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‘You must come on striking 12’

Stage legend relishes ‘Earnest’ role at STC

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Siân Phillips, gay news, Washington Blade
Siân Phillips, gay news, Washington Blade

Actress Siân Phillips calls her current play as intricately crafted as a well-made clock. (Photo courtesy Shakespeare Theatre Company)

‘The Importance of Being Earnest’

Through March 2

Shakespeare Theatre Company

Lansburgh Theatre, 450

7th St. N.W.

$20-100

202-547-1122

shakespearetheatre.org

Early in actress Siân Phillips’ long and illustrious career, trusted mentors warned her that despite a charmed start in the business, it would take many years before she got what she wanted.

“And they were absolutely right,” she explains in a small office in the Lansburgh Theatre basement. “It took me a long time to get where I am today. But of course, I wouldn’t have done it any other way.”

The London-based Phillips is in town to play Lady Augusta Bracknell in the Shakespeare Theatre Company’s production of “The Importance of Being Earnest,” staged by her lifelong friend, Keith Baxter. Makeup done, she wears a silk print robe and matching turban. Tall and slender, she moves like a woman much younger than her 80 years. It’s two hours until curtain and she’s sharing some thoughts on the part and her career before she gets into costume.

When playing Lady Bracknell, many players take their cues from Dame Edith Evans, whose brilliantly bombastic take on the society-worshipping Bracknell was the highlight of the 1952 film version. Not Phillips.

“Actually, I approach the part as if it were written last week. I adored Edith Evans but I don’t hear her voice when I read the lines. Not to say that doesn’t happen — when I played Miss Havisham, I couldn’t get Martita Hunt [famed British actress] out of my head.”

In Oscar Wilde’s enduring 1895 comedy, two men about town — Jack Worthing and his pal Algernon — fall for a pair of fair young ladies who are inexplicably intent on marrying a man named Ernest. The men come up with an intricate deception to land their quarry. And then the formidable Lady Bracknell steps in to ferret out the truth.

Jack describes the snobbish grande dame as a gorgon. “Yes, it’s true,” Phillips says. “She is rather unpleasant, and extremely intent on getting her own way. But try as she may, it’s Jack who comes out OK in the end, isn’t it?”

The part is a smallish-but-integral comedic gem in Wilde’s dazzlingly well-made satire. “It’s the shortest part I’ve played in some time. The disadvantage is you must come on striking 12,” she says. “There’s no opportunity to work up to it. You’ve got to come on high and stay up there.”

Phillips says the rhythm of Wilde’s language is difficult to master.

“I’m used to Shakespeare and have done a lot of Shaw. This is harder. It’s the heightened nature of the English. But of course he writes so well. When you rehearse it you realize what a great piece of work it is. It’s aged so well. I’ve done Wilde’s ‘Lady Windermere’s Fan’ and ‘A Woman of No Importance.’ But this particular play is a masterpiece. It’s like sitting in the middle of a clock. It’s a mechanism. The whole thing could collapse at any minute. It’s like being on ice skates. I find it exhilarating. It’s scary, but I don’t mind being scared.”

A radio personality throughout her teens, Phillips left her native Wales to study acting at London’s Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts where she was singled out for her talent and beauty in a year that included Diana Rigg and Glenda Jackson. After graduating, she seamlessly transferred to the professional stage.

Those same trusted mentors who predicted she would find professional satisfaction later in life, also advised her not to marry so early in her career. “Of course they were right again. “But what could I do? I was madly in love with O’Toole [she was married to movie star Peter O’Toole form 1959-1979]. And we had some wonderful times and two daughters. I don’t regret it.”

As part of O’Toole’s production company, Phillips’ job was to keep the sometimes hell raising actor in check. But all along she worked too, finding jobs and not attracting too much attention to herself. Exactly the opposite of what an ambitious actor is supposed to do. She draws a metaphor, comparing herself to the straight man who knows all about comedy but never gets a laugh.

Still, she gained international attention playing the deliciously evil Empress Livia in the much-ballyhooed BBC production of “I, Claudius.” And the last 10 years have been rife with nonstop theater successes on the London stage including her turn as Juliet in a retirement home-set “Romeo and Juliet,” and parts in “Cabaret” and Alan Bennett’s “People.”

“I love working and I’m able to concentrate on myself,” she says. “It’s funny. Now I have the career that I’ve dreamed about since I was a little girl.”

There are parts she’d have liked to have played but missed out on. “I regret not playing Cleopatra in Shakespeare’s “Antony and Cleopatra,” I’d have been very good in that. Also I would have liked to play Ranevskaya, the heroine in Chekhov’s ‘The Cherry Orchard’ but at some point I realized I was too old for the part. It was preposterous, so I called it off. I’m probably too old to play Lady Bracknell, but since it’s a part played by women and men of all ages, I don’t think it matters so much.”

Recently Phillips moved to a trendy section of London’s East End. Since she arrived in London at 19 she has moved frequently, always eager to explore another area of the city she enjoys so much. Her current home is her favorite to date.

So why leave her beloved London at this point her career when she can work anywhere?

“I came for the part of course, and because Keith [Baxter] asked me. Who’d think we’d be working together all these years later in Washington? It’s really quite marvelous.”

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Photos

PHOTOS: Silver Pride

Rayceen Pendarvis serves as emcee

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Rayceen Pendarvis was the emcee of Silver Pride 2025. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

The 2025 Silver Pride Resource Fair and Tea Dance was held at the Eaton Hotel on Wednesday, May 21.

(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)

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Out & About

Queer film festival comes to D.C.

DC/DOX to showcase LGBTQ documentaries made by LGBTQ filmmakers

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DC/DOX film festival will take place in D.C. on June 12.

DC/DOX will host a film festival beginning on Thursday, June 12, at the Regal Gallery Place, Eaton Cinema, and the U.S. Navy Memorial Burke Theatre. 

This festival will premier LGBTQ documentaries made by LGBTQ filmmakers. Each screening will be followed by in-person Q&As with the filmmakers. 

For more details, visit dcdoxfest.com

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Movies

Gay director on revealing the authentic Pee-wee Herman

New HBO doc positions Reubens as ‘groundbreaking’ performance artist

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The HBO Original two-part documentary ‘PEE-WEE AS HIMSELF,’ directed by Matt Wolf), debuts Friday, May 23 (8 p.m.-11:20 p.m. ET/PT) with both parts airing back-to-back on HBO and will be available to stream on Max. (Photo courtesy of Warner Bros.)

In the new HBO two-part documentary, “Pee-wee as Himself,” director Matt Wolf gives viewers a never-before-seen look into the personal life of Paul Reubens, the comedic actor behind the much loved television persona, Pee-wee Herman. 

Filmed before Reubens passed away in 2023 from cancer, Wolf and his creative team created the riveting documentary, interspersing several interviews, more than 1,000 hours of archival footage, and tens of thousands of personal photos.

Determined to set the record straight about what really happened, Reubens discussed his diverse influences, growing up in the circus town of Sarasota, Fla., and his avant-garde theater training at the California Institute of the Arts. 

Ruebens joined the Groundlings improv group, where he created the charismatic Pee-wee Herman. He played the quirky character during the Saturday morning show, “Pee-wee’s Playhouse,” and in numerous movies, like “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure” and “Big Top Pee-wee.” He also brought Pee-wee to Broadway, with “The Pee-wee Herman Show.”

To get an enigma such as Reubens to open up was no easy task for Wolf.

“I felt determined to get Paul to open up and to be his authentic self,” acknowledged Wolf at a recent press conference. “And I was being tested and I wanted to meet my match in a way so I didn’t feel frustrated or exhausted, I felt determined but I also, it was thrilling to go this deep. I’ve never been able, or I don’t know if I ever will, go this deep with another human being to interview them in an intimate way for over 40 hours.”

Wolf described the collaborative interview experience as a dream, “like we were in a bubble where time didn’t matter.” he also felt a deep connection to the material, having come of age watching “Pee-wee’s Playhouse.”

“I wouldn’t have been able to put words to it at the time, but I think it was my first encounter with art that I felt emotionally involved in,” noted Wolf.

“He continued: “I recognize that that show created a space for a certain kind of radical acceptance where creativity thrives. And as a gay filmmaker, I also recognize things like Pee-wee Herman marrying a bowl of fruit salad at a slumber party or dancing in high heels to the song, ‘Fever.’ That stuff spoke to me. So that was my connection to it.”

During the documentary, Reubens comes out as a gay man.

“Paul went into this process wanting to come out,” said Wolf. “That was a decision he had made. He was aware that I was a gay filmmaker and had made portraits of other gay artists. That was the work of mine he was attracted to, as I understood. And I wanted, as a younger person, to support him in that process, but he also was intensely sensitive that the film would overly emphasize that; or, focused entirely from the lens of sexuality when looking at his story.”

Their complicated dynamic had an aspect of “push and pull” between them. 

“I think that generational difference was both a source of connection and affinity and tension. And I do think that the level to which Paul discusses his relationships and intimacy and vulnerability and the poignant decision he made to go back into the closet. I do have to believe to some extent he shared that because of our connection.”   

Wolf hopes that the “Pee-wee as Himself” positions Reubens as one of the most “groundbreaking” performance artists of his generation who in a singular way broke through into mainstream pop culture.

“I know he transformed me. He transformed how I see the world and where I went as a creative person. And it’s so clear that I am not alone in that feeling. For me, it was fairly abstract. I couldn’t necessarily put words to it. I think people who grew up on Pee-wee or were big fans of Pee-wee, seeing the film, I hope, will help them tap into intangible and specific ways how transformative his work was for them. It really is a gift to revisit early seminal experiences you had and to see how they reverberate in you.” 

He added: “So, to me, this isn’t so much about saying Paul Reubens is a genius. I mean, that’s overly idealizing and I don’t like hero worship. It’s more about understanding why many of us have connected to his work and understanding where he lives within a legacy of performance art, television, and also, broader pop culture.”

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