Lara Pulver made an unforgettable impact with one of her first television appearances as Sherlock’s nemesis Irene Adler – shocking the unshockable sleuth by appearing completely
in the buff.
Now the Jewish actress is returning to British television in one of her biggest shows to date, Maternal, which is set to be a huge hit when it launches in a few weeks on ITV.
The new series is quite the family affair for Lara, who went on to star in Spooks and also won an Olivier award for her West End performance in Gypsy, as it also features her husband Raza Jaffrey and her best friend Parminder Nagra.
I met all three on the Liverpool set of the series earlier this year and had a sneak preview of the first episode which I absolutely loved. A drama with lashings of dark humour, it tells the story of three doctors who have gone back to work after having children and depicts what life is like for working mums – in all of its stressful, exhausting and joyful glory.
It is a juggling act Lara knows only too well, as a mother to son Ozias, five, and Thea, two. She starred in the last series of The Split but this is the first leading role she has felt happy to take on since becoming a parent.
“I love being a mum, it is the best thing I’ve ever done,” she says. “But I was ready for the balance of that and coming back to work and being around extraordinary minds and creative collaborators. It felt like a good time.”
She plays ambitious surgeon and single mum Catherine MacDiarmid, who is battling childcare issues while facing competition for a promotion from her arrogant rival and former lover, played by Raza.
“When I first read about the challenges she faces in the script I thought, ‘Oh come on! Surely that doesn’t happen!’ but the more I’ve spoken to people in the profession, they agree that things like begging the babysitter to stay for another hour because a stab wound victim has come into the OR [operating room] is perfectly normal,’ says Lara.
“We have a dear friend who was in the middle of doing an operation and got a call through the intercom of the OR because the nanny couldn’t turn the alarm system off after picking the kids up from school. She was talking them through turning off the alarm while operating with a scalpel in her hand.”
It is no coincidence that Raza and Parminder – an old friend and close neighbour of the pair in Los Angeles – also got roles in the six-part series. Parminder, who first found fame in ER, was helping Lara read her lines during her virtual audition with the show’s producers when they asked her if she fancied auditioning for one of the other roles. Raza read with her and he ended up getting a job offer too.
“It is such a gift that a job should come up which is as brilliantly written as this but for them to say ‘Here’s your best friend and your husband to go to work with’ is extraordinary,’ says Lara. “We already have that chemistry and that history which means you can go deeper quicker.”
Maureen-Lipman-Rose-credit-Jay-Brooks
Maureen Lipman in Rose (Photo by Jay Brooks)
Maureen Lipman tells me she is hoping to bring her show Rose – which won standing ovations every night when it played at the Park Theatre in Finsbury Park and the Hope Mill in Manchester – to the West End, if she can find producers who are willing to put some money behind it.
The one-woman play, which was written for Maureen by Martin Sherman, focuses on the Rose of the title who is sitting shiva for the dead Jews of the 20th century.
From Rose’s first pogrom to escaping the Holocaust, attempting to get into Palestine and finally finding a home in America, the play is incredibly powerful.
“It is such an important story for our community, I would love to think that more people could see it,” Maureen told me when we met at a Chanukah party for the National Jewish Assembly hosted by Baroness Deech at the House of Lords.
JEWS IN THE NEWS
Stacey Solomon has provoked much debate after openly admitting to having a favourite child – her eldest son Zachary.
stacey solomon
Stacey Solomon's show Sort Your Life Out has been nominated for an NTA (Photo: Jeff Spicer/Getty Images)
The star revealed her favouritism on her BBC Crafty Christmas show (I enjoy the chutzpah of a Jewish celeb making a Christmas craft show), saying: “Ah Zack, my favourite child. Just kidding – but he is. I’m just joking again – everyone’s got one – don’t pretend you don’t.” In case my kids are reading this: I don’t have a favourite child.
Quentin Tarantino has admitted he originally wrote the role of Sgt Donny “The Bear Jew” Donowitz in Inglorious Bastards for Adam Sandler and was devastated when the comedy actor had to decline because he was filming Judd Apatow’s Funny People. Tarantino, who used Eli Roth in the role, says Sandler had initially been thrilled at the idea telling him: “Oh man, I get to f-ing beat up Nazis with a bat? F-ing awesome! I can’t f-ing wait!” One day this still needs to happen.
