Buxton Autumn

Buxton, meanwhile, is an old friend. I spent a week here in 2005 staying in the house of a woman whose mood swings were so extreme she must have been on HRT. Because there's so much to see, I've been trying to spend more than a few hours here ever since, without success, but at least this time we're here for two nights.
It does seems to be the land of oddball landladies, though. I'm staying with Carol, Anna and Helen in a lodge - a stately, slightly tired house a few minutes out of town. Our landlady has cleared out of the house entirely and is living in the caravan in the drive, which (in a note) she assures us is fine for her because "I have facilities under the verandah". There is also a pungent and delicious smell of frying smoked bacon in the lounge, the origin of which is a mystery.
Anyway, the thing Buxton is famous for is the water, and one of the great delights is filling your bottle at the free fountain which flows directly from the spring - slightly warm because of its volcanic origin.

A Victorian BYOB

I reveal this fact to Malcolm but, tragically, only after he has been to the Co-op to buy some water which has been dragged all the way from Scotland or France or somewhere even more distant. Oops. Shut ma mouth.
The Opera House couldn't be more different from The Landmark. Classic Matcham design, Victorian dressing rooms with elaborate ironwork and thunderbox toilets; and a perpetually manned (or rather womanned) Stage Door, it's a very traditional experience. The rake makes it difficult to maintain your balance as a horse, though, and in the fight call Alan nearly ends up in the pit. We muster 200 on our opening night but that contrives to feel a little sparse, it's such a big room.

Landmark

Ilfracombe is - like Huddersfield, Worthing and a few others on our roster - not a place I've not visited before and of course I have preconceptions about it. I'm expecting Weston-Super-Mare but instead I'm delighted to find Padstow without Rick Stein - working harbour, clifftop walks and an absolutely typical and very slightly down-at-heel hotel called the Carlton.
There's nothing conventional about the theatre, though. It's an extraordinary construction, inspired by the bottle kilns which fired the pottery made from the local clay and has the most amazing acoustic I've ever heard;as if the words are being lifted and gently sprinkled around the auditorium.

Madonna's bra, North Devon Coast-style...

I understand it had a bit of a difficult conception, this building, but it really makes a graceful and surprisingly comfortable addition to the landscape. From the warmth of the cafe you can admire the churning Bristol Channel and precipitous cliffs which face it. If that all seems a little tame though, there's an uncomfortable sight a short walk up the cliffs, where this lonely little monument stands:

I'm ashamed to say I can't remember her name, but she was only 14 when she fell.

The Triumphant Return of Big Horse

Jamie's back at nearly full fitness. Our audience will therefore be split into those who saw Big Horse and those who saw the version post-injury-pre-recovery. Like Jeremy Northam taking over from Daniel Day-Lewis in "Hamlet", both good but different. The opinion of the cast is pretty united, although our chorus habits (which had developed during the absence) have needed more adjustment than expected. Still, it's good to have the big fella back again.
Since I last posted we've enjoyed some significant landmarks; our biggest audience (360 at Poole opening night) our biggest post-show audience (120 on the same evening) which was also our first one without Michael; and we could give out awards for most distracting ushers, loudest mobile etc but that would be cruel; not least because one venue sweeps the board in practically every category...

Public Parts

We had a public online review yesterday which remarked that the actors "wander on at the beginning, looking bored and chatting" or words to that effect. It was very positive, mind you, and clearly thought that the preamble was deliberately contrived like that to provide a counterpoint to the rather serious subject matter of the drama.
Like kids, punters tend to cut to the chase with their assessments. Matt and I ran into a man just after the Oldham Wednesday matinee who said he'd see then show, but was rather lost what to say next. He settled for "I liked it more than I thought I would" which leaves you wondering why he went in the first place. And in Huddersfield open market a man said "You were one of the horses, weren't you? The one with the limp?" which suggests that my portrayal of Frank wasn't all it might have been that day.
It was here in Oldham that I made the mistake of reading the audience comment book during "Beauty Queen". There was an entry (also after the matinee) which said "Wonderful. Steve Dineen = English accent!!" which threw me into a maelstrom of self-doubt. If only it had been punctuated differently...

No Coli Wobbles

Last time I was in Oldham I was smooching it up as Pato Dooley, acting opposite the lovely Carol Dance, who plays Hester in "Equus". Back then they had closed the rail station (hilariously called The Mumps, I have no idea why) and there was all sorts of civil engineering and regeneration going on. And guess what? There still is. There's little discernible improvement in three years, and if the billboards are to be believed, there won't be before 2014. Things have bitten hard up here.
Yet despite this (and despite the local area resembling a demilitarised zone on a Saturday night) the Coliseum rides this out with relish. They just had a considerable hike in funding, there's a refurb just starting, the houses were fantastic and the response superb. Kevin Shaw needs to watch out he doesn't get poached by, oooh, England Rugby? The UN?

The Shoot Horses in Worthing, Don't They?

It's a bloody long drive from Hereford to Worthing, but the Indian Summer which seems to have arrived with us makes it worthwhile. Like the Berwick Maltings and the Lawrence Batley, the Connaught is a new venue for me; although it's the slightly faded grandeur of the Chatsworth Hotel which I find more arresting at first. Not your normal digs...
Although we (well, Kate and Aidan really) cobbled together a solution for the final night in Hereford which went easy on Jamie's injured shoulder, a more permanent solution is essential. So whilst Michael takes Aidan, Matt and Jamie through the new moves, the rest of us are free to explore. Worthing is famous for a few reasons; it's why Jack Worthing is so named in "The Importance of Being Earnest" because Oscar Wilde stayed there in 1895; and ...er...that's it. That's why it's well known.

Shame really. It's got a cracking pier:

Probably not so lovely in the rain, but still...

and this!

Home of the Brown Derby. Forgotten but not gone.

When we get back, there's a new climax to Act I. I can't remember whether it was Besson or Tarkovsky who compared losing favourite moments from artworks to killing their young, but the golden child which was Big Horse has been murdered so New Horse could be born. Matt and Aidan have both found it difficult to let go, but there's little visceral impact lost in this revised version - and what the audience haven't seen, they don't miss.
It's a great show. Afterwards we mingle with Karen (Michael's partner) and her kids, Paige and Joe. It's the first time Joe's seen the heads since he helped paint them in Colliers Wood and he's well impressed. Paige is more concerned with settling a fashion score with Michael - something which has obviously rankled all night.
"You see, Dad?" she protests, pointing at a chunky girl in a very short skirt and no tights "that's slutty. Not trousers".

"The One Where Jamie Falls Down The Stairs And Dislocates His Shoulder"

It happens in the middle of the night, and the hospital are shocked to discover that it happened when he was stone-cold sober. As, I have to confess, are some of the cast, but then we are a cynical lot. Mercifully, Malcolm hears Jamie's calls and goes to his rescue (well, after Jamie has had an opportunity to struggle into some underwear). The ambulance arrives when they are still in what used to be called "a state of undress" with the inevitable assumptions made during the check-in procedure at Hereford County.


The patient with one of his eleven co-ordinating slings...

It's a dislocated shoulder - we're all grateful it's nothing worse, but the impact on the show is huge. Big Horse relies entirely on me and Jamie's supporting Matt, and this puts paid to that. With a show that night and several set pieces to rework, we're all called at 3.30.

Hereford

After a while, touring gets a bit like the series "Friends" - places become "The One Where Alice Got A Really Bad Baked Potato" or "The One Where Amy Insulted The Irish Nation In Tesco". My only memory of Hereford from 2008 is it being "The One Where Our House Buyer Tried To Rip Us Off By £8,000", so it's very nice to rediscover this lovely cathedral town. Next to the cathedralitself,as if to reinforce the difference between here and Hudders, is a bronze of the quintessential Herefordian Elgar, looking up at the building whilst leaning on a rather preposterous bicycle. Inside are arty delights by John Piper and the legendary Mappa Mundi, which I nearly reject in favour of TK Maxx because I hear a rumour it's onlya few inches round and so dimly lit as to be invisible. It's not, and apart from being beautiful it's the largest mediaeval map to survive from Middle Ages. Well, it is since the RAF destroyed its only serious competition when they bombed Bremen in WWII.
It's all becoming rather idyllic. And then suddenly, Hereford becomes memorable for reasons unconnected with cathedrals, maps or gazundering...

Some Art (and some not)

I'm on my way to Huddersfield Art Gallery when I see a crowd watching some Morris dancing in the town square. Now I normally think it's vaguely unsettling, that style of English folk dancing. I mean, it's not exactly flamenco, is it? It has a kind of preciousness about it, too, not helped by the fact that most of the people who do it seem to be middle class solicitors and accountants - and their wives.
But this is different. It's a sort of punky, death-metal kind of Morris dancing. The're all dressed in raggedy black outfits with faces painted like Michael Stipe of REM. And the stick-work is properly aggressive, both on the floor and on each other. It's dead exciting.
In the Art Gallery they've got a Bacon study which was donated by the CAS in about 1962 when it was worth twopence. They must be delighted about that now! Otherwise there's not much except a visiting exhibition including Carl Andre's "Equivalent VIII" - or "the bricks" as everyone knows it. The most interesting thing about this is the furore it created when it was first bought by the National, especially the exaggerations about how much it cost, mainly promoted by the Daily Mirror. Plus ca change...

But the thing that made me laugh today was this bronze of Harold Wilson battling against the wind. We all did that here, too.

Evelyn, not Madeleine...

I'm sure there are many remarkable things about Huddersfield, but for me the stand-out one is the discovery of a high-street Wimpy restaurant - a brand I thought had gone out of business years ago. I wouldn't have exactly mourned it's passing if it had, but when I was 11 and touring with "Every Good Boy..." I ate a dessert called a Brown Derby in the Bath Wimpy with my chaperone, Evelyn Maddock, and I can still remember how it tasted now
Evelyn had been a classics teacher at an all-girls school, and was not perhaps a natural choice for the job. She'd never had to look after a boy, for one thing. But she was a star, patiently dealing with my swollen head, teaching me for the sparse few hours the government insisted an 11-year old needed and then taking me all over the place to country houses, where I learned important things - like how to recognise Grinling Gibbons carving and how to tell Sevres from Limoges.
For a kid that age, going on tour was about the most exciting thing that could possibly have happened, but of course I can remember only snatches now. Getting caught smoking by Yannis Daras, the conductor; locking myself out of my hotel room about 10 times in Harlow; getting them to open the Ghost Train for me on Brighton Pier; and a ring doughnut covered with ice cream and topped with chocolate sauce and nuts. So in memory of EGBDF, Evelyn Maddock and the Brown Derby, here is Huddersfield's most significant landmark:

Lindisfarne

When I visited Coleraine in 2008, for some inexplicable reason we thought that going to a shopping mall was a better use of our time than visiting the Giant's Causeway. This is a decision I've always regretted, but despite being fully aware of this I am on the cusp of doing it again when Lindisfarne is mooted. I realise that the root of that choice was probably the same as this time; a jaded head full of wine, beer and Jagermeister.
It's only a short drive though, and I don't think anyone notices my twitching hands and grey complexion. And if there's a better hangover cure than a wet gale on a blasted North-Eastern island I've yet to discover it.
Once we've breakfasted on fantastic sausage sandwiches and great coffee we tackle St. Aidan's Church where there's this amazing sculpture of the Lindisfarne monks taking the remains of St Cuthbert to Durham. Oddly enough we've seen a replica of this piece in the piazza in front of the Gala Theatre.

 Later, when we're battling our way against the elements to the castle itself, I'm delighted to see there's enough  3G signal for me to check in at Lindisfarne on Facebook. Feels like sending an email in the Middle Ages.

A Stable Relationship

It's always a bit depressing to play to a small crowd, especially in a theatre of nearly 500. In Kirkcaldy this is probably not that unusual; it doesn't have a regular theatre crowd and it looks as though the publicity drive hasn't quite hit its mark. However, the first night in the Adam Smith frees us to try new things without the added stress of a packed house.
Anna (aka Kirkie, who regular fans will remember as Sue in Abigail's Party Mk II) and I explore a bit of emotional colour in our relationship, reasonably successfully too. It's complicated, because our appearances in the historical timeline of the play are filtered through the black and white of Alan's childhood memories, yet there probably has to be some suggestion of their relationship before the blinding.
I'm a big fan of Kirkie. As well as being lovely to watch when she's working, she also saved my life during the Musselburgh Incident. If it had actually been a cardiac arrest and I hadn't died anyway despite the quick response, that is. Oh, you know what I mean.

Dora (Kirkie) encourages Alan to watch more telly  

Sunday Latest

The British Stammering Association started their conference on Friday morning at Collingwood halls, where we're staying. By this morning everyone had registered, ho ho.

Horse Power

Alan (Matt) embraces Nugget (Aidan). Photo copyright Sheila Burnett

And They're Off!

It was a great opening. Everything worked beautifully - the protagonists held the audience breathless, the chorus moved with an easy fluidity and confident assurance, the lighting knit the show together with subtlety and grace.

On the surface it all went swimmingly, anyway, but in the bar afterwards we all gradually 'fess up to our personal purgatories and near-catastrophies. Like Matt (Alan) having to move his hand off Nugget's chest because Aidan's heart was beating so fiercely that it was actually visible. Like me automatically beginning to unbutton my trousers at one stage, offering the charming prospect of Trooper in vest and pants. Like lines dropped in the white heat of fear by almost everyone, including me.

But if that's the worst it's ever gonna be then we're in brilliant shape, and Michael's face was testament to that afterwards. And although today we say goodbye to many of the creative team including Katya, Kerry (our designer), Kris (production manager) and Paul (lighting designer) there is nonetheless a very happy time in prospect. Ave Equus!