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GO: THEATRE: ALL'S O-KAY AS CHARLES SWANS IN TO STRATFORD



GO: THEATRE: ALL'S O-KAY AS CHARLES SWANS IN TO STRATFORD
Coventry Evening Telegraph (England)
January 9, 2004

Making a recording to help teach parrots to speak was one of the early jobs of Coventry actor Charles Kay.

"Oh, it's all coming back," he cries. "Sian Phillips and I had just both won the Gold Medal at RADA and one of our first jobs was making this recording for parrots. We just had to stay the same line over and over again. The idea was you played the record to the parrot and it learned to speak. I thought it was very funny that we both ended up doing that job."

Strangely, if the pull of acting hadn't been so strong then Charles might well have ended up pulling teeth for a living.

He qualified as a dental surgeon at Birmingham University and then served in the Royal Dental Corps in the army.

"I was 26 when I went to drama school and 28 when I left to become a professional actor. I felt I had to give it a chance and I've not stopped since. It's years since I've looked at someone's teeth. I wouldn't know what to do now."

Born Charles Piff, he later picked Kay for his professional name because it was his sister's name, he is currently appearing with Dame Judi Dench in the Royal Shakespeare Company's highly-praised production of All's Well That Ends Well in Stratford.

"It is an unusual play," says 73-year-old Charles. "I've only seen it once in my life when Dame Edith Evans played it in Stratford in 1959. It is an intriguing play and I like playing the part of Lafeu very much. It's also nice to be back in Stratford. I was in the company when Peter Hall first began in the early 60s."

His acting career includes working with Laurence Olivier at the National Theatre and some landmark productions from Peter Hall's War of the Roses and the Wesker Trilogy at London's Royal Court to The Madness of George III and Amadeus. Film credits range from Amadeus and Kenneth Branagh's Henry V to Beautiful People and The Importance of Being Earnest.

However, Charles didn't come from an acting background. His grandfather was the headmaster of the old Centaur Road School in Coventry and his father was a wholesale tobacconist in Hillfields.

Charles grew up in Warwick and went to Warwick School and says, "I saw plays at the Coventry Rep Company and went to the panto at the Hippodrome. When I was in my teens I went to Stratford and saw all those wonderful people on stage."

He later worked with at the newly-opened Belgrade Theatre in Coventry and returned in 1973 to appear as Lord Nelson in A Bequest to the Nation.

He spent Christmas, as he has done for many years, with Penelope Keith and her family in Guildford, but is now back on stage in Stratford reaping the applause each night as insightful statesman and advisor Lafeu.

He has worked with Judi Dench in the past but agrees All's Well That Ends Well is proving rather special. "She's worth crossing the road to see, isn't she?" smiles Charles.

All's Well That Ends Well runs at the Swan Theatre, Stratford, until February 7. Booking information from 0870 609 1110.