Brian Beacom

BILLY McBain is an actor who doesn’t rely upon hyperbole to heighten conversation.

When he makes a grand statement he really means it.

And today, he’s come out with a whopper.

“I can say without shadow of a doubt this is the most difficult play I’ve ever been in,” he says of new Peter McDougall play, But That Was Then.

“The play reads like poetry. And that’s fantastic. But it also means you have to get it absolutely right or it trips you up.

“For example, in one line you say ‘A streak of cheek with a tear’, and then two lines later you are saying ‘A tear-streaked cheek.’

“You cannot get a word wrong, you can’t half know it, so when you go into rehearsals you’re ready.”

Billy, who grew up in Glasgow’s south side, has been making himself ready. And his efforts defy all expectation.

“I’ve been walking in Glasgow Green at six in the morning for a month talking to myself, trying to get the lines into my head,” he reveals.

“But it’s worth it. When you get lines such as ‘You think your life’s a whirly gig waiting for the gust from a puffed out wind to gie it a blow’ you realise why you do it.”

What is this play that’s so demanding of an actor he’s getting up at 5am to take to the park - and allowing the watching world to assume he’s slightly off his head?

“Marcia, (Alison Peebles) is an ageing actress who has seen better days and was once very much in demand,” he explains. “Now, she has a little bit of a go about people not getting back to her anymore.

“She goes up for auditions, but then hears nothing. What used to happen is casting directors would call your agent and say ‘Thanks for coming, but it didn’t work out this time.’

“And you accept that. But this common decency has been eroded in the business she is in.

“Sadly, Marcia, we learn, has become something of a dinosaur.”

Billy adds; “It’s all a contrast to the days when she used to be offered the big roles.”

Billy plays Marcia’s husband James, an unpublished writer who keeps an eye on his fragile partner.

“We discover he’s suffering from the weight of rejection slips he’s had to endure. And he still has to keep Marcia in check.”

The story is one of a behavioural change in society. Not only has the notion of politeness evaporated, there is an argument younger people in a position of power choose not to be polite.

They believe they look more powerful if they detach themselves from established social convention.

“I’ve had a sense of that in my career,” says Billy.

“It’s not entirely a new thing. Sometimes you go up for auditions and people haven’t bothered to look at see what you’ve been in before.

“You tell them you worked at the National, and they say ‘Theatre?’ You’re tempted to say sarcastically; ‘No, the National Tyre Depot.’”

He adds; “And there was a time when directors would call you with a result by a Friday. They didn’t want you hanging on waiting over the weekend. But that’s when things were more decent.”

If casting directors read Billy McBain’s cv they’d discover a wealth of experience, from a singing career to variety theatre, from stints at the RSC to working on an oil rig, and in television drama.

“But they don’t know what you’ve done, or care.

“I once went for an audition for the Bill, held out my hand to the director and he didn’t even bother to get up.

“It was all a contrast from working with someone such as Richard Widmark, real talent, who was fantastic and later wrote to me. “And I once went backstage to see Jimmy Stewart when he was at the Drury Lane Theatre in London with Harvey.

“He asked me about myself, he was lovely and chatted away. And he actually apologised for being pulled away.

“This is decency. This is how you should behave. It doesn’t have to be anything different.”

*But That Was Then, Oran Mor, until Saturday.