Joanna Vanderham, the star of Stephen Poliakoff’s long-awaited period drama Dancing on the Edge, talks to Vicki Power about playing the doe-eyed ingénue.
Jazzing it up: Joanna Vanderham, centre, in ‘Dancing on the Edge’ Photo: Ruby Film & TV Joanna Vanderham recalls a surreal moment at Christmas, when she unwrapped a gift from her mother. It was a box set of The Paradise, BBC One’s costume drama screened last autumn, in which Vanderham starred as zesty shop girl Denise Lovett.
“I hadn’t seen it because I was working on something else at the time,”
explains Vanderham in a soft Perthshire accent. “It’s a DVD box with my face
on it, and you think, ‘Is this real?’ It’s very difficult to take.”
Vanderham, still only 22, has risen rapidly through the ranks. Plucked from
the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama in her second year to be the
heroine of Sky1’s 2011 drama The Runaway, which bagged her an
International Emmy nomination, Vanderham then carried the bulk of the plot –
not to mention yards of taffeta petticoats – on her slim frame as the star
of The Paradise, which will return for a second series later this
year. She now has a Hollywood film under her belt, the yet-to-be-released What
Maisie Knew, alongside Julianne Moore, and a pivotal role in
writer/director Stephen Poliakoff’s long-awaited period drama Dancing
on the Edge, which begin on BBC Two next week.
What makes Vanderham so bankable is a subtlety in her acting that belies her
years. This was particularly evident during a scene in The Runaway in
which the camera focused only on Vanderham’s face as her character was raped
– and fear, pain, anguish and disillusion all crossed it in moments. She has
an expressive mouth and, tall and beautiful, has the flexibility to play
both doe-eyed ingénue and sultry society minx, period and modern.
There’s also a certain flintiness to Vanderham, something which manifested
itself when she refused to do a nude scene for Dancing on the Edge. Poliakoff’s
five-part thriller about the mixed fortunes of a fictional black jazz
band in Thirties London, which stars Chiwetel Ejiofor and Matthew Goode,
sees Vanderham’s society girl Pamela Luscombe strike up a relationship with
Goode’s Stanley Mitchell, a music journalist. Vanderham balked when the
first episode’s script called for Pamela to enjoy a naked clinch with Goode.
“I had to put my foot down and say, ‘I refuse to be nude,’” says Vanderham.
“It was difficult for me, because it’s Stephen Poliakoff and that’s how he’d
written it and I love that character.”
“But those images [of nudity] don’t go away. It was maybe my third large job and I thought, ‘I’m not ready for that.’” Ultimately, Vanderham managed to convince Poliakoff that baring all might be counterproductive to how the character plays out. The drama as a whole is intriguing and gripping, and Vanderham gives a startling, standout performance as the mysterious Pamela, by turns manipulative and vulnerable, while her eyes – huge dark pools – give away nothing of her motivations.
Born into a middle-class family in Scone, Perth, Vanderham’s Dutch businessman father Tom and mother Jill, a professor of cardiovascular research at Dundee’s Ninewells Hospital, split up when she was 11. “It probably forced me to grow up a bit, which I don’t necessarily see as a bad thing,” says Vanderham, who remains close to both. “I think it’s one of the main reasons I look at life the way I do – you only have one life, and you have to take chances.”
At drama school, a casting director who’d previously conducted a workshop at the college rang up five months later and asked for “the girl with the funny surname” to audition for The Runaway. Vanderham was cast as Cockney girl Cathy and flown to South Africa to co-star with Keith Allen and Ken Stott. The learning curve was steep and at times too much. “One day we were filming in the kitchen and I was making stupid suggestions about where to stand. I was trying to make a good impression and the director was like, ‘What are you doing?!’” recalls Vanderham, candidly. “I had to take myself away for a few minutes and give myself a pep talk and say, ‘You do want this.’ I could easily have thrown in the towel.”
Guest roles in TV drama followed, but it was The Paradise that thrust Vanderham into the spotlight. Nearly six million viewers were hooked on the sentimental goings-on behind the lace and fans of a 19th-century Northern department store. She’s the romantic lead, for whom store owner John Moray (Emun Elliott) jilted his high-society bride in the final moments of series one.
“I fell in love with Denise,” says Vanderham. “She’s a girl who’s struggling to tell the world she’s more than just a shop assistant. A lot of women can relate to that. We like to think we’ve come a long way since then, but the fact that women are still being paid less than men shows it’s relevant.”
With the US television network PBS having picked up the rights to The Paradise, Vanderham is about to get a wider audience It looks like the girl with the funny surname is going to have to get a bit more accustomed to seeing her face on DVD covers.
Dancing on the Edge began on BBC Two on Monday 4 February at 9.00pm
Source (including photo): The Telegraph
The Scotsman also has an interview article here
“But those images [of nudity] don’t go away. It was maybe my third large job and I thought, ‘I’m not ready for that.’” Ultimately, Vanderham managed to convince Poliakoff that baring all might be counterproductive to how the character plays out. The drama as a whole is intriguing and gripping, and Vanderham gives a startling, standout performance as the mysterious Pamela, by turns manipulative and vulnerable, while her eyes – huge dark pools – give away nothing of her motivations.
Born into a middle-class family in Scone, Perth, Vanderham’s Dutch businessman father Tom and mother Jill, a professor of cardiovascular research at Dundee’s Ninewells Hospital, split up when she was 11. “It probably forced me to grow up a bit, which I don’t necessarily see as a bad thing,” says Vanderham, who remains close to both. “I think it’s one of the main reasons I look at life the way I do – you only have one life, and you have to take chances.”
At drama school, a casting director who’d previously conducted a workshop at the college rang up five months later and asked for “the girl with the funny surname” to audition for The Runaway. Vanderham was cast as Cockney girl Cathy and flown to South Africa to co-star with Keith Allen and Ken Stott. The learning curve was steep and at times too much. “One day we were filming in the kitchen and I was making stupid suggestions about where to stand. I was trying to make a good impression and the director was like, ‘What are you doing?!’” recalls Vanderham, candidly. “I had to take myself away for a few minutes and give myself a pep talk and say, ‘You do want this.’ I could easily have thrown in the towel.”
Guest roles in TV drama followed, but it was The Paradise that thrust Vanderham into the spotlight. Nearly six million viewers were hooked on the sentimental goings-on behind the lace and fans of a 19th-century Northern department store. She’s the romantic lead, for whom store owner John Moray (Emun Elliott) jilted his high-society bride in the final moments of series one.
“I fell in love with Denise,” says Vanderham. “She’s a girl who’s struggling to tell the world she’s more than just a shop assistant. A lot of women can relate to that. We like to think we’ve come a long way since then, but the fact that women are still being paid less than men shows it’s relevant.”
With the US television network PBS having picked up the rights to The Paradise, Vanderham is about to get a wider audience It looks like the girl with the funny surname is going to have to get a bit more accustomed to seeing her face on DVD covers.
Dancing on the Edge began on BBC Two on Monday 4 February at 9.00pm
Source (including photo): The Telegraph
The Scotsman also has an interview article here
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