I was a bad lad at school

Today Oscar-winning actor Jim Broadbent is one of the nicest people you could wish to meet, but once he was a Reading rebel

- Bernard Bale

“It wasn’t the school – it was me,” Jim Broadbent confesses. “I was at Leighton Park School because my family were Quakers and thought they were doing their best for me by sending me to what was – and still is – an excellent school. The trouble was that it coincided with that rebellious time that most, if not all, boys go through.”

Jim was born to Roy, a furniture maker, and Dee, a sculptress, and he says he had the best start in life. “I was quite happy as a kid because Lincolnshire was not a bad place to grow up – at least we were never short of vegetables,” he says. “But the real joy was that both my mum and dad were very keen amateur drama players and started the Lindsey Rural Players. I was on stage myself when I was just four, taking part in a production of A Doll’s House. I don’t remember that much about it but nobody complained as far as I knew.