#my mad fat diary
Sharon Rooney: One Of Everything (Virgin Media)
As new series Finding Alice airs on ITV, Sharon Rooney talks about checking on your strong friends, building mansions on The Sims and falling down a YouTube rabbit hole on the daily
“Make a will,” Sharon Rooney urges us. “It’s so boring and so stressful and sad, but just take an afternoon out and get it done.” The Glaswegian actor, best known for her lead role in My Mad Fat Diary, is surprisingly upbeat and matter-of-fact as she discusses our mortality. Her latest project, Finding Alice, which deals with death and grief head-on, has rubbed off on her – small talk be damned! “It made me realise how important those conversations are that no one wants to have, because it’s inevitable – no one’s getting out of this alive.”
Finding Alice, created by The Durrells’ director Roger Goldby, writer Simon Nye and star Keeley Hawes (who plays Alice), almost immediately opens with a death. Alice’s husband Harry (Jason Merrells, Agatha Raisin) falls down the stairs in the dream home he’s built for her and their teen daughter Charlotte (Isabella Pappas,Paranoid). It’s clear he hasn’t planned for this eventuality (nor did he plan for a bannister) and Alice is left to deal with the fallout, which includes the secrets Harry leaves in his wake.
Sharon plays Nicola, who copes with the death of her older brother by attempting to stay positive for everyone, as well as acting and dressing loudly (“I’m the sassy one!,” she proclaims at Harry’s inquest) – something Sharon had a say in. “I said, “What about headbands?” There were about eight different ones. And I said she’s got to have a necklace with her name on. That’s Nicola’s armour,” Sharon says.
“The brighter the clothes get, the worse she’s feeling. Everything is to compensate. It’s so important to check on your loud friends just as much as your quiet friends. With Nicola, I think, “Who is checking on you?” It’s made me send a few texts that I hadn’t [previously], because I thought, “Oh, they’ll be fine.””
Despite the difficult topics the show covers, you’ll laugh a lot as the darkly comic humour shines through – Finding Alice screams, “Let’s talk about death, baby!” in a relatable and honest, yet funny and amusing way.
For example, Alice can’t figure out where the fridge is in the house (it’s a complicated smart home) and wonders why a “compare the coffin” website doesn’t exist, eventually opting to buy Harry’s from Amazon. “We all experience grief at some point,” Sharon says. “It’s not all awful, you do learn to laugh again.”
Joanna Lumley (Absolutely Fabulous) plays Alice’s stand-offish and judgemental mum, with Nigel Havers (Coronation Street) as her quiet but well-meaning dad. Gemma Jones (Bridget Jones’s Diary) and Kenneth Cranham (Layer Cake) also join the cast as Harry’s parents, and Rhashan Stone (Strike Back) is a mortuary worker who becomes Alice’s “death guru.”
Before you tune in for the show, which Sharon describes as a “wee bit of TV soup for the soul”, here’s one of everything from the entertainment world that she’s loving right now…
TV show: I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!
I really love Giovanna [Fletcher, from series 20], I think she is a super mum. I also really like Beverly [Callard]. I’d love to live in a castle. I’m slightly jealous of them, although not that jealous, because my couch is much comfier.
Box Set: The Royle Family
This is my third time re-watching The Royle Family during lockdown. I can quote the whole thing from start to finish.
Film: Stepmom
I watched it when it first came out many moons ago and I enjoyed it, so it’s a film I always go back to. I’m a really bad re-watcher, I’ll re-watch the same things over and over. I love a film that makes me cry!
App: Instagram
I spend hours on it. You know when you go into the search bar and they put videos you think you’ll like? Before I know it, I’m like, “Oh, that’s 40 minutes gone.”
Friend you always call: Best friend Anna
We met at college when we were 16 and I speak to her pretty much all day every day. She’s got the pink sparkly love heart emoji next to her name in my phone.
Video game: The Sims
I don’t play with the actual Sims, I just enjoy building houses. It’s really relaxing, because there’s a clear end goal. Don’t tell my agent that’s what I do – they think I’m doing very serious actor work, but I’m actually just building a giant mansion.
YouTube: Vlogs
I like Disney vlogs, family vlogs, people going about their day vlogs, and haul videos, where people buy stuff and show you. I do watch people building Sims houses – I wasn’t gonna tell you that…
Podcast:Janey Godley
I’ve been listening to her podcast for years and years – it first came out in 2010. She does it with her daughter.
Documentary: American Murder: The Family Next Door
I love all the crime documentaries. I also really like 60 Days In, where they put normal civilians in prisons to find out what’s going on inside. I also like watching YouTube videos on real crime – and then I wonder why I have weird dreams.
Guilty pleasure: YouTube videos
It’s all of the ones I’ve just told you! I’ll watch anything and everything. It’s probably YouTube videos. The other night, I went into a Dance Moms dark hole. I clicked on a recap video by accident, and before I knew it, I’d watched all of them. Or, those Facebook videos where they do funniest babies, funniest dogs, funniest cats. I’m usually watching them in my trailer.
When is ITV’s Finding Alice on TV?
Finding Alice airs on ITV HD (CH 113) on Sundays at 9pm, with the first episode screening on 17 January. The six-part series will subsequently air every week until Sunday 21 February.
TECH? NO: Sharon Rooney isn’t daft about smart homes after filming in one for new ITV show Finding Alice
TECHNOPHOBE actress Sharon Rooney reckons living in a smart home would be a hi-tech horror — as she doesn’t even like talking to Alexa.
The Scots star — who played Miss Atlantis in big-budget Disney flick Dumbo — was at the mercy of machines filming new show Finding Alice, which was set in a house full of futuristic technology.
She admits working on the six-part ITV drama — which kickstarts after her character’s brother is found dead at the bottom of his bannister-less stairs — made her realise she’s happy to keep it simple in her own life.
Sharon, 32, says: “When we were filming on the stairs, which don’t have a bannister, I was thinking, ‘Why would you not have a bannister? It’s just so dangerous’.
“I’m very clumsy. So the thought of not having bannisters on stairs fills me with fear.
“Also, the thing of having to talk to your house to open the curtains and so on.
“I’m bad enough with the Alexa. Sometimes I’ll say something at home and she’ll suddenly talk to me.
“And I think, ‘No, I don’t want to talk to anyone, never mind a machine’. I mean, what is she listening to? What has she heard?”
Finding Alice stars Bodyguard favourite Keeley Hawes as Alice, a mum whose life is turned upside down when her husband Harry (Jason Merrells) is found dead at the bottom of the stairs in the smart house he designed.
She can’t even find the fridge while dealing with the aftermath of the tragedy and struggles to contend with unexpected visits from Harry’s parents Minnie (Gemma Jones) and Gerry (Kenneth Cranham) as well as her own dad Roger (Nigel Havers) and mum Sarah (Joanna Lumley).
To make matters worse, other unexpected visitors make her realise that Harry’s business debt wasn’t the only secret he had.
Sharon — who starred in the early seasons of hit Scots comedy Two Doors Down — plays Harry’s younger sister Nicola who has a habit of blurting out the wrong thing at the wrong time and played second fiddle to her “golden boy” sibling.
The actress thinks the show deals with the practical side of someone passing away and hopes it gets people talking about how to deal with the death of a loved-one.
She says: “There is a lot of humour in Finding Alice. Even in the saddest of times there has to be joy.
"How do you breathe again when you’ve been through such tragedy and pain? Because you have to. Life is crazy. You have to laugh again.
“I love how Nicola always wants to remind people with stories about Harry at any opportunity.
“That’s how he lives on. With reminders of him on top of the coffin at his funeral.
"My gran always used to say to me, ‘A funeral is for the living’. That’s so true.
“There’s no cheat sheet that comes when somebody dies, to say, ‘This is what you have to do’.
“I really hope Finding Alice gets people talking. Just a quick conversation.
"No one wants to talk about death. But it is important. You have to know what to do in practical terms.
"When you’re grieving the last thing you want to think about is bank accounts and passwords.”
Sharon shares the screen with The Durrells actress Keeley and admits she loved working with one of the telly stars of the moment.
She reveals: “Working with Keeley was just the best. I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so much.
"I remember having a day off and thinking, ‘Can I just come in?’. And they were like, ‘No. Have a day off!’.
“There’s one part of the story where Nicola and Alice go jogging. We actually did do a lot of it.
"I’m not going to say I’ve developed a love for it. But I’ve developed a liking.
“We also filmed a night out at a bowling alley. Nicola gets a strike in the script and by sheer luck I got a strike on camera.
"I felt like I had scored the winning goal in the World Cup.”
Although filming for Finding Alice was interrupted by Covid, Sharon and the cast got back to work by following strict protocols.
Ironically, the Glasgow actress admits the best thing about working on a show about smart technology was the rules banned her from even looking at her phone.
She adds: “It’s really weird how quickly it became the new normal.
“And actually, how much better it was, in a way, not to be on your phone in the morning because you couldn’t take any personal items into make-up.
“So you could just sit and not scroll through Instagram. That was nice.”
* Finding Alice starts Sunday, January 17, STV, 9pm…’
The Scottish Sun, 14.1.21 (not linked to avoid giving them more clicks)
The Edit - Series 2: 16/01/2021
Sharon Rooney talks to BBC Scotland’s showbiz news show The Edit about ITV’s new drama Finding Alice.
Sharon Rooney stars as Nicola in Finding Alice, which starts TOMORROW (Sunday 17 January) on ITV at 9pm.
‘Finding Alice’: watch the trailer for ITV’s new Keeley Hawes drama
‘An all-star line up joins award-winning actress Keeley Hawes in the series, which was created by Roger Goldby, Keeley Hawes and Simon Nye, and written by Roger and Simon.
The six-part drama focuses on Alice’s honest, raw, blackly comic journey of grief, love and life after the death of her partner Harry.
BAFTA-nominated Hawes plays the role of Alice, and is joined by a star-studded cast including Joanna Lumley, Nigel Havers, Jason Merrells, Gemma Jones, Kenneth Cranham, rising star Isabella Pappas, Sharon Rooney and Rhashan Stone.
‘Finding Alice’ airs on ITV in January.’
Peak Shico Cuteness Klaxon!!!!
In DUMBO, Brooklyn, on this day in 2015!
Sharon was horribly ill, but managed to do the performance of Henry IV that Nico came to see. She couldn’t make it to the International Emmys with him thoughTwo years ago, these two were having a cuddle under Brooklyn Bridge!
Three years ago today!
(She was in DUMBO, now she’s in Dumbo!)
Four years ago today!
Five years ago this week!
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joyjoymcavoy 'That’s a wrap on McDonald and Dodds @itv so many lovely photos but this is the only one I’m allowed to post…it just so happens to be with the incredible @sharon_rooney ❤️
we had such an amazing girl gang with @shelleyconn033 @katronney @lifegoalsonwheels and a really wonderful cast @johnthomson2 @natalie.gumede @arothney, @tomosgwynfryn @felipebejarano and @georgehjwatkins thanks to McDonald and Dodds themselves @jasonwatkinsofficial and @talagouveia for making us feel so welcome on set and bringing the magic to every scene and to our incredible director @bexrycroft thank you!! @mammothscreen #itv #itvdrama #actor #lovelymemories’
(13 November 2020)
Sharon Rooney will guest star in the second season of ITV’s police drama McDonald & Dodds… will her character be victim or suspect?!
McDonald & Dodds is set in Bath and follows DCI McDonald (Tala Gouveia), who has recently transferred from London’s Met Police, and has been partnered with the unassuming DS Dodds (Jason Watkins), who has been happy in the background for most of his working life. To McDonald’s surprise they form an unexpectedly effective crime solving partnership.
“…The second episode of season two, titled We Need To Talk About Doreen, tells the story of Doreen (Sharon Rooney), part of a group who have travelled to Bath for the weekend to celebrate their friend Angela’s (Joy McAvoy) birthday.
Whilst out on the town celebrating, Doreen, Angela, Hilary (Shelley Conn), Melissa (Maya Coates) and Cath (Kat Ronney) get chatting to some players from the Bath Eagles Rugby Club, including its strapping new signing Dominique Aubert (Tomos Gwynfryn). They are invited to a party thrown by rugby club chairman Jimmy (John Thomson) at his home and happily attend with other members of the rugby team and Dominique Aubert’s agent Deborah (Natalie Gumede). But the following morning, as most of the party are nursing their hangovers, the body of one guest is discovered near a railway tunnel and McDonald & Dodds are called in to investigate…”
reblog this w the top 5 only shows u could rewatch over and over again
Going to the mall like this, little nervous. Cute and comfy
Chubby Bunny
