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ANITA DOBSON Why EastEnders wrecked my life
Seven year after she sensationally quit her starring role in Eastenders, Anita has finally got her life back together and put all fears of a breakdown behind her. She tells ANGELA LEVIN how she survived the aftermath of Angie. Main photographs by STEVE POOLE. Anita Dobson lorded it over the bar of the Queen Vic in EastEnders for just three-and-a-quarter years. It seemed much longer. Still people remember her as Angie Watts, all ivory-teeth clenched smile, cherry-red hair and relentless make-up. A regular 23 million viewers watched her sob into a double gin and tonic and denounce her disastrous marriage to Dirty Den. Off-screen there was no escape. Women would write to her about their own tragic relationships. She could charge 8,000 for snipping the ribbon at a new supermarket and beat Felicity Kendal in Rear Of The Year competitions. In the end it all got too much. When she quit EastEnders in 1988 her departure even made it on the Six O'Clock News. The pressures of the series almost drove her to a nervous breakdown, she said afterwards. She lost two stone from overwork and the stress of constant headlines about her personal life. After leaving the Square, she was determined to prove that she was More Than A Soap Star. 'I didn't do to much soul-searching before I left EastEnders,' she says. 'I'm a great believer in instinct. I realised it was the only way to go forward. I was quite prepared to prove myself again as an actress.' At first it didn't quite work out that way. Indeed, it's been quite a struggle to re-estabish her career. She was in the ill-fated musical Budgie with Adam Faith, which collapsed afer a few weeks. And in the TV sitcom Split Ends which was scrapped after one series. It's only now, after seven years, that she feels she's going in the right direction. 'The amount of attention I had was so crushing that I became withdrawn, fearful and as wary as an animal. Certain things that were said about me hurt tremendously and the scars have taken a long time to go away. But, she adds, 'I've now moved into a new era, become more forgiving and less fearful.' Her personal life has rarely been free from soap opera-style cliffhangers and clinches. Frequently spotted at nightclus and parties while she starred in EastEnders, she had an amazing ability to date men who would then trot to the newspapers to tell all. In 1986 she met the rock star Brian May from Queen at a party held by Freddie Mercury at his Earl's Court home. Brian had a wife, former model Chrissie Mullen, and three children. Dobson, already engaged four times, had most recently been linked with her co-star in EastEnders, Lofty, alias Tom Watt. It was a messy beginning - one moment they were caught cuddling at parties, the next May was running back to his wife. 'I didn't think "This is it" the minute I set eyes on Brian,' she remembers. 'But I did soon afterwards. There was a sense of inevitability about it all, as if we were both hurtling towards each other and we could do nothing about it. It was a wonderful and scary feeling.' These days, Anita is adamant that she wasn't the only reason May's marriage broke up. Certainly, a few years down the line, the two of them - they look remarkably similar with their big hair, pale skin and predeliction for sparkly jackets - are now a recognised celebrity item. 'We cross over well. Brian gives me tremendous emotional security which I desparately need. Underneath my confident exterior I'm quite insecure. I constantly think I'm not good enough, or attractive enough or interesting enough. Brian has a great deal of patience and understanding and is always there for me.' So why haven't they married? 'We've never got round to it, although we sometimes say we will one day. Also, because we met relatively late in life (she was in her mid-30s, he in his early 40s) we came with bits of baggage we've been busy trying to shift through. But we're as committed as two people can be.' 'I think I had a fear of marriage. I've always felt that if I couldn't actually commit myself for life I shouldn't do it. It's difficult for actors to sustain relationships. They're always on the move.' She's experienced the same indecision about having children. Until she met May she concentrated on her career. Now, at 46, she has the part-time responsibility of his three children to deal with. 'I never wanted a child just for the sake of it. Just before I got the part in EastEnders I began to think that if I wasn't going to break through professionally, then perhaps I should think about meeting Mr right, settling down and having a family - although I knew I could never give up my career. But then EastEnders came along and I was very busy with that.' 'When I met Brian I did think "perhaps", but when nothing happened I didn't fall in a heap on the floor or feel unfulfilled as a woman. I thought: "It's a shame, but that's how my life has worked out." It's pointless thinking if only we'd met earlier. I always try to look for good things. I have a man I adore, three stepchildren - although I'm not saying that particular relationship is easy - and a terrific career.' Her father, Alf, always encouraged her to fulfil her potential. Born in the heart of the East End of London in 1949, the eldest of two sisters, she had the very best working-class upbringing. For the early years of her life she, her parents and her aunt and uncle all lived with Anita's grandmother. The family made do with an outside loo and a tin bath in the living room which they filled with water heated on the stove in kettles and saucepans. When Anita was three, her parents moved into a council flat in Stepney. She played happily and safely in the street. 'My favourite games were hopscotch and kiss chase. We had great fun, with the older kids looking after the younger ones.' She adored both parents. 'My father (who died three years ago) was a dress cutter, a quiet, patient man who loved Shakespeare. He brought me up to believe that I could get whatever I wanted. My mother, Anne, was zany and had sung with a Forces band. My upbringing was a terrific foundation for life. I never played truant, did drugs, had an abortion or went off the rails in any way.' Anita was a bright child, chubby and boisterous. Her grandfather spotted her natural talents early on. She was only three years old when he took her to see a pantomime and she insisted on singing and dancing in the aisles. When she passed her 11-plus it was regarded as a real achievement for someone from her background, but Coburn Grammar School For Girls didn't suit her. 'It was boring and fusty with very little drama or art.' She left at 16 with four O-levels, unsure whether she wanted to go to university, at or get married and have babies. She spent four years working as a typist, receptionist and coat model at C&A before finally deciding to go to drama school. She had, meanwhile, conformed to peer pressure and found a steady boyfriend. His name was Alan Bailey and they were engaged for four years while they saved up to get married. She chose a diamond solitaire engagement ring, the banns were posted up at the local church and they met the vicar. The wedding reception was booked, the dress chosen from the hire company. Then, at the eleventh hour, Anita broke it off. 'I thought: "Hang on. I don't really know who the hell he is. I don't really want this." I realised - I think I knew all along - that I had so much that I wanted to do that I wouldn't be able to do if I were married.' Her parents were understanding. 'They said they weren't absolutely sure he was the right one for me and then took me out to lunch.' The Webber Douglas Academy drama school in South Kensington opened a whole new life for her. But almost as soon as she started the course (at the same time as Rula Lenska and Antony Sher), her father was made redundant and her parents told her that they would be able to afford only one term's fees. 'I realised I had to audition for a grant and that it was make or break. I made the most emotional speech of my life. Mascara streamed down my face,' she says. She was awarded 12 a week, which she supplemented by working part-time as a barmaid in an East End pub. At first she felt very inferior. 'There were lots of students with masses of money. I kept thinking: "Help. What am I doing here?" But you have to put your gloves back on and fight your corner, don't you?' She worked hard to lose her Cockney accent. 'For a long time I talked properly at drama school and kept my Cockney accent at home.' She also learned what she considers her most valuable lesson in life. 'They told me I had to develop a hard shell for the outside world to cope with all the knocks, but keep a soft inner core to let the warmth in and out. It's what I've tried to do, although it's not always easy.' When she finished the course she spent 13 years singing and dancing and playing small parts all over the country - a Jill of all acting trades and master of none. 'It was marvellous to be doing both serious theatre and comedy, but I knew that to become well known I had to find one thing to do particularly well. It turned out to be Angie Watts - a wonderful character with so many parallels in my own life. I was offered the part at the stage in my career when I felt I was just soldiering on. It made all the difference.' she adds by way of understatement. 'That's why I've never regretted being in EasEnders. I'm proud it made everyone know me.' 'I was hot. People wanted me. I decided to blitz everything and do all the openings and launches I could. Coming from where I come from, it was a tremendous thrill to buy my own house. And even more so to buy a home for my parents. But I never became a slave to money. Once I felt I could live comfortably I decided I didn't have to make personal appearances any more.' Her attitude to money remains typical of someone who has been brought up with very little. 'I always pay bills on the dot, hate borrowing money, am never in debt and always keep a bit by in case I'm never employed again. If that happens I know I'll be all right. I can get a job in a restaurant or type. I'm good with clothes and pick things up quickly. In fact,' she smiles, 'I'm a survivor.' After some initial flops she enjoyed critical success in Moliere's Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, and as a Holocaust victim in My Lovely Shayna Maidel. She enjoys not being typecast. 'I like being a glamour queen but I also adore the other extreme - being serious and totally unmade-up.' She's been touring in two plays, Chekhov's Three Sisters and The Break Of Day by Timberlake Wertenbaker - a new play about three women and their reactions to motherhood and childlessness which opens at the Royal Court Theatre in London later this month. She plays April, a childless university lecturer. 'I love the part. April is light years away from me. I'm not an academic, but I like to get on my soap box about education. For ages I used to feel my opinions didn't have much worth. But I'm now beginning to feel classless, that I have a right to say what I feel about anything, event the most intellectual person in the room. I've worked hard, put the time in and therefore earned the right. People from my background should take note.' |
