West End Profile: Writer and psychic Christina McCulloch
Published: 27 May 2011
by PAVAN AMARA
ONE day in 2009 Christina McCulloch woke up at 2am and began writing monologues. What she didn’t know then was that these would develop into a successful West End play.
Recipe For A Perfect Wife has been lauded by critics, attracting a steady audience, and often sold-out.
But Christina is more than a producer and writer. She is first and foremost a “psychic”, and a psychic to the stars no less – although the stereotypes of mystical otherworldliness don’t apply in his case; she is thoroughly grounded in reality.
When we meet at a café opposite Charing Cross Theatre, where she is busy rehearsing with the cast, Christina is displaying glossy red lipstick, perfectly styled hair and an earthy sense of humour.
The daughter of a welder and housewife, she was brought up in East Kilbride, Scotland, with her sister Jane. The family holidayed in Scarborough once a year.
“I am from an average working-class family, so there’s nothing off with the fairies about me,” says Christina, who attended the same school as TV presenter Lorraine Kelly and spent her time writing comedy shows rather than studying.
“I was far more creative than that. I couldn’t just sit in a classroom. When I was 22 I came down to London, and I just happened to be drawn to actress friends, and they pulled me back into putting on shows.”
At that point, she met George, her partner of 22 years.
“He was so exotic and charming. I instantly knew there was something about him. I listened to my gut instinct,” she says.
They went on to have Jo, her 20-year-old son, and Christina began giving psychic readings to friends, and then their friends, who had heard of her via word of mouth.
A few years on and her clients include politicians and celebrities including Gwyneth Paltrow and Thandie Newton.
“I gave a reading to a leading UK politician, and afterwards he said he’d been unable to sleep that night,” says Christina. “I think a lot about how the decisions they make play on their consciences. I did a leading Pakistani politician one night too, and what worried me about that was that, later on, his aide told me he had based quite an important decision on that reading. With a country like Pakistan, it’s quite scary to think they based a decision on something I said.
“What’s odd is that the more powerful people are the more open-minded they are about it. Conservative politicians take it far more seriously than Labour for some reason. The Tories tend to have more flamboyant and eccentric personalities.
“The irony is that there are Tory politicians I regularly give private readings to and then, when I see them in public, they will pretend not to know me at all. They obviously are terrified that they’ll be exposed as consulting a psychic, but it’s silly really because lots of them are doing it.”
Recipe For A Perfect Wife reflects Christina’s cheerful personality – chirpy on the outside, but with a real depth beneath the surface.
Produced by Christina and co-written with lifelong friend Nadia Papachronopoulou, the musical play features five wannabe “perfect housewives” who compete with each other to win the UK’s “Miss Perfect Wife” title.
Quips such as “I get up at 6am, and spend two hours making my face flawless to serve my husband breakfast,” and “The perfect wife should either be on her feet or on her knees,” and “Ladies, keep your hands in the kitchen sink, and you won’t have to think,” highlight the shackles placed upon the average 1950s British housewife.
But compelling monologues, performed by excellent actresses, unveil a landscape of anti-depressant-popping desolation that each woman deals with in her own way. Much like real life according to Christina.
“Sometimes I see people who seem like such tough nuts, and that’s how they’ve dealt with a hard life. Or some really charming lovely people, but it’s all an act to deal with difficult experiences.
“I have done readings for people who I am terrified of when they first walk through the door, because they seem so cold and hard, but then I see what they’ve been through and it breaks my heart.
“My work involves seeing beyond a person’s veneer by using a heightened sensitivity, and that can be overwhelming to deal with, but fascinating.
“That’s kind of why I love putting on shows that will make people laugh. I know what people go through, so I wouldn’t want to put something on that adds to hardship. The whole point of performance for me is to take people out of their experiences by entertaining them. Maybe that’s so important to me because every day I see and feel how vulnerable people really are, beneath all the barriers that we pretend to have.”
• Recipe for a Perfect Wife is at the Charing Cross Theatre, The Arches, Villiers Street, WC2, until June 26, 020 7478 0170