only a way of life, but a vocation. And Timothy is the perfect example, having to prove to parents and employers that acting really was his calling. “I sold office furniture and then worked as a junior recording engineer at EMI,” he remembers, “because you were expected to have a proper job in those days and stability. But I was in about eight amateur dramatic societies and eventually my boss asked whether I shouldn’t be pursuing the thing I devoted my time to,” he laughs. “But I had no idea how you go about becoming an actor. So I joined a rep as student assistant to the stage manager and worked my way up. I was basically a general dogsbody and had to collect the wigs and arrange to borrow the grandfather clock off the vicar. But by the time we got to Salisbury three years later I was playing respectable parts and was now viewed as an actor, which meant I got an extra pound a week,” he grins. “Then I had a couple of years pootling around in various reps and then got parts in London and elsewhere.” Elsewhere is hardly the way to sum up such an enormously successful and varied career, with parts in major films The Thirty-Nine Steps, The Day Of The Jackal, Cry Freedom, Iris and Endgame.