My Transcript from Rupert’s talk onstage at Sherlocked UK 2017 - This has taken me a Heck of a lot of work, so please do not re-post any of it elsewhere without asking me first - thanks & Enjoy!!
Rupert: Enters by jumping over his chair (Sherlock’s TAB chair) to sit on it
Compere: so, if you didn’t know folks, this is the Actual 221B set… and as Rupert did that entrance there was a bloke down in the sound booth going (mimes eyes wide open in horror)! (everyone laughs, oopsy). So, Good morning!
Rupert: (deep voice) Mornin’. (looks around at us) Ohh, hello… people!
Compere: so, obviously everyone here will know you as Greg Lestrade, but you’ve had a very long career on stage screen and telly, but when you started, it wasn’t quite that way, when you were at school, what made you want to become an actor?
Rupert: I was actually quite shy at school, and I had a stammer so I went to a speech therapist to help me with exams and we did a bit of acting and I did alright in those, and I thought, ohh, this seems good. I was in Weston Super Mare in a pretty lousy school, and I was terrible at school. I left when I was 15 without any O levels. So I had no real options. I did some comic monologues, touring round the West country, and I did alright in those. And then the circus came into town and they’d lost a clown Very carelessly! So I got on a bus & walked into the tent and said hello! The Government actually paid me 25quid a week on a youth training scheme, well no - they paid the circus, to train me as a clown. Drama school would have been great, but I just didn’t have any money to get a grant as I had no O levels. I was just so naive and I was just from this small West country town so I didn’t know how to do it. So I just joined the circus as my only way.
Compere: I looked up and an interview said you did slack wire - but I have no idea what that is
Rupert: It’s like the opposite of a tightrope - it’s just a really slackened wire and you need a lot more balance on it. It is really genuinely difficult. But if I fell off I was just like (mimics high pitched laughing and brushing himself off). I think, a proper clowns reaction I got across every time!
Compere: And how many times were you carried out (injured)?
Rupert: Well, you learn to fall. So I learnt to do that, and smile when I was actually in great pain. It was a very small, pretty colourful but rubbishy circus. It was called (difficult to hear, Dr Mings??) Circus. And we used to travel, we’d put our tents in odd places like old swimming pools! Which hurt, because of the concrete! (he giggles to himself)
Compere: There was another career path that you were tempted to take I was told that you wanted to do, but weren’t allowed to do - which is to become a Nun!
Rupert: Yeah! (quite proudly) I did want to become a nun… But… I was only about 6! And I didn’t realise what you actually needed to be a nun!
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