Elaine adds voice of authority

LIKE Mary Doll in the BBC Scotland sitcom Rab C Nesbitt, Mari Hoff in Jim Cartwright's bitter-sweet comedy The Rise And Fall Of Little Voice is role that could have been written for Elaine C Smith.

"Believe it or not, it was actually Jim Cartwright who said, 'Elaine should play Mari Hoff'. It's a bit frightening that the writer himself said that – and he's coming to see me do just that at the King's in Edinburgh," admits the outspoken actress, before quipping, "Which means, now I'll need to get the lines right."

Cartwright suggested Smith for the role after seeing her in another of his plays Two, the production that last brought Smith and her long-time collaborator Andy Gray to the Leven Street theatre.

And that was the pair's second production there in as many years. Before that Debbie Isitt's The Woman Who Cooked Her Husband teamed them up at the same venue. Consequently, it is safe to say that Smith and Gray have become a well established double-act.

Indeed, the last time they were here, Gray positively bellowed with laughter at the suggestion that they had become the tartan equivalent of Terry Scott and June Whitfield's middle-class suburban lovebirds.

"Which one's Terry?" he howled. It's a line Smith has obviously been waiting to respond to.

Reminded of the comparison she laughs, "I didn't find that insulting because June Whitfield is still going strong but Terry Scott was always rubbish, so I quite liked that."

She jests, of course, but then the pair have known each other a long time. From Naked Radio to Naked Video and the popular Scottish sitcom City Lights in the 1980s, they have worked regularly together on screen and stage.

"We always feel very safe with each other because inevitably you bugger up lines, get things wrong or make each other laugh."

Cartwright's highly acclaimed urban fairytale – which opens at The King's next Monday – tells the story of a young girl imprisoned in her squalid home grieving for her dead father.

"Finding solace in his classic record collection, she develops, over time, the ability to mimic the great divas like Bassey and Garland – Little Voice (LV) is born.

Mari Hoff, her widowed mother, is a foul-mouthed lush, who shares her adventures with her equally foul friend Sadie May and desires, above all else, to be rescued by sleazy lover Ray Say.

However, Ray has other ideas, namely how to use LV to further his career as a supposed entertainment manager.

Enlisting the help of dodgy club owner Mr Boo, he convinces the terrified LV to perform in public. But LV has her own agenda, which is to escape the squalor and abuse through her friendship with the tender and shy young electrician Billy Smith, better known for her comedy, admits that while the writer may have seen her in the role, Mari Hoff is a challenging female to bring to the stage.

"This is actually quite a difficult part for me because Mari Hoff is such a monster.

"Generally my audience come to see me because they like me, so I have to give a bit of what is expected – lots of fun and comedy – but also I have to take them on a journey with her.

"Jim Cartwright writes brilliantly about grief and this play is about grief. As he always said, 'This is not a play about Little Voice, this is a play about a mother, and she is a contemporary Lady Macbeth, very damaged.'

"One of the dangers is that if you play Mari as the monster, the audience have no sympathy for her at the end, so it's a balancing act to entertain the audience and keep them focused while fulfilling their expectations."

One major difference audiences will notice in this production is that the action of the piece has been transferred from its normal north of England roots to Scotland.

"It was the absolutely obvious thing to do. What do my audience want to see me do a Bolton accent for?" asks the actress. "Actually it is one of the accents I do really well, I find it really easy because I've always wanted to be in Coronation Street.

"Now if I was doing Little Voice in a Rep production, at The Tron or the Royal Lyceum, then I'd do it northern, but in a commercial production I want to engage with my audience.

"I think it would be sheer vanity to go out and show them that I can do a Bolton accent. After all, nobody says to Robert De Niro, 'Oh no, not the American accent again Robert'."

In this new interpretation, Smith and Gray, who plays Ray Say, are joined on stage by Deborah Saloman as LV, Peter Kelly as Mr Boo and Carole Anders as Hoff's long-suffering roly poly best-friend Sadie. The company is completed by Jim Webster-Stewart as Billy.

The Rise and Fall of Little Voice will be the third play that Smith has not only starred in, but co-produced at the King's Theatre and, slipping on her producers hat, she insists, "More than anything, I really care what the audience see.

"I have had a few humdingers of reviews in the past but I believe when the audience stop coming, that's when I give up, because they are the people I do the shows for. I don't do them for awards or reviews, I do them because people have a hard enough life and when they come to the theatre they want to be entertained and they want to be moved.

"And that doesn't mean going out there dressed as Mary Nesbitt doing Patsy Cline songs or going for the lowest common denominator – we're doing good plays and we're doing them in a way that we think entertains and moves an audience. Now that may not be everyone's cup of tea, but that is our aim, and so far, so good."

• The Rise And Fall Of Little Voice, King's Theatre, Leven Street, Monday-Saturday, 7.30pm (matinees 2.30pm), £10.50-£22, 0131-529 6000

THE RISE AND FALL OF LITTLE VOICE
IT'S not often you get to hear live performances of Shirley Bassey, Judy Garland and Billie Holiday ringing through a theatre and even rarer to experience them on the same night.

But that's just what Deborah Saloman achieves in her role as Little Voice in the stage play The Rise and Fall of Little Voice.

Saloman has a tall order to fill, not only mimicking some of the greatest voices of the 20th century but also stepping into the shoes of the woman the play was written for, Jane Horrocks.

Fortunately she is more than up to the task, having developed and toured her own play about Judy Garland, Get Happy, and wowing critics with her smooth vocals.

While sharing similarities with the acclaimed 1998 film, Little Voice, starring Horrocks and Brenda Blethyn, the play is a faithful rendition of the original 1992 script, created to showcase Horrocks' talent, albeit transposed from the north of England to Scotland. The play follows the fortunes of Little Voice, a reclusive young girl with a talent for copying the voices she hears on the records left by her late father.

Overheard by her mother's sleazy lover Ray Say, she is goaded into singing on stage to earn the gruesome pair some extra money.

When she starts to rebel, however, things get complicated. Thankfully, shy telephone engineer and love interest Billy is on hand, developing his own light show in the garden shed.