TOYAH ON
BBC RADIO SOLENT
WITH ALEX DYKE
23.5.2019 

ALEX DYKE: Let's call Toyah, shall we? Hope she's in for us, she is expecting our call -

TOYAH: Hello there!

ALEX: Hello! Toyah!

TOYAH: Can you hear me OK?

ALEX: I can. It's Alex here from the BBC

TOYAH: How are you Alex?

ALEX: I'm alright. How are you?

TOYAH: Really good, thank you. Really good

ALEX: OK, so here we go then. It's Sunday the 26th of May which is just around the corner. This coming Sunday, the Theatre Royal Winchester. 40 years in the business. You don't look old enough!

TOYAH: Well, I don't feel old enough (laughs) Life is very good at the moment so I feel exactly the same I did forty years ago

ALEX: This is the Greatest Hits you're doing on Sunday and some other stuff – back catalogue. It's your full electric band and you're just celebrating 40 years of being in the business?

TOYAH: Well yeah, it's inevitable it's going to be Greatest Hits because I've released in my career 28 albums and I've got to cherry-pick from this catalogue what we're going to be playing so virtually every song is a single

And I had a new album out in April called "In The Court Of The Crimson Queen", which is still doing incredibly well. It charted so we are going to be featuring that as well. 

So my shows are fun, they're high energy and there's a little bit of storytelling but with the electric band our aim is to get the audience on their feet having a really lovely time, enjoying good rock music that they can dance to and usually they're singing along as well

ALEX: I've seen you loads of times and I know it's a great show. So it's forty years so that's 1979. I remember you first with the EP "Four From Toyah" with "It's A Mystery", which I guess was early '81. And we talked about earlier – you were doing "Minder" and quite a lot of acting so what were you doing in '79 and 80' just before you broke through on Top Of The Pops?

TOYAH: Whoo (laughs) That is such a big question! Well, I was filming with Katherine Hepburn in a film called "The Corn Is Green", which was directed by the legendary director George Cukor. I then went straight on to do "Quadrophenia" (below, and the cast now) which is 40 this year. The movie.

So we're doing a lot of celebratory filming this year of that. I was also touring my band endlessly and in 78',79' and 80' you had the first Indie Chart, which was available in The New Musical Express, the biggest music paper at the time. I was number one in those charts every week, every day for two years
 

ALEX: Wow!

TOYAH: Even though I didn't have national success - the success that was going to come in '81 … On a kind of underground cult level I was phenomenally successful. Filling venues, touring all the time, charting. I had an album out in 79' called "Blue Meaning" which went straight to number 2 in the album charts

But back then you didn't get radio coverage if you were an album selling artist so I was enjoying success, wonderful success – it's probably one of the happiest times of my life because everything had a Midas Touch to it – my acting and my music and I had no idea what was about to come in 1981. It was a lovely time of innocence and joy with everything doing really really well

ALEX: I just have to rewind there, just a couple of things I want to pick up on. First of all I would imagine Katherine Hepburn was a lovely lovely lady. Did you sit down, get down time, you know – get Hollywood stories from her?

TOYAH: Yes, she was a very generous person. Not only did I get down time with her, my father turned up on the film set unannounced and was hiding on the film set to watch his film idol Katherine Hepburn and she found him! And she said "who are you and what are you doing here?" and he said "I'm Toyah's father" and she stopped filming and took him to lunch - 

ALEX: Aww …

TOYAH: She was just the most extraordinary woman. And she would talk to me a lot about who ever I asked about but her main influence and her big love of her life was Spencer Tracy and she would wear his clothes every day and he had been long gone by 1979. But she would often just say "this is Spencer's jumper, this is Spencer's trousers" (laughs) and she was still very connected to him

She was a very generous actress to work with. She allowed me close-ups, she would allow me to sit in her dressing room while her make-up was being done and we'd talk about how we wanted the scene to go. She was a phenomenal person and I feel very lucky that my career started at a time that allowed me to work with Hollywood greats

ALEX: Oh, yeah …

TOYAH: I worked with John Mills, I worked with Laurence Olivier. Even Diana Dors and they were all true stars. Today as stars tend to be very real or reality based these were people who were built by the Hollywood system and they were phenomenal. They were very very different and I'm so glad I met them

ALEX: Well, I can't think many things cooler than hanging out with Katherine Hepburn being told one on one Spencer Tracy stories. And then Diana Dors! I've got to briefly ask - what did you work with Diana Dors on?

TOYAH: I think – and I really have to pull this out of my my memory banks ... I did a lot of historical dramas for the BBC during this time. I did "Jekyll & Hyde" with David Hemmings (above with Toyah in "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" (1980)) and I did an another one - which I can't for the life of me remember what the name was and Diana Dors was, I think, in "Jekyll & Hyde" with me playing a Madam. And she was great!

When she came into the room – because in those days you'd have three months rehearsal for one of these drama series - when she came into the room she owned the room. It was “Hello darlings! How are you?” And everyone was included and the conversation was loud and brash and the stories were legendary – kind of 1960's London. 

But of course she worked with Elvis Presley, she had a fling with Elvis Presley - so she branched right across to Hollywood and back. Her stories were rich in this vein of 1960's rock culture. She was electrifying

ALEX: Wow … Talking about … I could talk to you all day – we should get you in the studio face to face, play album tracks and Greatest Hits and play the current album. You've got to come down and see us Toyah, so we can do this properly but Sunday, 26th of May, Theatre Royal Winchester, the 40th anniversary of the wonderful Toyah and you'll get just a great show with loads of costume changes and Toyah looking gorgeous and being fantastic!

TOYAH: Can I tell you my Winchester story really quickly?

ALEX: Yes!

TOYAH: I did "Taming Of The Shrew" at Theatre Royal in 1988, could be in '89 (Edit : it was August 1990). I was about to go on stage for the very last speech, it's a very big speech for "Kate" and the stage door opened - which is right at the back of the stage - and a fan grabbed me and pulled me onto the street for an autograph! (They both laugh) 

I was in shock! I didn't know what to do, everyone was waiting on stage for me in the big banquet scene and I was going "oh gosh, help help!"

ALEX: Oh no! But did you make it just in the nick of time?

TOYAH: Yes, I kind of ran back on stage looking incredulous and everyone thought I was delivering the speech in a different way! They thought "oh, she's going at this differently tonight" and the look on my face was I've almost been shut out of the theatre!

ALEX: Aww … Toyah, we've got to do this properly soon! Thank you so much and have a great night at the Theatre Royal Winchester Sunday night!

TOYAH: Thank you so much!