Celia Imrie: ‘I like watching people trying to wriggle out of their lies’

Had you read The Thursday Murder Club before taking the part of Joyce?

No, I’d heard rumours [about getting the part] but I’m very superstitious so I didn’t want to spook it. The minute I knew I was going to do it, it became my bible. Osman has written marvellous little details: I loved that Joyce uses a napkin so people think she’s posher than she is, and that she puts out chairs for the meeting so people like her.

She also makes cakes to ingratiate herself to people.

As did I on the first day of rehearsal: one big chocolate cake. It was a bit much, but I thought it was fun.

Joyce is a retired nurse. What research did you do before playing her?

I’m very lucky to have two nursing sisters so I did get on the phone to them to ask where I should feel for a pulse. It’s a calling, really, in the same way that acting is.

Did you feel that calling at the start of your career?

It is something that grabs you and doesn’t really let you go. Despite the ups and downs of it all, I don’t want to stop. And, it’s one of those things that you can go on and on doing.

The film pokes fun at the prejudices old people face. Do you think representations of older people are getting better?

Hopefully we’ve punctured a few of those obvious put-downs of old people. Everybody is carrying on as if they’re not old now, which is lovely. Somebody suggested that we were dressed to look as if we were 90; actually, that’s a particular, deliberate thing that both Joyce and Elizabeth [played by Helen Mirren] dress up like little old ladies.

What was the group dynamic with your fellow murder club members, Mirren, Pierce Brosnan and Ben Kingsley?

The great thing is that Dame Helen and I worked together 20 years ago on Calendar Girls, and Pierce and I about 10 years ago on The Love Punch. Before I met Sir Ben Kingsley I was intimidated because he’s quite a serious actor, but we warmed to each other over our vegetables. I brought him some onions from Roscoff and he bought me some damsons from his garden, which I was rather thrilled by.

Your most recent novel is set in 1940s London. What drew you to the period?

My father was in both world wars and he didn’t talk about it very much – people don’t. I’m trying to work out in my head: is it because they saw such terrible things? We can only imagine the horrors they went through, and it’s quite difficult to write because how do we know?

You recently returned to the Bridget Jones films

I did beg for another scene because I’m only in it for two seconds, but still, I’m in it [laughs].

Why do you think people hold those films in their hearts so dearly?

I was in the reading of the first script and rang a friend of mine halfway through and told her: “Well, it’s this film about this girl who thinks she drinks too much wine and wants to give up cigarettes. She wants to be slimmer and to have a boyfriend. But it’ll never be made; nothing happens.”

She said: “It’s not by any chance Bridget Jones’s Diary? It’s been in the paper the last two years.” I think everybody can relate to those wants, or women can.

You’re set to appear in the BBC’s first Celebrity Traitors later this year. What do you like about a murder mystery?

The first thing I signed up for at night school was the psychology of criminology. I love finding out about people’s minds. At the moment I’m obsessed with documentaries, especially crime ones. I like watching people trying to wriggle out of their lies.

With your Mamma Mia co-stars you had a top 40 hit with a cover of Abba’s When I Kissed the Teacher. Do you have further musical ambitions?

I wish I could play an instrument. I envy musicians because like painters you can go up into your loft and paint a picture in the middle of the night if you want. I can’t play Hedda Gabler in my living room: nobody’s there to say how good I am.

You were previously quoted as saying you didn’t know which side you were meant to be on in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.

I still haven’t got a clue. Did I win? Did I die? The only note I got from George Lucas was: can you take your lipstick off? But since I was the only woman fighter pilot I thought it was rather a good touch.

While appearing on Who Do You Think You Are? you discovered you had some fascinating relatives.

I said to the producers, I’m very worried that you’re just going to find out that I’m from a whole load of boring, posh people drinking tea all day long, but the last relation was my great-great-great-great-great grandmother, who was in the Tower of London for poisoning her lover.

I’m also related to William Lord Russell, who was so well thought of he was allowed to have his head chopped off rather than be hanged. Then in the next episode I went into this huge room at Woburn Abbey and in a glass cabinet with a huge great scroll in it was his royal pardon. I said, what? Bit bloody late, mate.

Photograph by Giles Keyte/Netflix