At St Mary Magdalene’s primary school in south-east London there were two teachers who were very inspiring, Mrs Randall and Mrs Rossiter, and they were good friends. They were fun, and taught us how to play the guitar. Outside school they had a musical group, a bit like the New Seekers. One of them was into dance, so in PE we’d do lots of dancing and creative movement.
They got me involved in a contemporary dance class after school at the Laban Centre in New Cross, held in a church hall. Mrs Rossiter used to take me when my sister couldn’t. I’d go to her house and she’d make me cheese on toast before we set off, and I remember her being warm and lovely and kind. This was when I was six or seven.
We always did school plays, and in one I portrayed a gypsy. It was like a Nativity play but they had gypsies and we all had to play the guitar. A teacher called Pat Kiefel saw me in the play and asked if I could be in the drama group she was setting up on Friday evenings, the Southwark Children’s Theatre workshop, so I joined. She was the mime artist on a television show called Vision On, and she used to do sign language.
I stayed until I was 14, and I went to the Young Vic Theatre from 13 to 16. I also went to the Weekend Arts College (WAC), where Celia Greenwood was a teacher, and was very influential. She had set up WAC for kids from north London - even though I was from south London - and I could come and do dance, drama and music on the weekends.
I didn’t like secondary school at all. It didn’t work for me, I didn’t fit in. In retrospect, I suppose it was because of my creative bent. My PE teacher Susan Goldstein was my inspiration because we did dance with her. I hated games so dance was an alternative and she encouraged it. It was funny because a lot of us didn’t like Miss Goldstein at first; she was really strict. But then we got to know her and we all loved her in the end.
When the Inner London Education Authority was still running it gave schools money to go to the theatre, so we were always going to see plays and dance at the National Theatre and at Sadler’s Wells. Culturally we were quite rich.
Originally I wanted to be a barrister. Acting was something that I’d always done outside school. I was 19 when I applied to drama school and I was still not even thinking about acting as a career, but just thinking I’d like to go to drama school. I was generally a confident person.
There were wonderful teachers at Rada (Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts). I particularly remember Doreen Cannon, who died a few years back. She was into method acting. Geoffrey Connor, a voice teacher who also taught singing, was really eccentric and very funny. He loved opera and he’d pick out good arias to work on.
Professionally, my break came when I was cast in Mike Leigh’s It’s A Great Big Shame. I worked with him again on his movie Secrets and Lies and the Oscar nomination I received for my role as Hortense came as a shock. I sometimes think I’m still reeling from it. After that I was in Los Angeles for a while, travelling backwards and forwards, but my base has always been in south-east London, where I live with my husband and three-year-old daughter. I like that the area is down to earth as well as very neighbourhoody, with Sainsbury’s up the hill, and Oddbins down the other way.
Actress Marianne Jean-Baptiste was talking to Helen Barlow
STORY SO FAR
1967 Born London borough of Southwark
1978 St Saviour’s and St Olave’s secondary school
1987-90 Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts
1993 Cast in Mike Leigh’s It’s a Great Big Shame at the Theatre Royal,
Stratford East
1996 Cast in Mike Leigh’s film, Secrets and Lies
1997 Oscar nominated for role in Secrets and Lies
1999 Nominated for best actor award from Royal Television Society for her
portrayal of Doreen Lawrence in The Murder of Stephen Lawrence
2000 Stars in two Hollywood movies - 28 Days and The Cell
2001 Stars in British movie, New Year’s Day, currently on general release
