At home with... Sue Collins

Trying to raise four young children – all of them under the age of three-and-a-half – is no joke, but stand-up comedienne/actress Sue Collins appears to be taking it in her stride.

“It sounds a lot worse than it is,” she says. “I get looks from people all the time along the lines of, ‘How are you still alive?’ and ‘How are you still standing?’ But life’s about change and adjusting to things and challenging yourself and that’s what you do.”
With four-month old twins making up half of the brood, life is certainly hectic for the former “Nuala”, who juggles home life with her ongoing comedy/acting career. She’s just about to star in a new play and is also co-writing a TV comedy.
“It’s all about balancing things,” she proffers. “I’ve written and performed comedy for 15 years now, and it involves constantly having a project on the go, which may or may not see the light of day. To be honest I never thought I would have so many kids so quickly and I’m not planning to have any more. And there are times when you think – ‘What are we doing?’ But there’s something spiritual about kids, they have their own little souls so it’s all great as far as I’m concerned.”
Showbiz certainly runs in this particular family; her parents were both classical musicians and she is married to actor Phelim Drew, (yep, the legendary Ronnie is her father-in-law). “Having both parents as musicians made us a little different, I suppose, but I wouldn’t say it was a bohemian, unconventional kind of life. We had a big family – there were five of us and people were always dropping into the house, which was great.”
Home for Sue and family is a 1920s house in the heart of Dublin’s Liberties, which she and Phelim bought four years ago. “It’s a lovely, quiet, safe community tucked in between Cork Street and Clanbrassil Street,” she explains. “But friends of ours thought we were mad buying it because the house was in such a dreadful state. There had been a woman living here on her own in fairly horrible conditions.
“But just walking around the house and looking at the aspect and the energy of the place won us over. It’s a corner house with a garden at the back, which had several decades of rubbish dumped there. My husband did all the work in the garden and we put in a simple patio which is now full of toy trucks and a trampoline. It’s amazing to have a house with a garden in the centre of town.”
Presumably having such a young family in a short space of time has meant major changes to their socialising habits. “Definitely,” says Sue. “From the time our first child was born we just said, ‘This is our life now – so let’s get everyone over to the house instead of going out’. It’s a relaxing house which lends itself to entertaining, so our friends and family come round to see the kids for a little before they go to bed, and they’ll have dinner and a few drinks. It’s perfect, though we still get out from time to time. We’ve been invited to a lot of 40th birthdays this year – we’re at that age now. The only thing I miss really is going to the cinema which is out of the question these days. When I was younger, I loved nothing more than a Saturday afternoon movie.”
Her latest comedy venture sees her hooking up with former Nualas pal Ann Gildea, in a production of Neil Simon’s classic play The Odd Couple. While most of us are familiar with the movie version starring Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon and the long- running ’70s TV series with Jack Klugman and Tony Randall, this female version was written by Simon much later.
“It was apparently written in 1989 and it’s slightly different and I think much funnier,” Collins proffers. “We’ve modernised it and kind of Dublinised it. The character Olive, who I play, is recently separated and she’s still clinging on to her marriage, giving her husband money and getting him out of holes financially. Fiona is her buddy and out of the blue her husband left her. They move in together in an IFSC type apartment and that’s where the stress begins.
“It’ll be interesting to see how the adaptation works. It’s not Chekov; it’s a romp, but Neil Simon is amazing. There is the chick-flick element to it but you have to care about the characters too. I think it’s a real classic comedy with some very funny lines.”
Finally, given her own musical background and that of her husband – does music play a big part in the household?
“The Nualas were very much a musical act and I would have been involved in arranging harmonies and that, but I’m afraid – much to my husband’s embarrassment – I was big into ‘80s music. He has a huge collection, everything from Amy Winehouse to Johnny Cash and Steve Earle, and he introduced me to a lot of great stuff. In fact he brought me to see Steve Earle on one of our first dates.” Now that’s romance!