Interview: Ria Jones Chats HABEAS CORPUS at Menier Chocolate Factory

Ria Jones is known for her roles in musicals, most recently Sunset Boulevard at Leicester Curve and Gypsy at Royal Exchange, Manchester. She now makes her straight play debut in the Menier Chocolate Factory's revival of Alan Bennett's Habeas Corpus. We spoke with Jones about the show.

How are you? How has this year been compared with last year?

I'm good, thank you. I've been very lucky in that I've got a garden. I've also been able to go back and forth to Wales more this year to visit my mum and dad and spend quite a bit of time with them, which I think is important.

They're both in their 80s now, and time is precious, as we all know, especially during the last couple of years. We've lost so many people, dear to us.

So I've enjoyed spending time with family and embracing my hometown again. I haven't lived there for 34 years! It's been lovely to revisit childhood haunts and go down to the beach every day, blow away the cobwebs, and spend time with my little dog.

I've really used this time to reconnect with family and friends. I've realised what's important in life: health, first and foremost, family and work.

It's been a terrible time for our industry, but I guess I'm very lucky in the fact that I'm at the point in my career where it's actually been nice to have time off. As of next year, I'll have been working for over forty years, pretty much working non-stop - I'm very lucky.

It's been a time for me as well, I guess; a time for me to stop and really think about my career and where I'd like it to go, you know, over the next ten years. I chatted with my agent and said that I'd love to do a play, you know, a comedy and if it could be in London even better.

So luckily for me, this production of Habeas Corpus ticks a lot of boxes. I also get to work with wonderful Patrick Marber. My CV is full of musicals! I never thought I'd get a chance to audition for a play like this. I was delighted to get an audition and then even more delighted to get the role of Mrs Swabb.

At the end of 2020, you reprised your performance as Norma Desmond in Leicester Curve's revival of Sunset Boulevard. What was it like, in that particular moment, returning to the stage in that role?

If I could have chosen anyone to play at that time, it would definitely have been Nora Desmond. The lyrics of "As If We Never Said Goodbye" were so poignant during that moment.

I really didn't think it would happen: originally, we were supposed to perform to live audiences at the Curve, and then when the second lockdown happened, we as a company thought we just had to accept our fate.

But then, Nikolai Foster said, "No, that can't be it. There must be some way to get this show to audiences." So that's when they decided to stream it, and the version everyone saw was pretty much one take. Sure we stopped a few times because a few of us had to get from one end of the auditorium to the other; otherwise, it was filmed as one live show.

I was absolutely thrilled with the final output. You don't know how these things are going to turn out. We only had a few days of rehearsal to brush up on lyrics and music, then we did a dress run, and that was it; we were then in the hands of the film company.

I'm so delighted with the response we got from audiences, and it's nice to have something that will always be there, preserved in film.

You are now making your straight play debut in Habeas Corpus. What drew you to this production?

I really wanted to do a play, and then when this Alan Bennett play came through, well, I just love Talking Heads! I love his writing. I've always wanted to work at the Menier and work with Patrick Marber - he's so well respected. He's a wonderful writer and performer himself; him being the director was just the icing on the cake. It was a no-brainer, really.

I just love the role of Mrs Swabb. It's a farce. It's comedy. It may not be a straight play by Shakespeare, but it's still a play with quite a few surprises - which I won't spoil.

The company are wonderful, wonderful actors and such fun to be around. I'm really enjoying being part of the team again. The configuration of the Menier backstage has just two dressing rooms, so we're all in it together. It's just a lovely atmosphere chatting away getting ready.

Normally I'm on my own in a dressing room, and while that's great when you need to focus, you miss out on the camaraderie you get in other dressing rooms. So it's lovely to have that real company feel before we got on stage every night.

I love what the Menier Chocolate Factory puts on as a little production house. It's had so much success; you've got Funny Girl opening on Broadway, after their version of The Color Purple, all these wonderful musicals have taken Broadway by storm and won lots of awards - from tiny acorns, mighty oaks grow.

What's your favourite thing about playing Mrs Swabb?

Alan Bennett writes every character so beautifully and brilliantly. It's a joy to perform those lines every night.

I love playing characters. I loved playing Mrs Overall in Acorn Antiques. In a way, Mrs Swabb is quite a similar character: she's a similar age, a cook, and a cleaning lady.

In the play, Mrs Swabb is basically the narrator of the piece as well as a character in the play itself. I jump in and out of So, you know, I jumped in and out of narrating to the audience, playing the role of Mrs Swabb within the play, which is quite fun!

I love jumping in and out of character when I do my cabaret shows. I just love chatting with the audience. When the venue is so intimate, you feel like you're just chatting to friends.

I also love the physicality of playing her because I'm playing her a lot older. What's funny is that people know me as Norma Desmond, with her turban and everything, and I'm also wearing a turban in this, but it's a very, very different turban, not glamorous at all; it's a knitted turban! I can't seem to get away from turbans at the moment. When I first saw the photos, I laughed!

I'm so lucky that I can be versatile in this industry; I'm Eva Peron one moment and then Mrs Overall, such a contrast. I think it's good to have as many strings to your bow as possible to give you longevity.

I've always loved comedy. Acorn Antiques was the first big comedy role I was offered, and working with the late great Victoria Wood was a dream come true because she's a genius. We became good friends during that job. It was a wonderful time in my career.

How are performances going so far?

They've been good so far. The audiences seem to be loving it, and it's been really busy every night. We've just opened, and we run right through until 27 February. There are alternative dates around the Christmas break - the best place to check is the Menier's website.

The last time Habeas Corpus had a high-profile production in London was in 1996. Why is now the right time for it to be revived?

I think everyone needs a good laugh and a bit of escapism. It was written in 1973, which you might consider dated but it's absolutely spot on for its genre.

It's such a farce, and you don't get your hands on an Alan Bennett play every day. All we can do is stay true and honest to Alan's writing. It has wonderful laugh-out-loud moments.

In 1973, the wonderful Patricia Hayes played Mrs Swabb, then when it was revived at The Donmar Warehouse, it was Imelda Staunton. So now it's my turn. I'm just honoured and happy to be amongst such great actors who have played this role in the past.

Interestingly, there are a couple of lines in the play that are so current to the pandemic. It's uncanny. We get such a big laugh at a particular moment, and I'm convinced the audience thinks we added it because of the pandemic, but we really haven't; it was written in 1973!

Speaking of comedy, what has kept you laughing in the last year or so?

Netflix has definitely kept me laughing. I love shows like Call My Agent! and Schitt's Creek; I love film and dramas...I think we've been so lucky to be able to access such great shows on TV.

My friends make me laugh, my dog makes me laugh every day - really, every day. She's lying next to me now and waiting for her walk. We just have to try to remain positive during these dark times and know that it will get better.

Do you have any other upcoming projects at the moment that you'd like to tell us about?

Hot on the heels of Habeas Corpus, I'll be doing live shows and the Crazy Coqs with my brother, Ceri Dupree. We do a show together called Misleading Ladies. We did a month-long run six years ago at the St James' Theatre [now The Other Palace]. It was very, very successful, and we had lots of nominations and awards. People kept asking us to bring it back, so we have.

We'd have done it sooner if we hadn't been so busy. Ceri's about to open in panto, playing Widow Tranky in Aladdin at the Opera House in Manchester with Alexander Burke. We looked at our diaries and decided we wanted to do at least a week, so we've booked 11 shows coming up from 21 March.

We've called it Misleading Ladies - The Revenge. It won't be the same show we did six years ago, but it has the same style. It's basically a homage to all the wonderful leading ladies of the bygone era. I'll be playing tribute to Édith Piaf, Ethel Merman, Doris Day, Julie Andrews, and Ceri, and I will be doing some duets with some characters - for example, Ceri will do Betty Davis!

Why should people come and see Habeas Corpus?

If you want to forget about the past two years for two hours, come and see us at the Menier Chocolate Factory.

Habeas Corpus at Menier Chocolate Factory until 26 February 2022

Photo credit: Marc Brenner (Sunset Boulevard image); Manuel Harlan (Habeas Corpus images)

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