In the cavernous dining room of Cliveden House in Berkshire, southern England, Dawn French, encased in a Yum-Yum haircut and a silk trouser suit, looks like an ornament brought back from an expedition to the Orient.
Only in a hall as big as this could a woman as outsized as French look ornamental, but this most English of stately homes has that kind of grandeur.
It may be why the press launch of the Narnia movie is being held here. Certainly the view this crisp morning down towards the Thames is Narnian, although French, who is cheerily posing for photographs following our interview, is momentarily distracted from it. “I suppose the headline’s going to be Aslan Was My Father,” she says. Would she mind? “No,” she replies. “Actually, I wouldn’t.”
French has previously spoken only sparingly about her father, who killed himself just before she embarked on her career as an actor and comedian, but she wants to talk about him today.
In Narnia, a faithful translation of the first part of C.S. Lewis’s magic wardrobe saga, she provides the voice for Mrs Beaver, one of the tale’s more comic turns. It was only after the film was completed that she realised she had never actually read the novel, but that her father had read it to her. “And, of course, it is a really potent thing when your dad reads it and does a big voice for Aslan, because Aslan is everything, isn’t he?” she says.
Did he do the deep-voice bit for the Christ-like lion? “He put on silly voices for everybody, but I definitely remember his Aslan,” French says. “When I was asked when I’d first read the book I suddenly heard my dad’s voice. It was one of those moments: my dad playing a big strong saviour, a hero.”
