DAWN Sievewright is currently starring on the West End stage in the National Theatre of Scotland's Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour. She says she understands and recognises the findings of the Acting Up report.
The actress grew up in Bishopbriggs, on the outskirts of Glasgow, with parents from Maryhill and Springburn. She says she was "lucky" to be one of eight fully-funded students at the Dance School of Scotland in Knightswood, Glasgow, before making the move to study at the GSA Conservatoire in London.
She says: "The prices of auditioning for drama schools, and if you are not from London or an upper class family, are really tough: £160 on the train. My mother and dad scraped together and I had a student loan, but paying my rent in London was tough. And it's tough now: and I am working."
Other barriers do exist, she says: "The whole working class thing: as soon as I got to drama school they said: 'You are going to have to lighten that accent. You can't speak that Glaswegian' and I said 'No, this is who I am.' I know a lot of people in the 1970s and 80s used to put that posh RP accent on. I knew people who were Cockneys, really thick Cockney, but they spoke in a really posh accent and I think that's ridiculous." She added: "It's amazing now that I am doing a play about working class women, but before that I was in musical theatre and it was quite tough, because they think you are not demure, not polite, not well educated, just because of my accent and my background. People think 'you will always play the maid, you will never get a job at The Globe or the Royal Shakespeare Company'."
Ms Sievewright noted the financial advantages of coming from a middle or upper class background in her profession. She noted: "It's difficult. Of course if you can afford not to have to work in-between shows then you will be available for more auditions, pay to go to the theatre, meet casting directors, go to press nights, pay to go to class, to practice your craft - it's just not subsidised, so that people can access all these things." She added, whilst also noting it was a "massive generalisation": "I do think coming from a working class background makes you a better actor, you've seen a lot more, maybe struggled a bit more, and you've learned a lot more."
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