Scarlett Strallen

The brightest and most sought-after ingénue role in town has to be the title part of the spectacular Disney/Mackintosh produced stage version of Mary Poppins, who enters from the heavens and keeps the show airborne till her flying exit. Popping in to meet Scarlett Strallen, the effervescent 23-year-old musical actress who is now flying high in the role in her dressing room backstage at the Prince Edward Theatre, she virtually skips to the stage door to meet me, and is the picture of unbridled enthusiasm about a stage career that has kept her in work constantly since before she even left school. She was still studying for A Levels when she was in the original cast of Mamma Mia!, and immediately prior to this job completed a summer outdoor Shakespeare season in which she also did HMS Pinafore, which earned her a 2006 Laurence Olivier nomination.

Theatre runs very much in your family blood it seems–and you made your West End debut when you were just nine!
That was in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Aspects of Love–my dad [Sandy Strallen] was in it and was also the Dance Captain, and was very good friends with the resident director. They were looking for young Jennys, and I got the job! It was so different from any other child role, though: the children here in Mary Poppins have a big dressing room and there are ten of them, but with that, I had this tiny little broom cupboard all to myself, my very own dressing room! That was just incredible, absolutely incredible! 

Your mother was a dancer, and her sister is Bonnie Langford, who is now coming back to the West End next month as Roxie Hart in Chicago. Was Bonnie, who also started as a child actor, an inspiration or a warning?
Yes, Bonnie started young, when she was about 7. I think my parents were very cautious about going down a similar route with me. But we all have done so. In fact, I’ve got three younger sisters and we’re all in the business now! The teenagers were both in Scrooge, for which my mom was kids’ director–they’re 12 and 15, and Sassie, the younger of them, has just started filming the latest Harry Potter. Summer, who is 21, was in Guys and Dolls and got all the publicity for her dance with Ewan McGregor; and she’s seriously following in my footsteps now as she’s just been offered Regent’s Park [where Strallen did HMS Pinafore last year] for this summer.

Is there any competitiveness with each other at all?
There isn’t and there hasn’t been. I kind of felt huge pride when Summer just told me that she’s got Helena inA Midsummer Night’s Dream and Maisie in The

Ross McCormack, Scarlett Strallen & Lydia Bannister in Mary Poppins

Boyfriend that they’re doing at the Open Air Theatre this year. It’s really brilliant, because I know all the people there and will be able to see her.

After you did Aspects of Love, you also did a revival of Annie Get Your Gun at the same theatre, the Prince of Wales. What professional training did you do after that?
After doing those two shows, I went to Arts Educational School when I was ten, which provides a vocational as well as academic training. Two of my sisters followed me there, but Sassie’s at Sylvia Young! She’s different from all of us–she’s more of a character kind of girl, and she’s been in Billy Elliot already. She’s funny and has the kind of confidence that the other three of us haven’t had–we were all quite shy–so she wanted to do something completely new for school. When I did Mamma Mia!, I was 16 and studying for my A Levels as well. Jenny Galloway, who was a huge influence on me, took me under her wing and used to go through my English A Level with me, and she told me to keep reading plays as well as doing musicals. Appearing in Mamma Mia!, the ensemble has to sing offstage for the whole show they’re not onstage in the booth; others would read magazines and books, but I had all my studying to do!

You were also in the original cast of The Witches of Eastwick, first at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane and then on its transfer to the Prince of Wales where you had begun onstage. You’ve definitely served your apprenticeship….
I really have, and I’m so pleased that I have. People comment that I’m so much more down to earth than some other people they’ve worked with, because I know what it’s like on the upper floors!

You moved floors during the run of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang….
I was in it for three years. I was there right at the beginning as the main dancer for Gillian Lynne, and in the second year I took over a small part and covered Truly Scrumptious. I was only 19, and in the third year, they offered me the lead. I thought, can I stay in this for three years? But then Truly is a lovely part as well, so it was good to step up into that part.

You’ve now made the transition from ensemble dancer to leading lady. How does that feel?
I was really lucky. Chitty really helped, being moved up from ensemble and understudy to lead role doesn’t happen that often. But getting the Park right after that really helped, too, to change people’s perceptions. I worked with some incredible actors there, most of whom are working in the West End now it seems–Daniel Flynn is in A Man for All Seasons, and Martin Jarvis is in Honour, for instance.

And now, of course, you’re the West End’s leading leading lady, in Mary Poppins.
I was quite anxious in a way about this when it came up. I’d never taken over like this before, so I was worried–you get so little time to prepare compared to doing a show from the beginning. You get five weeks to do an entire put-in, and there is so much to learn with Mary: I was thinking, am I going to be told what to do and say and not have any original input for myself? But in fact Richard [Eyre, the co-director with Matthew Bourne] was there from Day One, and he completely let me go with whatever I thought. I knew that I had something very big to live up to with Julie Andrews and also with Laura Michelle Kelly as well, because Laura had done such an amazing job in the first company. I knew how different I was to her, but they were encouraging that. They didn’t just want to
have an identical copy.

What does it feel like to now be part of the show, and playing such an iconic character?
It feels incredible! It’s such a weird feeling being in this show, because it is so different to me from the film. I grew up with the film–it was my favourite film! It really was, I’m not just saying that–I saw it millions and millions of times! But seeing the show, it is such a completely different thing. I hadn’t read the PL Travers stories until the part came up, and suddenly there was this whole other Mary Poppins world that I didn’t know about. They’re a whole other world from the film; they’re just brilliant. And I think that what the creators of this musical have managed to do is just incredible–they’ve managed to marry it all together, so

Scarlett Strallen in Mary Poppins

that people who love the film won’t be disappointed, and people who love the stories won’t be, either.

And you have to be the triple threat–a singer, dancer and actor.
That’s what’s so lucky about it–there aren’t many roles like that where you get to do all three, and then there’s the magic as well, so that’s four! And then there’s the flying, too, so that’s five!

Is the flying scary?
Not at all! I had a moment the first time I did it, when there were five automation and stage management people and just me in the theatre, doing it for the first time, and I wondered how I was going to feel at the top! But now it’s my favourite part of the show! I don’t have to do anything: it’s just an incredible, really special and exhilarating moment!

Do you have any other favourite moments?
"Step in Time" is my second most favourite moment. There’s so much energy... I look around and the whole cast is so talented, there are some incredible voices, and I really love the choreography. It’s so well constructed. The number just flows!

Are there any downsides?
I sometimes get what I call my Mary arm, from having to hold the bag! It’s so heavy, and you have to hold it with a stiff arm, so I sometimes get this Mary arm, a huge ache, usually on a Saturday night! It’s made of steel, to give it that kind of starchy look. There are actually three different bags–when I was rehearsing, and did my first dress run, I ran up the stairs, and had to leave one of the bags at the top of the stairs, because when I walk in there’s a bag already set with the magic in it. But I brought both bags in, and I was standing there with them both, which slightly ruined the illusion! And the flying harness is slightly uncomfortable, but you get over it!

How did it feel to get to go to the Olivier Awards a few weeks ago as a nominee?
I still can’t get over it! It was just brilliant. I was quite shocked to begin with going to the awards, as there were so many people there that I’ve previously only heard of. I suddenly got terrified–sitting in my seat thinking I might actually have to go up and say something, so I was quite relieved that I didn’t win. But what an honour to be nominated!

Have you done any films?
Yes. I was in Kevin Spacey’s film Beyond the Sea. I did three weeks filming out in Berlin, where it was freezing cold in the middle of winter. They needed a

Scarlett Strallen & Gavin Lee in Mary Poppins

couple of dancers to do this wonderful MGM choreography by Rob Ashford, who also did Guys and Dolls, and is so brilliant!

What do you like to do in your spare time?
I don’t actually have a huge amount of time. All the days seem to be leading up to coming in, or meeting people like yourself, or at the moment we’re doing a cast change, so there are extra rehearsals. It really hasn’t stopped since I joined the show last October. But I like the usual things–my hobbies are reading and the cinema. Gavin Lee, who plays Bert, is a huge film buff as well–he goes to the cinema about five times a week! We actually worked on a show together that he always forgets that I even did–a stage version of Peggy Sue Got Married. This job now is really incredible because of him.

Have you had any periods of unemployment?
I’ve actually been very lucky. The most I’ve had off is about two months when I’ve known what I was going on to, so I took those two months off to travel.

And what’s next?
I’m signed here till October. I’d love to do Broadway–it’s an ambition for any performer. I’ve been to visit twice, but I think London is equally exciting at the moment. And to be a Cameron Mackintosh leading lady is such an honour, a dream! So I just think I’ll go with the flow and with anything that comes my way. But I’m totally mortified that I can’t audition for Wicked, because it opens before I finish this!

See Scarlett Strallen in Mary Poppins at the Prince Edward Theatre, Old Compton Street. Click for tickets and more information.