Resurrection

The idea of doing a Bench production of "Hamlet" has swum back to the surface of my brain. I have several ideas floating around as to how I would want to tackle a production and hope to use this page as a way of expressing some of these ideas in advance of putting in a bid for a production slot. July 2010 has re-appeared as a vacant slot in the Bench calendar. The company have chosen a three hander, "Someone to Watch Over Me" by Frank McGuiness for February, and "The Crucible" for April. I have auditioned for "What the Butler Saw" in November of this year and will probably audition for the two plays above.

I need to decide whether my desire to do "Hamlet" will overcome my natural inertia.

Unesco International City of Film

Bradford, city of my birth, has been acclaimed as the UNESCO International City of Film! How cool is that!

Out of the blue

I got a phone call out of the blue from my agent in Brighton week before last offering me a job last week. I signed up with this agent before retiring from work and this was the very first phone call I had received from him. It is good to know I now have three active agents working on my behalf: Robert in London, Katie in Bath and Peter in Brighton. I hope this means more work in future. I hope none of the assignments get to the stage where they overlap each other but what a nice position to be in what! I don't know how anyone could make a living out of being a film extra but I am not in it for the money but rather for the buzz and the variety.

Last week's job was working on a TV series called "Returning the Reubens" and starring Timothy Spall. I can't tell you what was filmed but I can assure you that I was stood right behind Timothy Spall in the shot and as long as they keep the scene in the final film I will certainly be seen looming over his left shoulder. It was very interesting being able to overhear his conversations with the director and to watch a star actor at work from such a close range.

At the moment I am rehearsing the part of Scullery in "Road" by Jim Cartwright http://www.jimcartwright.co.uk/ (at Havant Arts Centre in July: see Bench Theatre link to the right). As part of the background information on the playwright, our director showed us clips from Vacuuming Completely Nude In Paradise (BBC 2001), in which Timothy Spall gave a magnificent, coruscating performance. He is a wonderful actor and based on the experience of last week's snippet of work not a half bad human being either!

I have just found out that the director wants me to sing in "Road". My father could sing and had a wonderful voice by all accounts, but my mother really couldn't. Fortunately my wife can and so can my two lovely daughters. I am now sweating on this new skill to be acquired rapidly. The director said rather casually, "Sing 'Danny Boy'", so that is what I am working on at the moment.

I have also got a part in "Life's Lottery" next week for Cloak and Dagger Murder Mystery http://www.murderdinner.co.uk/. We are working on a touring production of "The Party Guest" by Jacquie Penrose, Storytelling sessions at the Spring arts and cultural heritage centre in autumn, and on a new set of ghost stories for the Ghost Walks in Havant as part of the Havant Literary Festival Society http://www.havantlitfest.org.uk/

Parental Pride!

Below is the link to the News review of "Closer", in which the reviewer refers in glowing terms to the performance of Alice Corrigan as Anna:

"http://www.portsmouth.co.uk/entertainment/Review-Closer.5202520.jp"


Please forgive a father's pride in his younger daughter but the review says everything about the performance that I and her mother saw last night and were unable to express. Comic timing allied with purity of characterisation and emotional depth contributes to a stunning performance! Well done, Kitten!

This is a link to some stunning rehearsal photos by Finchy: http://www.flickr.com/photos/7174256@N03/sets/72157617196543832/

Quarter Final Winners!

Yes, folks! The Bench production of "Father For Justice" won the Southern Division quarter finals of the All England Theatre Festival and Martin McBride won the Best actor award yet again. It was interesting that the only other nominee was his co-star, Damon Wakelin, so the Bench were on something of a win-win situation there! The adjudicator gave a wonderful adjudication and what he said about the direction made my face glow with pride! I wish now I had asked for a written adjudication as it was really good to have all that praise heaped on my young and inexperienced shoulders. (OK, so the rest of me isn't that young and experienced, but my shoulders are!)

This win will only embolden me to continue my series of directorial guidelines for the new director.

I found support for my theory about choosing a bloody good cast in Brian Moore's column in the Monday Daily Telegraph. I was recommended the Monday Daily Telegraph for its sports/football coverage by a newsagent in the bed opposite when I was in hospital. Moore was writing about the task facing Ian McGeechan as he tries to put together a Lions Squad for the tour to South Africa. The quote which caught my eye was "It is the assembling of the team, not the training, which has the greatest impact on their chances of success."

If you change the word "team" to "cast" and the word "training" to "rehearsals", you will see that it almost replicates my point that the director's utmost priority is choosing the cast. The rehearsals are there to help that cast realise the play. They can be a help or a hindrance!

The Bench now travels to Devon to take part in the semi finals of the All England Theatre Festival as one of the "best of the west" quartet. We look forward to a new challenge!

Watch the listener

I was impressed by a Sky Arts 1 television production of "In the Company of Actors". It was the transfer of a Sydney Theatre company production of "Hedda Gabler" with Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving to the Brooklyn Academy of Music. The programme was an interesting look at the rehearsal process and would make a terrific Club Night for the Bench Theatre. Robyn Nevin, the STC Artistic Director, directed both the original production and the transfer to America. She made a number of telling comments about being pedantic about the script, about listening to the rhythm of the lines and insisting that the actors adhere to the words in the text. She also commented that when the books were down she would inevitably watch the actors listening on stage rather than the actors speaking. She found that their concentration and reactions in responding to the speeches were telling and uplifting.
In amateur acting actors without words to say sometimes see themselves as lesser roles as a consequence. I can remember at one workshop two actresses playing Gwendolen and Cecily in "Importance of Being Earnest" (not the ones in the final production I hasten to add) trying very hard not to impinge on the scene or the speeches of the young men, who are given all the words. I had to point out that these two young women were the whole reason for the scene and for the young men's speeches. Their reactions were paramount and of far greater importance than what the young men were saying. Actors sometimes need reminding to ask themselves why the writer wanted them on stage in this particular scene. Sometimes their presence is why the scene was written and that their reaction makes or breaks the scene. This is easier to understand if you are the lead character but are not given words in a particular scene. However this can be equally true of a smaller role and an ill-judged or badly thought out reaction can ruin a scene.

Being directed

I believe I have related elsewhere that I was personally directed by Michael Stevenson in "Shanghai". I had one tiny sequence where I had to cross a crowded room and had to do so on the personal nod of Michael Stevenson stood out of camera. I had grown to like Michael over the five days of shooting and realised he was much admired by those around him. Recently I was watching a television biography of David Lean. Michael Stevenson was interviewed with the tag line of second assistant director on "Lawrence of Arabia". This was in 1962 of course but Michael's list of credits on the Internet Movie Database (IMDb) is stunning: Harry Potter, Alexander, Atonement, Bourne Ultimatum and V for Vendetta to name but a few! Wow, so I can claim to have been "personally directed" by someone who has a fantastic film career and experience and who has worked with stars galore! I love this business!