Dear Me

I got the most bizarre letter in the post this morning (almost as bizarre as a pen-and-ink sketch someone sent to my agent once, with a suggestion that it was worth £10. It wasn't!).

It seems that Royal Holloway holds a student drama awards ceremony called the RHOSCARS every year, and this year they want me, "...an outstanding alumnus in the field of acting" to be guest of honour. They encourage me to "...support the event and promote and nurture young talent." Obviously I was on cloud nine about it, and swanked about all morning planning my speech of gentle encouragement and agonising about whether I should wear a square-cut bow tie or a butterfly.

And then I got over myself. There will many guests of honour, of course, and the support they mention I might supply will, I suspect, be fiscal! That said, I have fired off a cagey reply to accept and to try to discover exactly how many guests of honour there are likely to be. I hope it's less than fifty...

Happy Christmas from the Dineens!

She's a great little mover already!

http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/puigqAkEK9alPS5w

Early Doors

I was at Jake's nativity play this morning. What a farce! The story had a vaguely familiar ring, but sadly they'd made no effort to place it in a modern context. I mean, there's a single mother who's not sure who the father is; there's a tax review going on; a housing shortage. Couldn't be more 2008!
For all that, the part of the innkeeper was played with verve and gusto, and there was some excellent skin work from one of the pigs. Jake's performance as one of the three sheep was a masterwork of subtle characterisation which overcame his lack of costume (which had been rejected by the actor at the last moment). Some last minute blocking changes, however, left several of the shepherds looking stranded, and there were just too many guiding stars to be strictly credible. On the whole, a charming spin on contemporary mores; a petite farce aimed more at the heart than the head. 4*

And...

I forgot to mention, the director said he'd be in touch when they'd finished seeing people IN FOUR DAYS! Work must be thin on the ground.

Loose Lips

Sooooo......I'm at this casting for a short film at LFS the other day. I haven't done any film since early 2007 because of touring and all, so it'd be very good to get in front of a camera again. Anyway, a friend had suggested me for it and you know, it's going OK.
I'm doing some good impro with a female actor; nice and effortless, good flow, and my objective in the impro is to try to tell her I love her for the first time. Suddenly I hear myself saying "...you hold my heart in these tender hands, and I know you'll be careful with it."
WHAT! WHAT WAS THAT? Her face is like a poster for "The Agony and the Ecstasy".
I glance at the director and CD, but it's too late. They've heard me. I leave like my arse is on fire.

Accent Grave

I forgot to say, too, that my accents are the kiss of death. I did an impersonation (or rather an hommage) to Alec Guinness a few years ago when I was playing Herr Ringleman in "Clockwork", and the day after I first tried it, the poor man died.

Accent-uate

Ah. Not being seen for Pitlochry this year, then. Shame, because I am now an expert Bodhranai and can croak my way through two (count them, two) musical theatre baritone songs.
What would have undoubtedly undone me, though, would have been my variety of Scots accents - or lack of. No matter how many times I watch "Whisky Galore", I still sound like Fraser in "Dad's Army". Or worse, like Billy Connolly.
I don't much like doing accents for parts anyway. I read somewhere that you expend a huge percentage of your acting energy on maintaining an accent if it's not your own, and that's a terrifying statistic if, like me, you suspect you may be just a trifle underenergised at the best of times. Plus, when I'm in an audience and I know someone's doing an accent, I don't listen - I just sit in a state of fevered anticipation, waiting for them to cock it up. It's like being at the opera when a soprano does that very high solo in The Magic Flute. Everyone just winces.

Another Humbled Man

On this day, at shortly before 4am, my lovely wife gave birth to a baby girl at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford. No quips or smart talk. She's an angel and we're calling her Molly Elizabeth.
That's all!

First Steps

Jake's been cast as a sheep at his pre-school Nativity Play. A SHEEP, for Christ's sake! Not even a shepherd!
I scoped out the competition and it's not all that. But nobbling the shepherds or wise men, or best of all Joseph, will be no easy task. They're closely watched.
But I have found out that the Archangel Gabriel will be played by some bespectacled owl with a wheat allergy, so perhaps some judiciously placed Quavers will help...

Flying the Coop

Oh dear. I've just heard that a guy who left my old co-op last year amid a blaze of bunting and celebration has "all but given up" on his new agent after no castings for the whole of 2008.

There's definitely a downside to moving along to the conventional sphere - you don't get to see the breakdowns coming in, for a start. In a co-op it's not uncommon to browse the company email every night for the gold dust of Spotlight links and Castweb, and to check what you've been put up for. And although co-ops aren't in the top (or even middle) rank of agencies as far as breakdowns are concerned, they do get some reasonably good stuff. But once you leave you're out on your own. Well, except for the info that everyone gets from PCR or whatever. And that's a shock.

PCR, though, is a real oddity. When you first start out you get it religiously, turning automatically past the "Feature Films in Production" section (yeah, right) and head right on down to Low Budget Films and Fringe and Profitshare, where scuzzers like you belong. Then when you've got areasonable CV and perhaps even an agent you sniffily reject it. Right up until someone you know ends up in the West End doing a new musical or something, and the pronounce they "saw the ad in PCR, darling!" Or the Equity website. Or most hilariously of all, The Stage.

As Cast

As I'm sure you know, nothing compares to the sheer unalloyed joy of hearing how well your friends are doing. And I accept that it's most irrational to be envious of a twenty-four year old actor who's a) female and b) whose forte is musical theatre, but there you are. I am a bit.
Of course, this is madness. Any 24 year-old woman has probably the hardest time of it getting a casting - it has to be the most competitive age/sex combination imaginable. But it's difficult to remain level-headed when the castings dry up. Dry up, that is, except for my recent visit to the BBC. Coincidentally I was asked in to this by one of the two 24-year old woman actors I know who have decided to go into casting after the acting side just got too much to bear, and who are back on the bottom rung of the ladder again. Now that's self-awareness.

I Oughta Be In Pictures

God, there's nothing like this business for making you fret over details. I ordered some repros from Denbry yesterday and they asked whether I wanted glossy or pearl finish. "What do you think?" I asked. "Well, a lot of big agents are going for pearl now - ICM and people - they don't show finger marks and glossy seems a bit passe. Who's your agent? Maybe I can tell you what they prefer?"
"Vincent Shaw"
"Who?"
"VINCENT SHAW"
"No, don't know about them"
So I call VSA. Engaged for two hours (my fault for calling over lunchtime) after which a breathless Andy answers.
"Just a quickie, Andy. Headshots. Glossy or pearl?"
"I'm not fussed. Whatever you like. No border or name, though." Background mumble. "Tod prefers glossy. Whatever you like, though. OK? Bye, mister!"
Another hour or so passes whilst I agonise. Glossy or pearl? Would glossy blind the tired eyes of Kay Magson or Suzy Korel? What is pearl? I don't really know. Finally, just before business end, I call Richard at Denbry back.
"Can I have both?"
"Course you can" he says, with the weary air of someone who has long since tired of the caprices of performers.

Humbled Man

On Wednesday I was at the opening night of "Humble Boy" (you know, the new London Classic show that there's no part for me in and therefore I am not jealous of) and I was determined not to be jealous. I practised not being jealous in the car on the way down, and, just in case jealousy feeds off dehydration or hunger, I drank water and hasd a snack shortly beforehand.
But I was, and I knew I would be. Partly because I still feel like part of LCT but mainly because it's very, very good. For an opening night show it was remarkable in many ways - some of the detail in the performances, for example, was outstanding; the set is beautiful (and beautifully lit) and the action is very well sustained and rarely flags. There is a pivotal joke in the second act, the payoff of which looks as though it must surely fail, so great is the anticipation - but when it comes it succeeds through a masterpiece of subtle performance. Brilliant moment.
Afterwards it's first night drinks and a bunch of lovely old faces are there from Abs Party - Pete (Autumn CSM), Katja (Costume Designer) and Jeremy Daker from "Pera Palas" at the Arcola last year - but it's difficult not to feel like the skeleton at the feast. And so, I suppose, I should. LCT and Michael have moved on and so must I - we're all enriched by the experience, but I couldn't play Laurence for the rest of my life, nor would I want to.
However, if Michael was casting a nice, juicy Stoppard...

Casting Crises

There's a couple of phenomenons at auditions which I haven't thought of names for yet. One is that silent certainty you feel when you see someone on the tube who you just know is on their way to the same casting as you; the other is the heart-racing fear you get when you experience the above with someone who is infinitely better casting for the role you're up for. I had that last crushing experience only the other day at the Charley audition - he knows who he is...

However, that awful sinking feeling that you're in completely the wrong clothing has only happened to me once; I was up for an undercover Fashion Spy in a Ford Focus commercial and I wore my grooviest floral printed linen shirt teamed with bootcut faded jeans (it was 2004, okay?) and chukka boots. Very Boden/Liberty. Except I got there and EVERYONE else was in all black, without exception - they'd taken the undercover thing very seriously - I hadn't thought about that at all. They were running two hours behind, and I can only ascribe my landing the job to uncharacteristic extreme patience and shameless camera-hogging. Haha!

Charley's Aren't!

I've failed miserably to find my script of CA - but since it's somewhere in twelve unopened boxes of books I feel less of a failure than I otherwise would. I also failed to lure my friend Steve, who's auditioning for Brassett, to my house for a "dry run" of the casting; i.e. an opportunity for me to have a look at his script. So instead I dig out the film version which I videoed years ago, and it's an undiscovered gem.
As a version of the original it's a disaster (I'm sure Babbs and Donna Lucia don't snog in the shrubbery in the play) but Jack Benny is a revelation as Fancourt Babberley. He's plainly twenty years too old for it, and makes no attempt to hide his New York brogue but he's fantastic. He makes everyone else look as though they're hamming it up in music hall or something, he's so effortlessly and naturally funny.
Sadly, the re-writing is at the expense of Sir Francis, whose love interest (along with most of his role) is sacrificed to give Benny more screen time, so it's fairly useless for me as research material. I guess my audition will have to be another hommage to one of my father's friends, or possibly to my Dad himself. Again.