Helen Baxendale: How do I look?

Actress, age 34

As a teenager I was quite conventional in the way I dressed, more so than now. I tried to be rebellious but I was really lame at it. I was always a bit nervous. I remember wearing old long johns, my dad's silk paisley dressing gown, chopped off at the waist, and lots of crucifixes - trying to look like Madonna. But I wasn't breaking any moulds, I was just trying to follow somebody else. At that time I didn't have any self-knowledge or self-belief - you're confused about who you are and who you should be and whether you fit in with your group.

I used to be terribly vain. I'd spend a lot of time pampering myself and applying make-up and hoping that I'd look nice. When you're young you don't appreciate your youth and marvel in it like you should, you find endless flaws instead. If only you could have the hindsight. I don't spend half as long on my appearance now and it's strange - somehow you seem to look better if you don't spend so much time looking at yourself. I don't want to impress anyone any more and that's liberating.

Of course there are things I'd like to change - I'd like longer legs and bigger boobs - but I'd never do anything about it and I just can't worry about it that much. I've got two kids and I don't have enough time in the day. Me looking nice comes quite near last on the list of things to do. I am influenced by fashion, but I try not to be and I'd never buy anything designer. Ever. I'm a bit anti-that, I don't know why. Contrariness I think. I see other people desiring these things and so I decide not to desire them.

I very rarely watch myself on screen - there's a part of me that completely negates it and refuses to admit that I have been, and still am, on the telly. I'm in denial. I get recognised and to a certain extent it's lovely but there can come a point where it becomes slightly aggravating, when it starts impinging on your life. I find it very hard to be contained and closed - it's a skill I don't seem to have. I wish I did. When people start talking to me, I start talking back.

I'm quite different to the way I come across on screen. People can be a bit frightened of me because I've played quite spiky characters. But I'm not like that at all. I've just got the kind of face that means I can't carry off kind, happy-go-lucky, lovely girl very well. I'm better at looking severe because I'm pointy and angular. I've got a sharp nose, sticky-out cheekbones and little birdie, beady eyes. I'm not soft looking. I've had a few cartoons done of me and I always looked very hard and tough.

I've only really been transformed once, when I played Pandora Braithwaite, Adrian's Mole's girlfriend - when she's a grown-up and a Labour MP. I had to be blonde and busty for that, so they gave me a long blonde wig and false perky breasts. I loved it. It's all true, being blonde makes a big difference - men notice you more. Or maybe it was the false boobs they noticed. Going to fittings and playing dressing-up is excellent. I love that part of the process!

When I worked on Friends, the cast would spend three hours in make-up and so I had to spend that long too - the most you would ever get in Britain is an hour if you were, like, the poshest girl. I didn't go for the pedicure that was offered though. Maybe I should have, everyone else was having them. They were all so well groomed. It's part of the show, the glamour of those people. I have a problem with that - I don't think it's glamorous to look so perfect. To me, that's just not stylish or at all sexy.

This obsession with having to look fantastically gorgeous all the time - my God, it's so incredibly boring. And it seems like everybody wants to look the same, as well. It's really damaging. I just can't be bothered with it. It's too tiring and too worrying and really, what's the point? There is more to life.

Helen Baxendale is appearing in 'After Miss Julie' by Patrick Marber at the Donmar Warehouse, London WC2 (0870 060 6624) until 7 February

Interview by Fiona McClymont