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drinks Monday 4 August 08
FRINGE REPORT INTERVIEW: LIZZIE ROPER
Lizzie Roper has gorgeous blue-gray eyes, bright as lamps, 'two pussies (one's a cat called Fanny)'. Cody Burridge photographed her with a lavatory plunger covering one naked breast, a rubber duck over the other. She calls herself a foul-mouthed freak. Don't believe it, says John Park - she's adorable
Lizzie Roper is an actor. She does character comedy. She does stand-up. She's the voice we've heard for Golden Wonder, McVities, British Airways, Audi, Waitrose, British Gas, The Independent. She's an Aberystwyth drama graduate, and Guildford acting postgraduate in 'Mime, Wank, and Toss'.
She performs (Through My Keyhole Ed 03), produces and directs in Edinburgh (4 shows Ed 03) and London (Loonatics At The Asylum). She has very little spare time. But she has clean clothes. Mike Simonson who produced Lizzie Roper in the West End: 'Sharing a flat is impossible with someone who does her laundry at 3 am'.
Lizzie Roper's petite and quite bouncy. She's classically beautiful, with a dash of imp, Restoration (Nell Gwyn), and Regency (Moll Flanders, Becky Sharpe). She has lots of blonde/brown hair. Her mouth is wide, sexy, and usually open.
TV and radio presenter Wendy Lloyd co-wrote and co-performed Asteroid Haemorroid with her at Ed 99. 'Lizzie tried to get me to put my naked bottom in the remains of my birthday cake'.
Five years into the future? Lizzie maps out a couple of scenarios: 'A much bigger profile on tv. Or an alcoholic, living in Somerset, singing in a jazz band.' She loves Cole Porter, George Gerswin - and Shirley Bassey. Wendy Lloyd: 'Lizzie has the finest collection of wigs in West London'.
Lizzie Roper was born in Highgate and started school with 4 years at St Martha's Convent - yes, you'd guessed she was a convent girl. Her world was about to collide with that of stern Victorian feminist Frances Mary Buss. Buss wanted to educate girls and started North London Collegiate in Edgware. In Lizzie's time, a lot of the girls were Jewish. 'I spent my childhood wanting to be Jewish' - a dream that reached practicality with Lenny Beige.
Steve Furst's Lenny Beige featured in a set of cabaret nights called The Regency Rooms at The New London Theatre cabaret space Talk Of London around 1995-7. Lizzie played Lennie's mother Sadie Beige - The Kosher Chicken Giblet Queen Of Whitechapel. She also played daughter Naomi Beige With The Lazy Eye. Another of her characters was Rita Poonarni, who told filthy stories - and sang Shirley Bassey. Guy Chambers and NewsRevue's Chad Lelong were the pianists.
The Regency Room's two and a half year run saw an odd roll-call: Robbie Williams, Sasha Baron Cohen, Barbara Windsor, Leo Sayer, Lionel Blair, The Wombles - 'The B List from my 70s childhood' - and Lizzie herself - performing to a packed house of '400 people in cocktail dresses, hating you for being female and middle-class'.
It was the making of her. 'A 5-minute monologue. Just me and a microphone. I didn't know if I'd dry or they'd laugh. I thought "I'm doing stand-up". Then I thought "I can go with that". It was liberating. It was wonderful.'
Loonatics At The Asylum was the next step. Lizzie Roper got together with Amanda Baker and set up the gig weekly in Tottenham Court Road - hosting it with Stan Stanley and Tom Price. She booked good music and quality acts, like Ross Noble and Al Murray
'Comedy's about nurturing talk above heckling. People think it's a combat sport. No. Just shut up and listen.'
The 'You're shit, tell us a joke, 10 mates in tow, chicken-in-a-basket' comedy club is her personal anathema. 'People 17-20 are such a tv generation. They think there's a volume control to life.' Lizzie's taking on their education. 'They have to be controlled to shut up when an act's on stage.' She's up for 'kicking out anyone who's pissed up.' The result? Audiences 'have a great time. And comics like doing my club.'
Asteroid Haemorroid with Wendy Lloyd was her first full-on show in Edinburgh. 'It was incredibly scary.' Wendy Lloyd: 'Lizzie knows her way around false eyelashes and sex aids with equal expertise. She bought me a colonic irrigation for my birthday.'
Edinburgh? 'A fantastic summer school. A trade fair. It's the best learning you can have as a performer. You're pissed off at the end of drama school, and you can make your own work.' It's a topic she has views on (and Lizzie, it transpires, has views on most things): 'You have to make your own work.'
It's advice Lizzie applies relentlessly to her driving of herself. With acclaim. Iestyn Edwards, her former singing coach (aka Madame Galina Korsakova, 15-stone Russian ballerina): 'Brilliant eye, brilliant ear.' Is that all? 'Very, very naughty.'
Wendy Lloyd: 'She's one of the most giving, supportive people you could hope to have in your life - on or off the stage.' They've travelled the world together, 'frolicking in the jungles of Belize and - I can't remember what we did in Amsterdam but apparently it was fun'. Oo-er, Matron - so that's what the plunger's for.
Mike Simonson: 'A damn fine actress. She has not even begun to extend her range yet.' And it's personal: 'The first woman to make me seriously consider heterosexuality as an option.' Phew, the girl must be dynamite. 'Sexy, bolshy, and smart. A beautiful person. Keeps ridiculous hours'. It's that laundry again.
That's Lizzie - kind-natured, one in a million, and lots of fun. Last word from Wendy Lloyd: 'Her vulgarity knows no bounds.'
END
Interview with Lizzie Roper by John Park
(c) Fringe Report 2003
Fringe Report (c) Fringe Report 2002-2008
