PE
After losing my mum still managing to finish drama school, because that was really difficult. I lost her in the first year.
The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 18 November 2023 source ↗
The question
What accomplishment matters most to you?Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
Verbatim recurring item in The Guardian Q&A; two fully readable publisher-hosted respondent pages establish institutional recurrence.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Others on this question
View all 192 →
Robson Green
British actor
Surviving the entertainment industry.
Sarah Millican
English comedian
That I turned a broken heart into a career. That I hit rock bottom and bounced back up a lot higher.
Andy Serkis
English actor
Being the father of three children.
Bozoma Saint John
Marketing executive; former chief marketing officer of Netflix
My daughter. She’s awesome and it’s because I’m awesome. Lol.
More from Paapa Essiedu
View profile →In 2016, the moment my agent rang me to tell me I’d got the part of Hamlet for the RSC. While I was on the phone, I looked to my left and turned to the right, and a bus whizzed by and the wing mirror was so close to me that it knocked my hat off.
To find as many moments to laugh as possible.
I would really love to know my parents as an adult. I lost my dad when I was 14 and my mum when I was 20.
I find it difficult to sit still.
In order to raise money to pay for myself to go to the National Youth Theatre, I performed a medley of my drama school speeches and some songs for my entire school. Considering I can’t sing, this was terrible. I did U Remind Me by Usher and Hey There Delilah by the Plain White T’s. They paid £2 each – basically, to laugh at me.
A really bad habit of eating sweets before I go to sleep.
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