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Laura Fraser: From Lesbian Romp To Florence
Nightingale
By Paul English
SCOTS actor Laura Fraser
has revealed how her moviemaker husband filmed her and a
friend in a racy girl-on-girl clinch at their home last
week.
The 31-year-old Glaswegian actress, who plays Florence
Nightingale in a new BBC drama, filmed the scenes for a
short movie being made by her husband Karl Geary at their
home in Glasgow's west end.
The couple were working on a low-budget adaptation of a
story called You Were Perfectly Fine by US writer Dorothy
Parker.
Laura revealed: "I play a woman who gets drunk one
night and passes out. She wakes in the morning and has a
postmortem on what happened.
"It turns out all sorts of sordid things happened,
and my character becomes more scared and anxious as the
story goes on.
"In the original story it's between a man and a
woman, but my husband wanted to change it to two
women."
Yet Laura admits she had no problem with the storyline
change.
She said: "I think I've played about three lesbians
now, so it's not a problem.
"We filmed it with an actress friend called Miranda
Nolan. It really wasn't awkward. The only thing is, I did
think we were heading for a domestic in front of everyone
involved in filming.
"Karl was shouting at me to hurry up, but because it
was low-budget I had to do my own make-up, so things took
longer.
"I'm not sure when it will be released, buthopefully
it will make it to some of the film festivals."
It's all a far cry from Laura's latest role as Florence
Nightingale, who became known as the Lady of the Lamp
after tending to soldiers during the Crimean War.
Laura portrays the nurse in a biopic directed by
movie-maker Norman Stone, the husband of BBC Scotland
newsreader Sally Magnusson.
Despite her veneration as an "angel" who
changed the direction of 19th century nursing by pushing
for better sanitation in hospitals, Laura discovered
there was much more to her than selflessness and piety.
She said: "I wouldn't describe Florence as an angel.
From what I found out about her, she was a very driven
and very charismatic woman.
"But she really pushed people if they didn't meet
her expectations. She was very hard on them, quite
unforgiving.
"She was full of self-loathing and didn't manage to
get everything she wanted done. So I think it's wrong to
refer to her as an angel.
"There's no doubt she did some amazingly good
things. But when people do that sort of stuff, over the
years you come only to know the good things. Lots of men
were in love with her, but she felt she couldn't marry
any of them because she felt it would interfere with her
work."
The film also features comedian Roy Hudd and Star Wars
actor Michael Pennington, who played Moff Jerjerrod in
Return of The Jedi.
Asneak preview of its warts-and-all depiction of Florence
has left some critics feeling that rather than a shining
light, she was something of a martyr.
Despite this, Laura thinks it's important that her story
is told to a new audience for whom Florence's name is
synonymous with selfless devotion, care and compassion.
Laura said: "I read her biography and her letters,
and discovered that she was actually really funny, quite
ironic and used little phrases that sounded modern,
despite being written in 1835.
"But I also learned that after the Crimean War she
blamed herself for the soldiers' deaths. It took her
years to get over that and she felt so guilty.
"I think now you would describe it as depression. It
made her question her faith. I thought she had an
unwavering belief in God, but she didn't.
"She was just a human who did some amazing things,
but was still flawed."
Having starred in BBC period dramas Casanova and He Knew
He Was Right, Laura is no stranger to the discomfort of a
corset but refuses to moan.
"I dread those costumes," Laura said. "I
suppose I could sit here and bitch about how horrible it
is getting into them, but I'm very lucky to do the job I
do so I can't complain. But I feel sorry for women back
then who had to wear those things."
Florence Nightingale will be shown on BBC1 during the
Easter week, when Laura will also appear with James
Nesbitt in Auntie's dramatisation of The Passion.
"I play a baddie," she said, "a character
called Abigail who was married to Caiphus the High Priest
of the Hebrews. She is complicit in her husband's plan to
murder Jesus. She's not quite as bad as Lady Macbeth, but
she's deluded and protecting her own back."
Filmed last year in Morocco, her presence on the set
caused a stir among the mainly-male cast.
She said: "All the boys were delighted when a new
woman came to the set. They were desperate for female
company."
The diminutive actress was brought up in a non-religious
environment, with her parents choosing to let their
children decide for themselves.
"I remember when I was in primary six I was very
devout for a while," she said.
These days, religion plays no part in Laura's life. She
instead refers to "love" and
"spirituality" as two of her beliefs.
After breaking through in 1996's cult Scottish flick
Small Faces, she has since appeared in a string of
big-budget movies. A party lifestyle followed during
seven years in London as her star grew and she became a
fixture on the scene with showbiz flatmate Anna Friel.
Since then her career has teamed her with Leonardo Di
Caprio in The Man In The Iron Mask and Heath Ledger in A
Knight's Tale.
Despite these big movie parts, the actress enjoys
relative anonymity in Glasgow and seems unaffected by
fame or wealth. She walked from her home in the west end
to our interview in the city centre, being splashed by
cars and swearing at the wind and rain.
"But I love being back in Glasgow, despite the
weather," she said.
After starring in charged ITV drama Talk To Me with Max
Beesley last summer, she found she was being recognised
more by "women in chemists and places like
that."
She said: "They'd come up and say hello to me and I
could tell they didn't really know who I was.
"Sometimes people actually say to me that I look
quite like that girl on the telly, but not the
same."
She and husband Karl married in 2003. Having lived in New
York, Cork and London, they moved to Glasgow after the
birth of their daughter Lila in 2006.
And despite her career's upward trajectory, she has no
plans to uproot again.
"I have one little girl and I think I might like to
have another one," she said.
"I found it hard being a full-time mum, and take my
hat off to anyone who can do it.
"It's a lot harder than I thought. It's terrifying
but it's the most fulfilling thing I could ever do. It's
great to bring her up here. It's just nice to live where
you're from."
Florence Nightingale, March 24, BBC1; The Passion, March
16, BBC1
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