Jessica Hynes: “I would tell my younger self to chill out”

I was quite a serious person when I was 15. From that age I was very focused on how I was going to survive in the big, wide world. I wanted to have a home and a family. I didn’t have a timeline for this but I made the most of the opportunities when they came because I realise now that I was gearing everything towards settling down. You could have called me a young fogey.

I didn’t have any fun holidays when I was younger. I literally did not go away. I have never been to Ibiza. I was too worried that I couldn’t afford it or I might miss a job. That mindset to go away somewhere hot and have fun didn’t come naturally.

I’d tell my younger self it’s important to give her children the fun holidays she never had at their age. We try and get better and better at that. Now they are a bit older we can have all kinds of adventures. No parent will say that going away with your children is like a holiday – but it’s as near as.

I have never lost the excitement of being by the seaside, even though I grew up there. I remember the pain on the pebbles when walking along the beach and getting a little tub of whelks. I spent a lot of time on the beach. Brighton was a lot less busy [with tourists and day-trippers] then.

I wish I had enjoyed more of the stuff around me. I didn’t perhaps need to worry quite so much. You need to have a balance. Smell the flowers. Enjoy the journey. My objective was not success in and of itself. It was to settle down and have a family. The creative part was, I guess, the way I did that. I guess I felt there was a point where I would be able to deserve and earn the right to relax.

I auditioned for the National Youth Theatre the year before I was 15. It was a Saturday group in Brighton that I was part of. I got friends, experience and an agent out of it. I was so lucky. I feel like my life changed completely, after being at the National Youth Theatre. It gave me a purpose, tools and opportunity. It countered my anxiety. The greatest validation was finding people into the same things as me.

I have Catholic guilt and a Protestant work ethic

The Caucasian Chalk Circle by Bertolt Brecht was my first proper performance. I didn’t have a really good part but it was a lot of fun. One night, I don’t know why, someone started laughing and that sent everyone else off. We all had to go offstage. It was the intensity of the moment and also the thought that we shouldn’t be doing this that made it more intense and made you want to laugh more.

At 15 I moved from Brighton to London and I disappeared. As I didn’t know anyone in London, I just watched a lot of TV. There was one album I played, and this sounds really pretentious, by an African band called Akwaaba and it had thumb pianos. I had it on my Sony Walkman and I would listen to it over and over again. I have a very clear memory of being in a new school and just slightly disappearing with headphones on.

I’d want my younger self to know that some jobs will open up the world for her. When I left the National Youth Theatre, I had a full-time job in a restaurant. I was 17 and there were people who had come from the war in Serbia and Montenegro who were my age and were working beside me. It was an interesting time to be really young, out there and working a job in London. We met some lovely people who are still part of our lives.

That job taught me that you can tell a lot about a person by how they treat restaurant staff. Rude is just rude, whether you are in a restaurant or not. I was quite excited [in the restaurant] as I met Forest Whitaker once. He came in and I gave him a tub of salad. I was just so excited to meet someone famous. He was lovely.

I was brought up with no religion but I have Catholic guilt and a Protestant work ethic. That sounds like a terrible combination to me. I read a lot about all religions and the way they work. What you end up with is a sense of belonging, I suppose. That’s really powerful and important. But also sometimes not desirable. My interest in it is because I didn’t have it. I really like [writer] Joseph Campbell, who is interested in the myths and stories of all religions and how they have many parallels. They explore the same aspects and they are all searching for the same answers.

I would get on with the younger me but I would tell her to chill out – and take a holiday. We’d have the same interests. We both love music, films, TV and dancing, so we’d get on. I think I would have been amazed that any of it [my career] happened, to be honest. And thrilled. I’d be like: “Great – that’s going to happen. I can go to Ibiza for a couple of weeks. Chill out. Don’t worry.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TQe-zz9DyY

Comedy was never a place to retreat from adulthood for me. I was very much in adulthood. I was just trying to get a flat so I could have a family. My focus was comedy. I loved female comics like Julie Walters, Victoria Wood, French and Saunders. They were real icons. Their writing and performance was a massive influence. I liked making people laugh. A sense of play is important for all kinds of performing.

My sister and I have a joke that we tease each other with if we think we are getting too serious. We say: “Joy is just around the corner!” It’s about the idea that it’s okay to put things off until tomorrow as there are things that need to be done. So you put off gratification until tomorrow – the joke being that you put it off all the time. I’d like to tell my younger self to not put things off and to enjoy it. Carpe diem. Seize the day – but also enjoy the day.

Jessica Hynes stars in Hooten & The Lady on Sky One from September 16