Interview with Clarke Peters – Ken

14 December 2023

What is ‘true love’?

That’s a very good question. I think that’s a question that will only be answered by seeing this aspect of what love is. Love is difficult to define. In this instance, true love is taking care of the desires of the people you grew up with and with whom you were in love.

How has it been to have a main group of characters who are slightly older and looking at their relationships and friendships?

Well, it's good because at this age we have different experiences to people who are younger and sometimes we need a different type of support that a younger person can't give us because they have no idea of the journey that we've gone through. So being in a company of older actors, we can support each other like that. We're more patient with each other. If one should forget their lines, we don’t beat each other up or beat ourselves up.

As an actor, how have you tackled combining the difficult themes in the show with the lighter bits?

The tough bits were really tough because we're all actors who really like to live with the truth, and sometimes when going into the depth of the emotions, you find that your body resonates in a different way. It could be hilarity, or it could be devastating grief. There have been times on the set where you move to an emotion and you just have to step away and let yourself grieve. Hopefully the audience will feel that as well. The other side of it is that there's a love story and I have the most beautiful person to fall in love with, and that's easy to do.

Can you tell us a little bit about the relationship between Ken and Phil?

Well, it's a story of unrequited love. Maybe 50 years has passed since that fire was kindled in our hearts. As an adolescent, it's more hormonal than it is emotional. But in this case, I think that because of the time that came up, it was more emotional than it was hormonal, and whatever it was that we lived as teenagers and the things that moulded our characters are still there today. That's what resonates in us and what draws us to each other - some unfinished love. It's not a case of pouncing on someone's bones, so to speak. This is love and it's gentle, caring, nurturing and supportive. Hopefully, as you get older, you'll see that that's what love is about.

How has it been working with this cast?

It's been terrible. These guys are no fun. We don't laugh, we don't giggle, we don't support each other [laughs]. No, I’m joking, it has been a real gas, and as I said before, it has something to do with our ages and understanding where we are on this journey of life. It's a good cast, a good group of people to play with. You can just sit back and let someone follow their intuition and be supportive of that because you know that however they couched the language of what they're trying to achieve, it's going to be brilliant.

Does Ken’s experience in the army influence how he handles the course of events in the show?

Yes, his experience in the army is key. People who have experienced war in the infantry have experience and a play in life that most civilians have never seen except in film. Ken has gone beyond that; he has been special forces. So, his experience of life and death carry with it the post-traumatic shock. A friend of mine was medevacked from Iraq about 20 years ago. One of the things I remember him saying was, they teach us how to do these atrocious things to human beings, but they don't teach us how to come back from that. So even today, 20 years on, and although he appears to be healed, it’s still a part of his life. He went into the service when he was 17 years old and he spent 20 years there, so that's been his whole life. I think that that's been part of Ken's life as well.

What do you hope the audience will take away from Truelove?

People have myriad of opinions about the issues the show is dealing with. Some of them political, some of them spiritual, some practical, some fearful, some unlawful. I have no idea how the audience will react to this. What I would like them to do is sit down and go through the journey with us and then make up their minds afterwards and hopefully spur some conversation. Death is something that everyone's afraid of, and yet we're all racing towards it. It's the most inevitable thing in your lifetime experience.