Ann Emery: Super Gran of the London stage

VICTORIA PALACE THEATRE, LONDON: "Billy Elliot The Musical" is an extraordinary phenomenon – a musical where ballet meets socialism. The scene where striking miners confront police lines with little girls in pink tutus tiptoeing between their ranks is unique on the musical stage. It has been seen by 8 million worldwide, won practically every award going and is still drawing enthusiastic audiences.

The stage adaptation followed the 2000 film of the same name which itself won three BAFTAs and was nominated for three Oscars. However for many the stage version, darker and more politically charged, was the more powerful presentation. Skilful direction by Stephen Daldry balances the dreams and the reality while Peter Darling’s choreography mucks in with the miners and takes flight with young Billy’s ambition.

Billy’s story of success in the face of great adversity added to the wonderfully imperfect roster of gritty characters made it a real winner. There was also an unexpected consequence in what came to be known as the ‘Billy Elliot effect’. At ballet schools, and the Royal Ballet School in particular, there was a sudden rise in the applications for auditions from young boys!  

Billy is a motherless boy so the role of Grandma takes on added importance. Dansportalen spoke to Ann Emery, who created the role in 2005 and she has recently returned to reprise her success. She won the Theatregoers’ Choice Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Musical in 2006 and was honoured with the Lifetime Achievement Award from the British Music Hall Society in 2010. 

Ann was born into a theatrical family and trained at the Cone Ripman School where she excelled in tap dancing. However her father insisted that she also do a secretarial course, just in case, but she never needed to use those skills! Like so many English dancers her first stage experience was in pantomime as one of the youngest child performers. So working with children was nothing new for her but, as she noted, in Billy Elliot they were ‘real theatre kids’.

Ann’s career is long and varied, ranging from Principal Boy and Fairy Godmother in pantomime to Gumbie Cat in Cats and Mrs Higgins in My Fair Lady. Early in her career she joined a dance group and toured the world, singing as well as dancing. It was in the tough world of weekly repertory theatre, where the resident company perform a new play each week, that she learnt the acting trade.

She has regularly appeared in Cameron Mackintosh musicals most recently in Betty Blue Eyes. She said, ‘I have been very lucky to work steadily most of my life’, but is too modest to mention that talent obviously played a major part in her success.

The auditions for the young ‘Billys’ are held all over the country in an effort to search out raw talent. Ann was effusive in her praise of the rigorous training the boys have in the role and the quality of their performances. For Liam Mower, one of the three original boys, the plot has become reality.

On stage the adult Billy takes the lead in Matthew Bourne’s famous Swan Lake, and Liam, now 21 years old, has recently joined Matthew Bourne’s New Adventures and is playing a leading role of Count Lilac in his Sleeping Beauty!

There are always three Billys in the show and Ann gets to rehearse with all of them. The talent of the performers and the work to get every detail right results in scenes that are, in her words, ‘near perfect’ and the first performance with each new Billy becomes for her, a really exciting event.

At 83, Ann Emery is the oldest in the cast but a power house of energy as can be seen in her rendition of Grandma’s Song – We’d Go Dancing. In this song her vitality fills the theatre as she relates to Billy how her unhappy marriage was only made bearable when she danced with his grandpa.

She told to Dansportalen: ‘I have to say Grandma’s Song is my highlight in the show, but I love working with all the actors in the other scenes and a big wonderful finale where I dance in a tutu with Billy at the end. We nearly stop the show every night’.

Maggie Foyer/Cristian Hillbom
24 dec 2013