The actress opens up about how the Apple TV+ Christmas special came to be, the possibility of a spinoff of the Emmy-winning series and the projects she's most looking forward to post-actors strike.It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas with Hannah Waddingham’s newly released special Hannah Waddingham: Home for Christmas.
The Ted Lasso star returned to her musical theater roots for the holiday episode, which features special appearances from all of the stars of Ted Lasso, the hit Apple TV+ series that made her a household name around the world.
The special kicks off with Waddingham entering the London Coliseum, singing, “What Christmas Means to Me.” Nick Mohammed greets her at the door, followed by Leslie Odom Jr., Sam Ryder, Luke Evans and more of her Ted Lasso co-stars — Brendan Hunt, Kola Bokinni, Billy Harris, James Lance and Phil Dunster — as well as her 8-year-old daughter, welcoming her to the performing arts theater.
Odom Jr., Ryder and Evans join the actress onstage throughout Home for Christmas to sing popular holiday songs like “Please Come Home for Christmas,” “Run Rudolph Run” and “Winter Wonderland.” The Ted Lasso stars don tails and dance with large candy canes for her second number, “The Man With the Bag,” while Jeremy Swift and Toheeb Jimoh support their co-stars from the audience.
Juno Temple, Brett Goldstein and, yes, even Jason Sudeikis are also featured in the special at different points: Temple surprises the Sex Education actress in her dressing room ahead of her first costume change with Christmas gifts that she ended up keeping all for herself; during Waddingham’s second costume change, Goldstein appears, sitting in a jacuzzi, which she joins him in; and finally, in the last moments, Sudeikis picks her up outside of the Coliseum to take her home.
Below, Waddingham breaks down how Home for Christmas came to be, what it was like reuniting with all of her Ted Lasso co-stars, the possibility of a spinoff of the Emmy-winning series and what she’s most looking forward to post-actors strike, among other things.
Tell me about the special. How did it come to be?
It actually came to be because I had done a guest spot on Michael Bublé’s and, around that time, my fabulous manager Nick Todisco said, “Well, look, I mean, you’ve had all this wealth of like 22 years in the West End and on Broadway, and I think we should look at that for you.” Immediately, being typically English, I went, “Oh, no, no, no. Nobody’s interested in that.” And he was like, “I don’t know. You’ve had such popularity with your singing in Ted. Let’s just float it to Apple.” And we put a pitch together. I was very keen to make sure that it was an old-school… what I call a Dean Martin-Carol Burnett kind of special. The most important thing for me was to make sure that people understood that my more unique selling point is live — absolutely, completely and utterly live. Not one note of that whole special has been touched, tweaked, nothing. Not my vocals, not my guests’ vocals, nothing, and I wanted to make sure that the guests I had on it had proper chops, as we say in the industry.
That was a big thing that we pitched to Apple, to make it in a theater where I’m from and, most importantly for me, the fact that it was in my mom’s theater. Because as you’ve seen in the special, even the way the show is constructed — the dead center point of the show — talks about the heart of why we’re there, which is, of course, because my mum was there as an opera singer for 30 years from me being the age of 8. She retired when I was 38.
I wanted it to be a love letter to my mum, and to that world of privilege that I grew up in: Sitting in the orchestra, watching my mom and all the great opera singers of the day and how much they’ve influenced me. The most beautiful thing was when the London Coliseum agreed to have us there, and Apple really went for it for me. It was so amazing that when the English National Opera Chorus — some of whom are still there from my mom’s time — got wind of me doing it, they weren’t even asked, they offered to come and join me onstage and sing with me. So, the centerpiece is me very simply on a stand mic singing to my mum and my daughter, and my daughter sitting in the same box that I used to do when I was 8. People would think it was a made-up, schmaltzy thing, but it’s all fact.
It was incredible, and the fact that my daughter, who in the moment we were filming was 8, and I was 8 — you couldn’t have made that up. My beloved mum, she has quite pronounced Parkinson’s now, so she was there at the back of the auditorium in her wheelchair, and it was the first time she’d been back in years. So, it was really, really quite something to have her in the space with her colleagues, and her colleagues actually singing with me, and they were lovely. They were all teary, and I was teary because they’ve known me since I was a little girl, sitting there all green and soaking it up like a little baby sponge.
I was worried when you first brought up your mom in the special that you were going to say she had passed.
I was concerned that that might happen before I did it, so that’s why it made me quite emotional on the day, thinking they’re both here. My dad had had quintuple heart surgery in April last year while I was shooting on Ted. In fact, the day that I was shooting the funeral scene, my dad was having surgery, and I didn’t know if I was ever going to see him again. That day.
My Greyhounds were all around me that day, helping me get through, not least of which my magnificent Juno Temple and Harriet Walter, my mum in it, just checking in, constantly checking in. Really incredible. So, to have both my mum and my dad there, I was like, “You know what? Whatever comes now, they know that I’ve circled back on what was important to me,” and I’ve said thank you to both of them for always encouraging me and never, ever saying, “No, you should be this. You should be that. You should be more academic.” They knew that the force was strong with me, and they completely and utterly didn’t question it. [They] nurtured it, and so for them to see this 3,000-seater Coliseum theater, just jam-packed was really incredible.
Talk to me a little bit about growing up in the music industry, how that was for you and how much training you had. Your voice is stunning.
I’ve never had any training. I think because I sat in the orchestra every conceivable later rehearsal, every Christmas holiday, summer holiday, half-term, everything, all the time, listening to how they placed their voices. Even this Thundergong! thing I’ve just done this weekend, that was more like a rock sound, whereas my special is far more of a big band and a jazz sound. But then I have the operatic side from my mum because opera and classical singers are the root. They use their voices properly, with all due respect to all other singers. I believe that if you’re a singer, you should be able to decide which part of your voice you’re going to use. So, that started very much from listening to where those completely un-mic’ed singers placed their voices, how they did it, their breathing and everything.
The only time I ever had any guidance with my voice was when I was doing Kiss Me Kate at the Old Vic for Trevor Nunn, and I didn’t want anyone to tell me, per se, what I was doing with my voice, because I’ve always liked it to be an organic thing. But I just needed some guidance how to reset my voice, going from belting to coming offstage, then having to reset it to be able to do trilling soprano in Kiss Me Kate. The same with Spamalot, really, when I was here. That facility of swapping from head voice to chest voice, as we say, mixing the two and then being able to shout. I had a few lessons to be able to do that.
Anyone that I’ve ever seen would say it’s always been about vocal health rather than singing lessons. Singing teachers are glorious people, because they become like a therapist as well, because your voice is so connected to your emotions. And because of the emotion of my parents’ illness, I was concerned that I wasn’t going to be able to give the Christmas special my best shot when I had already presented the Oliviers this year, presented Eurovision and then straight off the back of that, I was into rehearsals for my Christmas special. So, I was worried that I wasn’t going to be able to do it. But thankfully, I couldn’t be happier with it. I’m really relieved that I was in good shape.
The only time I ever had any guidance with my voice was when I was doing Kiss Me Kate at the Old Vic for Trevor Nunn, and I didn’t want anyone to tell me, per se, what I was doing with my voice, because I’ve always liked it to be an organic thing. But I just needed some guidance how to reset my voice, going from belting to coming offstage, then having to reset it to be able to do trilling soprano in Kiss Me Kate. The same with Spamalot, really, when I was here. That facility of swapping from head voice to chest voice, as we say, mixing the two and then being able to shout. I had a few lessons to be able to do that.
Anyone that I’ve ever seen would say it’s always been about vocal health rather than singing lessons. Singing teachers are glorious people, because they become like a therapist as well, because your voice is so connected to your emotions. And because of the emotion of my parents’ illness, I was concerned that I wasn’t going to be able to give the Christmas special my best shot when I had already presented the Oliviers this year, presented Eurovision and then straight off the back of that, I was into rehearsals for my Christmas special. So, I was worried that I wasn’t going to be able to do it. But thankfully, I couldn’t be happier with it. I’m really relieved that I was in good shape.
How long did you all rehearse?
I got together with my fabulous musical supervisor Dave Tench back in February before I started the Oliviers, just for us to start piecing together music. The people who I have as creatives on this… we have Hamish Hamilton as my director, which is insane. We have Misty Buckley doing the set design. I mean, it’s just ridiculous. Al Gurdon doing the lighting. Raj Kapoor, who’d also produced a little-known singer called Mariah Carey. So, the forces that Apple had put around me made me feel subliminally like Apple had my back. Knowing that they had packed these people around me was such reassurance, and it meant that when that curtain goes up, you know that you are not only in safe hands because of my own years and years of being devoted to theater, but because of everything around me. Everyone brought it. It was incredible, not least of which David Tench, my musical supervisor. Then come May 27 when we recorded it in the blistering heat of England, unusually hot. It was the hottest day of the year.
Oh, my gosh. Merry Christmas.
Merry Christmas-ish. You send out an invitation. You’re like, “and if you want to come wearing festive clothes.” People are like, “Jumpers? Sweaters? Are you kidding me?” But it was incredible. Everyone showed up, and I think you can really feel it when you get towards the end of the special. And everyone piles back onstage. I wanted that old-school, variety thing of everyone piling back on. It was really palpable, the love in the room. It was gorgeous.
All the performances are incredible. How did they come together, and what was it like being up there with everyone?
Apple was brilliant. Whenever we had meetings, I stressed that, yes, you could sing with a load of famous people, but I have to have a connection to them because, otherwise, it’s not authentic to me. It’s my first foray into letting people into that side of me, and I have to buy it. So, Luke Evans was a total no-brainer because we’ve known each other for 20 years from theater, and no one knows that. We knew each other when we were in our 20s in the West End.
Sam Ryder, my God, I fell in love with his voice. I think he’s the closest thing we have to Freddie Mercury. He is literally like sunshine pouring out of his pores, and he has been the greatest addition to my life this year — both as a friend and as a professional. If you can spend five minutes in his presence, it’s a better day. Leslie Odom Jr., I mean, not only is he a phenomenal talent, but I asked my daughter who she would like me to sing with, and she’s obsessed with Hamilton. I had barely finished my sentence, and she went, “Please, can we have Leslie Odom Jr., mummy?” And I went, “I really don’t know because he’s super busy and on the other side of the world, but I’m going to ask.” And the thrill to get Leslie was just insane.
We have the London Gay Men’s Chorus of whom I am a patron, so that was very important to me, and I am very much a part of the gay community. I have their backs and then some. The whole LGBTQ community, I had wanted to involve. In fact, in my very first pitch to Apple, the London Gay Men’s Chorus, were in my pitch, as were the Fabulous Lounge Swingers who people don’t know. They are a married couple they’ve been together for I think maybe 25-30 years, married for the last 10. A gay couple who, even in years gone by… I think they met when they were 15 or 16, when it was more of a ridiculous, taboo thing. They have stood by each other all their lives, and they have this band called The Fabulous Lounge Swingers, and I always said to them and I’ve said very publicly always in the press, that it’s very important for me to hold the door open for others, and they are my two. They’re my daughter’s godparents, as I say, in a mighty panel of godparents. She has all the food groups represented. And it was important for me to have people that are in my life who aren’t as well known.
We do a number together, “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” with the very lovely Phil Dunster. And so it was trying to work a way to get the more established in my life, as in Scott Baker and Patrick Davey as the Fabulous Lounge Swingers, and then bringing in someone who has so much become part of my life in the shape of Phil Dunster, and to show how brilliant he is at singing. So it was a perfect opportunity to have that old-school, Carol Burnett-Dean Martin thing of making out to the audience that Phil is sitting in the audience, and it’s all done accidentally. So, it’s just bringing all those elements in. The fact that Nick Mohammed comes on. I said, “Wouldn’t it be funny if we hoist him up in the air and people think he’s stuck there for the whole show?” It’s, again, that kind of variety thing.
I feel like a lot of the Ted Lasso stars who were in the special all did something very unique to them. How did that come to be?
It was me, initially, wanting to show them in a different light. So, when you first see me come in, and Nick’s there at the door, I went, “Can you wink at the camera like you’re being all sassy and not like Nate?” Nick and I are planning on being in something together because we just feed off each other brilliantly. And we look funny. He was down with it immediately. I wanted to make sure that he was like a throughline, because he’s so brilliant at physical comedy. And then, of course, I had to have my girl Juno Temple turning up. Of course I did. She’s always buying people presents. She’s the greatest gift-giver. Anything she buys you, you’ll like the packaging just as much as the gift. So, we thought we would lean into that a bit and get her bringing me presents. Because she wasn’t available in London, we had the conceit that, after the special, I flew to L.A. and shot that with her. So, that’s an insert. The magic of television. So, we did that as a little insert where she comes along with gifts for me and ends up keeping them all herself. But it also shows our absolute deep-seated and unyielding love for each other in that moment, which is what Christmas is all about as well, isn’t it?
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