Stage: Kate Expectations

This Christmas there will be many young people going to see Great Expectations at The Gate Theatre, Dublin even if some have to be forced because it is a festive family outing. Katie Kirby, however, never had to be dragged to the theatre. She loved acting since she was a child, and now she’s playing Pip’s love interest, Estella in the Gate’s production of Great Expectations after a phenomenally successful year which also saw her play the role of Sibyl Chase in the same theatre’s recent production of Noel Coward’s Private Lives.

Katie also previously played the title role in the Gate’s production of Lady Windermere’s Fan and appeared in the radio play, Jack And Linda Discover Space, plus the movie Boy Eats Girl and short films like The Hotel Trade and Poetic Licence, as well as RTÉ’s The Clinic. But if 2007 has been a hugely successful year for Kirby, she is totally aware that next year may not be. Her advice is that you must learn to live with career uncertainty and never take a professional rejection as something personal.
“My family encouraged theatre-going and I always had that hunger in me” she says. “But it is a completely tough life. You have to live with uncertainty. If you don’t like uncertainty, do not go into acting. I have learned to live with it, but you have to learn to let go and not be stressed out about money or organisation – in the sense that if you want a structure to your career there isn’t any, because you may be working one month and not the next so you have to create your own schedule. That’s the key. You also have to learn not to be hard on yourself, because it is so easy to be so down if you are not working and to take that personally, when the truth of the matter may be that, for example, a part you went for wasn’t right for you. But if you see that as a personal rejection you can become paranoid and that can not only bring you down but also can hinder your next audition. Then it becomes a vicious circle.”
Katie sounds like a very healthily balanced young woman!
“I try to be, I have my moments!” she responds, laughing. “But this really has been a good year for me. Though, that said, I have nothing on the cards for after February; when this run ends. Yet, I’m not even going to think of that now! As we speak, we are doing rehearsals for Great Expectations and I am working with a fantastic group of actors, which is really inspiring. I happen to be the kind of actor who loves rehearsals and even though my part as Pip’s love interest in the play means I’m not on stage a lot of the time, that means I can sit in rehearsals watching other people do their scenes. And it’s wonderful to see how other actors work – especially those who have been in the business for years. I love it.”
As for being Pip’s love interest in this Hugh Leonard adaptation of Charles Dickens’ most popular novel, anyone who has read the book will know that she is a bitch to the poor kid – in every sense – to begin with.
“That is true!” she admits. “Pip is the main focus of the play and how he grew up poor and came into riches and became a gentleman, but in the start, when he meets Estella as a young girl, she is really nasty to him! But she has been taught to be this by Miss Havisham, who was rejected by a man at a young age. So she becomes a pawn, a puppet to Miss Havisham to wreak revenge on the male sex, basically!”
Katie Kirby herself, presumably, has none of these heinous attitudes?
“No! I have a far healthier attitude towards men!”

Great Expectations is currently running at the Gate Theatre, Dublin