Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne.
Welcome to Desert Island Discs Postcards,
where we share funny, moving and memorable moments directly from our desert island with you every weekday.
Today's castaway is the actress Penelope Keith,
who was best known for roles in the BBC sitcoms The Good Life and To The Man Are Born,
but she didn't start out in telly.
Back in 1976, she told Roy Plumley that after honing her craft in repertory theatre...
She joined the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1963. Well, that was the year of the Wars of the Roses.
Of course.
And sometimes you used to do the whole trilogy, all three plays.
That's right, in a day, starting at 10.30.
The half was called at 5 to 10,
and we got out of the theatre at about 10 to 11 in the evening.
Yes.
Did many of the audience stay with you?
Not so much in Stratford.
A few did.
A few hardy types.
But when we came down to London, to the Aldwych, with all three, we did three trilogies at the Aldwych,
and they were always packed with the people who had been there from morning to night.