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Zoe Wanamaker couldn't help Birthday Party co-star Pearl Mackie with former role

Revival: Zoë Wanamaker and Pearl Mackie at Mint Leaf: Dave Benett
Revival: Zoë Wanamaker and Pearl Mackie at Mint Leaf: Dave Benett

Pearl Mackie plays the same role in the revival of Harold Pinter’s Birthday Party that her co-star Zoe Wanamaker did in the Seventies — so the veteran actress should have been a perfect person to go to for tips.

Unfortunately, as Wanamaker confesses, she had forgotten all about the character. “I played Lulu in 1970-something but I’d forgotten it,” she told the Standard. “It was a British Council tour of Asia, we went to Hong Kong and Sarawak so I remember that but not a thing about the part.”

Wanamaker, 68, is now starring in the revival as landlady Meg with Mackie, 30, as Lulu, her neighbour. The production also features Toby Jones as the furtive Stanley, hiding out in a quiet seaside town, and Stephen Mangan as one of the mysterious men sent to find him.

When The Birthday Party debuted in London 60 years ago it was savaged by critics and closed after eight performances. Jones, 51, said he understood how it could have failed at the time, saying: “Even now I see how disturbed and unsettled people are by it, so I can’t quite believe it was done in 1958.”

​Wanamaker said before Pinter “there wasn’t writing like that” and compared its revolutionary effect to the hit musical Hamilton, which was created by Lin-Manuel Miranda.

She said: “There are new energies and explosions that happen in our lifetime and aren’t we lucky they do?

Double act: Wanamaker with actor Peter Wight, who plays her on-stage husband (Dave Benett)
Double act: Wanamaker with actor Peter Wight, who plays her on-stage husband (Dave Benett)

“With Hamilton I just admired his dexterity getting great lyrics that worked about a story most of us knew nothing about really and even just the production and the costumes and the dance were amazing. It was just so exciting and Harold in a way was just another explosion like that.”

Jones said he “fell in love” with Pinter’s writing aged 14 when he saw a school production of the play.

He said: “I had some mates in it and I remember the very strange responses you would get from people afterwards.

“I remember just laughing but also being terrified by it.”

Until April 14