It’s more than Pride & Prejudice. It’s Pride & Prejudice* (*sort of), and those brackets and asterisks make quite a difference.
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00:00Good afternoon, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers.
00:05Really lovely to speak to Rhianna McGreevy, who is on the road with Pride and Prejudice,
00:10with a very important sort of in brackets afterwards. Now, you're doing a very fond
00:16violence to Jane Austen, aren't you? Is that fair?
00:20Yeah, we're certainly, it's an adapted version of the story, told through the gaze of five
00:26servants. So there's five young women in the cast, and we all multi-role and play all of
00:31the characters. And it's a humorous look at this love story, but it is also a retelling
00:39of the original novel, and hopefully should appeal to people, whether you're an Austen
00:45fan or not.
00:45When you say humorous, I think you're understanding it slightly, it's hilarious.
00:49I'm glad you think so, yeah. I mean, I find it really funny. I've been doing this show,
00:54like, since September, and it still makes me laugh sometimes when I can sort of hear
00:59bits going on backstage. It still makes me chuckle. And I've heard, I mean, we're coming
01:03up to our 100th performance this week.
01:05Really? And the appeal is so interesting. It actually really appeals to people who love
01:11Jane Austen and consider those not disrespectful, but it also appeals to those of us who are
01:16slightly less sure about Jane Austen, doesn't it? And also people who don't know about Jane
01:20Austen.
01:21Yeah, in my experience, that has been the case largely. People who haven't seen any
01:29Austen adaptations or read the book before still have come and enjoyed our production
01:35enormously and really understood it and connected with it, which is what we really want. And
01:39equally, we've had diehard Austen fans in the audience who have loved it and been very
01:44enthusiastic about it and, you know, are really familiar with Austen and her work.
01:49So yeah, it's, either way, I think there's something in it for everyone, which is a really
01:54lovely thing.
01:55Absolutely. And one of the things I remember last time when it was in Chichester, I was
01:58thinking, obviously, how hilarious it was, but also thinking how knackered you must all
02:03be by the end. It's a huge task, isn't it?
02:07It is. It's a very demanding show to be part of. There's no downtime. There's no, well,
02:12just nip backstage and put my feet up for five minutes. It's constant. You know, the
02:18show starts and then you just literally do not stop moving and doing and being in it
02:24until it ends two hours later. So it's a very, it's a very immersive experience as an actor
02:30where, you know, which is a real privilege because, you know, I feel so, like all my
02:35skills are being utilised constantly during this production. I'm having to sort of turn
02:39my hand at so many different things. And yeah, so it's a real privilege to be part
02:46of a production like this.
02:48We're looking forward to seeing it again. Lovely to speak to you. Thank you.
02:52Thank you very much.