Actor Mike Edward on touring with New Zealand’s global hit comedy Ladies Night

Mike Edward, star of the comedy Ladies Night, touring nationwide in September and November. Photo / Joshua Apperley

THE VIEW FROM MY WINDOW: Actor Mike Edwards tells Karl Puschmann how his childhood influenced his life

I live in an apartment on the edge of Mt Eden. As you walk in the door there’s a massive bay window at the end. It’s about three metres long and opens right up. The apartment’s high up and has a view right back over towards the city. I’m so lucky because I don’t know if I could live in such a small space without it. It stops me from feeling squashed.

There was a Dr Seuss book that Mum used to read me when I was a little boy, called The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins. He was this pauper kid that lived at the bottom of a hill with all the poor people. Beyond that were all the workers and as you go up the hill there’s the nobles and the dukes and the houses get flasher and flasher. Right at the top, there’s the castle with the king. The book talks about this view that the king has looking over his kingdom but Bartholomew would look up and have exactly the same view but in the other direction and own it just as much as the king. I feel like that in my little squashed apartment. I look out and up to the Sky Tower and all the city’s affluence and feel like Bartholomew.

The other thing the view gives me is the feeling that freedom is still possible. As an actor, you need to feel like you’re free. It reminds me that even though I’m smashing out the mortgage every month and doing the work, I have a horizon I can look towards.

I think it’s really good for humans to remember perspective. It’s like when we sit by an ocean and look out over the sea, or when we sit under a night sky and look at the stars. It reminds us how fleeting this all is and how small we all are in the big picture. There’s something in that perspective. Life’s fleeting and this stuff doesn’t matter. There’s a lot of freedom in that. Whatever the choices are, whatever the things we’re doing, 100 years from now, no one’s going to remember us, so do the things that make you happy. That’s the perspective nature gives you.

When I was growing up, my mum used to make me outfits. I was always dressed as Peter Pan or Superman and I lived in an imaginary world. That place for me was really fun, very believable and very real. One of my defining memories is being 7 or 8, up a tree in my Peter Pan outfit and the neighbours coming over. It was the first time I was aware that this was a bit awkward. I hid and stayed still because I knew if I came down, the neighbourhood people would tease me for being in my green tights. It was the first time I realised that what I was doing was a bit different.

The cast of Ladies Night, New Zealand's most successful theatre comedy.

I never thought of acting as a potential career. I remember my sister going to drama classes at 12 or 11 and wanting to go but that not being an option because it was a thing girls did. Which is so f***ed up when you look at it now. All I wanted to do was act. When I finally got into the school show at Auckland Grammar, even then I was just trying to get on the set. I said, “I want to build the set,” so I could be close to this thing that was magical. But they made me audition and I ended up in it. After that I was away because I just loved it. I was terrible but I was so into it. I remember getting my first TV gig and loving it and then watching it and going, “Oh my God, I suck.” That’s what made me go to drama school. I had to learn how to do this. It took me a long time to get comfortable and even now I still wonder that if I’d made better life choices I’d be in a different state. Acting’s a hard career to pursue. You only do it because you love it.

When I’m acting it’s the only time that my busy, anxious, overthinking, mind switches off. It gives me the capacity to just be in the moment and have the freedom to go, “This is not actually me.” I can just let things out and let rip. That kid that was dressed as Peter Pan, that forgot the world and was actually in Neverland is still me. I don’t think I’m a very good actor, but when I go on stage I believe the stuff that I’m doing. I can play make-believe in a very true sense.

I’m looking forward to touring Ladies Night and getting out of Auckland. It’s a wonderful cast and I’m really looking forward to hanging out with all the people and putting on a play, telling stories and making people happy. Ladies Night is a classic Kiwi show of joy and a celebration of human life. What a cool thing to share with the country.

* Ladies Night’s nationwide tour runs through September and October. For venues, dates and ticket info visit eventfinda.co.nz