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.

Home Calls when Abroad

Doesn't checking your email on holiday just feel wrong? Our hotel in Venice had a free internet point so it seemed churlish not to have a look at what had come in, but it felt like being briefly transported back to the UK. Most odd.
I'm glad I looked, though, as Andy had sent through details of a casting with Vienna's English Theatre for Charley's Aunt. This is notable for two reasons - I've been seen by them before and I gave my worst audition to date (and that is up against some stiff competition); and I am being seen for the character of Sir Francis Chesney. I've done this show before, ten years ago, and I played Jack Chesney then - Francis' son (see posts passim)
This is a sort of memento mori, I suppose - I have an album on facebook called "Getting Older in Public" which I sometimes add to, which shows me getting more and more decrepit as the years bite. What next? Falstaff? Prospero? Lear? I should be so lucky!
Here it is: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=17546&l=bb3d6&id=617048310

Gathering

And so the season closes with a barnstorming Sat mat and slightly less assured evening show. I very nearly deliver my last line pronouncing "horrible as "hoggible" but control my wayward mouth at the last instant. Which made me think how unmemorable some last lines might have been if the actor hadn't been concentrating, viz: "Louis, I think this is the beginning of a suitable friendship" etc.
On the drive back I slip into murmuring my lines and find them comfortable friends now - something I never felt actually during the shows. The same goes for much of the other fundamentals of acting when applied to rep; it's rare that you get to concentrate on the drama as much as you'd like to amid all the prop/costume/blocking worries which never fully evaporate, and that's a terrific shame.

If I've learned anything over the last month, it's this: that rep will expose, cruelly and immediately, any guilty secrets you have as an actor. Whether it's a problem learning lines, fear of long speeches or holding the stage, remembering blocking, a confidence issue or a problem with focus, it will all be thrown into VERY sharp relief with absolutely no chance of resolution in the immediate present (and sadly, that is when you need it most). And that's scary.

Arrivederci Wolver

The goodbyes have started, even though we have two shows still to do. Su, our director, left on Wednesday (although she may visit this evening) and there were many fond cheerios at the friends evening on Tuesday, where CV himself made a short speech (after addressing the crowd at the show, too).

Of course, in all this, we are trying to decipher whether the rep will be returning next year, and if so, in what form. This season is about half the length of past ones, which is a disturbing factor. But the audiences, reception and general bonhomie seem to indicate that the theatre would be greatly the poorer without it. The girls are having lunch with the Friends Chairman, as I write, so perhaps they'll try to pump him for information over their dim sum and fried rice. Marcus and I aren't invited, of course. We don't get asked for autographs at stage door that often, either. It's a gender thing.


The endless, and unwelcome task is clearing my dressing room. I have a small mountain of Thomas the Tank Engine toys which I've bought for Jake, plus a fridgeful of milk and other things that I can't leave behind but can't take. Then I have to decide what bizarre gift I can leave for the next actor. The Russian Ice Stars Andrei C and Andrei B left me a drawerful of Alka-Seltzer. Bless.



In the fridge I have a plain bottle full of decanted Martini Extra Dry which was a "Dangerous Obsession" prop. It looks rather like a night-soil. Perhaps I'll leave that...

(sic)

I guess every town is famous for something - Bill Bryson talks about small towns in America which are famous for doing great grits (We're REAL proud of our grits, man! YEAH!). Don't know what Wolverhampton is famous for, but it leads the world in bad spelling on signs. Bejesus, it does. Here are some of my favourites:

There's a sort of classical beauty to some of it, and a breathtaking irony too. See this one on the right:

As a piece of postmodern criticism, it's genius. As advertising, it's an absolute catastrophe

And here's another corker. Perhaps I'm wrong, perhaps there's something wrong with their oven and this is the only way of describing it accurately. In any case, the guy sitting at the table behind got his comb out imediately after I snapped this...

But here, on the right, is the jewel in the crown. God knows how many local government mandarins and pencil-pushers this got past before it was sent to the signmakers. At least it's pointing towards the right street for the Learning Quarter.

Tempus Fugit

Nearly a week since our Saturday stagger-through, and last night (Thursday) was the first time I think any of us have felt anything approaching comfortable on stage. Me especially. A casting director friend of mine said once that it's impossible to do too much work for an audition and I think this definitely applies to performance. In weekly rep, if a performance is completed it seems almost to be in spite of the (limited) preparation rather than thanks to it. Plus "Gaslight" is a properly written play, with nuances and shades of meaning and characterisation, and a multi-faceted set of themes and relationships which is in direct opposition to the rather two-dimensional dramas which have preceeded it.I can't help but think it deserves better than we can give it in the time.
That's not to say that the reception hasn't been warm - it has. Emily's husband Terry said that the sense of ownership and fondness in the audience was palpable last night, and you can certainly feel that on stage.
It occurs to me, suddenly, that I'm totally unprepared for this finishing tomorrow, so obsessed have I (and we) been with getting through it at all. Perhaps this is why people come back - after all, the relationships deserve so much more than you can offer, and next year you get another chance. Maybe.

Lines

I've dried both nights this week so far, so much so that I had to be rescued by Emily, and I hardly slept last night for sheer worry about doing it again. I couldn't stand the house this morning - I couldn't slip on the mask of ease today, so instead I've come into town to escape to my dressing room. It's the only place I can really be alone at the moment.

It feels a bit like the downward spiral of depression, this problem with lines. Self-perpetuating. I remember reading that someone - Ian Holm? David Suchet? - was so crippled with stage fright from line anxiety that he gave up theatre altogether in his late 20's and has only just returned in his 60's. Nice if you can choose whether to be a movie star or not...

Mortals have to make do wioth whatever advice or solutions present themselves, and I'm not inclined to share the situation with the rest of the cast (don't want to freak them out or throw them off) so I'm trying something I'd normally scoff at - positive thinking and visualisation.

I've done this at auditions before - notably for "Pera Palas" and it seems to work, and I have no fear of pacing the streets chanting and stuff. Well, can't hurt...

Too Darn Hot

God, it must be the hottest day of the year. We ate lunch (pie and mash for me - well, when in Rome...) by the canal, where we were also coincidentally right next to the ring road and the railway line and it still contrived to be really gorgeous. Inbetween a run of "Gaslight" and our matinee of MWOC, this was. We're pretty done in, all told.
The slightly stop-start run proved that the new show is in pretty amazing shape for three day's rehearsal, but the clothes are going to be a nightmare. Shirt, waistcoat, jacket, overcoat, scarf, gloves and hat - in this temperature. Crazy. But not as crazy as a toga in the Courtyard Theatre for some loony Roman drama a few years ago - that was in February and during our changes we weren't short of hat-pegs backstage, let me tell you.
This is madness. My head feels like a pressure-cooker.

Managing Stress

I posted a couple of days ago about first-night stress - a phenomenon which is only surpassed, in my experience, by agent-night stress. Andy from VSA came up last night to see Paul and myself in MWOC. It's the first time he's seen me in anything since he took me on, and the first time he's seen Paul for some while, so the atmosphere was a little, ummm, heavy, not helped by the muggy weather.
Needn't have worried, though - the loose-lippedness of the opening night (picked up by the Birmingham Post review, unfortunately) has now entirely dissolved, and we've settled into quite a comfortable routine, Paul and myself especially. There are times, still, when I scan the lines ahead of certain scenes (II.2 especially) and just wonder how on earth we're going to get through it, and indeed there are times on stage when it seems endless, but ultimately it's extremely satisfying, if a little chilling, to have to hold the stage and drive the play for so long. Next week is much more of an ensemble piece - Bella is a big part, but most of the truly enormous monologues are mine. These are still a bit of a problem, but the plot is so good that driving it becomes a pleasure, not a chore.

Noticed at Last!

The Wolverhampton Express and Star give us a good review for MWOC! I am singled out as being "suitably irritating", which, along with "gives it tolerable substance" and "does as much as he can with awful dialogue and a plot line that goes nowhere", I can add to my suitcaseful of useless epithets. Huzzah!