Amateur Sex | Evening Times

Most plays focus on the star names with the top TV credits " but that all too often ignores the real stars, the actors who don't get top billing yet give great performances week-in, week-out.

Carolyn Calder is one of those performers, a woman who can perform a range of characters, from posh housewife, to Shakespearean witch to wee Glasgow wummin.

Last year her performance at the Pavilion Theatre as a happy hooker in comedy play Hacked Off was so convincing it landed her a River City role as Corinne, the con artist who tried to sell the hair salon.

Now, Carolyn’s back at the Pavilion, one of the troupe of Paras Over The Barras, the wartime comedy set in a Glasgow close, playing sex-mad neighbour Ina McLatchie.

"It’s great fun," she says. "I love this theatre and feel part of the family."

Carolyn, now 41, proved herself a comedy natural as a schoolgirl at Holyrood Secondary, a drama department which produced stars such as Tony Curran, Joe McFadden and Paul Blair.

She said: "My first part was as Greta Garbage in the Dastardly Diary of Dirty Dick.

"I was only supposed to have three lines but the school secretary was late for a reading one day and I stepped in and ended up playing two parts.

"I loved it. The only tricky part came when I had to kiss my modern studies teacher who was in the production.

"That was strange. I hadn’t even kissed a boy at that point!"

Initial hopes of becoming a journalist gave way to acting.

"I wasn’t a showbiz kid, singing and dancing all the time but I used to mimic the ads on the telly," she said.

"Then when I was 14, a new drama teacher came to school, Mr Black, and he put me forward for Glasgow Schools Youth Theatre."

Carolyn went on to enjoy success with Scottish Youth Theatre, touring the country.

"But she didn’t have the confidence - or the drive - on leaving school to consider acting as a career.

It took the death of her sister, Jacqueline, to spur Carolyn on.

At this time, I was 22 and working in the Corona Bar in Shawlands," she said.

"Meantime, I had been working with amateur theatre companies, multi-cultural drama groups and I enjoyed working with the likes of Gary Lewis playing John Mclean’s wife.

"But I hadn’t focused on acting as a career. Then when Jacqueline died from pleurisy at the age of 27 I thought ‘Life’s too short. I have to follow the dream.’

"And I went to Langside College to do a HNC and then on to RSAMD, on the recommendation of an actor who used to drink in the Corona, Phil McCall."

Carolyn loved drama college - and hated it.

She said: "I loved the great teaching, the parties, the drinking, the fun. On the downside, I don’t think there was a single day when one of the students didn’t have a crying session in the corner, having been told they had to shake things up or whatever."

Was it because the treatment was harsh - or were the wannabe actors vulnerable?

"The latter," she says. "Actors wear their hearts on their sleeves. You meet an actor and five minutes later you know their life story."

Does Carolyn see herself as being a little needy? "Probably," she said. "I was a middle kid and I remember my wee brother used to be a tearaway and he’d get more attention for being bad than I did for getting stuck in at school.

"And my older sister Theresa got attention too."

It perhaps didn’t help that Carolyn’s dad had left when the children were young, leaving her mum to bring them up.

"Maybe. But it’s all fine now," she says. "I get on great with him now. He comes up to visit. And he and my mum are pals. There’s still a twinkle in their eyes when they meet up."

On leaving RSAMD, Carolyn landed a role in seventies comedy, Sex, Chips and Ouzo.

Her varied TV work has seen her pop up in River City, Dear Green Place and Taggart. "The first Taggart was the episode where Jardine (James Macpherson) was killed off," she said.

"I ran a burger van. In the second, I ran a massage parlour. They were great fun to do."

Carolyn loves acting but she’s never needed fame. She said: "I’ve done TV such as Emmerdale and films such as Red Road, Movern Callar and Hallam Foe.

"And it’s been great to hear of my mum going into the bakery and pals saying to her, ‘I saw your Carolyn on the telly’.

"But to be honest, I still get lost in the magic of theatre. And I’ve had some wonderful moments at the Pavilion, starting with when I appeared in Girls’ Big Night In."

She adds: "I’m just so delighted I’ve been able to work in this industry for so long. And I’m never happier than when I working."

In July, Carolyn will appear as a witch in Macbeth at the Arches Theatre and then goes to work in Poland in August.

Right now, she’s the sex-starved neighbour.

"What other job can give you all of that?" she says, smiling.

Paras Over The Barras, The Pavilion, until Saturday.