Spilling the Beans on Dad : Lynn Redgrave’s solo show tackles her famous father’s legacy--though she’s left some secrets out.

Three years ago, when Lynn Red grave was out of work--”not even being offered jobs I didn’t want to do,” she says--she was invited to do a Shakespeare reading at the Folger Library in Washington. She decided to combine that with “the little play” she’d been ruminating on about her father.

The youngest child of actors Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson, Redgrave grew up in a household dominated by her brilliant, larger-than-life father, who apparently poured his energy and passion into his work--leaving little for his family.

The play she created, “Shakespeare for My Father,” is a bittersweet memoir of their relationship, balancing family history and anecdotes with short readings from Shakespeare--because, she says, “my memory of him was in Shakespeare roles.” Buoyed by a strong response, she took to the road in 1993 with an expanded version of the piece, playing 27 cities in six weeks, starting with three stops in Sothern California. The tour was followed by a nine-month run--and a Tony nomination--in New York.

After a sold-out stint at the UK/LA Festival at UCLA earlier this fall, Redgrave has returned for a four-week run at the Canon Theatre in Beverly Hills through Jan. 8.

Redgrave was born in England in 1943. She was invited by Laurence Olivier to become a founding member of Britain’s National Theatre in 1963. American audiences got to know her in 1966 as the vulnerable heroine in her

Oscar-nominated turn in “Georgy Girl.”

Among dozens of TV, theater and film credits, she has performed locally onstage in “Les Liaisons Dangereuses” (1988) at the Ahmanson and “Don Juan in Hell” (1991) at the Henry Fonda. She co-starred with sister Vanessa in “The Three Sisters” in London (1990) and in the 1991 TV remake of “What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?”

She has been married for 27 years to actor-director John Clark (who is producing and directing the solo show); the couple have two grown children, Benjamin and Kelly, and live in Topanga with their 13-year-old daughter, Annabel.

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Question: Many of the reminiscences in the piece are personal and painful. Did it take a lot of strength to share them with an audience?

Answer: I think it’s courageous for any of us to get up there every night, to go out on your own and say, “Watch me”--even though we love it. And the longer one does it, the standards are higher; you always fear failure. I have to fight back fear every time: “Maybe tonight I’ll blow it.”

But the piece itself doesn’t feel brave. I hope it makes people think how important we are to each other: parent to child, child to parent.

I’m doing what I should do--taking my life and work and making good of it--and also giving hope to other actors. There’s very much a sense in the acting profession of passing down the torch.

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Q: What about personal privacy?

A: I’ve been dramatically selective; I draw the line. The fact is that I’m open and everything is true--but I haven’t told you everything. I still have my secrets.

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Q: Did you ever question whether the piece would work?

A: Oh, yes. When I started, I really had no idea what I had. Some days I’d sit with my head in my hands in despair: “Why should this pitiful story be of any interest? Why share it?” Other days, I’d be elated. After the first night, a lot of people came up and said, “You showed me me and my father.”

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Q: After 400 performances, can you still tap into genuine emotion when you tell these stories?

A: I don’t think I could have performed the piece six months after my father’s death (in 1985); the proximity would have been overwhelming. Now--this is hard to describe--it’s performance, and it’s real. As a performer, I must tell the audience this story, tell it as if for the first time. I have to get lost--but I can’t get so lost that I can’t go on. It’s terribly real to me when I do it. I dread when it won’t be. On those nights, I always remember what my husband says: “Never tell a lie. Say it and mean it.”

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Q: After writing this, were you at a place of peace with your father?

A: I thought so; now I realize I had a little way to go. Each time I do it, I bring a little more (peace) to it. Now it’s with a sense of, “Thank you, Dad, for a great job.” The privilege, the pain and all the rest--I wouldn’t change a moment.*

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Vital Stats

“Shakespeare for My Father”

Information

Canon Theatre, 205 N. Canon Drive, Beverly Hills, (310) 859-2830.