Laura Linney: I hope I get to be in theatre for the rest of my life

Your dad was a playwright and you grew up with theatre in your bones. What was your actual experience of theatre as a child? 

I was taken to the theatre a lot, which I’m so grateful for. The most important thing that happened was my stepmother worked at Adelphi University and there was a famous arts educator there named Grace Stanistreet. She created a children’s theatre arts consortium that took place on Saturdays. And my stepmother took me there once a week.

It was the first time I had arts education. And it was transformative. Then I went and worked at a small theatre in New Hampshire [which was where] my dad was an apprentice in the 1950s – I was a technical apprentice there and worked backstage, and that was very informative. 

I went to every Broadway show I could. Pippin was the first musical I ever saw. I love it. I saw all of the musicals. I saw all of the theatre. There were great straight playhouses when I was growing up that did all the classics.

And my father worked in the regional theatre system. So I was able to go to the theatres outside of New York and see plays there, which I loved. I’ve learned every important lesson about life from the theatre. It’s a portal to being a good human being. I just think it is.

You mentioned the regional theatre [where you were a technical apprentice]. That obviously gave you the insight for the whole spectrum of theatre?

That’s right. It’s really important for every actor to do that sort of work. Because then you also realise what your job is and what’s not your job.
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Your character Kristen in American Classic has a background in acting – and we even get to hear you sing yourself...

Oh, it was agony. I’m not a singer. I’m just not a singer. It’s not my forte. So I really tried to get out of it. A lot. At some point, I just surrendered. I was like: ‘I’m going to lose this, so just jump off the cliff.’ 

But that feeling when you did it, it must have been euphoric, right? 

It was relief. No, I wouldn’t say euphoria was a part of that equation, but it was relief. And I’m proud of myself for doing it.

I am halfway through the series and can’t wait to see where this relationship with Kevin’s character goes, as you had a former relationship with his character. 

Yes. So Kevin Kline’s character Richard, who’s this big Broadway star, was my former boyfriend. And I moved to New York with him from this small town. We split. We break up. I move back home. And I marry his brother.

Sounds like there’s a potential for messiness there. We see at the beginning that Kevin’s character has this very public meltdown following an interaction with a well-known critic. I wondered what your own relationship is with critics...

I never read a review. It’s not their job to tell me how to feel about my own work. I know how I feel about my own work. I don’t need someone to tell me. I really don’t. 

They’re there for important reasons. They’re documentarians. They’re advertisers. They have a job. And what I remind myself is they love the theatre. No matter how mean they are to people and how heartbreaking they can be, I have to believe – and I want to believe – that they love the theatre. So I give them a wide lane because of that. 

And I think how hard it must be [to be a critic]. Imagine being a critic and having people hate you. Having the actors who you admire hate you. So I have real empathy and real respect for the really intelligent ones. 
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You’ve done so much on screen, but what I love about your career is that you go back to the theatre. You don’t abandon it for film and TV.

I like to think that I ‘go forward’ into theatre and not ‘back to’ theatre. I always flinch a little bit when I hear: ‘Oh, you go back to the theatre.’ It’s just semantics. But there is something a little like ‘I’m retreating to the theatre’, or ‘I’m not able to do something else so I go back to the theatre’. And, you know, I hope I get to be in theatre for the rest of my life. And I’m lucky because it’s a place where you can age. You can age in the theatre. 

I saw you in My Name is Laura Barton back at the Bridge Theatre in 2018. You must have been one of the earliest shows in that theatre. 

I was the second show in. Thank God I didn’t know how beautiful that space is. I walked in there and I was like: ‘Oh, thank God, I had no idea.’ I was already scared. I mean, I would have been paralysed, paralytically scared, if I had known. 

Were you scared because it was a one-person show? 

Yes, I was. It’s a very different experience. It’s an animal all its own. And I’m proud of myself for being able to do it. 

Are you going to see many shows while you’re here? 

I went to Kingston’s Rose Theatre and saw Michael Sheen’s Our Town. It was gorgeous.

Do you know Michael Sheen? 

A little bit. Yes, we are birthday siblings. So we text each other on 5th February. There’s a text that goes back and forth every year.

What he’s doing with the Welsh National Theatre is incredible. I mean, God bless him. It’s incredible. It makes me want to just stand up and cheer. 

I think there’s an undertow towards that – of getting theatre back into the small communities, of having artists from certain areas of the world represent themselves, and of claiming stories and telling them with a particular point of cultural view. All of that is vitally important. And God bless him. He does 5th February very proud. 
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Did you like his production of Our Town? 

I loved it. And I love that play. It is a play that has been in my life for a very long time. My grandmother was in a production of Our Town. My father wrote a short story about watching his mother in Our Town. I actually stage managed a high-school production. It is a true American classic. It is. And it is a great play.

What about being an executive producer on this? Was that really important to you?

It’s a privilege. And the thing that’s nice about getting to this point where I’ve been in the industry for so long is that is it gives you a voice. So I can speak up. 

What kind of things do you need to speak up for?

Just if there’s something that I see that I think maybe hasn’t been considered. It just gives me a voice. 

Lastly, I have to ask, do you think you’ll come back to the West End? 

Of course I will. If invited. I love the audiences here. I thought it would be a little colder as an experience – I thought the audience would be a little reserved. But no, that was not my experience.

My experience was warm. And, you know, there’s a sound of people listening. You can hear it on stage. Like a room of people being quiet – listening has a sound and it’s pretty great. It’s the sweet spot of where you want to be when you’re on stage. You want to be held by that. And I had that every night here.

American Classic is streaming now on MGM+