The house that sticks out as a really fun place is 39 Ravenshaw Street, in West Hampstead. I lived there for three years with two friends from Rada, Paudge Behan and Danny Cerqueira, both fantastic characters. It was a wonderful, experimental time. We’d spend long nights discussing art, life and politics; smoking weed, drinking lots of whisky, listening to music and throwing furniture on the fire.

After Rada, I played Romeo in an all-black production, did another tour, then kind of lost my bearings. I didn’t have any money, but I’d find myself on the Tube or on buses. I thought I could charm anybody and escaped into my imagination. Friends were worried and eventually took me to hospital, where they said I’d had a breakdown and filled me with drugs.

I think it happened because I was alone for the first time, and I was unhappy that my agent was only putting me up for black parts, placing limits on my hope. I was whisked home to Bir-mingham by my mother, who was convinced that Shakespeare was driving me nuts. After about six weeks up there, I was back to normal and working again.

It must have been about 1990 or 1991 when we moved to Ravenshaw Street. Danny and I found this lovely three-bedroom terrace with a green front door, bay window and tiny back garden. We paid £120 a week rent.

It was a little hideaway. Down the road was a garden with flowers that smelt beautiful growing over the wall; there was a school with kids playing and a railway ran round the back.

We sanded floors, painted walls ridiculous colours and put up posters: Van Gogh, Bettie Page, all unconnected. The colours in Van Gogh’s painting of a chair became the colours of the kitchen: gold doors, green floor. It just worked. I started doing television work, and got a hell of a lot more money than I’d got on stage. In my room, I had a nice futon, a stereo, some Ikea lights. I think I was the only one who had curtains.

Because we had a nice kitchen with a real fire, most evenings were spent in there. If there was a broken door or a skirting board that was half hanging off, we’d rip it off and burn it.

Danny had eclectic musical tastes: he liked Peggy Lee, for instance. With Paudge, it was Van Morrison. I was a raphead and funkhead, but really enjoyed the different music they brought in.

I was pretty competent with the ladies at the time, and Paudge and I would meet girls and bring them back. I also used to play for the Arsenal Ex-Professionals and Celebrity XI. It was fun playing with actors I’d grown up with on television: Tom Watt from EastEnders, Robbie Gee from Desmond’s.

We once stayed up until four o’clock in the morning making a horror movie. There was lots of drinking, laughing and making it up as we went along. Sara Sugerman was there, and Sophie Okonedo. I was the cameraman, and still have the video. Doing it was funny, and watching it afterwards was even funnier.

On Sunday mornings, we’d go for a walk and clear our heads on Hampstead Heath. I remember one wonderful day when I’d just started in the West End in a musical called King. The opening night got delayed and delayed. And, for some reason, every opening night, we got sent bottles of champagne. I ended up with loads in the fridge. We got up on a beautiful sunny day – the Chimes’ I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For was on the radio – and walked on the heath and drank champagne all day.

Appearing in the West End was the first time I realised the power of critics, and the first time I’d worked with American black artists. I saw how professional and skilled they were, and, if I’d been more awake, I would probably have thought then that I needed to go to America. I was playing one of Martin Luther King’s aides, and I fell in love with the story again. It was where politics and theatre welded together.

As we got older, things at the house started to fall apart. People were having relationships, and we were always in our own rooms. I was making a bit of money and perhaps wanted to express myself differently. I went off on another tour and decided to live wherever the wind took me. It was quite sad, really. But if ever there was a time I could rewind to, it would be then in West Hampstead. It’s where my horizons got broadened and where I grew up as an individual.

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