The Academy Award-nominated actress prepares to tread the boards in Belfast. Click Play Audio for a podcast interview

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‘I did a whole half hour video interview once in Sundance,’ BAFTA winning actor Brenda Blethyn comments, peering over the table at the recorder. ‘The man hadn’t put a tape in.’

Blethyn sits upstairs in the Grand Opera House next to a huge, bright red suitcase. She only arrived in Belfast 30 mins ago. Despite the trip she is fresh-faced and chic in a soft green jacket that flatters red hair flipped out at the ends. She looks younger than she does on screen, more delicate.

She’s in Belfast to rehearse for her role in Haunted, a play written by the doyenne of Irish Literature, Edna O’Brien, with Blethyn in mind, but Blethyn denies knowing the writer well.

‘No, no, not well! I met her four or five years ago in New York.’ O’Brien had been there to see Blethyn in a Broadway play. Afterwards she’d sought the actor out backstage to tell her about a play O’Brien had been working on. Blethyn clears her throat and assumes a rich, plummy voice, ‘I have a pley I’d like you to be reading.’

The accent makes her chuckle. That play wasn’t this one, she adds. Haunted came along afterwards.

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