Katherine Parkinson – ‘I’m Still Learning How to Be Me’

0:00Do you know, my mum has always said to me, you're not afraid to fail, which is kind of, I was like, what do you mean? I don't know if I like that. I was literally walking around with my shoulders like, come on, tap me, tap me. I remember being in the hospital that night and hearing the, I think what I find upsetting. This episode of How to Fail is supported by Dove Whole Body Deodorant because feeling fresh all over gives me the confidence I need. Hello and welcome to How to Fail with me, Elizabeth Day. This is the podcast that believes that all failure can end up teaching us something meaningful in the fullness of time.

0:40Before we get cracking on this episode, please do remember to like, subscribe and follow so that you never miss a single conversation.

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1:32Everything you need to study and play with select Windows 11 PCs. Eligible students get a year of Microsoft 365 Premium and a year of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate with a custom color Xbox wireless controller. Learn more at windows.com slash student offer. While supplies last, ends June 30th. Terms at aka.ms slash college PC. Katherine Parkinson used to want to be an astronaut. But when she was cast as Puck in her grammar school production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, age 13, her life took a different turn. After studying classics at Oxford University, Parkinson attended the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art before being cast as Jen Barber in the Channel 4 comedy The IT Crowd, for which she won her first BAFTA.

2:16She went on to star in the TV series Doc Martin and Humans, as well as appearing in movies such as The Boat That Rocked and the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. On stage, she was nominated for an Olivier for Home, I'm Darling, and wrote a critically acclaimed play called Sitting in 2018, based on her own experiences of sitting for a portrait painted by an ageing artist. And as of last night, mere hours ago, I can officially say that Parkinson is a two-time BAFTA winner after scooping the Best Comedy Actress award for her turn as the neurotic Rachel in the BBC comedy Here We Go. But the role for which she has most recently become especially beloved is that of Lizzie Verica, the romantic novelist married to bullying TV presenter James in Rivals on Disney +, the hit series adapted from the novels of Dame Ginny Cooper.

3:11The first season won an international Emmy and is a highly entertaining 80s romp through the fictional county of Brochshire. The show is notable for its emphasis on the female gaze, especially when it comes to the sex scenes. I'm just a normal 47-year-old woman who's breastfed two girls and that doesn't mean I'm not able to represent a sexual being, Parkinson said last year. For me, doing this job has been a glorious, fairly belated celebration. Catherine Parkinson welcome to How to Fail oh thank you for having me I'm so delighted you're here and we're going to get on to Rivals the second season in a minute but I just want to say first of all congratulations this is literally hours after you've won your BAFTA you are here and a surprising win I think fair to say I think everybody was surprised most of all me I am still a bit drunk and I realised the last time I saw you I was also drunk because it was at Jilly's Memorial I saw you across the church.

4:14Oh my gosh, Jilly's Memorial. Wasn't that the most beautiful day? It really was stunning. In Southwark Cathedral, the sun coming through those windows, the Queen in attendance. Yeah. And then everyone stayed and champagne was served endlessly. I don't think I've ever been stocious. Is that a word? I don't know, I made it up. Oh my gosh, I think it means drunk. I think I've heard my dad use that word for drunk. Your dad's Northern Irish, isn't he? Yes. We've gone totally off on a tangent already. I grew up in Northern Ireland. I remember reading that. Yes. I was in Belfast every single school holiday.

4:55I used to love the Ice Lollies, Hot Shots and Mr. Frosties. Do you remember those? I remember them very, very well. Gosh. Okay, let me get this back on track, but not before I've asked you all about Rivals, because I've been lucky enough to see the first three episodes of the new season. And of course, like everyone else in the world, loved the first season. This one's even better. It's so, so fantastic and so smart. And that's the thing that I often think people downplay because it's vastly entertaining and it's funny and it's sexy, but it's actually very, very smart what it does as well. And I think your character really epitomises that.

5:34What drew you to Lizzie Verica in the first place? Well, I completely agree that I think it's such a smart, craftily written show. So just when you think people can kind of not dismiss it, but put it in the category of a lightweight sort of entertaining romp, you know, bonk buster, rather like Jilly, the writing is actually far cleverer than them. you just can't sort of dismiss it. They're sort of really funny jokes. It's quite gently political, I think. And I think Laura Wade and Dominic Treadwell-Collins, you know, if you know them, are just about the cleverest people in any room you're in. So I never had any doubt it was going to be a show with depth.

6:16And Laura and Dominic, as you say, but Laura particularly is so adept at writing about class, as Dane Jolie was. And there's something in the second season as well where it really sort of unwraps all of that. And I wondered how much that appealed to you as someone who grew up Surbiton, Northern Irish dad, and then ended up at Oxford. Do you think you've got a particular interest in class and observing it? How interesting you ask me that. I've never been asked that before. and sometimes I sort of feel like I have to be careful because it's such a sort of hot potato, isn't it? Because, of course, I don't want to ever suggest that I'm from a lower class background than I am because I'm absolutely middle class.

7:06But the jump to sort of have never met anybody from even private school to suddenly living with three wonderful, hilarious boys that all have been to Eton and that is quite a big difference. grammar school and public school, so boarding school and grammar school. I mean, I hadn't even been away from home, really. So when I got to Oxford, I met these wonderful bohemian public school-educated girls who were very open about their sexuality, had, you know, explored all sorts of different avenues and it hadn't compromised their essential classiness, whereas I felt that there was, my classiness was absolutely dependent on me being quite chaste.

7:49Yes. I felt like I couldn't get away with being, not get away with, but I couldn't be sexually active, particularly even, because I felt that I would quickly be seen as cheap. And I look back and I think that's quite, that's a shame. And clearly, it's something that I think has changed. I think that women are, girls are, there was a lot of shame for me. I don't know if that's the Northern Irish thing, but it's certainly not something I felt was anything to do with my parents. It was something to do with how essentially different I felt in the company I was in at university and how I had kind of earned my place at the table by being quite, I was like a mascot sort of thing.

8:42But God forbid I sleep with anyone. That makes complete sense. I feel awful saying it because I don't want to say it with any judgment about the company I was in because they were some of the best people and the best times I had. I don't think you're judging them. I think you're analyzing yourself. Yeah. This is how you perceived you might be judged rather than anyone making you feel like that. Yes. Yeah. And just to bring it back to Rivals again, you know, I love the character of Lizzie and I love her affair with Fred Fred. and Fred Fred is there played by Danny Dyer previously of this parish it stands in there he his character and his wife are the kind of nouveau riche and sort of looked down upon in so many ways and yet here is this soul in Fred Fred that we gradually see unfurling and we see this intimacy blooming between the two of you and I just think it's played so beautifully and I'm not sure I have a question I just love watching it I love watching the two of you Yeah well I was speaking to the magnificent Felicity Blunt who was saying, you know, that it's clever because in this series I think the audience is almost invited to slightly judge Valerie ourselves and then shame on us at the end.

10:01And Valerie is Fred Fred's wife. Yeah. And Felicity, I should say, is exec producer on Rivals and on Mutual Friend. Yes. And I think it's, you know, in Jilly's books, those characters are sort of written with that sibilance, which I definitely had when I was growing up. So I did well to shake that. But I feel like there's a lot of compassion in the TV show for, you know, we're not, it's telling a truth of snobbery in this country. I wonder what the Americans make of it. I wonder what the equivalent is in America. but there is an awful lot of snobbery in this country and I suppose what I'm saying is I did feel it at university.

10:48Final question on Rivals for now. Is it as fun as it looks? Yes. Okay. Yeah. I mean, because everyone I've met who is an actor on Rivals seems utterly delightful. I don't think I've ever been in a company where everybody makes me laugh so much. And that is literally all I care about. That's all I've ever cared about. So Danny Dyer, as you know, is hilarious. Then we've got Claire Rushbrook, David Tennant, all these people, Lisa McGrillis, Emily Atec. there isn't actually a person in that cast, Gary Lamont, Hubert, that doesn't make me Alex Hassel. Bella, they're all funny. So I feel like it's, I think, you know, that basically is why it's so fun.

11:45Okay. I said it was my final question on Rivals, I did lie, because we started off talking about seeing each other at Dame Jilly's memorial. and of course there's a tremendous sadness that must have come with filming this series because she died so unexpectedly and suddenly. How did you as a cast and a crew handle that? It was such a shock and I think, yeah, I know that's, I know obviously she was, the age she was, but she was in such fine fettle so it was very upsetting and oddly it sort of chimed slightly as you'll see with things we were filming so that sort of made it weirder as well. And yeah, she just wasn't the sort of person you expected to die.

12:44So I think it's still people like Dominic Treadwell Collins and Felicity Blunt were extremely close to her. So you want to sort of respect that because their grief is sort of more personal. But she was very present, Jilly, and she had that writerly ability to make you feel very regarded when you're in her presence. So, yeah, she's very missed and I think we're all still a bit shocked. Yeah, I'm so sorry. This season is such a beautiful tribute to her, her spirit and her work. Yeah. Let's get on to your failures. Yes.

13:37This podcast is all about speaking the truth, honest, transparent storytelling, and embracing our perceived failures to discover what we've learned from them. Every week, I'm lucky enough to speak with some of the most impressive and inspiring people from around the world. But while those conversations are always a joy, they do sometimes take me out of my comfort zone. And when I'm feeling the pressure, there's always the risk of getting a bit hot and bothered before my esteemed guest arrives, which is why I'm so pleased to have Dove Whole Body helping me feel calm and confident. Dove Whole Body Deodorant delivers all day odour protection and is designed to be used beyond underarms on areas such as the chest, back, thighs and feet, helping you feel fresh from head to toe.

14:27It even comes with added skincare, so it's suitable for my sensitive skin. To help reach those trickier spots, Dove Whole Body Deodorant comes in a spray, in a stick and in a cream format with three fragrances to choose from, including raspberry and rose, lavender and chamomile and sea mist and peony, my personal favourite. Go about your day with confidence with Dove Whole Body Deodorant, available at major retailers in-store and online. Your first failure is a failure to be organised, Catherine Parkinson. So what do you mean by organised? For you, what would a perfectly curated and organised life look like?

15:16So I was worried about offering this up as a failure because I thought I'm failing to have interesting failures because this is such a boring failure. And also, you know, I should say in many ways I am organised. I think my head is quite organised, although people say that I jump around in conversation and it's a nightmare. I haven't experienced that. You seem very organised. You were here on time. OK. That was eloquent. Yeah, I have been known for lateness in the past. That's a sort of, there's an optimism, I think, with this organisation. So I sort of think, oh, we'll be fine. We'll be on time because there's a world where we could be.

15:54When I was a student, I would be like, OK, I'll stay up all night. I'll take some ProPlus and I'll read three Euripides plays in the original ancient Greek. No, you're not going to do that. So, you know, I remember a headmistress saying at my school, you know, the key to life is organisation. And I thought, I'm screwed, you know, because when I was a child, I couldn't colour and keep in the line. it's like a there's I'd like I cannot I haven't sought out any kind of diagnosis by the way but there are just patterns of behavior and very impulsive uh I change my mind all the time my agent has to be very patient with that um so there's a there's a room in our house that my husband calls the chaos room which is my my little room I feel like I know where everything is but The reason I feel it's a failure in my life is because I had a couple of times during exams in my A-levels and then my mods at university that were kind of the worst times of my life.

17:01And I could call it a meltdown, but a breakdown is probably a more, you know, a truer definition of it because it was pretty awful. And it was because I had not been organised. I was you know had all the right things going on in terms of liking the work and all the rest of it but I just I don't know I just didn't pull myself together and it was all a bit of a disaster. The reason I qualify it is because I ended up being fine and my finals were great and everything was fine so it's a qualified failure but it was a failure emotionally because I lost it. And when you say you lost it and it was dark, what did that look like?

17:48um well i i just it honestly it's almost like those periods of time are slightly blocked out um and you know i do remember this is terrible i do remember falling asleep in one of my exams uh and waking up and just seeing i had a green biro and just and they were you know they Obviously, I didn't pull off good marks in those mods, but it was fine in the end. But I think I was, it's part and parcel of what we were talking about earlier. I was in student digs for the first time. I was in a student house. I didn't have a lock on my door. I was such a bloody people pleaser. So whenever any of these boys came in the door, I wanted to be funny and charming and ready.

18:37So I really just couldn't focus. I can remember instead of a normal lamp, I had a red light, so I couldn't really see the words on the page. I would go to tutorials and the tutor would say, have you read the Xerox? And I didn't realise she meant a photocopier. I would be like, yes, I love Xerox. I was just such a fraud for that period of my life. But I think with hindsight, so I don't know if this ties into disorganisation, but with hindsight, I was trying too hard to be this person to these new people that I had met. I'm blaming it on the Etonians. I was trying too hard to be everything to them.

19:11Honestly, even Etonians blame it on Etonians. I think we're fine there. They were like the funniest, best people that I'd met and I really wanted them to like me and I knew they did and I wanted to keep that up and so I didn't manage to have a split focus. When I was in my final year, I was living in college in an all-female college with lovely girlfriends walking me around the grounds like I was in a sort of sanatorium And I listened to the music I liked and, you know, sort of smoked in my room and really fell in love with modern philosophy particularly and had a beautiful time in that final fourth year.

19:50but there have been there were chaotic times where I yeah my A-levels I wasn't myself you know and I yeah it was a dark time. I'm sorry I had a similar thing with my A-levels too it's interesting and I wonder this lack of organisation the word that's coming up for me is a kind of fear And I wonder if it's almost like you don't let yourself think, actually, I'm really great at this subject. I'm going to nail my exams. Yeah. Does that? That is very familiar to me. I think there's, I really used to want to do, well, I was listening to the amazing Chris Hoy saying that, you know, it's important to concentrate on the task at hand.

20:46I think sometimes in the past I was end gaming it and thinking, if I'm honest, I think I really wanted to go to Oxford and it wasn't that the odds were stacked against me. I was academic, but I wasn't the most academic girl. I wanted to go to Oxford because I wanted to be an actress. And that's the only kind of, I know that seems mad, but that was the route I saw. I thought if I go to Oxford, I can make that weird choice and it won't. Whereas if I go anywhere else, I'll have to do the, not to denigrate all the jobs that I, you know, but I didn't think they were going to suit me maybe as much as, but you don't know.

21:29It's an instinct and then it sort of seems, it seems like a sort of naive kind of, you know, I also wanted to be an astronaut. I'm a very silly person. And your biggest disappointment is not being tapped up by MI5. Me too, by the way. I'm so gutted. I was literally walking around with my shoulders like, come on, tap me, tap me. And were you studying? I did Russian. I didn't do Russian at university, but I have done Russian in the past. I'm like, surely. What's going on? The thing is, I am very indiscreet. I do want to tell people everything. I'm very indiscreet. And I'm not sure I blend as much as...

22:04So, yeah, I did actually do the MI5 exam. Did you? And, you know, I'm not in MI5, Elizabeth. Well, that's what you would say. But my brothers are... What? My brothers think I'm in MI5. Do they? No matter how many times I say, I am not in MI5. I'm quite... I'm an actress. Haven't you seen anything I'm in? If you are, though, will you tap me up? The two of us. Why do you think I'm here? Okay, fine. But we do that afterwards. Yeah, when we're not recording. Okay. Anyway, right. So, disappointments. Not an astronaut. Not an astronaut. Allegedly not a spy, but that is what she would say. The acting piece.

22:47So, I do think that we are sometimes born with an instinct as to what we want to do. And clearly, acting was your thing. How does your lack of organisation play into that? Is it actually helpful in certain ways? I think that with, you know, I kind of love that with academia, you're just a number and you do a paper. I remember going into exam schools when I was doing philosophy and, you know, it's a joint school. So you'd have people that were doing maths and you had people that were doing PPE and then you'd have the classicists and we'd all answer it differently. But it would all be kind of the right answer.

23:26but it's like an objective you're not talking your way around anything they don't know who you are or whatever but I also really struggle with the slightly kind of black and white you're you're a 70 percent person and you're an 82 percent person and I kind of love with acting this the subjectivity of it you know like some people will love your performance and other people won't and I find that a safer um I find that a safer space to be I think I to be honest with hindsight and I really should have therapy but with hindsight I think that I um because therapy I think would get clarity on these things um quicker and better but I think with hindsight I struggled uh with the pressure I put on myself because I didn't have pressure from my parents once I got into grammar school that was that was job done you know but I put a lot of pressure on myself to to get really um high marks rather than kind of loving the subject and and it was then that I lost my way when I loved a subject when I was into the philosophy or had these brilliant tutors um and got got excited about it was fine but I think if you're end gaming it um just to get a kind of mark out a 10 that's when I wasn't happy and that it sounds therefore that acting has been really good for that because you don't end game it you love the process and if you win a BAFTA brilliant everything's been easy since I sort of dared to become an actress like because it's difficult because a lot of people want to be an actress so I thought my am I just being unimaginative in my you know sort of um notion I want to do this but I I have found everything um much um less stressful and I haven't you know that if I have sort of stress dreams they're still about exams they're not about forgetting my lines so I think that I felt like a fraud when I was because you know not to bang on about my but I do feel like I had a bit of a because it was a long degree and you know that that life I felt like I was pretending to be something I wasn't this life I don't.

25:38Whereas you hear a lot of people say, I feel like I'm a fraud or whatever as an actor. I feel like, thank God I dared to do it because I feel like I'm doing the thing that I am. Beautiful. And how ironic that you literally are pretending to be people you're not. Yeah. And that is the purpose that enables you to live an authentic life. And obviously working for MI5. Yes, exactly. Exactly. I am very convinced by your cover story. When I started this podcast, I honestly felt like I was learning a brand new language overnight. Scripts, artwork, scheduling, tech. Suddenly, I was the entire team and it was kind of overwhelming.

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27:05Sign up for your£1 per month trial today at shopify.co.uk slash fail. That's shopify.co.uk slash fail. Good energy in. Good energy out.

27:24Storm. Zero sugar, 200 milligrams of caffeine and immunity support. Storm, energy for life. Girl, winter is so last season. And now spring's got you looking at pictures of tank tops with hungry eyes. Your algorithm is feeding you cutoffs. You're thirsty for the sun on your shoulders. That perfect hang-on-the-patio sundress. Those sandals you can wear all day and all night. And you've had enough of shopping from your couch. Done hoping it looks anything like the picture when you tear open that envelope? It's time for a little in-person spring treat. It's time for a trip to Ross. work your magic let's get on to your second failure because i'm aware i want to give this the time and the acknowledgement that it deserves and i'm very grateful to you for talking about it i think it's probably the first time that you have really spoken about it and so i want to acknowledge that and and say i'm sorry for what you went through and if at any point you want us to stop we totally can i'm also so aware that you haven't had therapy which i find completely fascinating in and of itself because so many people who come on this podcast have yeah and I I'm really intrigued in given what happened so your second failure is how have you put it failure to acknowledge trauma and there's a specific incident isn't there we were in a town out of London and I had last minute disorganized booked my digs for I think it was 12 quid an hour It was the cheapest digs I could find because I had this idea.

28:57You know, I wanted to prove I could be financially viable as an actress because I had to be and I didn't know then whether it was going to work because I hadn't had any telly jobs. So I wanted to save some money from this theatre job, which was optimistic of me. But the cheapest digs I could find was walking home one night with a colleague from the theatre and a guy who had previous form of doing this, got into a bit of a disagreement with this colleague of mine and I said, leave her alone and he knocked me out cold and broke my nose and everything else. But he was, I think, immediately arrested or he certainly went to prison for ABH and all the rest of it.

29:45Anyway, the reason I... So I was back on stage next week. I remember being in the hospital that night and hearing the, I think what I find upsetting about it most is that I remember hearing the, oh God, sorry. No, don't apologise at all. I do remember hearing the nurse in the hospital say, oh, she's a nice girl, you know, as well, she's a nice girl. and the sense of shame I felt that I'd, there was a sense, I remember somebody saying to me, you know, what were you doing to get, there was a sense that I had brought it on myself and it made me think of, you know, at the time I was still hanging around with my university friends and they were saying, Parky, you walk from the station, we're going to go and pick up so and so and so and so, So, you know, and I did sort of, there was a sense that I was, I did sort of think that I felt like I was a sort of cheaper, cheaper commodity when, you know, I was just as vulnerable, you know.

30:57So I think it's good with hindsight to acknowledge it and acknowledge the legacy of something like that because what I have found is that I'm really neurotic when it comes to my daughters about walking anywhere on their own. and you know I was chatting to somebody at the school gate who said um you know sometimes it's things that have happened to us has anything happened to you I was like no no no and then you and then you think god yes it has I just sort of have this kind of I think my generation our generation I think there was a sense of just getting getting on with it and I think that I want to be able to, I mean, my mother's generation, the things that they have tolerated and put up with, and I think there's a lot to be said for getting on with things.

31:50But I also think, although I haven't had therapy, the wisdom of therapy, I think, has bled into our culture in a way I find quite helpful. I watched in lockdown Michaela Cole's show, and I found that really, because it's about confronting your I may destroy you it's extraordinary and I think that made me that helped me actually and I sort of think I need to acknowledge that I did have quite a serious assault that had repercussions that are basically I'm not going to be cross with myself for being a really neurotic mum oh my goodness thank you so much for talking about that and I'm so sorry it's horrendous there's one thing that I absolutely have to say to you which is you have no cause to feel any degree of shame you did nothing wrong that is all on the perpetrator's shoulders and I know that at some level you know that but there's probably another level which doesn't which hasn't taken it in and I want you to know that beyond doubt that you survived something so appalling so out of the blue so violent so shocking that it must have required such recalibration of how you felt about the world around you and its relative safety it it was a huge thing to go through and you you sort of sped past the fact that he went to jail and you were in hospital.

33:28That's horrendous. But I think you're so right. Our generation, it's a very specific generation. We grew up analogue. We transitioned to digital. We were carrying a lot of sort of shame. Yeah, shame. Our mothers fought an amazing battle, but there was still a sort of legacy of shame as a young woman. And we were given lots of conflicting messages. And I remember at that time, there were a lot of news stories about women who quote unquote brought it on themselves or wore the wrong thing. And I'm so happy that we are unpacking that as a culture. But you were a product of that. And I also don't want you to beat yourself up about internalising it.