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Elle UPFRONT
Words:BeckyBurgum.Photography: Getty Images.ELLE.COM/UK May 2020FASHION POOLS
E VER WONDERED WHERE THE WORL D’S MOST-ST YL ISH POOLS
ARE HIDDEN? FASHION WRITER AND AUTHOR OF POOLS
(OUT 7 APRIL) LOU STOPPARD OPENS HER LIT TLE BLUE BOOKDiv e in...
The Albatroz Beach
and Yacht Club Santa
Cruz, Portugal Order
a poolside champagne
at this crystalline pool,
cut into the cliffside.
Stadtbad
Charlottenburg
Berlin, Germany
The capital’s oldest
indoor pool is lavish
Art Nouveau design
at its best. Dive in.
Harazem, Morocco
These circular public
baths are so
beautiful they deser ve
a starring role in a
Bottega campaign.
Aqua Dome Tyrol,
Austria The new wellness
trend is healing waters,
like the ones found here.
” WHENYOU’VE
BEENIN
SOME T HING
so, so successful,
WHERE DOYOU
GO?I FEELTHE
E Y ESONME TO
PROVEMYSELF ”WITH MATTHEW MACFADYEN INQUIZAwards the next day, where we met Brad Pitt, and it built from
there. It’s like Phoebe said so beautifully in her speech at the
SAGs: “If I wake up tomorrow, it’s been the most beautiful dream.”’
She met Phoebe Waller Bridge, or PWB as Clifford calls
her, at RADA, after travelling home together on the Tube after
class. ‘I was very studious,’ she says. ‘It took me three years to get
in, so I really wanted it. I was focused on learning everything.’
And after graduating came stage work, from the Bristol Old
Vic to London’s Barbican, along
with some inevitable fallow periods.
The constant throughout was
PWB. ‘Our friendship and support
of one another’s pursuits remained
steady, through our ups and downs,’
she says. And so, when the BBC
signed up Fleabag there was no one
else Phoebe would have play her
sister. ‘I really do owe her everything.
And I’m enjoying reaping the rewards
and riding on her coat-tails,’ she grins.
The show’s meteoric success has
led to a delicious variety of job offers.
‘I’m surprised how varied the roles
have been,’ she says of the fear of
being typecast as Claire. ‘I think more
interesting women are appearing
in scripts. They’re more believable.
They’re real. They’re multidimensional.
I’d like to think that Fleabag contributed to that shift.’
And so, she’s taken work that takes her to new places.
First up: Quiz, ITV’s three-part drama with Matthew Macfadyen
(Succession) and Helen McCrory (Peaky Blinders), which tells the
infamous story of the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? coughing
scandal. For those too young, or who were under a rock in 2OO1:
British Army major Charles Ingram was accused of cheating to
win £1m on the TV game show. Clifford plays the major’s wife and,
while she admits she’s useless at quizzes, the story fascinated her.
‘The only things I’ve been able to watch myself in are Fleabag and
Quiz; I hope that’s a good sign,’ she says of the show’s prospects.
In July comes Two Weeks To Live, playing Game of Thrones
alumna Maisie Williams’ ‘very young’ mum in a comedy about the
pair on the run. ‘She’s cheeky, funny and an absolute joy,’ Clifford
says of her co-star. ‘I wasn’t sure what to expect, she started Game
of Thrones when she was 14 and child actors are notorious. But
she’s truly the most extraordinary actor, I learnt so much from her.’
Despite the accolades, awards and celebrity fans, Clifford
says the nerves never wane. ‘If anything, they get worse, because
the stakes and expectations get higher. When you’ve been in
something that’s been so, so successful – where do you go? I feel
the eyes on me to prove myself.’
And while Fleabag and Claire won’t be returning to our screens,
she promises that she and PWB have more projects to come.
‘We will work together forever. She’s writing a film, which a
few of the Fleabag team are involved with. This dream of hers
to establish her production company, which we always sort of
joked about. Well, apparently we’re doing it!’ They really are.