Anna Soden is playing Dave the Cow in Jack and the Beanstalk at York Theatre Royal from 08 Dec to 07 Jan.
Any York or Yorkshire connections?
YES! I grew up in York and went to York Youth Theatre for a decade. I was in the young peoples ensemble for loads of shows at York Theatre Royal growing up, including The Railway Children twice, The Wind in the Willows, Peter Pan and King Arthur, and Cinderella pantomime in 2006. I moved away at 18 so it’s lovely to sporadically come home to YTR! In the pandemic the theatre partnered with me, with the support of Arts Council, to make my one person family adaptation of Five Children and It, set on Scarborough beach.
In 2020 you played the Fairy in York Theatre Royal’s Travelling Pantomime which toured around the city during covid times – how was that experience?
It was a really special thing. It kind of felt like a fever dream, it was a little explosion of glitter in an apocalypse. Working in that cast of 5 with a skeleton creative team was a unique bonding experience, I really made such dear friends on that show, and I’m so happy to be reunited with lovely Robin (Simpson) this year. Performing on that little pop up stage, our dressing rooms being disabled toilets/ storage cupboards, touring to hotels, schools, churches, village halls… it felt like a really gorgeous way to do panto, it was bursting with a sense of community and local identity. I’d love to see more theatre being made like that, not just when there’s a deadly pandemic (although I will take a dressing room over a disabled toilet this year).
Now you’re playing Dave the cow – both the front and the back half – in Jack and the Beanstalk which you call “a massive career moo-ve”. What’s Dave’s role in the story?
It is a huge career moo-ve in that I will be saying moo a lot. Obviously cows can’t read, and I’m a very method actor – so I decided to not read the script at all and just say MOO at random intervals throughout the show. I think it will add a very serious and emotional element to the story.
Have you appeared in any other pantomimes?
Yes! I really get around the country! My first was the rock and roll pantomime at Liverpool Everyman – everyone played instruments, it was Sleeping Beauty and I was the fairy and got to fly, and sing Golden Slumbers- a Beatles song, in Liverpool!! Then I did Chipping Norton, they have a brilliant traditional show there, with original songs. I played a Boy Scout and a Weasel in Rapunzel (you know! The famous weasel in Rapunzel!) which was gloriously silly. Last year I was at Derby Arena, which was a totally different vibe again, as it was MASSIVE!! I played the Genie (and a lot of other roles), it was a spectacle, I had a ball! Every city/town does panto SO differently so it’s really interesting experiencing them all.
You’re an actor-musician and writer, which instruments do you play? Which comes first – acting, music or writing?
Acting comes first, I trained in straight acting at Mountview, and I’ve explored writing and music and comedy since then (I play bass and trumpet mostly) and love it when I can incorporate singing, or playing instruments into a job, and it’s ace to put on my own work, but I’m an actor first and foremost.
You also say you “make stupid videos”
I love to make online sketches, digital comedy is at a really exciting place where it’s so easily accessed, so I make a lot of silly stuff for tiktok/instagram. (it’s also easier than persuading the BBC to give me my own sketch show/sitcom). I’ve recently started doing stand up comedy which I’m loving, but making video sketches is my favourite format. They are very stupid but I did win the British Comedy Guide sketch competition last year and Harry Hill said they were “Very funny”- so there’s definitely merit in stupid!
You joke (I think) about being an Olivier Award Wanting actor but surely you’ve won prizes already.
Yeah I was meant to win an Oscar for my previously mentioned role as Weasel in Rapunzel, but Leonardo Dicaprio hadn’t won one at that point, so I kindly said he could have it instead.
Any unusual interests or hobbies away from the stage?
Lying on the floor when it’s about to rain, producing dairy products, eating grass, and tarot reading.
Interview by Steve Pratt
Jack and the Beanstalk, York Theatre Royal | 08 Dec 2023 – 07 Jan 2024
