Kimberley Nixon interview
Kimberly Nixon discusses playing Josie one last time...
This is the last series of Fresh Meat. How does that feel?
It was a strange filming experience, because obviously it was lovely to all be back together, but there was a real sadness knowing we wouldn't do it again. But I think we all felt it was good to be able to go back and say goodbye to our characters.
You played Josie for four series - how do you feel about her?
I feel really fond of her, like she's my wayward little sister who is unbelievably embarrassing and makes incredibly bad choices. But you can't help but admire her tenacity. I'm really sad that I won't get to play her again. She's one of the most freeing characters I've ever done. I think partly because I get to do her in my own accent, which I don't get to do in a lot of shows. That freed me up slightly. I think Josie taught me a few things about standing up for yourself and not letting people walk all over you. I took that away from her.
Where did we leave Josie at the end of the last series?
She'd kind of gone off the rails slightly. But Sabine had allowed her to come back and do pharmacology. I think she'd done the kindest thing she'd ever done - she broke up with Kingsley. As she says to him, she wanted to know him for the rest of her life, because he's awesome and she loves him, but she knows that if they stay a couple that will never happen. I like to think of Kingsley and Josie as becoming really old friends who laugh at the fact that they used to sleep together.
Do you think she's changed over the time that you've played her?
Yeah, definitely. When we first started she was very girl-next-door, fresh from Wales, excited to be out on her own and taking uni really seriously. And as I found in my uni experience, it's always those people who go slightly off the rails. They get this tonne of freedom, and they're not very good at making decisions. They sleep with the wrong people, say the wrong things and act rashly.
In Series 2 and 3 she got kicked out of uni, which was a pretty big thing, and she was drinking a lot and all that. Series 4 is nice, I feel that she is the most Josie. In the very beginning she was pleasing other people, then she thought she was trying to please herself, but in this series, she's kind of together. She's not playing up to anyone, she's just doing it for herself.
You talked about your own experience. Did you go to university or drama school?
I went to the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, so my uni experience wasn't typical, in that we were in 8:30am to 7:30pm every day, and weekends and all that.
That's brutal in anyone's book, let alone when you're a student.
Well, it sort of sets you up for filming. It's not such a massive leap. If I'd been doing two lectures-a-day for three years, and then going into a world where I was being picked up for work at 5:30 every morning, that would have been pretty tough. So in some respects, for me and for some of the others, our time doing Fresh Meat felt like a second chance at uni. We got to do the social side that I never got to do in drama school. Especially in the first series - we went out a lot! The days are so long, and can be pretty brutal, and it gets to 7:30pm, and we'd wrap, and then go and let off a bit of steam. Over the series that quietened down slightly as we got older and couldn't handle it. We're all much older than we're playing!
Is Josie now a year behind the others?
Yeah, she is, so she's feeling quite isolated in the fourth series. Everyone else is gearing up to leave, to have the safety blanket of uni stripped away from them. They have to find jobs and actually pass their exams. She's in second year, so she's half smug while they're all freaking out about finals, but there's a sadness to it because she knows she's being left behind.
How do you think she'll cope on her own?
I honestly dread it. I'm quite glad I didn't have to play it.
Maybe there will be a Series 5, and it'll just be Josie, alone, drinking neat vodka and sobbing to herself.
Yeah, I know! There's a bit towards the end of the new series where she's looking for new people to move into the house, and no-one's quite up to scratch. It's really sad. The very end of the very last episode is incredibly sad. And the director, Jamie, was making it worse by blasting the saddest music as I had to walk around the house and into all the empty rooms. It was awful. It was really sad to film. It really freaked me out seeing the house stripped bare. All the detail had gone. All the personal things had gone. It was really horrible.
Regarding all the personal stuff, did you keep anything? Did you get to take away a memento of Josie?
We unofficially took a bit of stuff as we went along. But we could all pick things. In the opening titles, when you see Zawe's name, in Vod's room, there are little wooden deer on the window, and I got those. And also the huge light-up pharmacy sign in the kitchen, on top of the cupboards. I had to get that back from Manchester to Wales! And the art department put together gift boxes for us, so we got to keep our phone covers and student IDs. Although I nicked everyone else's. I'm the only responsible one, they're all useless and would have lost them anyway. They even gave us degree scrolls. It was incredible.
Which one of the gang is the most likely to succeed in the real world?
I'd probably say Howard and JP. JP because he's on that track anyway - he says it a lot. He's on a well-trodden road, posh school, any kind of degree, it doesn't matter, he'll say he got a first anyway, and then he'll get a job at his brother's firm, work his way up, and finally end up in government. Not due to any merit, he'll always be fine. And I think Howard, because he's a genius. It doesn't matter how odd he is, he's got stuff that the world needs.
What do you think the longer term future holds for Josie?
I don't know, really. The safest one is that she meets someone, settles down and has kids, things like that. But even though it would be a relief that she doesn't end up in rehab, I kind of feel sad about that. She could do some wicked stuff. I don't know if the safe option is the best one for her.
What have been her high and low points at university?
I think being incredibly drunk/hungover, and drilling through a volunteer's cheek was probably the low point. And breaking Heather's arm. That was so fun for me, because I've been friends with Sophie Wu for a long time, and it was so fun to just throw her around. And I got to slap her and Joe while I was dressed as Geri Halliwell. I don't know if that was a low or a high point, to be honest.
I think the high point for me was when she had the courage to break up with Kingsley. That was a really hard scene for me and Joe to do - it took a while, and by the end of it we were both really drained. I love that she did that. She did it for him, and not for her.
Where do you think you'll watch the last episode? Will you all get together for it?
I don't know. I might just watch it in a darkened room by myself! I don't really watch my stuff back. All the things I've done, I've hardly seen any of it. I don't enjoy it at all. Fresh Meat is one of the few things I actually watch - I love watching the scenes I wasn't involved with, because they're five of the funniest people I've ever met, and they just make me laugh. So I can slightly see myself shying away and watching it a few months later on my own.