Actress Lucy Briers on the Impact of Having a Very Famous UK TV Actor Father, Majestic Recovery After Betrayal & Divorce & the Poignant 'De-Tethering' of her Mother’s Alzheimer’s

Ladies n' Genminminmin (er, min...) please welcome Award Winning Actress & fellow Bristol Old Vic Theatre School Alumni, Lucy Briers to 'The Clearing'.

Lucy is from Theatre & Show Business Aristocracy here in the UK, as she is the daughter of Richard Briers, the famous UK TV Actor and National Treasure, now sadly no longer with us, but listen with delight as Lucy describes her joy and luck at having her very own 'Dad cupboard: With 250 or so DVDs, capturing his wonderful career on screen, if ever she needs a 'top-up' to watch him speak and move!

Lucy Briers chooses Sheep Meadow, Central Park Manhattan as her ‘Soul City’ and as her 'Clearing'. 

Despite her ‘weird blood disorder’, Lucy is almost always smiling or chuckling - even when dealing with big or bittersweet issues. Like her father Richard’s fame and popularity interfering with their walks together as a child or her mother’s progressive  Alzheimer’s disease changing almost everything about her behaviour in her final years. Lucy herself alludes to her own serious illnesses in earlier years and how hands-on healing, helped her shrink a tumour by half! 

Listening closely to her narrative, we get a wonderful picture of a privileged, posh, bright, private-school-educated Sloane Ranger-type choosing a radical alternative to Oxbridge: a highly political, reputedly ‘gay’, transformative, red-brick university - Lancaster! - to do a Degree in Theatre and Sculpture (Independent Studies). Here our lovely young Lucy shaved off her long hair, dyed what was left a bright orange and picked up the placards of protest. 

Then she went on to the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School - to learn how to act. 
In 2019 Lucy Briers won the prestigious Clarence Derwent Award for Best Supporting Actress. (Lucy hadn’t heard of it either - check it out, it’s impressive, with the likes of Gene Hackman & Christopher Walken as previous recipients!) 

Lucy now sees herself as a ‘structured person’ (even though she wittily describes herself as still being nevertheless ‘deeply superficial’!).  But Lancaster was the first 'radical reconstruction' for her. So was getting divorced. So was the deeply poignant story we also get to hear about caring for her mother through the 'great de-tethering' of her Alzheimer’s. 

Lucy has learned a lot of life’s lessons the hard way and changed, she believes, for the better. That is her objective - to deepen her understanding of the human condition and share it on stage, with the spirit of her famous father supporting her whenever needed with words of encouragement from the wings. 

Lucy admits to a continuing crush on Ryan Gosling as well as personal and professional admiration for Tom Cruise. She is a most fascinating paradox: a very private person, who is also an extrovert. 

Here is a truly wonderful woman and a truly wonderful conversation!

Tune in next week for more stories of 'Distinction & Genius' from The Good Listening To Show 'Clearing'. If you would like to be my Guest too then you can find out HOW via the different 'series strands' at 'The Good Listening To Show' website.

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Thanks for listening!