Former Conservative MP Ann Widdecombe is in a jolly mood when I call to speak to her about her role as the Wicked Queen in classic pantomime Snow White which takes up residence at Redhill’s Harlequin Theatre on December 7. The levity could be down to the fact the 71-year-old has just been asked to return to Strictly Come Dancing - the show that effectively changed her life - for the Christmas Day special.
“Everything I have done since retiring flowed from Strictly,” she says with genuine warmth. “The show’s producers had asked me to appear every year since 2004, and I had declined as I was still an MP and it wouldn’t have been appropriate. But once I had retired, I thought, “Why not? And I was the first politician to do it”.
Ann who was partnered with show favourite Anton du Beke, lasted an astonishing nine weeks, the viewers enjoying the ongoing verbal battle between the feisty politician and acerbic judge Craig Revel Horwood – who once likened her to a “dancing hippo”.
“That was why people were voting for me, the
Poppy Berry
y wanted to see how rude we could be to each other.”
But the comments were strictly for the cameras and Ann admits that she and Craig are now great pals, not only appearing in panto together but travelling the South East in each other’s company for a celebrity edition of Antiques Roadtrip – “which I won by the way,” she quips.
“Craig off stage is nothing like Craig on stage. He’s Mr Nasty on the Strictly panel, he has a role to play and he plays that really well. But in real life he’s not like that at all.”
This year, Ann finds herself up against her old sparring partner once more as Craig takes on the role of the Wicked Queen in Cinderella at the New Victoria Theatre in Woking.
“Yes he’s very close, which amuses us both,” she adds with a chuckle. “Two wicked queens in Surrey.”
For her part, Ann is, “really looking forward to the panto” and is prepared for plenty of topical gags. “I should think there’ll be some political stuff in there – plenty of Brexit material. I don’t think you could get away without mentioning it this year. But I won’t be singing or dancing, my wicked queen is a haughty and remote character.”
Ann, a fervent Brexiteer who has been openly scathing of Prime Minister Theresa May’s exit deal -labelling it as a “surrender” - has never shied away from expressing her public and private views. An old-school, conviction politician she has spoken out against fox hunting, voted consistently against new laws pertaining to LGBT rights and in 1993 famously converted to Roman Catholicism after the Church of England opted to ordain women priests, branding it as “theologically impossible”.
Born in 1947 in Bath, Ann spent her early life in Singapore where her father worked for the civil service. After studying at the universities of Birmingham and Oxford, she embarked on a career in marketing at Unilever before entering the House of Commons as MP for Maidstone in 1987. Rising through the Conservative ranks under Margaret Thatcher and John Major, she was a vociferous Shadow Home Secretary under William Hague from 1999-2001.
“I became a Conservative politician to fight socialism. People will understand that now because of Jeremy Corbyn. If I’d have said that to an 18-year-old before Corbyn’s arrival they would have looked at me like I was talking Greek because we haven’t had the experience of socialism in this country since the 1970s. Blair wasn’t a socialist. Blair was New Labour, which is not the same.
“When I was becoming politically active the world was very clearly divided between Communism and Capitalism – the Cold War was still going on. In this country that manifested as Conservatism versus Socialism and everybody knew which side they were on. You wouldn’t have got anyone on the doorstep telling you, ‘Well you’re all the same,’ as we had until recently as the country would be run radically differently depending on who got in.
“I’m all for choice, but the people who are taken up by it [Labour], the ones who think it’s something new are the ones who have never lived through it. It’s actually something very old and discarded. Unfortunately we are doomed to repeat past mistakes as the corporate memory fades. If people believe Labour can renationalise industry and wipe-out student debt then they are going to have to find out the hard way. Trouble is, the rest of us will as well.”
Ann is happy she left the House of Commons when she did, saying she would have felt “jaded” if she had carried on much longer. “I got the point of exit exactly quite right and I don’t miss it.”
But since retirement from politics, Ann has very much remained the public figure, which she again attributes to the Strictly factor. Although a published novelist while in parliament, Ann acknowledges that her appearance enabled the public to see her in a different light of her, opening doors to opportunities she never thought possible – her appearance as La Duchesse de Crakentorp in Donizetti's La Fille du regiment – “I still have to pinch myself about that one,” she says with obvious pride.
This year Ann entered the Big Brother House, notorious for bringing out the worst in its so-called celebrity housemates and against all odds was runner up.
“I was led to believe it was a special female edition to mark 100 years of suffrage with serious debates,” she explains. “My agent said to me, you’re not out in the jungle, it’s only Ellstree to get out you just have to open the door. I did not find it a difficult experience aside from the boredom factor – you are not allowed books, pens or paper – and you tend to form groups with people you have things in common with. That’s why in the tasks they throw you together with people you would not normally be with for the benefit of the viewers.”
What with CBB, Strictly, Sugar Free Farm et al under her belt surely it’s time we saw Ann head out to Oz for I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here. “I would have done the jungle, but the jungle didn’t want me,” she laments. “And with these old bones, Dancing on Ice is out of the question.”
And before I ask, she adds: “And Love Island of course. You won’t find me on that. Not that they’d want me.” Never, says never Ann…
Snow White is the Harlequin Theatre, Redhill from Dec 7-31. For tickets, visit: harlequintheatre.co.uk; 01737 276500
