'It really has been like a family'
Megan Cusack plays Nancy Corrigan
BBC/Neal Street Productions,Olly Courtney
- Gareth McLean
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On Megan Cusack’s first day on Call the Midwife, she was handed an ice lolly. Was it a welcome-to-the-show treat? “It was cold as I was walking up to Nonnatus House, so they gave me the lolly to cool my breath so it wouldn’t show on camera,” she explains. “It was my first taste of movie magic!”
Such is Cusack’s enthusiasm about working on Call the Midwife — “I enjoyed almost every second on such a beautiful show with incredible actors and such a dedicated crew” — getting the part of Nancy Corrigan was the real treat.
In four and a half years of playing her, Cusack has deftly navigated Nancy from unmoored, unmarried mother, full of shame and self-doubt, towards self-belief and assurance, stepping into her power, in modern parlance, as a mother and as a nurse. The catalyst for the change?
“She’s surrounded by people that love her. That wasn’t something she’d ever had before. She didn’t have someone to say, ‘Well done. I’m really proud of you’ or ‘Do you need help with that?’ And until you’ve experienced that, how do you give that back to people?”
As the large and loyal Midwife audience took Nancy to their hearts, Cusack’s been blessed with bigger stories and better gifts. Ice lollies? Pah! Last year, Nancy got a man for Christmas. And though he wasn’t conceived of as such, Conor O’Donnell’s Roger became part of Nancy’s exit storyline as the pair departed Poplar for Surrey. For, as Cusack reveals to Radio Times, she’s leaving Call the Midwife.
Leaving is bittersweet but I need to take a leap of faith
“Sometimes, you’ve got to step out of your comfort zone to grow. I’ve learnt so much, but I’m at the start of my career and I need to take a leap of faith,” she says, explaining that she wants to do more theatre. “It’s bittersweet, really. I’ve made lifelong friendships there and I get to take those with me. But when I think about not rocking up to set and seeing Tim, who’s part of the grips team, with his guitar hanging out of his van and serenading people at half six in the morning…”
She pauses before fondly saying, “It really has been like a family.”
This brings us neatly to her actual family. Niece of actresses Niamh and Sinéad, Cusack’s dad Pádraig is a theatre producer. In these nepo baby days, is the name a blessing or a burden?
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It’s all about perspective. I look at the breadth of work that some of my aunts have done and part of me is jealous. But that’s just a negative emotion and there’s no point in holding on to it. Instead, I think I’m so lucky to be able to call on them for advice or to watch them in incredible things they do, to ask them what work they did to get to that place — because I want to be able to do that. My aunt Niamh helped me work through something I was struggling with the other day for an audition, so it’s less burden and more inspiration. Some people ask, ‘How does it feel to be living in that shadow?’ It’s lovely. The shade is great.”
Authors
Gareth McLean
Gareth McLean has been writing about television for nearly 30 years. As a critic, he's reviewed thousands of programmes. As a feature writer, he's interviewed hundreds of people, from Liza Minnelli to Jimmy Savile. He has also written for TV.
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