As one of the UK’s most versatile actresses, Tracy-Ann Oberman has conquered the worlds of both stage and screen. After attending the Central School of Speech and Drama, she spent four years with the Royal Shakespeare Company before joining the National Theatre.
Although she is best known for playing Chrissie Watts in EastEnders and Auntie Val in Friday Night Dinner, Tracy-Ann, 58, who grew up in a Jewish immigrant family in Stanmore, north London, is currently starring in the “project of her life” – her West End reimagining of one of Shakespeare’s best-loved plays.
Set in 1930s London, amid the Cable Street riots – in which east Londoners famously rallied to block a march by fascist Oswald Mosley and his blackshirt supporters – The Merchant of Venice 1936 also turns gender on its head, with Tracy-Ann playing Shylock as a single mother.