MY KIND
OF DAY - ANTHONY STEWART HEAD
From the Radio
Times, 30 September - 6 October, 2000
For the past four
years I've spent eight and a half months a year in California playing the
English librarian in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I had plenty
of theatre work in Britain but I was best known on TV for doing the Gold
Blend ads with Sharon Maughan. The ads were a hit in America, too,
but the Americans were prepared to see what else I could do. Buffy
is huge out there - it's as much a cult adult show as a kids' show in the
States - and it's worldwide now, number one in France and Australia.
I get hundreds of letters every week and I was recently voted the second
sexiest man in TV sci-fi! I do get recognised quite a lot in the
streets of Los Angeles but, apart from the occasional shriek, the fans are
very gentle with me.
Being away from my
partner Sarah and our two daughters Emily, 11, and Daisy, nine, makes for
a very lonely life. I miss them intensely and there are some days
when it really hurts. If I have six days off filming then I'm on a
plane back home. We do speak most days on the phone and they come
and join me when they can - the girls went to school in Santa Monica for a
couple of months and fitted in extremely well. But I'm very
fortunate to have a family who not only tolerate my being away but
encourage it. Sarah said: "If it's right for your career then
you must do it and we'll think about what we'll do." And the
girls think Buffy is cool and say, "You can't leave
it!" But Sarah is a single parent for most of the year and I
really don't know how she does it because she is also an animal therapy
practitioner with her own business. She is an extraordinary woman.
When I'm in America I
live in a rented flat in Santa Monica and the life I lead is not remotely
glamorous. I choose to be as down to earth as I possibly can and
Sarah would certainly not tolerate me being airy-fariy. I have a
very strange enforced bachelor existence there - no glitzy Hollywood
parties, though the Buffy publicist encourages me to attend a few
film premieres. I try to occupy myself as much as I can, otherwise I
think I'm wasting my time out there when I should be with my family.
So when I'm not in the Buffy studios (actually it's an old
warehouse in Santa Monica) I'm at the flat working on screenplays - I've
got three on the go. Every Saturday I go to acting class. I
trained at drama school in England but now that I'm working in TV in
America I think I should immerse myself in their style. It's all
about adapting, changing and growing.
I have another three
years to run in my Buffy contract and all I can say is I still
enjoy reading the scripts and expanding my character. To get
something that's booked for 22 episodes a season is fortunate enough but
to be part of a mainstream success gives it a whole new twist.
In England, at our
Regency house on a hill near Bath, I do my best to put something back into
family life - I cook, take the girls to school and do the chores around
the house. I spend a lot of time in the kitchen making things like
lentil soup and corn stew and I really miss the Aga when I go back to
LA. We've been in this house for seven years (a medium told us we
would buy it and described it exactly) and we're trying gradually to get
it back to its original state - we've taken up the Victorian floorboards
to reveal the Georgian pennant slabs and replaced the fireplaces.
We're currently looking for an authentic Regency front door. It's a
daisy chain, but it's a labour of love.
We have ten acres of
land and stables with ponies and horses. Sarah works closely with
our vet and at the local dogs' home and treats animals through a series of
exercises and pressure point touches that are designed to relieve pain and
tension. I get involved by default, really, but I did once help to
save a squirrel with pneumonia by massaging its ears! We also have a
most wonderful dog and four cats for whom I'm currently building a cat
house in the old washroom. Los Angeles seems a world away!
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