The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel comes to Leeds Playhouse

It’s not often you see mature actors leading a play, and what makes The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel different is that the younger cast members are in supporting roles as a group of British retirees find themselves trying to make new lives in India.

The two smash movies featured the cream of British acting Oscar winners having great fun as they help a mother and son save their rundown hotel and finding themselves along the way. The stage production is based on the book that inspired the movies, and also features some acting royalty in Paul Nicholas, Rula Lenska and Hayley Mills as the tour which has played to packed houses makes its way to Leeds Playhouse.

Rekha John-Cheriyan is one of the younger cast members playing the feisty Mrs Kapoor who will do anything to save the hotel, and she tells our Features Editor Paul Clarke why she thinks audiences want to see their favourite movie onstage.

There’s been two hit The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel movies, so will audiences enjoy the stage version?

This play is based on the book that Deborah Moggach wrote, which is called These Foolish Things, then the film rights were bought, and it became The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. But she didn’t write the screenplay, so elements of her book were used in the film.

So why a stage version?

And although she is really proud of that film because it’s in most people’s Top 20 apparently, it was never quite what she wrote in the book, so she decided to write the stage play that was more faithful to the book. There are elements of both Marigold one and Marigold two in the play because it covers everything in the book.

When I watched the movies I was expecting something a bit twee, but there are some quite raw moments, especially the culture clash the middle class retirees face when they arrive in India.

I think the first line is ‘bloody hell’, which kind of sums it up really. They’ve all come for their own reasons and the play just follows their journey as they come to terms with life there, what they’ve left behind, and interspersed with that are the people who live there. So my character, and my character’s son, they run the hotel. He is in love with a girl, his mother wants him to have an arranged marriage and the hotel residents get involved with all that, they help him with his romance and try to help Mrs Kapoor keep their hotel.  They are shocked at first, but they do grow to love it.

What are the challenges playing the forthright Mrs Kapoor?

She could be quite an easy character to really dislike because she seems to be very manipulative, and she seems to be pushing her son in a way that she wants him to live his life as opposed to letting him live his life. But then as the story goes on, you see that’s comes from a place of resolving the financial difficulties rather than his wellbeing. She also comes from a place of what society thinks so she doesn’t want him to have a love marriage with an unsuitable girl.  There is a reason for all her behaviour, and in the end her love for her son shines through.

And are you having fun playing someone who could be described as a bit challenging to say the least?

I’m really enjoyed playing her, although it didn’t help when my children came to see it, and my son, who is an actor, said you weren’t acting at all. That’s just the way you are at home always shouting, that put me in my place a bit.  My challenge was just trying to make sure the audience didn’t dislike her, though I don’t think they did according to what they say at stage door, so I think it’s working OK.

I get really angry when people dismiss older people and their rich life experiences, so is the play like the movies also a celebration of being older and the freedom that can bring?

It’s so wonderful that something has been written with strong characters who are in their later years. Our older cast have more energy than you can imagine, our oldest member is 85 and she just is like a spring chicken. The characters have enough energy to get them to India in the first place, and they have that willingness to embrace the new life, even though they’re a bit scared about what that entails. Even though their heart is still in England, and they’re still trying to do things the way they would there, they do have that zest for life.

So, there’s hope for everyone no matter how old they are?

There is a line at the end where one of the characters says, you know, people think we’ve come here to die, but I’m just beginning to live. And it is that the whole play is about, that feeling of it’s never too late to do whatever you want to do at it. Never. You just need to have the courage to go do it.

I don’t want to always hark back to the films, but there were a significant number of Oscar winner and nominees onscreen, and there’s some big names in this production too.

The film had Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Bill Nighy, and they were all the people that you loved, all our national treasures in the films and we’ve got that on stage as well. Hayley Mills is a complete and utter legend, Oscar winner, she’s done so much, and the most gorgeous person you could work with, or just be with. Rula Lenska complete star, and Paul Nicholas, the cheeky chappie from the eighties, and still even in his 70s has still got that glint in his eye. As far as I’m concerned they are legends and we have the privilege of working with them. Most of our audiences are older, they know the film and they want to come and see all the people on stage and they love Hayley, Rula and Paula and because of that they love us as well so we all benefit from it.

Why do you think people are coming to see a stage version of two beloved movies?

It’s very character driven, but fundamentally the reason people are coming today is I think they’ve heard of The Best Exotic Marigolds and that’s a draw in itself, but they want to see people like themselves, we all do. The audiences we have, which are typically older, are loving seeing possibly themselves on stage, or people that they know, and giving them ideas about what they might like to do. And then you can’t not mention the fact that they’re coming to see their heroes.

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel is at Leeds Playhouse from 14th – 18th February. To book online at www.leedsplayhouse.org.uk or 0113 213 7700