TV star Denise Welch is reflecting on the fortuitous timing of her latest project that will see the stars somewhat align in Manchester with her rock idol son Matty Healy. For while Denise is starring in the world premiere run of new Jim Cartwright play The Gap in Ancoats, her son will be just down the road headlining the AO Arena with The 1975 in front of thousands of fans this weekend.
Denise laughs: "Quite a few family and friends have used it as an opportunity to see Matthew on the Saturday, and then see me on the Sunday. They are trying to do the double, get the double whammy in!"
It also means that son Matty got to see his mum in action during her run at Hope Mill Theatre too. Denise is starring in The Gap alongside TV star Matthew Kelly in a play already causing a serious buzz after its early previews this week.
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Former Corrie star Denise told the MEN: "My Matthew, whose career is so international now, can very often not see me do things because he's not in the country. But he can actually see me in this."
Matty made the visit to Hope Mill on Thursday night, taking his girlfriend Gabbrietta Bechtel to see his mum in the show. In return, Denise hopes to get time to pop over to see her son in action too.
Although she admits to "massive FOMO" after missing the first night of The 1975's latest leg of UK dates in London on Monday night. She says: "All my gang were there sending me photos, I had massive FOMO.
"Matthew rang me after he got off stage last night, you wouldn't believe he'd just been on stage in front of 20,000 people. He'd had a really good night and it looked absolutely amazing. Lincoln said it was the best of the shows he'd ever seen."
The band have come a long way since they were rehearsing in Denise's garage in Wilmslow as schoolboys. She says: "I've seen them gig all around - I watched them go from Academy 3 to 2 to 1 and now to the arenas. I still can't believe it." She proudly adds: "But they're still the same boys."
Fans will need to be quick to snap up tickets to see Denise in action in The Gap if they haven't already. For demand was so high when the show was first announced that the first four weeks are near sold out - and so an extra week of performances were added taking the show through to March 16.
Welch and Kelly play Corral and Walter in the play, which is described as a "love story" although they are not a conventional couple. We will see them reuniting after 50 years apart at different ends of the country reminiscing on old times and "back to old tricks".
Denise has performed in Jim Cartwright plays before - most notably in Rise and Fall of Little Voice at the Royal Exchange which won her an MEN Theatre Award back in 2004. When the playwright got in touch with her about his new work The Gap she was intrigued - especially when he said that Matthew Kelly would be involved.
Denise and Matthew became firm friends after she appeared in a celebrity version of Stars in Their Eyes (memorably as Petula Clark) back in 1999.
So when talk turned to which theatre would stage the play, Denise knew it just had to be at Hope Mill Theatre. She is a patron of the independent theatre in Ancoats, and a passionate champion for its community ethos, run by owners William Whelton and Joseph Houston.
Denise recalls: "When I first came along [to Hope Mill] I was just blown away by the whole thing. I think a lot of it is because I started my career at Live theatre Company in Newcastle which [ex-husband] Tim had been a founder member of. There was me, Kevin Whatley, Robson Green, Trevor Fox, Lee Hall, we had all cut our teeth there and seen it grow.
Looking around at Hope Mill's unusual theatre space inside a former Ancoats cotton mill, she says: "This theatre reminds me of the essence of where I started. Give me a theatre like this which serves the community, which is accessible not just to the fur coat and no knickers theatre brigade who turn up for the Royal Shakespeare Company once a year.
"It has an amateur group it encourages, a young theatre group it encourages, so when they asked me to be a patron I was absolutely delighted. I've never seen such diverse and amazing shows here, you can have a show like this with just two of us, or the dressing room I'm in has had 16 people in it."
While Denise has appeared on countless TV shows, and is an ever-present on ITV's Loose Women, she felt the call to return to her theatrical roots this year.
She says: "Jim remains one of my favourite contemporary playwrights. I felt the need to do some theatre because I'm very fortunate that at my age, in quite an ageist profession, that I have a TV show that encourages the voices of older women and respects and reveres those opinions, but also that my career has allowed me to diversify into presenting, being a panellist, and being a personality.
"But sometimes it's easy to forget I'm actually a theatre-trained actress. It's not about reminding other people, it's about reminding me. I said if I'm going to do it, this is the theatre I'd like to do it because I feel safe here.
"I couldn't think of a space where it would work better. I get to be at home, and as I get older I prefer to be at home, just me and my husband."
Despite a long career in showbiz, Denise laughs that she was "terrified" on opening night and still gets nerves before each show. She says "I was terrified, me and Matthew both were.
"I think it actually gets worse the older you get. The nerves get worse the more well known you are, the more expectation there is of you.
"I still deal with my body turning nerves into anxiety sometimes, I still live with that condition, its just there. But we are both there to support each other, we both adore each other. Jim is a brilliant writer, although he writes in a very naturalistic form it's also poetic, there's a rhythm and a beat."
On the relationship we will see play out on stage, Denise explains: "It's a love story but Walter and Corral are not a couple. I've heard it described as a comedy - but I think it's better to think of it as a play with laughs, it's very funny in parts but it's also quite tragic in parts too.
"I think people are enjoying seeing two older people on stage because we live in a youth, youth, youth obsessed age. It's a beautiful piece, I'm reluctant to say it but I honestly think it's one of the best things Jim has written."
She's vocal in supporting live theatre, having watched with dismay the number of venues having to call time. She says: "What the people responsible for pulling back and cutting funding don't see is that they're destroying communities by making theatres like this struggle. It's such an accessible place, it does so much for so many people.
"We just have to keep ploughing on, I feel very proud that this is putting the bums on seats."
Having caused such a buzz in Manchester, the inevitable question is what comes next for the play. She says: "The previews are being loved by the audience and that's who we want to please. We're doing it here, let's make it a fabulous success, and then just see what's next.
"A short stint in the West End like Maureen Lipman did with Rose would be fabulous. but I'm not a lover of the tour these days. I have too many holidays I want to go on, so I don't like to plan too far ahead these days!"
Denise has recently become "nana" for the first time too - with little grandson Theo born to her stepson Lewis. She beams: "We are totally and utterly obsessed with him so that is one of our priorities to spend as much time with him.
"With my son Louis in Manchester, Matty is in LA, so it's a case of spreading ourselves, I don't want to tie myself to something too much as I want to be free for the kids as well."
The Gap is at Hope Mill Theatre until Saturday, March 16. Tickets from £25 from box office on 0161 275 9141
