Interview: Alexandra Silber On Her Proms Wishlist, Solo Shows And FIDDLER ON THE ROOF!

Alexandra Silber is in town, and she has a message for London.

"Dear London," she says, raising her voice, then corrects herself: "Dear THE PROMS. Anyone who's willing to listen. Don't you want Julian Ovenden and me to do She Loves Me? Wouldn't Louise Dearman or Ruthie Henshall be a great Ilona? If you're talking about a bookish, spinster soprano, that's me. I want to do that at the Proms. I'd love to do that with the full orchestra. It would be a dream. Let's make that happen."

Until she gets that set up, she has plenty of other work keeping her busy - beginning with her five cabarets in London this week. She has a different special guest every night - Howard Goodall, Damian Humbley, Julie Atherton, Simon Bailey and Gina Beck.

"They're all very good friends," she says. "I don't know how many shows I've done with Damian, probably over 700, him singing in my face [in Fiddler on the Roof, in London], and Howard Goodall, I did the American premiere of Love Story. Then there are some people I've done a couple of concerts with, like Julie; and then Simon and Gina, I've always loved them socially and admired them but never performed with them. So this is my show, I can ask who I want, and they're coming along!"

The audience should expect a fun evening, because, as Silber says: "There's nothing worse than an overly-sincere cabaret. I'm all for a little bit of seriousness. That matters. But I do a lot of shows in a corset, crying. I just want it for the night to feel like my living room, but with everyone dressed up and some really fancy cocktails. You're a foot and a half away from me, so we can't pretend I'm anyone but me. , and we'll sing some songs and have some fun."

The sudden boom in London cabaret fascinates Silber.

"There's something interesting about it," she muses. "When I was doing Carousel, I had an incredibly vulnerable moment on stage every day. Total strangers saw me in that state through the veil of that character. There was a realisation that we have this craving, this desire on a deep level to know people. Cabaret offers a little peek with that veil taken off. You're spending time with performers you have connected with through another piece, but not with them. I find that liberating, not scary."

She's in town for ten days, and when she's not performing she'll be taking in as much West End theatre as she can. Then she's back to San Francisco for their Symphony Gala with a 'Salute to Broadway', singing Rodgers and Hammerstein with opera star Nathan Gunn and "almost all" of My Fair Lady - with Patrick Stewart ("I'd never actually dropped my phone on the floor before, but I was in the street - and I was like, 'WHY ARE THEY EVEN CALLING ME?!'"). As well as all this, she's teaching at a university, which she still finds slightly bizarre ("I have my own office. They call me 'Professor Silber'").

And of course, then it's off to New York to rehearse for the new production of Fiddler on the Roof, which begins performances in November. Silber played Hodel in the West End version alongside Henry Goodman, which she recalls very fondly.

"I lost my dad when I was 18 - I had just finished high school, and in the face of that, I wanted to really live and have a big adventure," she recalls. "I had no connections to Scotland, but I packed and moved over here, and Glasgow just cradled me and took care of me. It wasn't until Fiddler that I had the opportunity to say goodbye to my dad - I felt the show gave me the chance. Hodel and that scene at the train station with Henry - it gave me a chance I only fully understand with hindsight. I've never missed a character as much as I missed Hodel, but it was like someone stopped calling me - all of a sudden a friend isn't there."

Although she desperately wanted to be involved in the new Broadway production, she didn't expect to be, and cast her eyes around elsewhere for potential new projects as well as enjoying the usual social events.

"I went to a close friend's wedding, and as she was walking down the aisle, I burst into tears. But it wasn't just 'my friend looks beautiful', it was something else hitting me - this recognition that no matter what I do or successful I become, I will never walk down the aisle with my father, I will never have that moment.

"Fast-forward a couple of months, and they couldn't find a Tzeitel. Sheldon Harnick, the lyricist, remembered me from London and asked why they hadn't seen me. So I went in for the last two days of auditions, and it was like a whirlwind. All of a sudden, I'm Tzeitel.

"And it only hit me in hindsight - that memory of what Fiddler gave me before, it's going to give to me again - I'm going to get to be given the gift of walking down the aisle every night. It's a gift beyond imagining. That's what the theatre can do to an individual. I believe in my soul that people will see that moment and feel it. You're uniquely suited to serve certain moments at certain points in your life."

Silber's enthusiastic about so many things - her sheer glee when recounting the time that Bryn Terfel followed her on Twitter is hilarious, and her stories about her theatre fan family are very endearing (as a shy 14-year-old competition winner alongside her dad, she met Judy Kaye after a performance of Ragtime, who told her that she would make it as a singer - and went on to work with her at Carnegie Hall). She still has a wishlist of those she'd like to perform with - she mentions specifically Terfel and Lin-Manuel Miranda.

She never wants to lose that joy in what she loves - and wants to advise everyone else: "Never stop being a geek about whatever you're a geek about."

Alexandra Silber is live at the Crazy Coqs from 1st-5th September.

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