Adelayo Adedayo is a versatile young actress who works in TV, film and now stage. Trained at the Identity School of Acting, Adedayo’s TV work includes the leading role of Viva in BBC3’s Some Girls as well as M.I. High, Skins and Meet The Bandais. For film she recently starred in playwright Bola Agbaje’s adaptation of her Oliver Award winning play Gone Too Far, which premiered at this year’s BFI London Film Festival.
After making her stage in November in The Dead Wait at Park Theatre it has just been announced that she is to join the team of Law & Order: UK next autumn. With her star on the rise, Adedayo tells Joy Francis why she didn’t see acting as a career option, how she combined acting with studying and why new actors should never take no for an answer.
What got you into acting?
I’ve always loved acting. I did it as a hobby when I was growing up. A lot of the shows I used to watch were American except for EastEnders. I didn’t see acting as a career as I didn’t watch British shows and films. When I went to university to study law, I had to put something on my UCAS form about extracurricular activities, so I went to the Identity School of Acting part time. That’s when I realised that was a British scene.
You got your first gig in the TV classic The Bill. What was that like as you were entering a TV institution with well established characters?
It was really weird for me, coming into an established show. It was the first time I had an audition and my first show. It was my first time on set and working with people I had seen on TV. It was a crazy and brilliant experience.
You’ve been in Skins and are more known for the popular lead character of Viva in BBC3’s Some Girls. Describe Viva and what it is that you enjoy about playing the part.
Viva is fun. On the face of it she is sensible and a quite well rounded teenager. I love playing her because she is written as a good representation of a teenage girl. She is smart but isn’t above being silly at times. She gets into trouble and has fun with her mates and can take the piss. Viva has a crazy home life and yet it is still stable.
The show has a really mixed audience in terms of ethnicity and age. Did that surprise you?
It did surprise me at first. I’m getting that little more used to it now. When the first series aired my friends took me to a wine tasting event for my birthday. There was this group of men in their 40s there who had come from work in Canary Wharf. One of them said to me: “Darling I think you are great.” He then started talking about the show and said that he and his wife loved it. I was like, what? It would never have entered my mind that the show had such an audience.
It is also unusual to have four diverse young women leading a show on TV.
It is a rarity to have four strong female characters at the centre of a TV show. I would hope that it does open more doors for females with parts written showing that they can be leaders and that they can make good television and good film.
You are in your first play, Paul Herzberg’s The Dead Wait at Park Theatre. You play Lily and a Wambo woman. Tell us a bit about the characters and their roles in the play?
I feel very blessed to be in my first play and I couldn’t be happier that it is The Dead Wait. The Angolan war was totally before my time. Before the reading the play I didn’t even know that there was a war and that the South African army was part of it. Even though I didn’t know anything about the subject I didn’t struggle to understand the play. The real story is about relationships and how those relationships make you act in extreme circumstances. Lily is my principal character. She is the daughter of George Jozana who goes to fight in the Angolan war and she is left waiting for 20 years not knowing what had happened to him – whether he was captured or tortured. Then this guy [Josh Gilmore] comes out of the woodwork and says he knows everything about my father and she is like – how come you have sat on this information for 20 years? My other part, a Wambo woman, is Angolan. She is in love with her country, is very patriotic and is in the middle of the war.
What was it like working with Bola Agbaje on the film adaptation of her award winning play Gone Too Far?
I saw the play, loved the play and could see it as a movie. We did a pilot version of the film first and when I got the part I was like, this is sick. When we were on set and doing it as a film I was very proud of Bola. To transition from stage to film is amazing. Obviously the film had to be made its own and we were a new cast. It has more of a comedic feel as it wasn’t as dramatic as theatre, so that was fun to do. There is always fun to be had with Bola’s writing.
What is the main piece of advice you would give to young actors?
Keep working. Just keep going until you get there. It is very easy to get disheartened when you hear one no and you think, it’s over. I’m not good enough. Good sailors weren’t made on safe seas.