Having a field day

Press, 13 November 1985, Page 18

Having a field day

JUDITH REGAN

By

Features International Take two highly talented stars from the classical and musical theatre, put them in a television situation comedy series and it sounds like a casting director’s nightmare. But for Anton Rodgers and Julia McKenzie, conquering fresh fields has been a highly rewarding experience. Their series, “Fresh Fields,” (a new series begins on One this evening) has not only been a soaraway success with viewers, but has also collected an Emmy award for the best situation comedy. For Anton Rodgers some things in “Fresh Fields” were rather familiar. He plays a middle-aged accountant whose children have grown up and left home — his own father was an accountant.

“Generally, I do about one play and a television series each year,” he says. “In fact, a great deal of my income now comes from television. If I do five voiceover jobs for TV commercials in a week, I earn much more than I would ever make appearing at the National Theatre!

“It’s an amazing industry, doing voice-overs,” Rodgers explains. “There are some very well known actors indeed who fail the auditions.

“And there are quite a few actors, totally unknown to the public who are really coining the money from that work.

“They’re called ‘the kings,’ and walk around wearing bleepers just like doctors in hospitals.” Before “Fresh Fields,” Julia McKenzie was probably best known for starring in smash-hit musicals like “On The Twentieth Century.” She played the leading role as the beautiful and glamorous Lily Garland. “The ‘glamorous’ bit rather worried me,” she admits. “I’ve never been what I’d describe as a looker!

“Frankly, I wasn’t certain I could get away with playing Lily, but it became the part of a lifetime. I’d never dreamed I could have succeeded the way I did.” In spite of her natural modesty, throughout her theatrical career she has gathered a faithful following of fans.

“There’s one who’s been writing me letters for years,” she explains. “Sometimes he’ll also send me records - it’s all very nice. “But I’ll never forget one play, in which I had to wear a succession of blonde wigs. They spoilt my own hairstyle, so I went around offstage in an old turban. “He spotted me wearing it and later he sent round

three new turbans in different colours. They’d been made especially for me. “He’s one of my most loyal fans. We’ve been in touch ever since my days in the chorus.” Julia McKenzie’s career has spanned every sphere of showbusiness, from pantomime in provincial theatres to topping the bill on Broadway. She even entertained, at one time, in working men’s clubs — that is one period of her career that she did not enjoy much. “I hated that work,” she admits. “I’d go along to the clubs in a nice outfit, with carefully worked out orchestrations, and find there’d be an organist who

couldn’t read music. “I’d die the death! Then some housewife would come up from the audience, sing something like ‘The Holy City* and bring the house down!”

Surprisingly for an actress whose role of Miss Adelaide in "Guys And Dolls” won her a best actress award, Julie McKenzie’s ambitions are not entirely in the theatre. “I’d like to become as popular and successful a comedienne as Beryl Reid or Irene Handl,” she explains. “I don’t consider that to be any lesser an ambition than striving to play Lady Macbeth with the Royal Shapespeare Company!”