Born in Brighton in 1957, Amanda Redman trained at Bristol Old Vic Theatre School before beginning a successful acting career in film, television and theatre. Her breakthrough came with the comedy drama At Home with the Braithwaites, followed by her best-known role as determined detective Sandra Pullman in New Tricks. She won an award for Best Supporting Actress in the 2000 mob crime-thriller-comedy Sexy Beast. She was awarded an MBE in 2012. She has one daughter, Emily, 39, from her first marriage to actor Robert Glenister, and lives in London with her second husband, Damian Schnabel.
Here she looks back on the moments that changed her perspective on work, love, family, money and health.
All of my earliest memories are of me being in hospital after an accident I had when I was 18 months old. I don’t remember what happened [Amanda suffered burns to 75 per cent of her body when she was scaled by a pan of boiling soup] but I had to remain in various hospitals until I was five years old: Brighton, where it happened, then Great Ormond Street, then the burns unit in Salisbury.
The whole experience changed the course of my life. When I finally escaped hospital I had so much pent-up energy that my parents put me into a Saturday morning ballet class. I was incredibly enthusiastic. I was also very clumsy and like a little elephant spinning around, so the teachers suggested my parents put me in to the drama club upstairs – and that was it. I never wanted to do anything else.
I made two lifelong friends on Sexy Beast: Ray Winstone and Julianne White. Filming that movie [in Spain] was one of my favourite jobs – I had an incredible time shooting it. The charisma between all of us was incredible from the get-go, which is very unusual, and we laughed such a lot. The whole experience was joyous. The fun continued after filming stopped and it still does to this day.
The moment we all met at Heathrow airport, before the shoot, we immediately became those people. We slotted into our roles, and it continued on the flight, all the way to Almería, and it never stopped. This doesn’t normally happen. We got told off that first night in the hotel for behaving so badly and because there were so many night shoots that went right through the night – that bad behaviour just carried on, usually ending up at Ray Winstone’s place, until we all really had to go to sleep, which we all thought was very funny. Not so much for our livers, though.
Sir Anthony Hopkins gave me some advice which I’ve never forgotten. I worked with him in 1970, on the BBC film The Great Inimitable Mr Dickens and he said to me once, “Just remember to never take yourself too seriously. It’s just a job”. I think that’s completely true.
I had a terrifying encounter with a 6ft snake in Sri Lanka. I was out there filming The Good Karma Hospital and the place is absolutely full of snakes. I was just having a coffee on the steps of the hospital when a huge thing just slithered past me, and I froze. It was about 6ft tall. The locals are used to them, so they just scared it off with some sticks. I had another unnerving moment where there was a cobra just outside the door of my villa.
I’m renowned for taking risks. I’ve broken lots of bones. I’m clumsy, and I don’t see risks. Every time I walk out of the door, my husband says to me, “Be careful”. The last bone I broke was my wrist when I tripped over some shoes I’d left in the middle of the bathroom.
I have a baby granddaughter now, so I’m a little more careful. I’m on tenterhooks the whole time and my heart is in my mouth constantly, but my daughter just says, “Mum, relax, she’s fine. And if she bangs her head, that will teach her”, and I’ll say, “No, but I can’t bear it”.
I’m loving every moment of being a grandmother – I never thought I would. I just didn’t imagine I could feel what I do feel for somebody else’s child, but the second I laid eyes on her, I fell in love. It knocked me for six. I couldn’t believe it. The link is so strong, it’s incredible.
I laugh all the time with my husband. I love the fact that people say to us that they just they love watching us because we giggle – we’re like children. We share a deep love. Somebody said to me only last night, “My God, you love each other so much; it’s so apparent”.
My husband and I were both going through heartache when we met. When my dad died, my agent became like my surrogate dad, and his partner became like my surrogate mum. She used to come and see me whenever I was feeling low, and on one weekend visit she said that her daughter, whom I’d known very well for years, had just split up with her boyfriend, and it was her daughter’s fault. The boyfriend was in bits, and would I mind if he popped round to see me? He came round and we decided that rather than bore all of our friends with our individual heartaches, we’d bore each other. It wasn’t a ker-ching moment though. Quite the opposite. Our feelings just grew. Two decades later we’re still together.
‘Sexy Beast’ re-release is out now in a Limited Edition Box Set (Second Sight Films)