So how do you become Keith Richards? New Rolling Stones play in Chichester

So how do you become Keith Richards, the task facing Brenock O’Connor in the Rolling Stones drugs bust play Redlands at Chichester Festival Theatre?

Transcript

00:00Good afternoon, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers and I'm fantastic

00:07this afternoon to speak to Keith Richards, or as close as I will probably ever get to

00:11Keith Richards. Brennan, you are playing Keith in Redlands at Chester Festival Theatre, the

00:15last play on the main stage, and what a fantastic character to play. What have you got to capture

00:22about this great man?

00:24I mean, there's so much to capture, and that's sort of the great tragedy of having two and

00:29a half hours to capture it in, and a wider story to tell.

00:32Yeah, whereas he's an 81 years old.

00:35Yeah, absolutely, he's had a lifetime of being Keith, I've got two hours a night to try and

00:39get his energy across, and to capture...

00:41But it's the energy, isn't it, isn't that the key thing?

00:44That is the thing, is the energy and the intention and the drive being to try and get the music

00:51across and to make something, and make people feel something. It's a real joy, and it's

01:00a massive privilege to be trusted with someone as iconic as Keith, and I can only hope we

01:05do it justice.

01:06Oh, absolutely, and what happens, I was asking you, if you look up and there is Keith sitting

01:11in the audience watching you as Keith?

01:14I either crumble or I flourish. I weep or I wail. Either way, it's going to be something

01:24if he does come through. But if he doesn't, he's been a local boy for a long time now,

01:30there's enough people in the audience that know him or have met him in the street or

01:33had parties with him or bought him a pint, you know, it feels like a definition.

01:38It's an association, isn't it?

01:39Yeah, it's a hometown tale. I've had three people this past week tell me three separate

01:43stories about him.

01:44Fantastic.

01:45It's so beautiful to get research from the area that we're doing the show.

01:49So how do you approach, are you kind of attempting to do an impersonation, or are you allowing

01:55yourself to be more free than that?

01:57It feels wrong to, it feels wrong to play pastiche or to play a caricature. But also,

02:07it's a heightened scenario. It's not just the stones existing, it's the stones going

02:12through a time where if this goes wrong, the stones don't exist anymore. So that adds a

02:17certain weight to it and a certain fire behind Keith and Mick and Marianne, and the way they

02:23negotiate being involved in this world. But it's a gas, it really is.

02:30The photos that have been released so far look like you are going to absolutely nail

02:35it. Really fabulous to see the show. Thank you ever so much.