Dawn French has been contemplative of late, specifically about what the right or wrong thing to do is when it comes to “shuffling off”. In an exclusive interview with Good Housekeeping to tie in with her new book, Enough, she opened up about her experience with death, sharing the generous choice her own mum made before she passed away in 2012 that gave her family freedom.
“We only had a short time with my mum after her diagnosis of lung cancer and I remember her saying, ‘The will is in that drawer. Don’t let Uncle Terry have that wooden cabinet – he’s always been after it. He says it’s his, but it’s not,’” Dawn recalled.
“She went through the big things and the petty things. I started to ask her about something and she said, “I don’t care. I won’t be there. Do whatever you like.” It was very generous and it gave us huge freedom.”
Dawn's novel, Enough, tells a somewhat different story about death. At the centre of it is Etta, a mentally and physically fit grandmother who has gathered her family to announce that it will be her last day on Earth. Etta wants to free her family “from the crap to come’; she’s happy with the life she’s led thus far and disapproves of our constant need for more, whether it be money, men or existence itself. At one point, she says, ‘If there was some way of staying here without getting old, I’d choose that… we all would.’”
It’s a departure from Dawn's usual work and a project she says her friends will have a lot to say about, but the Vicar of Dibley star says that by writing it, she wanted to face a fear. “My motivation was writing about something that would frighten me,” she shared.
“And the idea of getting older, of being vulnerable, of no longer being independent – those things are all daunting.
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“I made Etta my age for a few reasons, one of which was laziness; I didn’t have to research the music and politics with which she grew up. I also thought that Etta being 68 and healthy but deciding to die by suicide is shocking.”
Despite tackling such a sombre subject in her book, Dawn hasn’t lost her funny bones. In January this year, we were treated to a new sitcom, BBC One’s Can You Keep A Secret?, in which she plays Debbie, a widow whose husband (Mark Heap) is mistakenly declared dead and is actually hiding out at home after the life insurance payout arrived in cash.
She recalls a funny moment after the screening of the first series. “After the cast and crew screening of Can You Keep A Secret?, a producer came up to me and said, ‘Honestly, Dawn, I have to congratulate you on your remarkable lack of vanity.' I obviously wasn’t trying to be beautiful, but I wasn’t quite aware of how brave it was for me to do a character with no makeup and frizzy hair!”
Thankfully, it hasn't deterred her and, as well as working on a second series of Can You Keep A Secret?, Dawn will also soon be reuniting with her comedy partner in crime, Jennifer Saunders. “We’re playing the Ugly Sisters in Cinderella!”, she says – and we can’t wait.
Read the full interview in Good Housekeeping UK’s July issue, on sale from Thursday 28th May. Enough (Penguin Michael Joseph, RRP £22) by Dawn French is out now.
