All About Manchester

Homecoming Queen

From slacker Twinkle in Victoria Wood's Dinnerladies to the brassy Veronica in Shameless and the cold blooded Myra Hindley in See No Evil, Maxine Peake has gone to great lengths to avoid being typecast. This spring, as she prepares to star in the Royal Exchange Theatre's production of The Children's Hour, she tells All About Manchester she is returning to her roots in more ways than one.

Maxine Peake seems to have grown younger since her days in Shameless - the Bafta award-winning drama that made her a household name. Sporting a short, fringed bob and no make-up, the 33-year-old actress looks radiant but completely unaware of it.

Born in Bolton, Peake has lived in London since she was 21, but not for much longer. "I'm just in the process of moving back North, hopefully," she says, nestling her mug of tea in both hands. "I'm buying a place in Salford."

If you think this is a very bizarre move for a celebrated actress to make, think again. By 2010 Salford will become home to the UK's first purpose-built media city, making it a vibrant hub for creative people. But Peake's reasons for moving closer to home are more personal.

"I just decided that I needed a change," she says in a matter-of-fact tone. "I wanted somewhere that was near Manchester city centre so that getting the train to London for auditions isn't going to be too bothersome; and I've got family that live in Bolton so it's 20 minutes door to door to them. And that's important to me, that I'm near family."

With Peake's impressive CV it is difficult to believe that casting agents aren't tripping over themselves to offer her work, but she says the reality is a bit more mundane.

"I don't really get many offers for screen or stage. I still have to go and audition. And I still have a bit of a struggle sometimes to convince casting directors.

"I like to keep people guessing with my choice of roles and I hate to hear things like 'you're not right for this because you're from Bolton'. Well I may not be, personally, but we do all act!

"I actually prefer to play characters that are further away. The hardest parts to play are when they say 'just be yourself'. What is that anyway, what is being yourself? I did this thing recently called Cinderella and I was thinking 'right I'm just going to be more like me'. I watched it back and thought 'that is quite possibly the worst performance I've ever done in my life'."

Peake will not have to worry about being herself in her latest stage role at the Royal Exchange, or about proving herself to the theatre's newly appointed artistic director Sarah Frankcom, who offered it to her.

"Sarah has madly got this confidence that I can do it and it's quite flattering in some respects. In other respects I'm thinking you actually don't know if I can do this, are you crazy giving me this part?"

Her modesty is genuine and endearing, but we're with Frankcom on this - Peake is perfectly suited for the role of Karen Wright in Lillian Hellman's The Children's Hour, which opens at the Royal Exchange on March 5.

Karen is a teacher at an all-girls boarding school founded by herself and her friend Martha. Just when the two women have started to get the school up to standard, an angry pupil accuses them of an illicit affair - a lie that brings their world tumbling down.

The play was very controversial when it first opened in 1934, but will it strike a chord with people today?

Peake thinks so. "Maybe the circumstances wouldn't have been as tragic today but it is still a universal story about how lies and mass hysteria can ruin careers and lives. And, also, it's part of theatre that you do transfer back to that time. You do put yourself in that mind-frame of being in the 30s and being affected by this scandal."

Karen Wright is quite unlike any other character Peake has ever tackled. "She's quite contained, Karen, and very practical," she explains. "Out of the two teachers she's the least outwardly emotional character, but she's got a lot going on - very few people are really what they seem on the surface, aren't they? So it's a challenging role for me because I tend to play characters that you sort of know where you are with - this role requires more control than I usually have.

"I've also got to do an American accent, which I'm a bit worried about. They say it's in Boston and I keep joking 'well I'm from Bolton, that's why me accent's so bad'."

Peake admits that one of the reasons that attracted her to this role was the opportunity to work with Frankcom again - the actress first worked with the director in 2005, on the Royal Exchange Theatre's Rutherford and Son. But she says it is also a hoot to work with fellow cast member Charlotte Emmerson, who plays Martha.

"Charlotte has been one of my best friends for eight or nine years now, so we are still going through that phase where we're just giggling. In fact we're sharing a flat together so I just hope that the friendship survives this production!"

And she is excited to be working with rising star Kate O'Flynn, who plays the pupil. "She's fantastic," she enthuses. "I think she's definitely going to be one of the faces to watch."

The Royal Exchange is a comfortably familiar place for Peake, who used to be a member of the youth theatre here. Can we expect to see more of her on stage when she moves to Salford?

"I'd love to do much more theatre. Good screen roles are thin on the ground when you're in your mid-30s; stage parts are slightly more interesting."

With all the questions answered, the conversation descends into idle chat. We compare notes on getting old, doing something you love and…well, hair colour.

Peake's hair, bleached to within an inch of its life for Shameless and See no Evil and then dyed dark brown and red since then for other roles, is finally starting to revert to its natural colour - a dark ash-blond that brings out the twinkle in her blue eyes.

Yes, our favourite actress is back and we hope she doesn't stray too far again.

The Children's Hour is on at the Royal Exchange from March 5 - April 5. For more information visit www.royalexchange.co.uk.

Digital Edition

Corrie - the play

Free beauty products

Aspiring entrepreneur?

Homecoming Queen