Family dynamics are simultaneously something we can all relate to and deeply personal. There are bound to have been occasions when arguments flared up that are regretted later on and Olivier Award-winning actor Celia Imrie has a valuable reminder for us all about these moments.
Speaking to Nuala McGovern on BBC’s Woman’s Hour in February, Celia reflected upon the couple of times she’d lost her temper with her mum Diana Elizabeth Blois Cator - and how she wishes she could take it back.
"I personally wish that I hadn’t lost my temper with my mother maybe once, twice. I wish I could have those days back, you know, when she was being cantankerous or something - and she wasn’t, she was wonderful."
At the time, Celia had been starring in the play Backstroke at London’s Donmar Warehouse and she added that if there was "anything" the show might remind people of its "make the most of them whilst you’ve got them". Making every moment count and enjoying as much time as we can with our loved ones is a sentiment we often hear, but hearing it put like this is incredibly poignant and important.
Celia Imrie’s mother Diana passed away in 1999 when the Calendar Girls actor was 47 years old and had become a mother herself, giving birth to son Angus Imrie five years earlier. She declared that "nothing prepares you for your mother dying", adding that this loss is "colossal".
All these years later, the star kept a photograph of her mum outside her dressing room door for Backstroke, after a special suggestion was made.
"Anna, our brilliant director and playwright, suggested us bringing photographs of our mothers into the rehearsal room and, actually, they’re outside our dressing room door. So they’re sort of in the air with us," Celia told Woman’s Hour.
She and fellow legend of stage and screen, Tamsin Greig, played mother Beth and daughter Bo in the play and it clearly meant a lot to have Diana’s photo hanging outside her dressing room. Whilst this particular role was very much focused on this relationship, Celia has revealed in the past that her mum is in "every part" she takes on.
In 2016 she declared, "I hope I have some of my mother’s spirit because she’s in every part I play – when I did Love In A Cold Climate and had the great delight of being married to Alan Bates, I based it entirely on my mother.”
Celia spoke of her admiration for Diana’s “bravery” and honesty after she realised she “didn’t love” the man she was supposed to marry and broke things off. She said, “She followed her heart. I’m a great romantic at heart, but in that respect I haven’t followed her and I never got married."
Whilst Diana and Celia’s father David Imrie married, Celia has always thought that marriage wasn’t for her. She’s recalled saying as much to her mother when she was still a child.
"I have a horror of boring someone or, worse still, of someone boring me," she revealed in 2013. "I said to my mother when I was seven, 'But, Mums, if it was only my husband and me in the house together, what would we talk about?' I've never wanted to answer my own question, and I doubt I'll bother now."
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