Mort - all about DEATH

All wrapped up

2007-03-26T22:09:00.000Z

Just returned from paying in night. Actually that's rather an odd name. It used to be the time when people turned up to hand over all the money for the tickets they had sold. That's a long, long time ago. Now we are mainly paying out. Funds to all those who have run up huge credit card bills on behalf of the group by spending on wood, paint, props, materials etc. Strange how the old names stick.
Our party on Saturday night involved a moderate amount of drinking on my part but some outstanding word games with Ysabell, Albert, box office, high priest, director him and a whole range of others from time to time. This went on for a couple of hours. We all found out one thing. Don't pull your willie instead of the ripcord when using a parachute. Sound advice.
I was drinking Wychwood and Hobgoblin. Two of the ales in a case of 12 presented to me after the show in the bar. Black Magic chocolates too. But the things which mean the most to me are the card signed by all the cast, complete with photograph of DEATH and Mort and wonderful calligraphy, and the clapperboard and film reel with director her, director him and producer's names and the dates of the show written on.
Ysabell and Albert dropped secretary and me off at about 3.30am. The clocks had gone forward. What a nightmare.
We made it to set break at just after 10am, with footnote already in the kitchen putting her promise of bacon sausage and egg butties for the early arrivals into practice. I joined her, in the spirit of Harga's House of Ribs, having initially got to grips with some flats with a screwdriver. Then it was time to load up the van and take it to the shed. Amazingly this only took one trip as opposed to the three or even four it has often taken in the past. High priest, Albert, director him and producer unloaded and stowed away all the flats, platforms, chairs, stools and other assorted oddities and we were back to the hall in record time. We ended up sitting down eating a roast dinner in The George pub at the back of the hall car park by 3pm. When we got home, secretary and I both slept the sleep of the just and arose for only a couple of hours before returning to sleep more.
Today was fabulous. Warm and sunny. I spent a lovely hour or so with director her walking her dogs in Virginia Water, blowing the strains and aches of the week away, while secretary had the aftermath of a week of heavy make-up removed with a facial. Then the three of us spent a couple of hours over lunch and drinks outside the Rose & Crown chewing the fat about the aftermath of the show. Very relaxed and very pleasant. Certainly better than having to go back to work for the day.
So the sums are being done and we will find out how financially successful we have been. In terms of ticket sales, we have shifted a bigger percentage than any show since Stags & Hens in 2004 and before that Aladdin in 2002. Most of the costs seem to be under budget, so hopefully we will be in good shape. Director him will no doubt tell us at our committee meeting next Wednesday.
We also await the review from the National Operatic and Dramatic Association who came to see the show on Saturday night. This review is being done by a new rep, so there should be no holds barred as she doesn't know anyone from any past show. I know what I think, but I look forward to seeing it in print.

Thought for the day: 'Fly away on my zephyr, I feel it more than ever, And in this perfect weather, We'll find a place together.' The Zephyr Song. Red Hot Chili Peppers. Director her was playing it in her car. Tops.

And so we face...

2007-03-25T21:20:00.000Z

The final curtain. It has come and gone. The last two days went by in a blur. Out with Mother and Dad for lunch on Friday. Evening show. Curry. Coffee with them here on Saturday morning. Frantic rush around. Saturday matinee. Frantic rush between shows. Saturday night show. Party. Set Break. Post set break lunch. Sleep. All quite straightforward...
Well of course it's not straightforward otherwise I would have stopped there. It misses out the fact that secretary and I took Mother and Dad to the pub where acolyte has just started working for their lunch. Well to the Italian Restaurant section around the back. Very nice too. It misses out my long conversation about money and presents with director her outside the pub. It ignores the fact that once we had dropped them off at their hotel we raced into Slough for me to pick up a cake and present(s) for high priest's birthday. It doesn't mention that after that secretary and I then sped over to Taplow for her to buy a variety of things at a couple of shops.. while I was told to wait in the car. And it doesn't explain why we need to hold production meetings to discuss the set up for my special performance with my toes and bottom. Sorry, you had to be there. Well rather, you had to be part of the text communication. Only set man, box office, previous producer and secretary will have the faintest idea what that's all about. Hey-ho.
Friday's show was great fun. Maybe the thought of a curry afterwards stirred everyone into action. Maybe I was concious of Mother & Dad being in the audience. Maybe it was the fact that we had to squeeze in some tables at the back to accommodate the extra sales. But the finest performance of the night came from producer and Cutwell in the male dressing room as they were getting changed after the show, with a stream of witty conversation masking the full blown lovers' tiff that was raging behind them. Introduced set man to Dad. They discussed the relative merits of civil and mechanical engineering.
Secretary and I shared a table with the ginger one and the animal lover (they are married), box office and maid (they are not - thank the gods!). Good food. Didn't eat too much - I ordered two vegetable side dishes which I could share with the animal lover, who is a vegetarian plus. Normally I end up with way too much. Well that's what curries always end up like if you're not careful. And I'm not normally careful. Box office stayed overnight at ours. Goodie-goodie yum-yum was supposed to go to the curry and also stay at ours but didn't.
Saturday was a rush job with M&D round for coffee. I just about had time to shower before they appeared and ate breakfast once they had arrived. Dad was most impressed with the technical skills used to put the production together. Surprise, surprise! Secretary then spent ages trying to print out photographs from her laptop but wouldn't let me help.
The afternoon show wasn't packed, but there were plenty of people there who wouldn't have been able to make any other show. Previous producer and producer put in a great scene together at the job centre. The fight went well. And there were ploughman's lunches nleft over to have for supper between the shows. Secretary and I went to Budgens and Threshers in Langley to buy some stuff. She dropped me back at the hall to have my make-up retouched while she went home to pick up a red bow-tie and dress shirt for producer geezer to wear on front of house. And to have another go at the pictures.
Saturday night. I step out onto the stage. And there they are. In the front. At the middle table. Scud and previous chairperson. And they laughed all the way through. It was great. And I suddenly realised just how much I have enjoyed performing opposite the ginger one. Lots of laughs all round in fact. Right from the first scene. In the job centre (although my hood had dropped way too far down at that point). Even the Rite of Ashkente. That scene got better show by show. Another great fight. Both shows I gave the table a massive whack to knock the Duke's hourglass off. And at the end the ginger one and I hugged instead of just shaking hands.
Having been told by others (including Albert, doorknocker and director him) to pull my mask up for the walkdown I was instructed by director her to do so for the afternoon show. Albert said you take the bow as yourself not as your character. When I walked down for the final time I was apparently bright pink underneath the mask. It had been phenominally hot inside the mask every show. That one was just insane though. I came off after scenes one to six and was sweating then. After the fight and the final scene I could barely breathe. But the applause was wonderful. I think people applauded more when they saw who the man behind the mask was. We stepped forward together and bowed. Then we stepped back and bowed again. The curtains closed. They opened once more. We bowed. And then they closed for the final time. Hello Spider. What came after comes later.

Thought for the day:
'Now with the help of your good hands.
Gentle breath of yours my sails
Must fill, or else my project fails,
Which was to please.
....
Let your indulgence set me free.'
Epilogue spoken by Prospero. The Tempest. Shakespeare.

Not sharp enough

2007-03-23T01:20:00.000Z

I forgot to take on the sword tonight. Bugger. Thank God the ginger one is pretty quick on the draw. Boy, does he need to be. Ysabell dropped her first line tonight. Was she annoyed? Too right. High priest got very upset with himself for missing a bit. I got most of the ones I had mucked up last night right. Apart from one fairly important one. And I got away with a momentary lapse in the crucial fight scene by breathing very heavily while I found time to think. The fight went well and the pyro scene was the best we have done it yet. Classic moment of the night though, apart from the sword, fell to box office. His line as the abbot 'I can remember all my lives' became 'I can remember all my lines'. Quality. One change of letter can a magic moment make.

Thought for the day: 'The pen is mightier than the sword.' That's why I forgot it. I'm a writer. I had a biro in my pocket.

Trying to focus

2007-03-22T17:37:00.000Z

Last night's performance was a bit of a catologue of errors. I'm not sure which was the funniest or most alarming. I got lost in the first scene (how bad is that?) and footnote (who has the unenviable job of prompting) had to feed the next line to the ginger one and so it looked like he was the knob. Cutwell, who had spent the day driving to Cwmbran and Wolverhampton (I think) had to be rescued by the ginger one when he dropped some lines. High priest managed to punctuate the beginning of one of footnote's pieces with 'hear me ye gods...'. The ginger one managed to walk on and cross the stage as footnote was starting another one of her pieces. I managed to hit the table to knock off the Duke of Sto Helit's hourglass as required... but so hard that Albert had to grab the table to stop it falling off the stage. Keli was late on for scene four to see her father get killed. Albert referred to me as 'DEATH, the bloke'. Town crier managed to kick the pyro as he went off so that it landed next to my feet. Oh and to top it all I forgot my best line...
I feel I have some kind of excuse as I spent three-quarters of an hour in the bar discussing whether the licensing issues with the premises supervisor, and later with him and previous producer. We were also discussing the absence of alcohol, in two respects, and the access and otherwise, to the bar for members of CAST. Not entirely the best way to focus for the start of the show. Shame really as I had enjoyed an excellent chilled out lunch with Albert.
I have also had some problems with the interior structure of the mask. The area around my chin collapsed on Tuesday night, and we fixed it, repositioned the mic and taped it in before the start yesterday. I didn't work. By the time I had walked on I was practically chewing it. It all ads to the amusement.

Thought for the day: 'Sylvia'. Now work that one out...

God bless'em

2007-03-21T01:20:00.000Z

I just love the OAPs. Every show they turn up, have a good time, enjoy the entertainment, have a cup of tea and biscuits, buy some raffle tickets and then clap everyone enthusiatically at the end. They love everything. At panto they love the smut. Tonight they loved the naughty words. They got most of the gags. They sympathised with Mort, empathised with Ysabell and recognised part of themselves in Albert. It's a great way to start the run.
All sorts of complications have arisen off stage, which I won't go into, but today I was running around all afternoon. Programmes. Pictures for front of house. Warning signs about the pyrotechnics. Posters showing who our fire officers are. I detailed most of it yesterday. To be honest, it's hard to tell what day it is. There were a lot of very obviously tired people around this evening.
I personally had an interesting time. I skipped a bit of dialogue in a scene with the ginger one. I got to wave my teddy, goldfish and tankard around. I had the best version of my scene with previous producer so far. I had the pyro go off up my trousers. I thoroughly enjoyed the big fight scene. But... the support inside the mask keeping my chin away from it caved in so I found myself chewing rather than speaking my way through the lines in the last two scenes.
Anyway, best thing is, here I am ready to go to bed at the earliest time for five nights. Marvellous. And I'm doing lunch with Albert tomorrow. What fun.

Thought for the day: 'There's a child in your eyes, And the child never dies, So keep the dream alive, With the aid of second sight.' Achilles Heel. Joseph Washbourn. Onka's Big Moka. Toploader.

Death unmasked

2007-03-20T13:25:00.000Z

The tech rehearsal on Sunday and other associated items of work which followed it saw the late night shift finish at 2.10am. Last night I have already mentioned. Yesterday we were all up and tackling various chores by lunchtime. Here I am today having just finished my lunch (which is also my breakfast), ready to go again.
The consequences of such strange timekeeping are tiredness, bad spelling (just corrected the spelling of tiredness) and short term memory loss. They combined, along with a natural fear of being blown to pieces, to provide one of the more amusing moments of last night. Yes. OK. It was me. What do you want - a medal?
Scene 21 is the only one in this show with a pyro. We have had to fireproof all the costumes worn in that scene. Last night we had a visit from a fire safety officer to make sure we had done it all properly. Serious stuff.
The thing is, the scene has to be set behind another dropcloth. This means there's not much room for the pyro. That is, it's right underneath Albert and me at the point where it goes off. We're, basically, a pair of scaredy-cats. So we were protesting about this and I lifted my mask so it was on top of my head as we discussed the matter with director her, director him and set man. Tough. That's basically what we were told. So we started the scene. I spun around in dramatic fashion. Began my first word 'Bugger...' and Albert was laughing his head off. 'Oi DEATH pull your mask down.' Yes. OK. Bloody pyrotechnics. I blame them.
When it came to it the pyro was absolutely tiny. It exploded and we vanished... or rather, we did'nt vanish. I asked secretary who had finished her stint as doorknocker about it and she said there was a little pop, a waft of smoke and two people walked off the stage. Not exactly the vanishing effect you might hope for. Anyway the two of us felt rather pathetic for complaining...
Today secretary has to sort out the ordering of the wine, which she was told was under control weeks ago. I have to get posters done warning the audience about the pyro (!) and the use of strobe in the show to put up in front of house. I have to copy the poster about fire officers and general supervisors etc from the last show to put up. I have to sort out the front of house photos. I have to get the newspaper finished. I have to pick up the programmes. And I MUST remember to take down the teddy bear.

Thought for the day: 'Bugger'.

Stupid O'Clock

2007-03-20T04:14:00.000Z

It's a quarter past four and I have just got home. That's 4.15am. We finished the dress rehearsal, which was excellent apart from a few prop and costume items which need sorting out, at around midnight. Then producer, director him, director her, footnote, set man, previous producer and mad new mug, aka stand-in landlord, did four hours of work. We finished and hung the unseen university drop cloth, director her's magnificent Michaelangelo, and completed the side flats to go with it. Then we tidied up. Paint, tools, brushes, trays, bits of paper, battery packs, half drunk cups of coffee... We then took pictures. Of director her with the Michaelangelo. And of us all under the clock. Then footnote drove me home. She said she felt more like fucknote. I feel like DEATH.

Thought for the day: 'Success is one per cent inspiration and 99 per cent persperation.' When I started typing that I could remember who said it. Now I can't. I think I'm too tired. Night, night.

The importance of food

2007-03-18T01:29:00.000Z

Today followed an interesting pattern. Paint some bricks. Have a cuppa. Paint some more bricks. Eat (Big cooked breakfast). Paint some more bricks. Have a cuppa. Paint some more bricks. Have a cuppa. Paint some more bricks. Have a pint. Paint some more bricks. Watch the rugby (first half). Paint a few quick bricks. Watch the rugby (second half). Cry. Paint some more bricks. Eat (Big curry). Paint some more bricks. Attend to the requirements of nature. Have a cuppa. Paint some mortar. Eat (Big chocolate chip muffin). Paint some more mortar. Come home.
That is of course an over simplification. I had more cups of tea and coffee than that. I also haven't mentioned that my brick painting sponge fell apart twice, so dangerous repaired it twice and then the third time I happened tto mention that it would be good if it had a handle on it... and I was given a new sponge cut to size fixed into a specially made wooden box with a handle on it.
Keli did most of the mortar. She also did most of the shouting during the rugby. She supports Wasps so she's obviously a very special and lovely rugby fan.
Footnote and previous producer masterminded the breakfast, or rather brunch. The first time we have ever had sausage, eggs, bacon, beans, fried bread and toast at the hall. It was a great idea as it meant we had a good long afternoon to get things done. Nice.
The curry we had in the evening was excellent too. Director her didn't partake though after last night's experience. She still had a lot of crawling on her hands and knees to do. But the food over these long and tiring sessions is important. There is a delicate balance of stodge and grease to be consumed. I was concerned that set man might have upset his metabolism by having two glasse of orange juice with breakfast. He seemed to be OK though.
Ysabell and Albert created DEATH's world in shades of black. Set man and dangerous sorted out secretary's position on the door so her head was comfortable. Footnote showed off her calligraphy skills for the books in DEATH's library.
Director her tackled the Michaelangelo again. She was there in the evening. Director him was down supervising during the day. Box office painted the fireplace, went off to a party (one of our members 18th birthaday) and then came back at midnight to finish it. High priest, dangerous and set man hung one drop. And then at the end they painted the extension to the stage black. All in all a good day's work.

Thought for the day: 'An army marches on its stomach' I'm not sure whether that was Napoleon or Wellington or someone from a completely different time and place, but it's a good quote so I'll stick with it. I'll check for tomorrow.

Bricking it

2007-03-17T01:58:00.000Z

It took footnote and producer about 3 hours tonight to 'tidy up' some of the brickwork on the inside of Cutwell's cottage. We have now finished a third of it. Two more walls, including a fireplace in one of them, to go. We reckon on that basis about another 18 hours should be enough to finish it...
Director her spent the evening on her knees working on the Michaelangelo backdrop otherwise known as the Unseen University. She didn't feel too well afterwards - doing that after a large Chinese meal didn't help.
Set man and dangerous completed building the corner of the set for DEATH's study & library and the evening ended with the two of them fireproofing the front of the stage. Funnily enough this prompted a mass exodus from the hall due to the dangerous radioactive cloud which descended as they did it. Not pleasant.
Director him and previous producer were also there working away and high priest, lord bless his soul, turned up after work... having finished at 10.15pm.
Downer of the night was secretary arriving at the hall after having been up to London to see The Sound Of Music, to tell us that her car had been broken into at Langley station. Apparently the show was great.
Tomorrow we are having a very big brunch. Footnote is turning the hall kitchen into a full blown restaurant...

Thought for the day: 'All in all it's just another brick in the hall.' Trad arr Cole.

Liking one another's company

2007-03-14T23:48:00.000Z

It's a good job that the core group in Cast all get on. Set man pointed out tonight that we would see one another every day now until a week on Tuesday. Director her, producer, previous producer, box office and set man had the final production meeting tonight. We met at The Crown in Chertsey, venue for that first meeting which director her, director him and producer held all those months ago. A lot of water has flowed under the bridge since then.
I have just been delivered home by set man and previous producer. We have all been preparing ourselves mentally for the coming weekend. As always the list of jobs to be done, stuff to build and particularly things to paint is a long one. They will go up on the wall in the hall on Friday and be crossed off one by one. In many ways I enjoy this long weekend more tyhan any sane person should. Buit I guess it's the time when those key people bond and get on with it together to make the show for everyone else to take part in.
I could never sit on the sidelines and then turn up once it's all finished and go wow! haven't you done a lot of work. Even for Dick Whittington I was there for the weekend when I wasn't in the show. People just rely on one another - and as I say we must like one another's company.
Set build last Sunday was rather strange. First there was the Binky photo shoot. Then when director her and I got to tyhe hall there was the strange experience of being offered a bacon, egg or sausage sandwich rather than the usual bacon buttie we have. Our usual chef, bacon bitch was stranded in Portsmouth with dangerous because his car had gone kaput. I sent a crisis email to footnote on Saturday night explaining the trauma of the situation. And so we had a wonderful array of breakfast possibilities on offer to set us off for the day.
My actual contribution to the set was fairly minimal. I drew the outlines for a window and a door with director her. Well actually did the ones high priest had done free hand over again as his were a bit wonky. Then I started painting with box office... and got summoned so we could choreograph the fight scene between DEATH and Mort. Sword fight man was there to train us and work us hard so we mastered the moves. Knackering. It certainly wore me out. We had lunch and then did it all over again.
One amusing other incident saw director him and town crier drive off to do door-to-door delivery of our postcards. They headed off, did their own separate parts of the estate. Then director him returned to his car. And waited for town crier. And waited. And went to have a look for him. And waited some more. Town crier of course doesn't have a mobile phone. So director him waited some more. Then he called box office at the hall. Have you seen town crier? Oh yes. He's been back ages. What?! Yes, he walked back. Well I said amusing, director him was not that amused. But it did give us something to take the mick out of town crier over during lunch...

Thought for the day: 'We go together like rama-lama-lama-de-dinga-de-dingy-dong' Bizarre song from Grease. Albert will no doubt tell me that the lyrics are wrong, which they probably are. But he told me I had the lyrics to Wild West Hero wrong today and I checked on the insert for the CD and I had got it right, so there!

Madness Part Two

2007-03-13T23:52:00.000Z

Horses are animals with which I have very little experience. I have only ever ridden one seriously. And really it took me for a ride, lovely animal that it was. I didn't have to do anything. Australia 1990. I was staying in Queensland on the Sunshine Coast. I won't go into it because it will only make you jealous and make me depressed that I haven't been back since. Anyway, the guy I was staying with, his brother, their mum and I travelled into the backwoods away from the coast to Ipswich - a town that makes Colnbrook look like LA and Brands Hill like Hollywood.
It was fantastic though. Christmas Eve! Boiling hot and the reason for our trek was to visit the guys grandfather who owned a farm out there. I was given a pair of his old jeans to wear. Well shorts were not advised for a beginner. I got onto the beautiful grey horse. I posed for a picture looking very unsure of myself. Then off went the horse for a nice stroll, then a serious walk around the valley.
We headed back through the rainforest on the ridge between Ipswich and Brisbane and when we got to their mum's house looking out above the city it started. A lightning storm the like of which I have never seen before and may never see again. Warm rain. Flashes of forked lightning hitting every tall building to be seen. It went on for hours.
Those two things helped make Christmas Eve 1990 one of the best days of my life before meeting secretary. The Christmas Day that followed was pretty good too. Full cooked breakfast. Tennis. Full Christmas dinner. All in 40 degree heat. Bonkers but brilliant.
But let me get back to horses. Or rather Binky, aka Alfie Moon. What a lovely chap. Only four. A bit twitchy at first but pretty good when he had got used to us.
The great grey beast I am talking about is owned by someone who stables him at the same place as a man who travels on the train to London as previous producer. Remarkable the things you can lay on if you speak to the right people. We needed some photos taken for the press and for our programme somewhere, somehow and the concept of Warwick and/or any other castle had gone by the wayside. So there we were. Sunday morning. A farm in Middle Green backing onto Langley Park. Director her, producer, the ginger one, Albert and Ysabell.
Now this sort of special photo shoot has evolved through the years. The most famous was the first, arranged by producer, which saw us go to London to take pics for Moby Dick - The Musical. Dressed as schoolgirls and teachers and school staff. Including two blokes dressed as schoolgirls. I was assistant director for the show so I got to be the deputy head. As it was my idea too... Previous director was the headteacher as he produced and directed the show. We went to the Natural History Museum to have our pictures taken by set man with the gigantic Blue Whale. All before the museum had opened to the public. We did Trafalgar Square, Herman Melville's house, the Cutty Sark and the Greenwich Meridian among the many stops on our tour.
Since then other trips have included a trip to the Portsmouth Docks for Treasure Island, to Taplow railway station for Stranded and all over London again for Dick Whittington. But you can read all about that one at allaboutdick.blogspot.com.
Back to our horse. When it came to it, director her was the only one of us to get on Binky. She had already suggested that, and when we were told that Binky was only four and had never had a large flappy piece of material - or in our case DEATH's cloak - draped across it's back we knew she was right. Director her has experience with horses and it showed. So up she got onto this 17 hand beast to then put the cloak on once she was up there. Along with DEATH's mask. With producer's sunglasses taped into them. Prescription sunglasses. It was a sunny day, but as producer is blind as a bat the prescription meant she could barely see a thing.
It was very convincing though. Despite the foot gap in height between stand-in horse-riding DEATH and real but firmly rooted to the ground DEATH. Then Albert and the ginger one and producer had their pictures taken next to and leading Binky. And Ysabell had her picture taken dressed in pink looking demure leaning on a fence. Not as her character of course.
After all that it was off for the second set build... I'll tell you all about eggs, sausages and bacon tomorrow. Oh and swordfights as well.

Thought for the day:
'Ride the range all the day
Till the first fading light
Be with my western girl
Round the fire oh so bright
I'd be the indians friend
Let them love to be free
Riding into the sunset
I wish I could be'
Jeff Lynne. Wild West Hero. ELO. Out Of The Blue. And yes, they were The Beatles of the 1970s. And if you disagree i'll sort you out.

Madness Part One

2007-03-12T23:45:00.000Z

No blog for Friday, Saturday or Sunday. Why? Well it's been a bit busy, that's why. I'm not going to talk about work, because that's almost as bad as talking about problems with printers. No, I shall tell you of the fun of Saturday and tomorrow I shall run through Sunday and let you know just how good our rehearsal was tonight.
I brought the second batch of postcards home with me from work on Friday night and the task for Saturday was for secretary, director her and producer to tour the bookshops of the area leaving them by the tills.
Of course we started in Langley... with a cooked breakfast. We managed to get the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker to put a poster up in their windows. Well the sandwich shop, the greengrocers and the hairdressers anyway. Plus a couple of others if we get lucky. And we paid (grrrr!) to put them in the Post Office and hardware store.
I think it might have helped that I was carrying a cuddly rabbit that secretary had bought in the Age Concern shop. I asked everyone behind the counters if they would like to say hello to George. Maybe they said yes out of sympathy. Maybe they said yes to get rid of me. Or maybe they said yes because they thought it was really amusing and if the play was as funny as me then it would definitely be worth seeing...
Slough was on the map for two reasons. I needed a haircut. Barber in Queensmere. 15 minutes. £10. Secretary happy. Director her happy. Sorted. The other being to visit the town's two bookshops, which the pair of them did while I was having my locks shorn. We were going to meet footnote and woman in street, but woman in street couldn't make it, so Maidenhead, where they were going, has been put on hold for the time being.
Then we split up. Secretary went off to Uxbridge while director her and producer headed for Staines on the way we picked up some sponge, black and grey wallpaper, burgundy wrapping paper, silicon sealant and medical tape. And probably some other stuff I have forgotten. Why? Well firstly we planned to make up my deathly mask later that afternoon. Secondly we wanted something to cover DEATH's books and Albert's book of spells.
We visited Ottakers or Waterstones or whatever the main bookshop in the middle of Staines is and then went to Books etc at Two Rivers. The sales assistant at the back counter wasn't too sure about taking the postcards. But. She called her manager down. And. He turned out to be a Pratchett fan. So. He was quite happy to take a pile of them.
Then director her and I had one of those moments which really make such an exercise worthwhile. Like they say, if you don't ask, you don't get... thus I asked whether he and his team would put a card in each of the Pratchett books on their shelves. He didn't like that idea, but when it was suggested that we could do it... he said the immortal word 'Yes' (or something rather longer but basically meaning the same thing for practical purposes).
For the next 15 minutes director her and producer could be seen working their way through two-and-a-half shelves worth of Pratchett books. It's about as good a direct marketing campaign as we are likely to get. The manager did OK out of it - we ended up buying two books ourselves.
We ended up back at home (arriving at exactly the same second as secretary) to work on DEATH's mask, only to find, after director her had gone to work fixing in the blue lights and the sunglass lenses, that the switch to turn the lights on was broken. Yet another job for set man.
So that was it for the day. Well apart from secretary testing me on my lines for about an hour and a half. It's the first proper session we have been able to do. We should have done it ages ago. Hey ho. Consequently though, I got no work done on the programme. That is my biggest current concern.

Thought for the day: 'Two budgies on a perch. One says to the other: "Can you smell fish?"' Source unknown. Well it's obvious really...

Flash! Bang! Wallop!

2007-03-08T12:55:00.000Z

We do all sorts of things on our stage, but in this show we need some pyros and using them causes all sorts of complications. When we did Wyrd Sisters all those years ago director her had several. This time it is all a little more restrained - just one for DEATH & Albert's disappearance in scene 21.
Of course such things require a certain amount of care. Setting fire to the front row wouldn't be a good idea really. After all they will have had a big meal during the interval. We don't want them getting indegestion while we run around putting them out with fire extinguishers.
Director her has been in touch with the people at Slough council who are responsible for issuing licences and we have to adhere to a number of key safety requirements to be given the go ahead. Most importantly, all the costumes of those people in the immediate vicinity of the big bang need to have their costumes fireproofed. As that includes me I think it is probably quite a good idea.
Fortunately director her, director him and producer are all trained at squirting stuff for work just in case something goes wrong. All the flats we have up were there at panto so they've been fireproofed already and the stage curtains are also protected so there shouldn't be any towering inferno.
It all adds to the complications though - but if you are doing a show with wizards or witches in it then a few magical pieces of stage action are likely to be required.
I shall now disappear....

Thought for the day:
'Roll up, roll up for the mystery tour
Roll up, roll up for the mystery tour
Roll up - and that’s an invitation
Roll up for the mystery tour
Roll up - to make a reservation
Roll up for the mystery tour
The magical mystery tour is waiting to take you away
Waiting to take you away'
Them scouse blokes

Do you trust the media?

2007-03-07T23:38:00.000Z

No, I'm not referring to my own publications. Nor am I referring to town crier's newspaper or any of the other weeklies around here currently being pelted with press releases and interviews by producer geezer.
I am of course referring to our potential honorary president and one or two articles reporting problems with her health and the preview shows for Treats in the West End.
It seems so strange that what seemed to be a perfectly successful production when we witnessed the last night at the Theatre Royal in Windsor should hit so many problems. I can see it's been a tough run so far. Two weeks at Windsor, then with just a break on each Sunday a run at Great Malvern, then Bath and finally Richmond. They had no break then before hitting the stage at the Garrick Theatre in London.
If you do believe the papers - and what is true is that the opening night has already been put back a week and may be put back further - then our Billie is having a pretty tough time of it. Poor health, stress, self doubt. Whatever is true, it seems like she has reached a crucial rubicon in her acting career.
Performing in a three-hander is demanding and this is her first theatre role as a leading lady. The irony is that her solo scene involves her sobbing her heart out deciding whether to call her boyfriend. The scene certainly gripped and drained me when I saw it and I should imagine it's pretty demanding to generate that level of traumatic effect time and time again.
Method acting is a serious business and if she is tapping into some daemons from her past to produce all those tears of despair then I could imagine she has got some pretty heavy shit floating arround in her head at the moment. Anyway, we shall wait to see. Personally I hope that they delay the opening night another three weeks until March 28 - to give her time to recover properly from whatever health problems she has - then I'll be able to get to the opening night with press tickets and review the show!

Thought for the day:
'I know the way that I want it to be
But you know that I'm gonna take my chance now
I'm gonna make it happen some how
And you know I can take the pressure
A moments wait for a life time treasure
Every girl wants you to be her boy
But I'll wait right here 'till it's my turn
I'm not the kinda girl who gives up just like that oh no'
The Tide Is High. Billie Piper. Walk Of Life.
Should have been her number one hit, but she opted out and so Atomic Kitten hit the top with it instead.

Dazed and Confused

2007-03-06T16:25:00.000Z

At rehearsal last night producer was about as much use as, well, a not very useful thing. I returned from a long weekend in Berlin with scud, domefur and virtual dildo during the afternoon and was very, very tired. Why? Because I had a little problem sleeping on Saturday night due to the other resident of my room having a ridiculously loud snoring session. Suffice to say I could still hear him with my iPod on turned up to full volume. I ended up sleeping on the bathroom floor...
That aside, it was a magnificent trip. Here is not the place to detail the full story, but a good weekend of footie (Hertha Berlin 2 Bayern Munich 3), sightseeing (Reichstag, Checkpoint Charlie, Brandenburg Gate, Holocaust Memorial) and food (Oscar Wilde pub, a Spanish restaurant on Ku'damm and an Italian restaurant in Charlottenburg).
Now though, it is time to get on with the crucial few days before the show hits the stage. We have three more rehearsals before the dress. OAP show is two weeks tonight. While I was away the set man, dangerous and the rest of the crew got the two extensions to our stage put up. It's nevert big enough for us so we have been adding two 4ft extensions which run the width of the hall onto the front of the stage. Normally we don't get to do this until the final weekend before the show, so it's great to get the chance to rehearse on the full size stage for four extra run-throughs.
Last Friday I had the posters and 5,000 leaflets delivered to the office and on Sunday some of the team walked around in the rain (it was fine in Berlin!) putting them through letterboxes in the village. Town crier got absolutely drenched, so secretary told me... There are plenty more waiting to go out over the coming days. I have the rest of the programme to put together and we have to sort out the pics with 'Binky', DEATH's white horse. Previous producer has lined up one for Sunday - DEATH, Mort, Albert and Ysabell assuming the ginger one can get up for 10.30am. I tried on my costume last night for the first time and it will be finished for Sunday. It should make great pictures.

Thought for the day:
'I had a dream, oh now,
Crazy dream, oh-hoh,
Anything I wanted to know,
Any place I needed to go.'
The Song Remains The Same.
Plant/Page/Jones/Bonham.
Houses Of The Holy.
Led Zep

Time Marches On

2007-03-02T00:20:00.000Z

St David's Day, Daffodils, A Pinch & A Punch. Yes it's the first of March and that means it's scary time. We are counting down the days until the first performance. There's no complication like having to add together bits of February and bits of March. The dress rehearsal is on March 19. That's 18 days time. That's not very long. Gulp! Would I like a glass of water?
Actually, it's past midnight. Which means it's March 2. Bugger. Why did you have to go and spoil it all.
Ysabell was complaining tonight that I had fallen behind a bit and needed to be writing something every day. And let's face it, who would argue with anyone who carries a large pink bunny around with them. Well her father maybe. Especially when he's carrying a goldfish and a teddy bear. I bet she hasn't noticed that in the script. Hah! Never mind the scythe my girl just make sure your bunny doesn't come anywhere near my goldfish or my teddy will be having words.

Thought for the day: 'What's the difference between a bison annd a buffalo? You can't wash your hands in a buffalo.' Bad joke c22.02.07. I won't even begin to tell you who told me that, but she was in disguise - not wearing pink at the time.

Publish and be damned

2007-02-27T16:41:00.000Z

Let's face it, most newspaper editors have problems with printers and deadlines, with equipment and distribution. However, it is very annoying to have the same problems at home.
To recap:
Point one: My Dad was given our old iMac, scanner and printer by my mother for Christmas. My mother paid secretary and me the money to buy a new flash three-in-one printer/scanner/copier as a replacement. You already know that.
Point two: When loading the software for the printer onto my iBook on the day of the Billie Piper letter I discovered that I couldn't use it with the Mac OSX operating system I had and had to load it onto secretary's pc laptop to print it instead. You know that too.
Point three: This Sunday we had the special screening of Songbook and the handing out of DVDs of the show. More of all that in a moment. I've mentioned that.
Point four: I did the DVD label and cover for the box a couple of weeks ago and gave them to previous director who was editing the recording to print but was due to do the booklet insert at work last week so that I could print it there. And that one as well.
Point five: I was so busy with work on Friday that I didn't leave until just before 11pm anyway, so I had no time to finish and print the booklets.
Point six: So I therefore had to do them at the weekend.
If you have made it this far you will probably have spotted the fundamental flaw in point six. I couldn't actually use the printer at home...
Well there's a solution to everything isn't there. and the solution to this problem was simple. Get the latest operating system for my iBook and upgrade it.
Simple stuff. But don't forget about the deadline, deadline, deadline, whispering away at the back of the mind.
Now there are Mac users and there are PC users and I won't go into a long detailed explaination of why Macs are far, far better than PCs here and now. Well other than to say of course they are and don't argue.
One problem with Macs however is that because they are the elite of the computer world, there are fewer stockists...
Well on Saturday morning I rang the Apple Centre in Brentford to check that they had the OSX Tiger operating system in stock - just in case - well actually because secretary told me to. After all she would be driving me there.
Of course they didn't. I asked where else might. PC World I was told. Oh the shame of it. A Mac man having to ring PC World. Did they have it in stock at either their Slough or Staines stores. No, of course not.
So off I went on a jolly little jaunt to the Apple Store in Regent Street. Oh the things I do for CAST on a Saturday afternoon. I spent the journey to and fro learning my lines with the recording of the show on my iPod so it wasn't time entirely wasted.
So I returned with Tiger plus the latest version of Adobe Photoshop Elements to sort out the pictures. And I began loading the software...
Now these are not small items. An entirely new operating system for your computer takes a little while to sort itself out. Suffice to say that I went to bed at gone midnight leaving the Photoshop stuff still loading.
Sunday was our first setbuild day, but I spent the afternoon sorting bits out for the Mort programme and then loading the printer software...
And finally, at about 5.45 I was ready to start printing the booklets.
Deadlines, deadlines, deadlines.
By now previous director was gathering together the last of the 18 DVDs he had managed to copy ready to race down to the village hall and set up the screen and equipment for the show.
Meanwhile back at the nightmare ranch...
I had put the booklets together with the publishing trade's number one tool, QuarkXPress. It's a wonderful thing. I have worked with it from my first days as a sub-editor at the Windsor & Slough Express through various generations of the software. There is nothing to match it as a layout and editing programme.
Every time I do a poster or programme or leaflet or postcard for Cast It gets done with QuarkXPress.
I have version 4.1 at home. It's not bad. To give you an idea, we had 3.2 on our Macs at work until a few months ago. I now have 4.1 on a Mac and version 6.0 on a PC.
Anyway, here's a crucial little techie bit - 4.1 will only operate on Mac operating system OS9, which I also have on my iBook. To use it on OSX or Tiger I would have to get an upgrade to version 6.0 or 7.0.
Am I boring you? Well it was all boring me on Sunday.
So here you are. The result of my endeavours. A series of equations which do not have an answer.
OSX Tiger on iBook can use printer. Tick in the box - bought it in London.
QuarkXPress can run in OS9 on iBook. Tick in the box - already there.
OOOOPS! S**t, b*****s, b*m.
Yes I couldn't print from QuarkXPress in OS9 as the printer would only work with software in OSX Tiger.
Deadlines, deadlines, deadlines.
Nothing to be done. No booklets.
And people would have loved them too.
So they will now have to go out separately at some point in the future once I have moved all the documents to work. I see another trip to the Apple Store to pick up a new version of QuarkXPress on the horizon.
Technology is a wonderful thing... except when you have to use it.
PS. If you hate all this sort of techno-gibberish you have my apologies. But don't worry. I do too.

Thought for the day: 'You are the apple of my eye...' You Are The Sunshine Of My Life. Stevie Wonder. And plenty of other people in other places. It's probably from Shakespeare. I'll check.

Right of reply

2007-02-22T17:01:00.000Z

As with all reporters, I operate to the highest standards and should anyone feel they have been subject to a libel on the site then I will act accordingly.
I would therefore like to offer an alternative version of the entry pain and paintings...

My entry

DIRECTOR HER: Be very careful, remember he's badly hurt himself.

Corrected to:

DIRECTOR HER (mid scene): Watch his ribs!

and

My entry

DIRECTOR HER: I shouted out to be careful.....!!!

Corrected to:

well, nothing... cos that was never shouted!

also a clarification on one other part of the entry

My entry

"The ginger one broke the scythe as well. And he almost broke the sword. Well OK not really. But the switch to turn on the blue lights along the side of the blade won't move and needs replacing. Another task for set man to worry about."

Correction

The cheap Maplin switch failed to last more than two rehearsals. Better it broke early in rehearsal stage anyway isn't it than on the second night of performance?

and

The swords life was perfectly safe all evening!

allaboutdeath.blogspot.com is happy to publish these corrections and apologises for any inconvenience or distress caused.

Oh yeah and he WAS holding the scythe when the switch broke.

We'll se how rehearsal of that scene goes this evening... The show is actually quite violent. Ysabell gets to slap both of us and I get to stick the scythe into his nuts. The handle end that is. The other doesn't bear thinking about.

Thought for the day: 'All right now baby it's a-all right now.' Free. Free. Paul Rogers.

Chocolate

2007-02-22T13:49:00.000Z

I forgot to say. Lent starts on Ash Wednesday. Albert told me so, quite properly pointing out that I am a heathen. He's a good catholic boy. Well good might be stretching things a little. Apparently his mum always used to tell him Lent ended on Easter Sunday. Then one day he counted out 40 days and worked out it actually ends on Palm Sunday. That's a whole week of eating chocolate he was deprived of for years and years. Outrageous.

Thought for the day:
'If love were liquid it would drown me
In a placeless place would find me
In a heart shape come around me and then
Melt me slowly down
If love were human it would know me
In a lost space come and show me
Hold me and control me and then
Melt me slowly down
Like chocolate'
Chocolate. Body Language. Kylie. I had never thought of it as a religious song before. Funny how you can miss these things.

The late, late, late show.

2007-02-22T12:48:00.000Z

Previous producer has to get up at some ridiculous time in the morning to get to work. Like 5am or something equally stupid. I have caught the same train as her about twice. She was probably doing a half day and I was going in really, really early.
Now look at the reverse side of the coin. She stays up rather late. As ridiculously late as she has to get up. Have a look at her blog from the last show, allaboutdick.blogspot.com and see the time of the entries. That's the time she started writing them, not when she finished.
I can only conclude that she is a witch. She has to get up before she has gone to bed, so that is the only conclusion I can draw. In fact she's playing a wizard in the show.... so that's it.
Previous director is similar, but he works on the don't go to bed at all principle.
So when I tell you that we had a CAST committee meeting last night followed by a Mort production meeting, held at previous producer's house as committee meetings always are, and that we finished at gone midnight, at which point previous director then had to go through one or two important other issues, you will understand.
Having one after the other might seem ludicrous, but we always spend a large chunk of committee meetings discussing the current production, it isn't actually such a mad idea. We were still discussing committee stuff when director her arrived at 10ish, and still discussing them when director him arrived about 20 minutes later having been training staff all night. He now the record for the latest arrival at a CAST committee meeting.
Most things are progressing well. We're going to ask whether we can put the stage extension up early so that we can work on Keli's bedroom and DEATH's study before the final long weekend. There are one or two extra costume issues which previous producer needed opinions on. This weekend there's going to be a lot of ironing to do. We can't go to Warwick Castle for a photo shoot, so it is probably going to be a few of us in Windsor instead We're still hunting for a white/grey horse (depending on how you describe it). Set man is going to take photos of people this evening and on Monday for the programme. Producer geezer is going to sort out the biogs for the programme, once I can get the old ones to him. All good stuff.
This morning I had a great piece of news. Grundon waste management are going to sponsor our show again, paying for the publicity production costs to the tune of £680. I rang director him, director her and previous director to give them the good news. Director him is especially pleased. If you remember, he is also the CAST treasurer. Happy man.

Thought for the day: 'Show me the way to go home, I'm tired and I want to go to bed...' Just about everyone who's ever recorded a song anywhere ever. And a lot of drunk people outside pubs at closing time. Including me. Probably.

Pain and paintings

2007-02-20T22:25:00.000Z

CUTWELL:
Are you sure this couldn't be sorted out by just getting round a table -

MORT/DEATH
NO.

CUTWELL
One...Two...

(and they start fighting. Slow motion. Strobe effect)

DIRECTOR HER:
Be very careful, remember he's badly hurt himself.

KELI:
They both cheated!

YSABELL:
Of course.

(As they fight the DUKE's hourglass is knocked off the desk or shelf and breaks on the ground)

The Duke of Sto Helit!

KELI:
Isn't there something we can do?

YSABELL:
Mort will lose either way.

(MORT shows signs of tiredness)

DEATH:
YIELD, I MAY BE MERCIFUL. THUS IT ENDS, BOY.

MORT:
Mort. Mort. Mort, you bastard!

DIRECTOR HER/REST OF CAST:
Noooo!

(MORT flies at DEATH in a fury, and DEATH is driven back against a wall, he crumples and tries to fend MORT off with cries of 'Ouch!')

DIRECTOR HER/REST OF CAST:
Stop! You're really hurting him.

MORT:
Sorry mate - are you all right?

DEATH:
No, you've hit me on my fractured rib.

MORT:
Oh no! I didn't know!

DIRECTOR HER:
I shouted out to be careful.....!!!

I think the ginger one felt pretty bad after that incident, although probably not as bad as I did when I got up this morning. Secretary is threatening to send him texts calling him a 'beastly boy'.
My ribs are just one element of the effects of my fall. Actually I think plummet is probably a better term. Anyway, I have also discovered that when you smack your knee on something hard, as the knee cannot bruise a ring of bruising appears around the knee. It, and particularly my upper calf are both a lovely mix of yellow and purple.
The ginger one broke the scythe as well. And he almost broke the sword. Well OK not really. But the switch to turn on the blue lights along the side of the blade won't move and needs replacing. Another task for set man to worry about.
Director her gave me her artwork for the poster/postcards/programme last night. Well I say artwork, what I mean is painting. It's fab! DEATH and Mort on Binky (and she really is very, very good at drawing horses) with the Discworld beneath. You can even see one of The Great A'Tuin's er... are they called flippers? I'm not really an expert on large turtles that fly through space carrying elephants holding entire worlds on their backs.
Of course secretary very carefully put it away in her bag so that no-one spilt beer or tea on it.
When we got home we put it on the table in our lounge. This morning I went to get it to take to work. I looked. It wasn't there. Or rather I should say the sketch pad was there, but her painting wasn't. Two other drawings. No Mort artwork. Cue expletives from secretary and producer. 'Someone must have taken it out of my bag.' 'The ******* ***** probably wanted to have a look at it and forgot to put it back in the ******* bag.' 'I can't believe it. Who'd be so stupid?'
Tonight I rang director her. I told her about it and asked who the last two people to leave the hall were, hoping someone had picked it up. The last two out were director him and director her. Then she asked if we were sure they had taken it out as they would have had to rip it out of the pad.... 'It was quite sticky around the edge, maybe it has got stuck to the back of.........'

DEATH
What do you call the feeling of being very small and hot?

DIRECTOR HER:
Please don't do that to me again!!!!!!

Thought for the day: 'By my troth Nerissa, my little body is a-wearie of this world.' Portia to Nerissa. Act I Scene II. The Merchant of Venice. Willy Shaker. Regularly quoted by my dear secretary. Just spoken as she headed upstairs to bed. She has just added 'Now quit your care and anxious fear and worry for schemes are vain and fretting brings no gain.' That's from a hymn. Apparently. She says it's the start of Lent so we should have a hymn. Well we had pancakes tonight. Actually, when does Lent start? On Ash Wednesday? Or is it the day after Ash Wednesday? I'm sure I have had this conversation with Albert before. Maybe he or one of my lapsed catholic friends could assist on this one...

I can't fly

2007-02-20T16:09:00.000Z

That's one thing I have in common with Orville The Duck.
I found out last Monday by 'flying through the air with the greatest of ease, like the daring young man on the flying trapeze', as the song goes. You see, I was trying to be helpful. That can land you in an awful lot of trouble.
I will make my story as brief as possible. But I do say 'try'.
We don't have a gents toilet (or a ladies for that matter) in our office. It's the same for every company in the building. We don't have a kitchen either. If you want the ladies it's the first, third or fifth floor of the six-storey office block. If you need the gents then it's the second or fourth. The communal kitchen is on the third floor at the opposite end of the building to all these toilets.
Now no-one much goes through the fire door at the end of the corridor past the kitchen. There are no offices to be found that way. But there hides a secret... a small stairwell with a toilet on every mezzanine floor on the way down.
It is a place of solitude used by 'those in the know'. Our Leisure Editor uses it. So does our 72-year-old marathon-running part-time sub-editor. But then he has a good excuse - he uses the kitchen the most to make us all cups of tea. Our circulation manager used to use it before he was made redundant. Then there's maybe half-a-dozen others who work in the offices nearest to the kitchen. That's about it.
Then of course there's the cleaner. Let's face it, it's a pretty good job she does know it's there... and last Monday I came out of that toilet and started up the steps towards the kitchen, to meet her coming down the steps towards me, bucket and mop in hand. She's Portuguese (there's a huge Portuguese and Brazilian community in Harlesden and Kensal Green) and very friendly although her English is limited. Far better than my Portuguese mind you.
She asked me whether there was anyone else in the toilet. Being helpful I said I would check for her and turned round halfway up the stairs. That was the crucial decision. Trying to be helpful.
I have epilepsy. It takes two forms. One, major seizures where I fall to the ground and shake all over, bite my tongue etc as you always see it portrayed. Fortunately that has not been a regular problem for more than 12 years. Two, absences where for a moment I will be totally unaware of what is going on around me and then 'come round' maybe two to five seconds later. This will mean my eyes glaze over and if people are talking to me I will just say 'hmmn' a lot. My body will carry on with normal activities. One flatmate watched me continue tying my shoelaces while I had 'blanked out'. I have been making a cup of coffee and put the spoonful of coffee straight into my mouth rather than into the cup. That's not nice. Nicer, however, than what happened when I blanked out on the stairs.
On this occasion I came to not going 'bleuuugh! what's that horrible taste in my mouth' but 'oh dear, the floor seems to be coming towards me at an alarming speed and I think I'm going to bang my.... thud'. Six or seven steps up. Concrete floor. Thin office carpet. Ouch.
Fortunately my glasses fell off during my fall. Fortunately I turned so that I landed on the side of my head not on my face. Fortunately I hit the area between my ear and eye and not my chin.
Cue very upset cleaner. She grabs a bloke aho happens to be in the kitchen to look after me. She then goes down to the ground floor to get the guy from reception. Then they get me some water. Then he goes down to our office to get my deputy. Then he gets a rag from the kitchen for me to hold against my head. Then the cleaner goes into the nearby offices to see if anyone has any ice in a mini-bar. She reappears with an ice-tray and puts some ice into the cloth. After a while holding that against my head I move downstairs and sit in my office for about half an hour hoping that the ice will work quickly and I can get on with my work - after all, it is a Monday.
Eventually our Swedish reporter comes in and tells me that I have to go to hospital as she had a similar thing happen to her and she had to stay in hospital overnight when she was younger. So my deputy drives me to Hammersmith Hospital...
See receptionist. Wait in lobby. See nurse. Go back to wait in lobby. See doctor. Wait in corridor. Be X-rayed. Wait in corridor. See doctor again. But I hadn't fractured anything that the doctor could see. So he told me to rest and be careful....

Thought for the day: 'Those magnificent men in their flying machines, they go up tiddly-om-pom, they go down tiddly-own-down.' Lord only knows. It was a film, but was it something else first? Someone look it up on the internet and tell me.

Head lines

2007-02-19T16:13:00.000Z

My head hurts. Not as much as it did this time last week though. At this point seven days ago I was emerging from Hammersmith Hospital having been told that I hadn't fractured my skull. Which was some kind of compensation.
I'll explain exactly what happened at a point when looking into a computer screen for extended periods of time doesn't increase my headache.
For the moment I shall confine myself to saying that I missed both rehearsals last week In the meantime director her has drawn the poster, which I shall be given at the rehearsal tonight, previous producer has been hard at work sorting costumes and secretary has confirmed that NODA will review the show and that we will have a visit from the Mayor of Slough who apparently is a huge Pratchett fan.
We have a committee meeting on Wednesday which will become a production meeting at some point part way through. More details about how the world has progressed in the past few days will be forthcoming then and of course tonight at rehearsal.

Thought for the day: 'Since you been gone, since you been gone, I'm out of my head can't take it...' Rainbow. Zippy & George. Oh yes. No I won't explain. Well not now anyway. (I had to choose a piece of headbanging music... ho! ho! ho!)

Radio Ga-ga

2007-02-11T23:29:00.000Z

We have become pretty good at publicising our shows in recent years. There are the usual posters around the village and local shops. There are postcards through all the letterboxes in the village. Actually, the postcards idea was devised by rincewind when he directed his self-penned play Stranded this time last year and they have been used for each show since. Neat. Then there are the leaflets for handing out at 'events'. These occasions vary from village fetes for the summer show to turning on the Christmas lights for panto.
Last summer in the stinking heat we walked round Wexham Park hospital handing postcards out to the staff. In and out of the offices, along the wards and into the cafeteria. Not into the nurses quarters though, which upset director him no end. Especially as he was dressed as a Roman centurion at the time.
I spent a long hot day (the hottest of the summer) trudging up and down the Bath Road in Slough Trading Estate persuading companies that, yes, they really did want a couple of posters and 20-odd postcards to promote the show through their staff social club/restaurant/staff noticeboards/foyer tables. I would like to point out that this was during the World Cup. I would also like to point out that I had taken time off work to watch the football. I would finally like to point out that I missed the first half of one of the games in order to do this distribution of publicity material. Dedicated or daft? I sometimes wonder.
We have good contacts with the local press. Well town crier works for the Express so we do have an advantage there. The Observer are pretty good to us too as they hate to be outdone by their rivals. So much so, that they sometimes end up giving us even better coverage.
But one of the great recent successes has been through radio. We are lucky to have a great relationship with Time 106.6 FM, the radio station in Slough. So good that producer geezer arranged, as I said he would, for director him and footnote to go in today to record an advert which will be played twice a day from now until the show. All the ones we have done before have been top class. I am looking forward to hearing this one. It's a great way to reach people outside our normal catchment area, and for TP I think that can only be a really, really good thing.
I will say something else about the power of radio. We had Virgin on when we were doing the big costume sort-out last weekend. They have this really annoying advert which has part of Queen's I Want It All as the soundtrack. I love Queen. I have all their albums and saw them live on two different tours. However, I do not want to hear part of one of their songs 20 times in the course of a day. Please.
I was singing it all day the next day. And the day after that. The following day secretary and I were driving along happily listening to Virgin in the car and the first 'I Wa...' came on and I turned the radio off instantly. That is bad advertising. Really bad. In fact it's so bad that I can't tell you what product they were advertising. Really.

Thought for the day:
'I go out to work on Monday morning,
Tuesday I go off to honeymoon,
I'll be back again before it's time for sunny-down,
I'll be lazing on a Sunday afternoon.
Bicycling on every Wednesday evening,
Thursday I go waltzing to the zoo,
I come from London Town I'm just an ordinary guy,
Fridays I go painting in the Louvre,
I'm bound to be proposing on a Saturday night,
(There he goes again)
I'll be lazing on a Sunday,
Lazing on a Sunday,
Lazing on a Sunday afternoon.'
Lazing On A Sunday Afternoon. Freddie Mercury. A Night At The Opera. Queen.

Jolly chilly

2007-02-08T23:55:00.000Z

Two good nights, with a lot of snow and 210 works of art inbetween. What am I talking about. Well it's pretty abstract I know, but then so was a lot of the art...
Last night a few of us... well OK then... director him, director her, producer, the ginger one, Albert, Ysabell, Cutwell, previous producer, footnote and bursar... gathered at the hall to record the entire show so that the cast can use it to learn their lines. We reckon we can sell the recordings on front of house. Or maybe not.
Footnote and producer did come up with a good knock, knock joke though. 'Knock, knock.' 'Who's there?' 'Ysabell.' 'Ysabell who?' 'Is ya bell not working?' Well we reckoned it was very, very funny and don't care what you think.
It was bloody cold down there. It always is in the hall. This, however, was ridiculous. As I had expected, secretary didn't join us. She was and still is feeling pants. I mean as in 'not well'. I don't mean as in my underwear. Although she does do that too. For sorting out the laundry of course. Yes.
Anyway, it was, as I said, a trifle cold. The coldest night of the year so far to my reckoning. There was plenty of snow when I woke up this morning. Needless to say, it took 40 minutes for a cab to get to the house and 45 minutes to do the normal five minute journey to Langley station. Mad. I cannot believe the way the whole country stops with a small fall of snow. Our Swedish reporter at the paper thinks it's hilarious.
I was at Brent Town Hall all day. Chairing a group of judges to select works of art by school students for an auction. Five judges, 210 pieces to judge and we had to be finished by 3pm. I wanted to be there by 8.30am. I arrived at 9.50am. Bloody snow.
It was knackering. We each had to go round filling out forms to decide which ones went up for auction (the best) which ones went into an exhibition and which ones went back to the schools (the worst). Then we had to see which ones we could agree on. Then we had to go round as a group to try to make a decision on the 50 or so which we had different opinions about. Bonkers.
We finished at about 4.30pm. After boxing all the art up into the right order in the right categories and loading it into a cab it was 6pm. Remarkably, I made it home in time to grab a quick meal before director him picked me up for rehearsal.
Of course, just like yesterday, numerous people were not there. And of course the same ten from last night were there. Plus pregnant wizard, town crier and high priest. Some people rang with good excuses, some with poor ones and some didn't bother to call at all. Irritating.
It was a lot of fun though. Memos to self; talk quicker, stride don't shuffle; be more angry at the end. Oh and next time bring down my own script with all my notes in it rather than secretary's.
The ginger one burned off CDs for those who wanted them and he is now off to Arizona for a week. Someone is going to have fun standing in for him...
It all gets serious from now on. Need to learn those words. We all do. That, after all, is why we were there in the cold until gone midnight last night. I hope the rest of the cast appreciate it, bless 'em.
Two more things. Ysabell has a mind like a sewer. Then again I knew what she was thinking, so I must be on the same level. All of us are in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars. And judging by the expression on her face a couple of times tonight... Well actually the point is that we are the stars... Obviously.
The other thing is that the snow is quite funny in some ways. Secretary had a text from a colleague this morning saying: "I won't be able to get into work today, there's snow outside my house." Then her boss said she couldn't get in because her electric gates at the end of her drive and frozen solid and wouldn't open. Fantastic.

Thought for the day: 'We're walking in a Winter Wonderland.' Winter Wonderland. By loads of people. Secretary has about a dozen different recordings. She likes her Christmas music.

Making hay while the snow falls

2007-02-07T15:40:00.000Z

Went to see Hay Fever at the Theatre Royal last night. It may seem as though I am going a lot. Well that's because I am. But there have been four shows in a row that secretary and I have wanted to see so we decided to go. The posse this time was director him, setman, box office and high priest. We had two pull out on the day. As usual we went for a meal at pizza express beforehand. Well everyone except director him. We were sat up in the gods about three rows in front of where we were for The Unexpected Guest. Stephanie Beecham was magnificent.
When the show finished we looked at the pictures in the corridor. I noticed one of a previous production of Hay Fever and box office spotted one for An Inspector Calls, a show he has always wanted direct. I then said I would love to do 12 Angry Men. We went through the list of possible Cast members past and present who might be capable of doing it. We thought of 11. Then we remembered town crier. Set man said in that case we would have to change the title to 11 Angry Men And One Who's Slightly Miffed. That works for me.
Tonight we are reading through the script to give everyone a recording to practice their lines. A few people won't be there, but that doesn't matter. People can read in. Actually I'm not sure whether secretary is going to make it down as she is feeling pretty poorly.
Talking of people not being there, I have this horrible feeling that one or two people may not be here at work tomorrow. They are predicting the heaviest snow in years. Five to seven inches. I have to judge pictures for an art auction tomorrow. I need to be in Wembley by 8.45am. I can see that being a litlle bit of a problem.

Thought for the day: 'Let it snow, Let it snow, Let it snow...' Doris Day's Christmas Album. Which I bought for secretary this Christmas. She loves Doris.

Recorded at last

2007-02-06T00:18:00.000Z

Another rehearsal missed tonight. Pain in the bum. Not that I was the only one. Keli couldn't make it and previous producer is ill. She's probably worn herself into the ground after the efforts of Friday and Saturday night. At least we have an extra session on Wednesday to read through the whole show and record it onto disk for everyone to learn their lines. Then it's a complete run through on Thursday, before the ginger one heads off to the USA - Arizona to be precise - for a week.
Sunday was another one of those days which vanished into Cast activities. We put on a one night charity concert this time last year; the full details of the whys and wherefores I shall not cover now. In among all the songs that were performed we had a series of speeches which I had written to link the whole thing together. Trouble was, when we came to putting the DVD together there were four of the seven speeches missing because they had been used as the points to change the video.
Now a week is a long time in politics, they say. Well a year is a ridiculous length of time for a bunch of luvvies to wait to get their hands on copies of the DVD. But could the ginger one, scud, previous chairperson (they're married - remember that one too) and producer manage to be in the same place at the same time, complete with evening dress and copies of the speeches, for previous director to record? Could we hell. I have to say that on one occasion last August, secretary and producer were coming back from holiday and completely forgot about it. So I take the blame there. But with the anniversary fast approaching we decided we should put on a special showing and dish out the complete DVDs then. What is it about deadlines?
For me this involves designing and producing labels for the DVDs, an outer cover and an inner booklet, the first two of which I completed on Sunday (either side of a fabulous roast lunch prepared by secretary) and then we went round to scud and previous chairperson's pad (that's right, well remembered) to do the recordings. Needless to say, for producer and previous director this involved a couple of takes. For scud... well I'm not sure, but it was nearer to ten than two. A man in search of perfection....
Previous director now has all he needs to put the finished article together, while producer works on the inner booklet. It should be a nice little package - a fitting tribute to the occasion. Like I said though, that is one for another occasion.
Most important thing today though was an email from domefur to confirm our booking to go to Berlin. Looks like it will only be domefur, virtual dildo, scud and producer. No previous director or Albert which leaves a big hole, but then scud and domefur couldn't make it at the last minute a year ago. It will be great. Our first event in Germany. Oh the things that Cast brought us together to do.

Thought for the day: 'Darf ich Destroya vorstellen.' I could have written other things, but babelfish is a dangerous website to start playing around with at this time of night. Albert will vouch for that. And domefur. It nearly destroyed their lives...

Clearing out the Tardis

2007-02-03T23:15:00.000Z

Last night previous producer, previous director, set man, box office and secretary spent six hours taking everything out of the Tardis. These pictures show what it looked like. Today previous producer, previous director, set man, director him, high priest, saturday landlord and producer spent nine hours sorting through it all, chucking out as much as possible, and putting it back into the Tardis in a more orderly fashion. It was all very neccessary in order for us to be able to do the show in comfort and know what exactly is where.
All this has nothing to do with Billie Piper. It wasn't one of the things I included in my letter to try to win her over. I am in this case referring to Time And Relative Diminsions In Shite. Otherwise known as the Colnbrook Village Hall loft.
It's been full of junk for as long as I can remember and the bulk of it belongs to the Colnbrook Residents Association and the village hall trust. The loft is actually the gallery where the lights are controlled from for each show. In an ideal world the person calling the show is also up there.
For the last three years or so our ever expanding collection of costumes has lived up there and outgrown the space available.
Previous producer has been photographing and logging the costumes and chucking out the junk. There have been two or three occassions when we have taken all of them down from the loft and she and her team have sorted vast numbers of them out. Set man and producer spent on session after our own clear out of 'the shed' (more on that another time) going through the hats, logging and photographing them. Yes, we have quite a lot of hats. We have quite a lot of everything actually.

Set man and saturday landlord are spending quite a lot of time at the back of the hall during rehearsals taking photographs of items, while previous producer enters them on a massive database. I have called it a database rather than a spreadsheet, because, although previous producer is famous for her spreadsheets, the word really doesn't do the whole thing justice.
To give an idea of what we were doing today, let's give some statistics. Director him made two trips to the dump with a car crammed full of stuff we had thrown out. Secretary just about managed to fit in her car all the stuff for the Age Concern shop - there wasn't any room for a passenger to fit in to help unload it. We have 23 full giant plastic crates (with lids) full of costumes. We have more than a dozen huge suitcase shaped plastic zipper bags with more costumes, material, shoes and boots. And then there is all the remaining stuff belonging to CVH and CRA which we wrapped and stacked in open crates and boxes. And then there is all the other stuff. From clothes rails to tribal spears (not the britney spear - I'm not sure where that's gone...) from a plastic cash register to a pair of lanterns. But it all went back in a tidy state and the floor of the loft can still be seen - and there is almost room to swing a cat. How it all fitted back in, I'm still unsure. Maybe it really is a proper Tardis. Damn! In that case I should have put it in my letter to Billie after all. Talking of which, at the rehearsal on Thursday, when we completed Act Two, the ginger one said he had a good feeling about the whole honorary president exercise. Keep praying to the picture everyone.

Thought for the day: 'There is no escape. Return the Tardis immediately to our home planet... You have broken our laws. You must face your trial.' The Time Lords summon the second Doctor back to Gallifrey in The War Games, his final story.
If you thought Billie leaving in Doomsday was a bit dramatic, then you should try this one. Patrick Troughton ended his tenure as The Doctor. His two assistants, Jamie and Zoe had all memories of their time with The Doctor wiped and were each returned to the places they came from. The Time Lords sent The Doctor to Earth and removed the ability of the Tardis to travel.
So in the next series, the first episodes of the 1970s, The Doctor was played by Jon Pertwee. He had a new assistant - Liz Shaw. He worked alongside UNIT (The United Nations Intelligence Taskforce) with its leader Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. He was stranded on Earth, for the bulk the next three years (in order to save the BBC money). And it was shot in colour for the first time (which was why they needed to save money).
A pretty dramatic change. Jon Pertwee I loved as The Doctor. In many ways he is still the one I like the best. I hated Liz Shaw. She had replaced Zoe. I had a really big six and seven-year-old's crush on Wendy Padbury. I was really upset when she went. But Liz Shaw only lasted one series and then she was replaced by Jo Grant. I had an even bigger nine, ten and 11-year-old's crush on Katy Manning. Funnily enough when she was replaced by Sarah-Jane Smith I didn't like her much, until Jon Pertwee left and Tom Baker came along and she seemed OK then. I never fancied her though. But I was upset when she left.
My God Billie's replacement has got her work cut out winning over a lot of children's hearts over the coming episodes...

National coverage

2007-02-02T00:33:00.000Z

We've always been pretty good at publicity, but box office has taken things to a new level... last night (that's Wednesday for those of you who are pedantic) he was on the Geoff show on Virgin radio. Talking about Cast. Not about Mort, truth be known, but still talking about us.
He rang up in response to the question: 'Have you ever had anything strange happen to you while you have been dressed up as an animal.' Well how many stories from the annals of Cast did they want? But he picked the best.
Those of you who have read allaboutdick.blogspot.com will know that we made a tour of London organised by yours truly (called programme producer on that blog) to take promo pics for the press and to use on other publicity and in the programme. You may know this story from that blog.
But if not...
Among the places we visited were the house where Dick Whittington lived, and the church he founded next door, where he is buried. There are plaques on both of them and Keli, who played Dick, and previous producer, who was dressed in a huge cat costume, had their pics taken with each of them. We then took a line-up shot by the plaque on the side of the church before walking down the tiny street to the front of the church.... where a tour guide was telling a group of tourists all about Dick Wittington.
"This is the church where Dick Whittington, four times Lord Mayor of London is buried..." We came round the corner just as he turned round towards us and taking things beautifully in his stride he carried on his chat. "...and here he comes, accompanied by his cat. And now if you will follow me this way..."
The tourists snapped away with their cameras before scurrying off after him. He will be dining out on that one for years. We walked into Whittington Gardens opposite laughing our heads off and got on with taking our own photos.
So the late night listeners to Virgin Radio now all know the tale - and maybe that tour guide was listening himself.

Thought for the day: 'All we here is radio ga-ga, radio go-go, radio blah-blah.' Radio Gaga. Roger Taylor. The Works. Queen.

Official sponsorship

2007-01-31T13:41:00.000Z

One of the reporters just came into my office. He offered me a Werthers Original. I just had to say yes. I am eating it as I write. I just have to write something. It's not really specific to this show, but very important to the group. Why? Here goes...
For our 2003 pantomime we did Jack & The Beanstalk, written/adapted and produced by box office. It was directed by producer geezer. But in addition to the normal cast of principal boy, principal girl, dame and panto animal etc there were two elderly ladies. Or rather scud and producer playing two elderly ladies. Ethel and Vera. As members of the audience. In a royal box. Passing comment on every scene during the set changes. And sometimes during the scenes. Especially on the last night. A bit like Waldorf and Stadler from the muppets.
It was an idea which worked very well and box office let us write our own script rather than give us dialogue. We had a chance to change and adapt things during the run. On the first Saturday England won the Rugby World Cup, so that became part of the act. We had stuff about everything from Saga holidays to Michael Jackson dangling a baby out of a hotel window. From Stanna stairlifts to George Bush. From Goldfish to beer. The NODA rep who reviewed the show loved it. Said it was the best thing about the show in fact. Oh NODA stands for National Operatic and Dramatic Association by the way.
On the last night there was a notorious incident involving sausages. But the most important item to come out of the whole exercise was the cult status of Werthers. We did the advert where the elderly man tells the story of how his grandpa gave him werthers when he was a little boy and he now gives them to his grandchildren. And then we threw them into the audience like normal panto sweets.
Loads of the kids there had never heard of them. It all changed in those two weeks. One young member of the audience, whose mum was playing the principal boy, became a total addict.
So the next year for Snow White & The Seven Dwarves, out they came again. Not from Ethel and Vera. They had retired. But from the Dame (played by rival). And then the following year in Treasure Island as well. And so last year secretary decided to do something about it. After all, Werthers are not cheap. Not when you throw them out by the handful. So she wrote to Germany to the company who make them. Bendicks, who also make the high class mints. She offered them the chance to become the official pantomime confectionary sponsors in return for sending us shed loads of Werthers. And they agreed. And they sent a huge box of them, by post, from Germany.
So just before the end of every performance of Dick Whittington, while the cast were getting changed into their walkdown wedding costumes, Father Christmas was dishing out piles of Werthers to the audience. And now it's official, it's never going to change. So to everyone in the group, Werthers only mean one thing. Of course I had to tell my reporter that. Poor bloke. All he did was come to offer me a sweet. I might have done my own legs in here. He probably won't bother in future, scared that I might have a story to tell about Wrigley's Extra. Or Revels. Or Jelly Babies. In fact, come to think of it, I do have a story about Revels....

Thought for the day:
'She's got a smile that it seems to me
Reminds me of childhood memories
Where everything
Was as fresh as the bright blue sky
Now and then when I see her face
She takes me away to that special place
And if I stared too long
I'd probably break down and cry
Sweet child o' mine'
Guns 'n' Roses

Religious violence

2007-01-30T23:13:00.000Z

I have had a very important response to my last blog. Guidance from director him. He has written, as the authority whom shall be obeyed, that: 'As an extremely lapsed catholic I can confirm that your little prayer is not blasphemous as it is traditional to pray to Saints. And if anyone should suggest that Billie is not a Saint I will hold them down and box office can punch them.' Pretty conclusive if you ask me.
Went to see The Last Laugh tonight with secretary and box office. High priest cancelled as he had to work. Shame because it was fantastic. Both hilarious and serious at the same time. First night of the run, prior to moving up to London. Roger Lloyd Pack was brilliant. Perfectly cast in the role. He and Martin Freeman are going to have a great time in the West End.

Thought for the day: 'Two goldfish swimming in a bowl. One says to the other: "Do you know how to drive this thing?" .....(pause)..... Er, shouldn't that be tank? Goldfish in a tank. I think if you try that it will work better next time.' The Last Laugh

Just for luck with a little prayer

2007-01-30T14:28:00.000Z

I thought I should put something up for everyone to pray to... Oh Billie, wilt thou be our Honorary President and pour your blessings upon us. Amen. Or something like that.

Actually, is that blasphemous? Maybe one of my dearly beloved lapsed catholic friends can let me know...

I really hope she says yes, for the Academy kids as much as anything. Well OK, for director him too. And box office.

Meanwhile, I have been humming Something Deep Inside to myself non-stop since Saturday night. Worrying.

Thought for the day:
'The first time that it crossed my mind, I kept on pushing it aside. It's such a strong emotion. Second time it's plain to see, This feeling rushing over me. Oh yeah..... And unknown to me, This chemistry is.... Something deep inside'
Something Deep Inside. Billie Piper. Walk Of Life

Transport of delight

2007-01-29T23:30:00.000Z

It's great when you are travelling somewhere and you make all your connections and get there on time, or if you're really lucky even get there ahead of schedule. It really is lovely. When it doesn't happen it's a bit of a bummer. Like tonight for instance. Bus, tube, train. Left work at five past nine. Took me nearly an hour to get to Ealing Broadway. It really is desperately irritating. Had to ring director him and say it was a no-no. Eventually got home about 15 minutes ago.
I think I have finally uncovered the problem with our railways though. There was a goods train derailment at Cricklewood a year ago and we got a copy of the findings of the inquiry into the incident today. Not that an exciting read to be honest, but there were some recommendations for future policy at the end.
The final one is the most important... 'Ensure that someone competent is in charge.' I kid you not. There in black & white. And following that it says: 'If that person is not there ensure that someone else has been briefed to the relevant level of competancy.'
So if you ever doubted it, it's now official. Our railways have, hitherto, been run by incompetent people. But then if you examined the timetable of the line in and out of London from Langley and saw the size of the trains and the conditions in which people have to travel, you would know that for sure already.

Thought for the day: 'If God had meant us to fly, he would never have given us the railways.' Link between the sketch 'By Air' and the song 'Slow Train'. Michael Flanders. At The Drop Of A Hat. Flanders & Swann

Sign of the times

2007-01-28T23:09:00.000Z

Secretary's part as Doorknocker is pretty funny. Having your face made up to look bronze and holding a ring in your mouth with your head stuck through a door is pretty funny in itself. She's made it even funnier with her choice of accent. Or rather choices of accents.
At the read-through and auditions she did it with a west country twang. The she picked me up from the station on Thursday and announced that she was going to do it with a Welsh lilt. It caught director her out for one! There were certainly plenty of laughs as a result. Yesterday she suggested that maybe it should be Irish instead. I'm not entirely sure she was serious...
That said, she played an Australian in three shows during our early years with Cast and by the time it came to the third one the NODA reviewer actually said that she really was Australian.
She only has speaking parts in three scenes according to the script. However she is now going to play a rather irritable sign holder for the Mended Drum pub and the employment agency. We are going to have someone come out, remove the knoocker ring from her mouth and hang a sign there instead. I'm not sure whether it was director him or director her's idea, but whichever of them it was, it is certainly very amusing.

Thought for the day: 'How could you tell the difference between a pub and a brothel in mediaeval times? The signs on the brothels hung flat against the walls while the pub signs hung out at 90 degrees to the wall.' There was no difference in any of the names. The Horn could be a knocking shop or a drinking establishment. Although I reckon it was probably hard to tell the difference with what went on. Then again, I would suggest it could be pretty tricky now.

Karma - and now we wait

2007-01-28T00:56:00.000Z

Sometimes things are meant to go wrong just so they can turn out all right in the end. This evening was a case in point.
A few months ago I booked up for a number of us to see a series of shows at the Theatre Royal in Windsor. I have already mentioned our trip to see The Unexpected Guest a couple of weeks ago. On Tuesday we are going to see Martin Freeman and Roger Lloyd Pack in The Last Laugh. The following Tuesday it is the turn of Christopher Timothy and Stephanie Beecham in Hay Fever.
Tonight was Treats. Starring Billie Piper. When I booked to see the show, it suddenly hit me like a lightning bolt from the blue. She should be our Honorary President!
Hayley Mills took on the role about 12 years ago, but as she now lives permanently in New York we never hear from her, and about two years ago the search began for a new person to take the role.
Well I say search. What I mean is that we spent an awful lot of time sitting around at committee meetings trying to come up with an idea of who we could ask without ever agreeing.
The chairman - previous director - fancied Natalie Imbruglia. He also quite liked the idea of having her as Honorary President when she was living in Windsor. We talked about Anna Friel as she was local. Rolf Harris even. Then someone hit on the idea of Euan McGregor. None of these people really fitted the bill.
With the launch of our junior section, CAST Academy, we needed someone who was known and liked by our members as young as eight to ones as old as me. It was obvious when you think about it. She can sing, dance and act. She has the Dr Who following, the pop star past and now the serious acting career to make her everyone's prime candidate.
I put it to the committee that I should try to get hold of her agent to send a letter. They said yes, and I got on with it. Could I find her agent? No chance. So it came down to basics. A letter to her at the theatre.
Our party for the show tonight consisted of secretary and producer, set man, box office, director him, high priest and summer producer. The plan was that I should drop off a copy of the letter to the theatre before we all had a pre-theatre meal at Pizza Express. Then, armed with a second insurance copy, we should go to the stage door and the bar to try to see her and check whether she had seen the first copy and maybe get a chat if we were lucky.
But secretary and I hit problems. Serious problems. Printer problems. Having given our old computer, scanner and printer to my parents at Christmas and bought our three-in-one new Hewlett Packard, we of course hadn't got round to setting it up. We also had problems with the letterhead and charity logos which she emailed to my mac and... it's all to complex for words. Then we couldn't get the computer installed on my laptop as it doesn't have a high enough operating system, blah, blah... so I had to email the text of my letter back to secretary and then she had to reformat it and then install the printer on her laptop.
This all took a ridiculous amount of time. We ended up having cheese on toast at home rather than getting to Pizza Express to eat with the others. Finally we printed out two copies and wrote on the front 'Ms Billie Piper, c/o Theatre Royal, Windsor from Colnbrook Amateur Stage Theatre'.
We drove to Windsor and went to park in the car park near the theatre. As we drove past I saw two people outside the alley which leads to the stage door. Someone to hand a letter to, I hoped. We parked. We had to get change for the ticket machine. We had to put the ticket in the car.
We spotted summer producer walking down from the front of the theatre and I left secretary with her to stride off towards the end of the stage door alley. There was someone with a camera. I walked to the end and Billie was standing there signing autographs. She had one last photograph taken and turned up the steps to go in.
I called out 'Billie, can I just give you this' and she turned and I handed the envelope over people's heads into her hand. She smiled and said thank you in an almost surprised tone, and turned to go in, looking at the envelope and seemed to do a double-take as she looked at the words on the front. She looked puzzled - maybe. Intrigued - certainly. Likely to open the envelope and read the letter - I reckon the chances were at least 50-50 if not better.
Mission accomplished. I walked back to secretary who was flabbergasted. Then we went round to the front, where everyone else was waiting outside. I told them and director him said it was definitely karma that we had had so much trouble during the afternoon. I was meant to be there at that precise moment.
I have done my bit now and put the letter in Billie's hand. The rest is down to her. Secretary wonders if she gets this sort of request all the time or whether no-one has ever asked. I think we are a relative rarity in having a famous Honorary President as it is. And I think most groups would pick someone far older and less cool. Let's face it, we are exceptional in so far as our membership is so young and that we want a figurehead to represent that.
Finally, one thing surprised me. She is actually very, very pretty. I have always thought of her as strikingly good looking, but not pretty in the obvious normal sense of the word. She looks quite different to the character of Rose and the pop star persona which we all saw so many times. Pretty and polite. I instinctively liked her and having met and interviewed quite a few names over the years as a journalist there are an awful lot of 'celebrities' who definitely do not fall into either or both of those categories. Yes, I really hope she agrees. She would be great.
The play was good too. Cleverly constructed with the relationships between each of the three of the characters examined clearly. You got a chance to study them on their own as individuals, interacting as pairs, and playing off one another as a threesome. The performances were all very good as well. Not a bad night all in all. Just say yes Billie... please!

Thought for the day:
'Are you gonna walk the walk of life with me?
Are you gonna see more than you dreamed you'd see?
Are you gonna walk hand in hand with me?
Can you be the one who sets my shadow free?
Are you gonna try and understand with me?
Are you gonna be the best that you can be?
Are you gonna walk the walk of life with me?'
Walk of Life. Billie Piper

Sofa, so good

2007-01-27T00:45:00.000Z

It's not really relevant to the show, but we did spend a lot of time talking about it...
Tonight, or rather last night as it is now, a few of us went out to celebrate goodie-goodie yum-yum's birthday. Just producer & secretary, director her & previous director and scud. We had food and drink and goodie-goodie yum-yum had presents and we had more food and drink and then we went back to her mansion and sat around on the floor. Well half of us did. Because she won't buy another sofa. Even though she could fit about ten in her lounge. She wants a chair. Three of us can't sit on one chair. Ah well, never mind. Don'tcha just love her.
Thursday night's rehearsal was great. We did the first four scenes of act two. Town crier kicks it all off and is hilarious. Secretary has now decided that she should be Welsh as the doorknocker. That's hilarious too. I got to do my drunken bit and get seduced by a woman in the street. I also got to do my scene with previous producer playing Mrs Keeble in the Job Centre. And The Ginger One, alias Mort, Albert and Ysabell got to do their fantastic scene where the story of Alberto Malich is revealed. I think director him and director her are enjoying it too. Lots of fun. We are having fun. Isn't it all fun. What fun.

Thought for the day:
'Sofa away from me,
Sofa I just can't see,
Sofa away from me,
You're sofa away from me'
Sofa Away. Mark Knopfler. Brothers In Arms. Dire Straits

Football

2007-01-25T18:03:00.000Z

Set building is very important. Let's face it, be it a pantomime or a Pratchett, Godspell or My Fair Lady, Stags & Hens or Outside Edge, the actors need somewhere to perform. From my point of view, there are very few excuses for not turning up to do what we call 'stagework' on the three Sundays before the show.
For some of us, with the complex nature of what we do, this now also includes the Friday night and Saturday of the last weekend as well. Two stag weekends have interrupted my participation in the past, but there is only one other thing as far as I am concerned which is allowed to get in the way. Football.
I am missing the second setbuild for this show, as I reminded a shocked director her when we went to pick up my mask. Producer, previous director, domefur, virtual dildo and another very special member of the group who is not involved in the show called scud will be in Berlin watching Hertha play Bayern Munich. I met the first four of these people through Cast and my friendship with the other has become reinforced since we have been there, so it is only right that we should all be allowed time off together for the great game. Of course.
Box office, dangerous, high priest, director him and producer geezer are among the many serious footie fans liable to disappear into the bar for slightly longer than it takes to get a drink when there is a big game on. Set man, not a fan, let's us get away with it because he knows we will put in the hours as required. Let's face it, we are the ones who will be doing the work at 1.30am once most of the rest are long gone.
But this isn't really anything new. It started back with Grease. With Albert and producer sneaking off like a pair of naughty schoolboys...
There we were, June 14 1992, banging some nails in to fix an 8x4 sheet of hardboard to a frame in order to build the side flats for the set:
'I can't believe we're here doing this and our second European Championships game kicks off in 10 minutes.'
'Do you think anyone would notice if we went off for a couple of hours?'
'Where would we watch it though?'
'I'm only down the road in Slough.'
'Right.'
Off we went - very quickly. We made it in time to sit down for the kick-off. England were as dull as possible. France were not a lot better. It ended 0-0. But the important thing is that we got to see it. After all, as the great Mr Shankly said: Football isn't a matter of life and death, it's more important than that...

Thought for the day: 'Chris WOODS, Stuart PEARCE, Martin KEOWN, Des WALKER, Carlton PALMER, Andy SINTON, David PLATT, David BATTY, Trevor STEVEN, Alan SHEARER, Gary LINEKER.' Hmmn there's a couple of worrying names in that list...

How it came to pass

2007-01-24T22:50:00.000Z

What on earth led me to join this strange organisation. One that can take over your life and have you pulling your hair out. One that can drain and frustrate you. One that han reduce you to a nervous wreck worrying about the financial implications of everything you are doing. But also one that can give you some of the highest of highs and stretch your talents to new levels. And one that can provide you with some of the closest friend you will ever make. And in the case of producer here, enable you to meet your wife.
Well now.....
I'm a journalist. In my early years at the Windsor Express I worked with a woman... let's call her founder in Spain... and she was involved in another group, Riverside Players, in Old Windsor. She used to get me to review their shows for the paper, which included a memorable production of Grease for which I stupidly praised the actor who played Danny Zuko to high heaven. It would come back to haunt me later.
I carried on with the reviews even after she had left the paper. Then founder in Spain vanished. Well she and her husband, founder bloke I'll call him, had upped sticks and gone to Malta. I heard nothing of them for a long while.
Then one day.....
I was by now a sub-editor on the paper and took a call from this blast from the past. 'Hello,' said founder in Spain. 'I thought you might still be there. Can you put something in about our next show.' Having ascertained eventually that no, this wasn't Riverside Players, and yes, this was a new group in Colnbrook, I got a brief history of Colnbrook Amateur Stage Theatre.
She and founder bloke had come back from Malta and got together with another person from their Riverside past, I'll call her founder here, to set up Cast in October 1990. They and a few friends and some colleagues from the Surrey Herald newspaper, where founder in Spain was by now working, had formed a committee, thrown some cash together, written a script, recruited some more actors and put on their first production, Yet Another French Connection, in summer 1991. Among this group of Surrey Herald renegades were the man previously mentioned on these pages as Albert, a gentleman who can only be called domefur and that Danny Zuko I praised, who I have to refer to here as virtual dildo but won't explain why. And your imagination will take you in completely the wrong direction there.
When founder in Spain called me it was January 1992. A planned production of The Boyfriend had been dropped. She wanted me to advertise auditions for their next show in the paper. It was Grease. She told me I should come down.
I probably wouldn't have gone to the audition if it hadn't been for one of the other sub-editors, a bloke, saying we should. Well not just the two of us. The third sub editor, a girl, as well. And one of the reporters, now known here as Town Crier.
I rang her back and said we would be coming. She said it was something about newspaper people. We were all, advertising staff like her and the Surrey Herald lot or journalists like the four of us, natural exhibitionists who loved to be the centre of attention and always wanted to be on stage. Whatever the psychology of it, I am very, very glad she called.

Thought for the day: 'Let's start at the very beginning, it's a very good place to start.' Do, Re, Mi. The Sound Of Music. Oh dearie me, that is both tame and obvious. Memo to self - come up with something a little more inspired tomorrow.

Missing all the fun and enjoying the party

2007-01-23T23:47:00.000Z

Last night was a 'no' on the rehearsal schedule for me. Given my staff situation at work this week it was never going to happen. Got home very cold at 12.40am in the end. Not good.
Anyway, I hate missing all the fun. The rehearsals have been such a laugh so far. Serious work with everyone enjoying themselves. I have been in a couple of shows recently which didn't really fall into the 'fun' category. Director him and I are very strict about having fun. If you don't then it's off to the comedy club with you!
Director him sent out an email today praising everyone for what they have done so far. My sentiments entirely. The Ginger One wrote back agreeing and asking where the after-show party was being held. We all know that means he wants to have it at his place really. A bit obvious that one.
After-show parties are a big thing. Secretary and I have had two at our place; after Honk! and Snow White & The Seven Dwarves. The Honk! one was amazing. We had 42 people in our garden at one point, along with a gazebo which filled most of it and a barbeque which took up the rest of the space. It's not a very big garden...
High Priest holds the record for the highest number of after-show parties now. Two of our wonderful founders held loads over the years, but now he has the record i'm sure. I'll have to ask him. He's very good at keeping records.
All sorts of things happen at after-show parties, some of which will not be mentioned here, but suffice to say a number of relationships have started (including one which has led to marriage) in earnest at these unholy bashes. One or two have seen dramatic splits as well.
Over the years I have seen people in all states of ill-health. I have witnessed a man spend an entire night making guacamole from scratch. I have seen a man fall asleep hugging a large china hedgehog. I have enjoyed a man playing drums on a set of saucepans. And, notoriously, I have discovered that a large number of teenage members have drunk their way through an entire garage full of Smirnoff Ice before the person who they belonged to even got her hands on one.
These are the things which Cast is all about. There is a lot of history. Well sixteen and a half years of it to be precise, and next month I (along with secretary and Town Crier) will have been here for 15 of them. No where is that long service award I was promised five years ago?

Thought for the day: 'Celebration time, come on.' Used in Aladdin, I believe.

A fitting mask

2007-01-21T21:33:00.000Z

I found out something very important on Saturday, but I'll save that until later. What I also found out was that the mask director her had seen for me was absolutely spot on. I got the train to Chertsey and had breakfast with director her and previous director (yep) in a regular haunt and then went to the magnificent mask shop.
Suffice to say that we were inspired to all say that CAST should hold another masked ball (our last one was something like six or seven years ago) and that we would then have an excuse to buy something quite ridiculous. As well as the obvious kind, they have everything from a crocodile to a demon, from the comedy and tragedy theatre masks to an enormous horse.
The real reason for the visit was to check the size of the DEATH skeleton mask they had, to make sure that I could use it. It was excellent, perfect width, but will need a little adjustment for length. The microphone will have to be fitted inside and we will have to pad it out at certain points, but it should look great. The eye sockets are huge, so set man will, we hope, be able to put blue lights in them. To help my breathing, we will drill some small holes through between some of the teeth and in the nostrils. It would be preferable if I didn't pass out while on stage... the costume under the stage lights will be a trifle warm so being able to breath might be a useful option.
When we did Wyrd Sisters, I only had to appear as DEATH in one scene. Director her made me a cool hooded cloak and I had an overhead mask. It was great for the one scene, but I couldn't see a thing. Being seriously short-sighted, any additonal complications to my vision once I have taken off my glasses are a bit of a hazard. I can't do contact lenses so it all gets to be rather amusing at times. The hardest part of this role is going to be moving around with all the clobber and still maintaining the correct air. I'm looking forward to developing the right head movements to indicate different emotions and thought processes. Plenty of time looking in the mirror lies ahead.
After we had bought the mask we went back to director her and previous director's house and I found out that important fact which I referred to at the start. Director her is, I can confirm, currently looking after a dog which sounds like a wookie. So much so, I think it is actually a wookie which has been to the mask shop and bought a doggie mask as part of a fabulous costume. I just hope mine is as convincing.

Thought for the day:
'Don't you come too close to me,
You're dangerous, can't you see,
You make the darkness mean more,
Than it did, ever did before.
It's a devil's disguise,
Angel in black,
And I recognise,
The face behind the mask.'
Behind The Mask by Christine Mc Vie from the album Behind The Mask by Fleetwood Mac

The extra show

2007-01-19T00:28:00.000Z

Told everyone before we started tonight about our plan for an extra show and they seemed up for it. Only one person has said they can't make it so far - but he's playing Walter the half-wit, Young King Olevre and the Landlord so those parts need to be sorted. All the main eight characters are available, as are box office, high priest and town crier who are the others with the most parts.
Keli clapped her hands, looked very excited and said she thought it would be great. Footnote was similarly full of joy. The ginger one, who, let's face it, does have a fairly important part to play in the title role, of course said he couldn't make it. And of course we believed him. Or maybe not.
He and I were a nightmare tonight. We succeeded in putting one another off our lines to an alarming degree, but when I have the mask on it should help as far as he is concerned.
Talking of the mask, I am going over to Chertsey on Saturday morning (for the ungodly hour of 9.30am) to meet director her and go to the shop where she has seen the perfect item. I can't wait to get it on and start practicing the head movements in the mirror.
Previous producer was sorting out costumes for people, getting them to try items on. Mainly the girlies. In pretty dresses. And they all looked luvlee. She found Rincewind's cloak of many stars and sequins and glistening bits. And then she and director her told Cutwell that he was going to wear it. That's not a nice thing to do. But standing there watching his face as he turned to go to try it on was rather amusing.
So all in all, plenty of laughs, a complete run through act one and a lot of useful tweaking from director him and director her. It all makes for an enjoyable evening.
Apart from the fact that we came home to find five fence panels blown down in the ridiculous wind today. And box office had a tree blow down in his front garden.

Thought for the day: 'The answer my friend is blowin' in the wind, the answer is blowin' in the wind.' Robert Zimmerframe. Actually I love Dylan (not the Magic Roundabout one) but it's just too easy a line to miss. After all he's getting on a bit. But his last album was v.g.

Some complete ****

2007-01-18T15:39:00.000Z

Sometimes things bring you down to earth. Two of our cast had their house broken into last night. I won't say who it was as they might not want me to publish the fact. What a ******* *******. She arrived home to find the patio doors smashed in. Nothing was taken, but it's a horrible feeling coming into your house knowing someone has been inside.
I've only been burgled once (2 speakers & a telly taken) and they came in through my back windows as well. I walked into the room and felt a combination of fear and anger in equal measure.
He's staying at home tonight to look after the house. She's coming down to rehearsal. It's a good thing as it might help take her mind off it for a little while. Poor them. It really is horrible.

Thought for the day: 'Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes.' It's probably not exactly appropriate here, but she sent it to me the other day and I like it.

Strange but true

2007-01-18T00:27:00.000Z

Director her is looking after a dog which sounds like a wookie. Cutwell will be the gayest wizard in the village with gold rubber hot pants and leather straps under his wizard's cloak. Ysabell will be pursued around the stage by a giant pink bunny. And box office will play the abbot wearing only a pair of white underpants underneath his hooded cassock. These and many more items were discussed at our production meeting tonight. Or yesterday if you want to be pedantic. It's now 12.30.
In actual fact only the first of those items is true. Sorry. We did actually do a lot of useful stuff tonight. Publicity. Costumes. Box office. The set construction. Props. Sound & light. All of it was touched on to a greater or lesser degree.
Best bits are: Set man has worked out how to do the scythe and sword for DEATH so that they have a blue light along the edge; producer geezer has been in touch with Warwick Castle to see whether they would let us do a photo shoot there; directorhim has been able to come up with a feasible budget which allows £500 for costumes, £100 for props and £250 for the set; best of all director him's mum is going to make DEATH's costume, and she's fab!
Most importantly though, after discussions at the committee meeting last week about revenue and likely ticket sales, we agreed to still do the show as a supper night, but to add in a Saturday matinee - provided all the main characters can make it. Should any of those playing the other smaller parts be unable to be there then producer geezer, director him and director her will take over.
At this moment in time we have all the bases covered and everyone knows what needs to be done. Producer will be sending out notes tomorrow. We are where we should be with the show with nine weeks to go until opening night.
You know, it's a shame about the giant pink bunny. I quite like that idea. She is going to have a bunny though. It will be pink. It will be fluffy. It's just that it will only be bunny size. Never mind eh!

Thought for the day: 'Midnight - that would just be fine. Rain or shine - it wouldn't change my mind. I-I-I-always find the time.' Always Find The Time. Rhythm Of Love. Kylie

Important correction

2007-01-16T00:06:00.001Z

Director her did not drink an entire bottle of port the night before our AGM last summer. Nor is she an alcoholic. It was only half a bottle of port... ish. I was told off by email on Friday and hadn't spotted it until I got back from rehearsal tonight.
I made it to the hall before 10pm, which gave me the chance to go through my scene for tonight three or four times in the last hour. It was a relatively straightforward one - only three pages of script. We have now completed the first act and will run through the whole thing on Thursday from the beginning. I honestly can't remember the last time we managed to keep on target with a rehearsal schedule.
Tomorrow night I have a meeting in Addlestone for a completely different show - yes, I am bonkers. Producer geezer is organising it and The Ginger One and Albert are also involved. Then we have a Mort production meeting at our pad on Wednesday and rehearsal on Thursday. Oh yes, not much happening really. Secretary asked me how I think up the stuff to write so much here. Hmmmn. I think the thought for the day can be a famous one this time...

Thought for the day: 'I don't really feel my poems are mine at all. I didn't create them out of nothing; I owe them all to other people.' Robert Graves.

Just another manic monday

2007-01-15T16:22:00.000Z

Mondays are a nightmare. Busiest day at work. Papers come out on Wednesday. Deadline is lunchtime Tuesday. Most of the work happens on a Monday. I had hoped that by now a planned change to move our publication day to a Thursday would have gone through. We first discussed it in August. Hey-ho. It would make my busiest day a Tuesday. What would that mean? Well, for one thing, it would mean that I could get to all our rehearsals without a mad panic and stress. stress, stress.
I've gone through the rehearsal schedule with director her and director him and pointed out the problem weeks to them. I have already booked a long weekend for February 16-19. This will enable a) secretary and me to get a couple of nights away as a late valentine's trip, b) the two of us to go on to my parents to give my father another computing lesson (he really needs them) and c) me to be at the rehearsal that Monday on time.
Shows involve a lot of time off anyway. Especially when you are either heavily involved in the production/direction side or have a large part. Hmmmn. That'll be ticks in both boxes then. I'm off the whole week of the show, the Friday before and the Monday afterwards. Why? I'll tell you another time. The pics I was waiting for have turned up.

Thought for the day: 'When you're racing with the clock...' The Pajama Game

Any port in a storm

2007-01-12T19:22:00.000Z

She had been drinking. She came to the phone.
'We should put forward another Pratchett', she said. 'Men At Arms? No, too many boys parts. Guards Guards? Same.'
'How about The Truth?' I said.
'No, I don't really like that one', she said
There was a pause
'Mort,' she said. 'We'll do Mort. I'll direct it and you'll help me.'
Thus, at 1am the night before our AGM, decisions are made.
If you have visited www.cast-online.org.uk then you will know that we do a summer musical, a Christmas pantomime and a spring play each year. At our AGM each summer the decisions are made as to which show we are going to do for each of the three slots. Last summer, the night before the AGM, I spent the best part of three hours on the phone to previous director, who as you may remember is also chairman. No-one else was going to put forward a musical, so we decided we should put forward six ourselves, to give people something to choose from.
Now you can't just do any old show. First of all it has to be available - not in the West End or on a national tour. You have to be able to stage it. It has to have a decent balance of parts. So there we were, on the opposite ends of a phone line trying to come up with a list. We picked 12 and whittled it down by a process of eliminating one out of every similar pair. We chose Jack The Ripper - The Musical (yes, really) over Jekyll & Hyde. We picked The Boyfriend rather than The Pyjama Game. We selected Return To The Forbidden Planet not Saucy Jack & The Space Vixens. We decided on Oklahoma instead of Carousel.
Anyway, in amongst all our chat and decision making, director her was passing raucous comments in the background while drinking her way through a large quantity of port. And then chairman put the phone down to go to look for something and she picked it up... and the rest is history.
In actual fact, director him and I had been talking about him doing a Pratchett, but not until the following year - he wanted to pick up more experience on the way. Over the eight years since we did Wyrd Sisters under director her's guidance, I have been trying to get her to do another one. Those magic words: 'We'll do Mort. I'll direct it and you'll help me,' were followed on my part, very quickly, by an indication that director him should work with director her, while I became producer.
All this depended on the members voting it in. Our opposition was an Agatha Christie being put forward by box office. Until that night I had been right up for the idea. Then came director her's bottle of port. Mort was voted in and director her suddenly realised what she had done. Fantastic.
For the record, Return To The Forbidden Planet narrowly beat Jack The Ripper - The Musical as choice for the summer musical, which chairman and I will do together. Sleeping Beauty will be this year's panto, directed by box office and produced by secretary.

Thought for the day: ' The rougher the passage, the more welcome the port.' Proverb. By some person who writes proverbs. Probably

Tommy tank extra sausage

2007-01-12T00:21:00.000Z

Well really. What else is Ankh-Morpork all about? TP was guffawing into his Coco Pops at breakfast on the morning he came up with that one. And scene 10. All that stuff about 'prying and poking' and Mort going blind reading the books about 'young wimmen'. What's going on, for heaven's sake.
Tonight's rehearsal was quite amusing. We had town crier being very town crier, ringing his bell and waving his hands around in the way only he can. We had goodie-goodie yum-yum doing her thing for the first time. We had box office being ridiculously monastic as Abbot Lobsang. Doorknocker had her first line. And Albert discovered that bacalavas get more laughs than balaclavas.
Sat down with producer geezer in the bar for half an hour while DEATH wasn't on stage and sorted out some of the stuff for publicity. Loads of ideas between us. He's going to tackle lots more papers. Also examined supper night options, an issue which was discussed in great detail at last night's committee meeting. There are 'do we, don't we' questions. There are pricing questions. There are also questions now about the number of performances. That's more, not less. Producer geezer has also taken on the challenge of finding us a castle. But more of that at a later date.
All this and more will be decided at next week's production meeting, taking place at our residence on Wednesday.

Thought for the day: 'Anybody like a nice hot sausage' Dibbler, alias director him. Scene one. Mort

Charting the territory

2007-01-10T17:41:00.001Z

Turned on my work email today to find a pile of messages from director her and director him. They were the final revised versions of the rehearsal schedule and cast flow chart (very pretty - I was quite pleased with that one) plus the contacts list. A couple of amendments and they were ready to go. Oh and one email address which didn't make sense. From town crier. Not a surprise I'm afraid.
Also got an email from the male half of the 'friends' couple at whose house we spent New Year's Eve. He objected to the fact that they were just referred to as 'friends'. As a result of that email they will now be referred to as sword man and pregnant wizard. That last name may be of news to some people. Needless to say we're all delighted about it. When pregnant wizard was last expecting she spent the prior show parading around as a giraffe. A fact that doesn't seem to have scarred their lovely daughter for life, as you might have expected.
Need to sort out a production meeting. In fact if producer geezer, director him and director her had been at the theatre last night we could have had one in the bar. All of the rest of us were there. Oh and previous director. Who is technical director. And chairman. And married to...
Need to get the radio ad sorted. Must talk to producer geezer to find out what the score is. He wants to get director her, director him and producer together to script and record it.
Off to committee meeting now.

Thought for the day: 'See my baby jive.' Wizzard. (Nice one eh!) Oh and you do spell it ('spell' it - geddit eh? I'm on form here) with two z's. Check if you don't believe me.

We're underway

2007-01-09T23:40:00.000Z

First rehearsal last night. Good fun. Plenty for everyone to do in scenes four and one, so it made for a good atmosphere with everyone feeling involved. Well everyone apart from secretary that is. Doorknocker is only in three scenes and as the part involves having your face covered in bronze make up, then taking on any other role is impractical. So she spent the evening having a good old chat to set man. About fashion and lifts among other items I believe.
Mort and DEATH are kept quite busy in all the scenes we did last night (one to five) so I and the ginger one had a good laugh. We will need to arrange a few rehearsals between the two of us, and maybe one or two with Albert & maybe Ysabell. The plan for last night was to do scenes one to four, so bashing through scene five as well was a bonus.
On Sunday, while producer was visiting parents, director her and director him had a meeting to do basic blocking of scenes one to eight and sort out rehearsal schedule. The schedule isn't perfect for me but there are ways of getting around a number of potential problems.
We have had two people pull out; gothic bloke and blonde girl, both could have been very good, but didn't want the smaller roles they were given. Much as I hate to see anyone go though, it actually helps us out, as it reduces the number of people in the show to 21, which is what we really wanted. It means that everyone has a reasonable amout of stuff to do. We have juggled things around and it all seems to fit well so far.
Tonight I went to see The Unexpected Guest at the Theatre Royal in Windsor with secretary, previous producer, set man, box office and high priest. Box office was very pleased with himself as he managed to correctly predict the outcome when we were in the bar at the interval. Previous producer had never been there before. I think she might like to go again. But not in the same seats. We were in the rear circle. One row from the very top of the entire theatre. Jolly steep.
Sadly, all six of us are on the Cast committee. This means we will see one another again tomorrow - as it's our six-weekly meeting. Then we shall see one another again on Thursday at rehearsal. Thank God tonight wasn't a Cast social, just the few of us enjoying a good night out. Otherwise people would think we were extremely sad. Hmmmmn.

Thought for the day: 'I hope you're sitting comfortably, I saved you the best seat in the house.' Messiah Ward. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

Sleeping on it

2007-01-05T18:50:00.000Z

A phone call from director her and an email from director him revealed one thing this morning; we were all very tired and had trouble getting to sleep last night, running through all the decisions over and over again in our heads until we eventually nodded off.Then this morning we woke up and were all happy about the decisions we had made.
The juggling of non-speaking roles remains to be perfected. We have to firmly establish whether we have the right number of guards, servants, guests and villagers in the crowd scenes. We made one minor boo-boo last night when we were shuffling things around, but director him worked out how to resolve it this morning with a stroke of genius.
I drew up a spreadsheet (previous producer - otherwise known as Keeble - would be proud of me) to map the flow of the parts, speaking and non-speaking, each person has under the allocation we have currently. Director her and director him will have a meeting on Sunday to sort out any adjustments. I shall be at my parents for the weekend so will have to be included by conference call.
I'm pleased by the way the three of us have been working together as a unit. We seem to be of like mind as to how we want the whole show to progress. Decisions never get made by a process of osmosis, but at the moment you could believe they are.
To wit, the way last night that we all managed instantaneously to reach the same decision was great; be it a definate instant verdict on who should get a part, or a desire to give people a second fuller opportunity to show what they could do, or a decision to see people again in twos or threes to see how they worked together.
So that's the first fence jumped, but there are many more ahead. Beechers' Brook and The Chair lie in waiting.

Thought for the day: 'Never underestimate The Power of Three' Charmed (obviously - well it had to come out sooner or later...)

The nightmare is over

2007-01-05T01:01:00.001Z

It's all cast. Some people are very, very happy, some are disappointed. Some are surprised, others got what they might have expected. As for me, well I got THE PART, but by default in many ways. Rival emailed director him today saying that he wouldn't be auditioning due to work commitments and the other people who read for it were better at other parts. Anyway, I am one of the very, very happy ones.
Director him got a first taste of what casting is like. It is his first show as a producer or director and I think he was quite surprised at what he found himself saying and doing. It's not a case of picking the 10 people you would most like to invite to a dinner party, you have to be detached and make your judgement on the basis of what will work on stage. He grasped that concept just as well as director her or producer. We have ended up with the best cast possible and, after seeing some people two or three times for certain roles, were all in agreement over who should do what.
We've got someone doing their first show as Cutwell, two people who haven't done a show for four years as Ysabell and Albert and someone doing her first play as Keli. Then in the other main roles we have a regular as Footnote, secretary as Doorknocker, producer as DEATH, and some ginger bloke of ill repute as Mort.
Telling everyone is a nightmare, but we didn't cop out and announce the parts all at once or by email, we told each person individually before letting the group know. Director her did it the same way for Wyrd Sisters.
So we march onwards and upwards. Rehearsals begin on Monday. We have 20 between now and show week. That's just 60 hours to get everything perfect. It's not long...

Thought for the day: 'Onwards and upwards. The inside is bigger than the outside.' The Last Battle. CS Lewis.

Geezer gets us going

2007-01-04T00:08:00.000Z

A five minute phone call to producer geezer revealed that he has sorted out an agreement with Time 106.6 FM to record an ad for Mort which will be broadcast twice a day for the next three months. He's also got a regular slot lined up in the Slough Express and is contacting the Slough Observer tomorrow. Publicising Mort is going to be tricky. If you are a Pratchett fan, the single word will instantly provoke interest. If you are not... well that's where producer geezer will need to use all his talents.
After all, when it comes down to it, Discworld stories can be a little complicated to the uninitiated. For example, trying to explain the fact that the librarian at the Unseen University is an orang-utan is quite tricky. Any attempt to tell people about a Pratchett story unually involves an awful lot of subordinate clauses and contorted sentences.
I have absolutely no doubt that we will be able to sell out the show - it's 320 tickets when we have a supper night, which means £2,240 in takings if we shift them all. The tickets are £10 but £3 of that pays for the fish & chips, so it's £7 revenue per person. Judging by the number of people we are expecting to audition and cast (between 20 and 25?) we are only going to be looking at cast and crew selling one table each.
Next up will be the budget. Director him happens to be treasurer too, so we should have no problem there. We have got a number of other potential sources of income to include as well. The biggest expense is probably going to be on the set, but the recent acquisitions set man has made have been real money savers.
Anyway, by this time tomorrow.....

Thought for the day: 'Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow...' Mr Bardy again.

Polishing piles of poo

2007-01-03T16:44:00.000Z

Apparently in my job (I'm a newspaper editor) I am used to 'sifting through piles of sh1t until everything looks polished'. Well according to director him that is. Why are we on this topic? Well someone has to play Cyrus the cess-pit cleaner, don't they!
This discussion began with a conversation about the advice about characterisation we were giving to those who sought it prior to the auditions. One person has asked both director her and director him for guideance - and maybe had different answers! Last night I suggested to director her that if I didn't get THE PART then I would only be able to do something where I wasn't on at the same time because HE needs to be the tallest person on the stage. Which is where Cyrus came in.
Foolishly I asked director him and director her what advice they would give to me if I was to play that part... Which takes us back to where we started. Carte blanche for an open season on all things toilet related. Oh and I should add before we go any further that we usually have to unblock the drains at Colnbrook Village Hall (where we perform) a couple of times a year. There's no caretaker, so the lot falls upon us. If you get my meaning.
So here is the advice:
"Make sure you have had a good swim around in a cess pit - to get the flavour of the charater."
"Wear a snorkel and nose plugs. That is how I would do the job anyway."
"Whoever gets the part now has to go and sort out any drainage blockages that might occur at CVH in order to make sure they really understand their part. :))"
Plus the stuff about being an editor.
Thank the Lord that I didn't ask set man or dangerous (set man's Portsmouth-based sidekick). All sorts of gags about bumper books of crosswords would have come back at me. I'll explain why another time. Maybe when we get around to set build.

Thought for the day: Gutter jounalism. Fireplace toilets. Dr Livingstone I presume. Steptoe & son. Gordon Bennett Oh yes, there is a link between all five of those things. Here goes....
James Gordon Bennett was a real person, or rather two real people. The elder James Gordon Bennett was born in Scotland in 1795 and emigrated to the USA, eventually becoming a journalist and founding the New York Herald in 1835. The paper flourished to become the number one in the city. But Bennett's was criticized for his 'gutter press' methods. In 1836, in a pre-cursor to tabloid cheque book journalism, he published a notice offering to reward any woman who 'will set a trap for a Presbyterian parson, and catch one of them flagrante delicito'.
James Gordon Bennett Jr. inherited his father's talents for journalism and controversy, not to mention his multi-million dollar estate - and he's the one the phrase refers to. He took over control of the New York Herald in 1866.
He has the unenviable record, as bestowed by the Guinness Book of Records, of the 'Greatest Engagement Faux Pas', for the manner in which his engagement to the socialite Caroline May was broken off in 1877. At the 1877 New Year's party held by his fiancee's father, he became so drunk that he mistook the fireplace for a toilet and urinated in it in front of his hosts and their guests. Needless to say, the marriage didn't go ahead.
This didn't stop him being an successful and innovative journalist though. He invested heavily in developing on his father's news empire. In 1868, with the simple brief of 'find Livingstone' he sent the travelling correspondent of the New York Herald - Henry Morton Stanley, to track down and interview David Livingstone in Africa. After a long search Stanley was ready to give up but was encouraged by Bennett which, when he eventually located his prey on the shores of Lake Tanganyika, resulted in what has become one of the most famous of all journalistic lines - "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"
From 1877 Bennett lived in Europe and died in 1918. The expletive 'Gordon Bennett' is a version of 'Gor blimey', which is itself a euphemistic version of 'God blind me'. That, combined with Bennett's outrageous lifestyle and newsworthy stunts, is sufficient to explain why his name was picked out.
But the earliest known use of the phrase in print is in the script for a 1962 episode of the BBC comedy 'Steptoe and Son' - The Bird:
Harold: Well that's that then. I said "That's that then".
Albert: What's that then?
Harold: That is! I've finished for the day!
Albert: Have you fed the horse?
Harold: Of course I've fed the horse - I wouldn't have said "That's that then" if I hadn't.
Albert: You wrapped him up?
Harold: Yes I have wrapped him up. Look when I say "That's that then" it means I've done it all, it means I've finished. Gordon Bennett, if you don't know that after all these years.
Phew!!! I think that explains it all... I told you that if you read this every day you would learn something.

Adding a footnote

2007-01-02T15:20:00.000Z

"Hello. Welcome to the Discworld, not a spherical world like yours, but flat… like a pizza. The Discworld moves through space on the backs of four giant elephants. They in turn stand on the back of a colossal turtle – the Great A’Tuin. Just goes to show the gods do have a sense of humour!"
Our version of Mort will open with Footnote, the narrator character used by Stephen Briggs in other Discworld adaptations, describing the locations and characters of the play for the audience. Pratchett's tales are easy to understand when you read them, once you have bought into the overall concept. On stage, life isn't so easy for the uninitiated. So to assist our audience Footnote will be their guide.
In the original play, as mentioned in an earlier blog, all the 'narration' pieces are done by characters in the story. Having decided to change this right at our initial meeting, replacing them with Footnote, the adjusted dialogue and new introduction needed putting together. Director her has done it all and sent it to director him, secretary and producer last night.
Apart from the usual caveat about spelling & grammar, which director her now always makes as a result of director him taking the p***, it is absolutely spot on. Whoever does the footnote role has got a pretty interesting job on their hands learning an introduction of 500 words. Strangely, it's the sort of thing I would normally fancy doing myself, but it's going to be a female part for us.

Thought for the day: 'Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste...' Sympathy For The Devil. Mick & Keef.

Dream scenario, nightmare decisions

2007-01-01T20:25:00.000Z

Happy New Year! It's 2007! Four days to go to auditions. Looks like we are going to have even more people turn up than we thought. All sorts of calls about auditioning have come in from new people to director her and director him.
A show in Windsor has apparently been cancelled according to one person who phoned director him. That person is definitely coming down and may bring others along too. This will be the largest turnout for auditions for a spring play since Stags & Hens, maybe the largest ever.
This dream situation makes life very difficult for those who have to cast the show. Secretary and I spent a very pleasant New Year's Eve at friends along with box office, director her and previous director. We stayed the night at director her & previous director's place and had a discussion over a drink (with box office as well) that there may be a lot of disappointed people (producer and box office included) after auditions.
We need good new blood and doing a Terry Pratchett is a useful way to draw a different group of people into CAST. You are going to have a rather different sort of person thinking about trying out for Mort than for say My Fair Lady, Cinderella or Outside Edge. The people who appear in this show are also quite likely to stay to do our next one, Return To The Forbidden Planet, as it has a similar sort of appeal.
The point here is that director her is already having nightmares over the casting. As each extra person comes into view, it gets to be more of a nightmare as well. But once DEATH, Mort, Ysabell and Albert have been cast I shall join director her and director him to assist with casting the other parts and to help take the blame from anyone who is disappointed! It will be good for me to have something to do to take my mind off being disappointed at not getting the part I wanted!!!

Thought for the day: '"Ah. Well. There's certainly plenty of raw material" sighed Lezek.' Mort (The book, that is) TP

No sooner said than done

2006-12-28T15:55:00.000Z

Just had director her's translation of director him's notes from yesterday come over as a spreadsheet. You see it's not just past producer who knows how to do these things... I have had a bit of fun splashing pretty colours all over it, with the aim of making things clearer when matching up the smaller parts for casting. It's all more complicated now compared to when director him and I did our first versions. We were working on minimum numbers. Now it's all more fluid.
Forgot to mention that I watched Hogfather last night. Great job they made of it too. DEATH and Albert were excellent. Susan wasn't exactly as I had imagined, but she was very good nonetheless. Teatime's eyes were fabulous. I enjoyed the wizards although Stibbons looked a bit too much like Harry Potter for me - not a good thing. I hope Terry Pratchett was pleased with the end result and that the money for other projects becomes available. Hogfather was perfect for the first one, but there are plenty more where that came from which would translate to the screen very well.

Thought for the day: 'HO! HO! HO!' DEATH in Hogfather

Not just lunch

2006-12-28T10:29:00.000Z

Met director her and director him in the pub yesterday afternoon for a late lunch and planning session. Previous director was there too to ensure the ratio between the number of silly comments and sensible ones was kept as high as possible. Things like suggesting we should do Mort - The Musical. Well actually to drink beer, eat a burger and read the paper. Oh and to offer technical advice too.
It was very productive. After going through the play blow by blow we have now done the basic blocking and director her has an idea of some of the finer points of movement she will be looking for. The exact set details are still coming together and set man's advice will be needed on some of the finer details.
I said I wanted THE LIBRARY to run all the way down one side of our hall to the door. This would give us room for enough books going from the current ones right back to the ones which just say 'Ug'. We are having smaller tables this year to allow for the stage being extended into the audience. This should give us extra width to play with. Previous director said he wants walkways down both sides of the hall for the summer show... At least if we build one now for this show we can use it again next time.
We got through all the parts and calculated a minimum of ten people are required in addition to those playing the main eight roles. For future reference those main roles (people who will stay in these characters throughout) are Mort, DEATH, Albert, Ysabell, Cutwell, Keli, Doorknocker and Footnote. There are 20 other speaking roles, but some of those are only tiny parts in one scene so they will be doubled up to give people a fair crack of the whip. Just being cast as Cyrus the cess-pit cleaner, with a couple of lines in scene one (his only scene), and then playing a wedding guest or member of the conga line for the rest of the show would be a bit harsh.
There are some very good smaller parts which have one or two scenes for people to enjoy. Being cast as the Duke of Sto-Helit, Goodie Hamstring, the Abbott, Keeble, the High Priest, the Prince, the Vizier, the Town Crier or Rincewind would give a great chance for good characterisation. That's nine secondary roles for people to enjoy. Then doubling or trebling up other parts, maybe Lezek and the Landlord or Hrita, the Woman and the Acolyte for example would provide plenty of fun.
As director her said yesterday, we want people to have enough to do so that they don't get bored. I reckon the ideal number of people for the show would be 20-22 people. A few interesting names, some old, some new, are coming forward as people who might audition. Who knows. But I think that figure of 20-22 may well be around the number we actually get.
Director her and director him had already started discussing the format for the auditions. They don't want to restrict themselves to the sections that we have already selected, beyond an initial reading. There are individual characterisations which they will want to see for some of the parts, which is pretty logical. Casting someone as the High Priest or the Town Crier based on how they read the Mort or DEATH wouldn't be terribly precise.
Sadly though, I shall not be helping to cast the show as I am auditioning myself, but as a rule it is a fun process to go through, watching everyone try their hand at a variety of roles. Casting itself is tricky but entertaining, especially when you have to match people to two or three roles and have a choice between playing some parts as female or male. The only bad bit is having to tell everyone what part they have got - or haven't got. Honk! was OK, so was Snow White. Godspell was bad and Stags & Hens was a nightmare.
Director him and director her are hoping to get through it all in one hit a week from today so that we can swing into rehearsals from Monday Jan 8. Oh it's going to be fun.

Thought for the day: 'If you have a skeleton in the closet which you can't get rid of, you had best teach it to dance.' George Bernard Shaw.

Christmas Interlude

2006-12-23T01:21:00.001Z

Well this is it, the final pre-Christmas entry. Not a huge amount to add. Previous producer, who has knackered arm (see allaboutdick.blogspot.com), director her, previous director (well done again, you really have got the hang of this now) and set man are going to the hall tomorrow. Or rather that should be later today.
The blokes will be removing the banner for panto from across the front of the pub while the ladies put some costumes into the loft. Previous producer's dining room is filled with boxes and bags of costumes at the moment. There are a lot of costumes in a panto. Hmmmn.
Director her will be casting her eye over appropriate costumes for our show as she helps to get them in order in the loft. With director her and previous producer doing the costumes for Mort, the job is in safe hands. I'm glad it's not me. I wouldn't know where to begin. I'm quite good at knowing what I don't want. Summer producer, who has been costumier for my shows in the past would probably tell you that.
Anyway, director him has sent off the license application to Stephen Briggs, along with a nice fat cheque. It is all coming together as well as you could possibly hope two weeks before auditions.
I'll write more when secretary and I return from our Christmas jaunt. We're heading off westwards tomorrow (OK, OK, today) and I'm looking forward to it.

Thought for the day:
Driving home for Christmas
Chris Rea

Cats and curry

2006-12-22T14:23:00.000Z

DEATH likes cats and curry, and so do I. Funnily enough so does previous producer. I wonder whether it's a requirement of the job. We had a curry together last night. It was previous producer's husband's birthday.
Director her and previous director (yes they are, well done!), set man and box office were also there. As was a wide range of other lovely people. I could describe them in a variety of complex interconnected ways, but I think things are hard enough to understand without any further additions.
We went back to previous producer's house for coffee afterwards. She has a cat. It behaves like it's DEATH's cat. No, that's not fair. If DEATH had a cat it would be much nicer than that. In fact this cat would probably scare DEATH. Secretary gets so frightened of it that every time we go round to the house she will not go to the loo in case the cat is sitting at the top of the stairs waiting for her.
Secretary and I don't have a cat. I try to have extra curry to make up for it though. Secretary wants a dog. She grew up with one. I grew up with a cat. Well 25 cats to be precise. Not all at the same time mind you. A mother and a succession of six litters, one of three kittens, four of four and one of five.
Last night was good. Director her and I tried to have a private production conversation as everyone was leaving the curry house, but didn't get very far. She has decided that auditions for DEATH should take place with a mask on though. Very sensible really. That's how the person doing the part will have to perform on the night. If you are claustrophobic do not apply!
Last time I played DEATH, very briefly in Wyrd Sisters, the combination of clothing and face masks that I wore meant that for that one scene I couldn't see anything. At least it was only for one scene. We have better plans this time.
I got a Christmas card from director her and previous director last night. There was a DVD inside. Hogfather. I missed it. Now I can watch it. I love director her, she's my bestest friend. Actually director him offered me a copy too and then emailed me to say it is on again over Christmas, but secretary and I will be at producer's parents (nooooo! stoppit!) sorry producer's parents (thank you!) over the hols. They do not have Sky so that one's out.
Director him has also been emailing out audition pieces for everyone in CAST so that we are all set for Jan 4. Producer, director her and director him are having another pub lunch, I mean production meeting, next Wednesday to make sure everything is in hand for the auditions, so more of that then. I may add more here tonight, but otherwise this will be the last piece until then. Not only do producer's parents not have Sky, they do not have a computer. Well, actually....... Merry Christmas.

Thought for the day:
"So here it is Merry Christmas,
Everybody's having fun,
Look to the future now,
It's only just begun."
Those seasonal fun-loving party boys Slade

Frightening really

2006-12-19T17:43:00.000Z

I finished the last entry, posted it and then signed out. I then spent the next few minutes searching Terry Pratchett related sites for possible book signings for us to visit and visiting the NODA (National Operatic & Dramatic Association) website for future productions of Mort. The last tour was in the spring and the only production is ours. Not a great result then.
So I go back to my email inbox... and there, staring out at me is an email from previous producer to set man, director him, director her and producer giving details of the props we already have and how we can source the rest. Scary, scary, scary.
Previous producer works at triple speed. Maybe it's drugs. Or maybe I'm hallucinating. No! It's all happening because I'm such a tip-top producer and allocated all those responsibilities so early on. That's it. Phew.
Director him has also sent through an email conversation he has had about tables. As we will be serving food during the interval people need somewhere to eat. Everyone likes to have somewhere to put their drink. It makes for a great atmosphere too. We first did it for Stags & Hens back in 2004 and have done it for the spring play each year since. This year we are having to get slightly smaller tables than before in order to allow for a bigger stage, but it should work OK. Interestingly, it tends to encourage people to sort out their own block bookings as they want a table exclusively for their own friends. When they are sitting in rows people tend to care less.

Thought for the day: "Faster than a ray of light, she's flying." Ray Of Light - Madonna

Props, car boots and eBay

2006-12-19T15:26:00.000Z

Director him has just sent through a list of the props for Mort to set man, previous producer, producer and director her. For this show, officially set man is doing props. In reality he will be assisted by previous producer. The two of them make an impressive double act. This is why director him has written "I have included you in this email as your wealth of knowledge could be useful for any ideas you have" in his email to us all.
Given that we are an amateur group with a limited budget for each show (I'll talk about charities and sponsorship some other time) we try to do everything on the cheap. Set man and previous producer have developed a skill for finding items for next to nothing. Sometimes this is on the web (I know previous producer has already been looking for hourglasses) and more often it is by trawling the car boot sales of southern England. Anywhere within about a 30 mile radius of Colnbrook village (outside London) is a possible target for the two of them. Hockey sticks and tennis racquets for Moby Dick - The Musical were the start of it and it has progressed alarmingly from there.
The value of these items is, of course, whatever a buyer will pay. That is why after shows previous producer has often managed to make a tidy profit for the group selling items on to other people via eBay. It's time-consuming, involving late nights in front of a lap top, but proves financially useful as it ultimately increases the cash in our coffers and bumps up the amount we can give to charity.

Thought for the day: "Charity begins at home." Old proverb. For your interest, the idea can be found in the Bible but not the words. In the 14th Century John Wycliffe wrote: 'Charity should begin at himself.' It was actually 500 years later when good old Charlie Dickens said that 'Charity begins at home, and justice begins next door.' Read this blog for long enough and you will learn a lot, mark my words.

This sort of thing can happen

2006-12-18T21:52:00.000Z

CAST is a pretty close knit community. Some would say incestuous. There is a social life to be enjoyed by anyone who joins - some official CAST events, others off the cuff ones. For me though, the most important part of that social life is the one I have developed with little groups of people I have met through the group or who I knew before and have joined as well.
The most obvious part of this is that I met secretary when we both turned up to do Grease. It took us nine years to get married, but when we did there were two tables of CAST members and their families. My best man was someone I knew pretty well before I joined, but our friendship grew under the spotlights when he came down too.
You will find different groups appear as part of one person or another's birthday celebrations. Some are part of an irregular drinking clan. Some play football together. SIx of us travel to European football cities in search of perfection.
So having read this it will probably not surprise you to learn that on Saturday night producer, secretary, box office, set man, summer producer and others went to see summer director perform with her all girl vocal trio at a pub in west Berkshire.
Meanwhile, previous producer was out with producer geezer celebrating his birthday along with numerous others including previous director and director her (you've remembered they're married - well done! I can see you are getting the hang of this..) discussing many of the same things.
Those same things being... the show after this one... and the show after that. But it gets worse. Hold onto your underpants, because this bit gets quite tricky. For the next show producer and previous director are coming together to be co-directors. For the show after that box office is going to be director and secretary will be producer. See what I mean about incestuous?
Anyway, on the way back from the west Berkshire trip (a very good night, with lovely food, excellent beer, fine entertainment and great company, it has to be said) producer got a text message from previous producer. To precis, it said previous director had asked previous producer to be producer of the next show.
Now you know what I have said about previous producer already. I no longer feel I have to justify any of my comments. After a phone call it transpired that previous producer had not been drunk at the time of saying yes but was now. Two subsequent nonsensical texts also proved it to be the case.
Producer has a bit of a track record for this sort of thing, having managed, as director and producer (and writer) of Snow White & The Seven Dwarves a few years back, to acquire a co-director/co-producer while she was drunk at her birthday party. The fact that she also was the choreographer and played the leading role gives a suggestion of just how successful that little exercise was.
But today, nothing. All is quiet on the eastern, western, northern and southern fronts. Not a single email relating to anything about CAST. Not even remotely. Not even from anyone who once was a memeber but isn't involved any more. And believe me it's bliss. For once there is no connection and there is a chance to breath in deeply and relax. What a nice feeling.

Thought for the day: "Silent Night, Holy Night, All is calm, All is bright..." Rather nice chill-out carol

What do I do?

2006-12-15T23:33:00.001Z

To be honest, the producer shouldn't do anything. The producer's job is to work out what needs doing, find people to do those things and allocate the jobs to them and then make sure they are doing them. A bit like a committee chairman. Now to my way of thinking previous producer did this very well. There was one slight problem - most of the jobs she had allocated to herself! So, I won't be doing costumes or props, being set designer or scenic artist.
Those jobs have been allocated. Who to? Well previous producer of course! Actually, it's not as bad as it sounds, but you have to say previous producer must be a sucker for punishment - don'tcha love her!
We allocated most of the key jobs last night, which was a great kick off - knowing who is going to be doing what come the new year.
Thus, producer geezer will look after all publicity and advertising with press and radio. Previous producer is going to supply details of the 101 websites she advertised the panto on. Director him will provide previous producer and set man with a list of props for them to find.
THE PART rival and previous producer will be the scenic artists along with director her. Set man, rival, previous producer, producer, director him and director her will come up with the set design.
Previous director and producer her (husband & wife remember - try to keep up) will look after sound and light, while previous producer and director her will be responsible for costumes.
Director him and producer geezer will sort out tables and waiters/waitresses and secretary will negotiate over the fish and chips. Needless to say, box office man has already opened the box office...
What more could anyone want? All that before we have even had the auditions. Which reminds me, I must get everyone's photograph taken at the first rehearsal. It will make doing the programme so much easier!
My other task is to try to track down any performance of the show before March, find any Terry Pratchett book signings and get in touch with the Discworld Society. I think that's quite enough of an allocation for me.

Thought for the day: "Help! I need somebody. Help! Not just anybody. Help! You know I need someone. Oooh Yeah." Old Liverpudlian saying c1960s.

Read all about it

2006-12-15T00:35:00.001Z

Secretary asleep. Cup of tea. Mince pie and cheese. Right. I reckon there are five good candidates for specific parts based on the read-through tonight. We had stand-out performances for a Town Crier, High Priest, Ysabell, Keli & Cutwell. The irony of a journalist giving a hilarious performance as a town crier has not been lost on me.
I have let my views be known to director him and director her, and also to a new face I would like to add to the team; my co-producer. What shall I call him here? I think I'll make it producer geezer as he's a top bloke. Hmmmn. Funny how this sort of stuff flows out of one's brain at this time of night.
Of course, when it comes to it I shall not be doing any of the casting as I shall be auditioning for THAT PART, although based on tonight's performance I have a very serious rival for the part. Numbers were good. Of those who were there we had nine blokes who actually want to audition and six girls. I reckon three more blokes and three more girls who were not down tonight. That would make 12 and nine in total.
When I calculated our minimum totals to perform the show I worked it out at 11 male and seven female. Then take away producer geezer who only wants one very small part and another person who often drops out along the way. This leaves you with bang on the target, keeping everyone busy, making sure that everyone has at least one really good part and giving us enough people for the 'crowd' scenes.
Who knows what January 4 may bring. I hope an even bigger turnout to give director her and director him a good choice of candidates for each part and a chance to shuffle things around. I hope a satisfaction from the cast with the parts they have been given. And I hope (in amongst that) THE PART for me.
As I said who knows? Nothing is certain yet and there has been no pre-casting - or at least nothing to happen today could have been predicted and we haven't had auditions! With our previous Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters, all bar one part turned out completely differently to how director her had expected. When I cast Stags & Hens a three years ago my co-director and I had three totally different line-ups after each of the three auditions. It is all still up in the air.
As well as discussing the quality of the read-through afterwards, we had a highly fruitful five minute production discussion. But more of that - and what a producer's job really involves - tomorrow, or rather later today.

Thought for the day: "Life is uncertain. My life certainly has a certain degree of uncertainty about it and I'm certain yours does too. Of that we can be quite...sure." Sir Marcus Browning MP - Rowan Atkinson.

First essentials

2006-12-13T18:08:00.000Z

Our first production meeting last month covered the basics. Stuff like: 'Where shall we put the interval?' (There isn't a designated place) 'What should the audition pieces be?' (The bits of the play people have to read at the audition depending on which part they want) 'How can we do this if we only have three people turn up at the read-through?' (We all have to be in it ourselves) and 'Does anyone want another drink?' (Well yes, obviously!)
We also touched on one or two more complex ideas. Director her had a pretty good sense of how she wanted the basic set to look: Two levels for Death's study & library, castle as hardback etc. Director him and producer added details as we worked our way through the script.
We also decided, after a suggestion by director him, to ditch the concept of having the chunks of narration done by individual characters during the course of the show. Instead we shall have a single narrator. The Footnote role is one that occurs in other Pratchett/Briggs plays, so there is nothing especially heretical in the idea.
Now it's preparaation time. We need audition packs to hand out at the read-through tomorrow. Our concern over the number of people turning up has long gone. During Dick Whittington more and more people, both those in the cast and members of the audience, announced their interest. So all the fun that director him and I had had in working out which parts could double, treble or even quadruple-up goes out of the window. Director him's spreadsheet was very pretty though.
Producer has been busy putting together a top strip (no top strip, not top strip) for all our documents, which includes director her, director him and producer's email addresses and mobile phone numbers. Members of the cast are always very stupid. They will lose anything. They will also email secretary constantly saying: 'Have you got the email for so-and-so', or 'Do you have x, y and z's phone numbers'. This annoys her no end as she sends everyone an email copy of our membership contacts list every month. Losing scripts is a particular passion for tha cast. This time I am thinking of putting sticky labels with 'This book belongs to ....... age ....' Not because they will stop leaving them behind at rehearsals, it will just make it easier for us and more embarrassing for them when we hand them back.
Director him is printing out all the audition pieces. Director her is currently putting together a general intro piece and producer is printing out (as I write) copies of the basic plot and character descriptions. Producer is out of the office tomorrow, so secretary will print off director her's piece. Oh yes, it's started...

Thought for the day: "Earwig O, Earwig O, Earwig O." Bad joke c1974?

All about Dick

2006-12-12T16:22:00.000Z

Why am I writing this? Well it's all down to the previous producer. It's ALL HER FAULT. If you have read allaboutdick.blogspot.com you will know what I am talking about. If not.....
You see it's Colnbrook Amateur Stage Theatre. CAST. More than just a theatre group. More like a way of life for the theatrically insane. If you get too heavily involved it can take you over - and when you are the producer you have no choice.
All about Dick was, well, all about Dick Whittington, the CAST pantomime for 2006. The last show was on Saturday. The effects will last a lifetime. Well for my predecessor anyway. She worked her way from being a first-time costume manager and a first-time producer to coping with an absent director and choreographer via rewriting songs and purchasing props. Oh, and two weeks playing the panto baddie, King Rat as well.
But, fortunately for me, it's a little easier with Mort. No songs. No choreography. Only one week. And two directors who will be around all the time. Here I shall have to call them director her and director him to distinguish between them. Oh and they are not married. In fact Dick's director is married to director her. Confused? Read this for long enough and you will be.
What about CAST? Well you can find out more at www.cast-online.org.uk Suffice to say though, It was founded it October 1990, staged its first show in the summer of 1991 and I joined for the second show in 1992. I am married to the group's secretary, who joined for the same show. Good reason for me to be thankful. All my history with the group will no doubt appear here over the coming weeks and months.
In the meantime... The read through of the Mort script takes place on Thursday (Dec 14). Yes, one show is barely over before another gets underway. Director her and director him and I had our first production meeting a month ago (Wednesday Nov 15). The show was selected by the membership as the one for this spring at our annual meeting in August (The circumstances of that event will also have to wait).
For the moment I will just say that I am looking forward to this show more than any in recent years. I intend to audition for a part. A SPECIAL PART. But that isn't until January.

Thought for the day: "Once more unto the breach dear friends, once more." King Henry in Henry V by that Bard bloke.