La nouvelle saison shakespearienne à Stratford-upon-Avon
Stratford-upon-Avon est une ville-carte-postale. L’hiver en noir et blanc, la maison natale de Shakespeare reçoit la visite de quelques égarés dans le brouillard anglais, et le Royal Shakespeare Theatre, grand navire ancré sur les bords de l’Avon, ressemble à un vaisseau fantôme. Mais avec les jonquilles les couleurs reviennent et du monde entier affluent vers le théâtre, pour le grand sacrifice, tous les amoureux de Shakespeare, mais aussi des cars de touristes, pour qui la représentation du soir fait partie du circuit organisé.
Cette année, comme tous les ans, l’anniversaire de la naissance de Shakespeare (23 avril) sera célébré avec fastes, respect et amour, par la Royal Shakespeare Company. Comme tous les ans ? Pas tout à fait. Cette année, le R.S.T. fête ses cent ans. C’est en effet en 1975 que fut inauguré ce haut lieu du culte shakespearien, qui portait alors le nom évocateur de Shakespeare Memorial Theatre.
Le menu du centenaire est composé de pièces à la gloire de l’Angleterre et de son passé historique. Pièces bien faites pour remonter le moral des Anglais. La Saison débute le 8 avril avec Henry V, dont le morceau de bravoure est la fameuse exhortation d’Henry à ses soldats avant le combat : tout patriote anglais sent son cœur se gonfler d’orgueil. Les relations avec la France y sont aussi abordées, sur le mode tragique, mais surtout comique. La « rencontre au sommet » entre le Roi d’Angleterre et la Princesse française qui doit devenir sa femme, donne lieu à un « dialogue de sourds » qui n’est pas sans rappeler certains débats politiques.
Au mépris de toute chronologie, Henry V redeviendra le Prince Hal dans la seconde pièce au programme Henry IV (première partie), qui ouvrira le 24 avril. Pour connaître la suite du feuilleton et la fin du règne d’Henry IV, il faudra attendre le 24 juin. Henry IV est une pièce d’actualité : un usurpateur devenu roi, aux prises avec ses remords, se heurte à la difficulté d’être un chef d’état et le père d’un garçon turbulent et débauché. Elizabeth I, négligeant l’histoire morale et politique, fut surtout séduite par l’un des personnages les « importants » de la pièce : Sir John Falstaff, le principal héros des Joyeuses Commères de Windsor.
Vers la fin de l’été, la R.S.C. donnera donc une reprise des Joyeuses Commères de Windsor, dans une mise en scène de Terry Hands, datant de 1968. L’orchestration de la Saison 75 toute entière appartient d’ailleurs à Terry Hands, le plus jeune des metteurs en scène associés de la R.S.C.
Quant aux vedettes, ce sont toutes des « gloires maison » : tous ont, en effet, participé à plusieurs de ces « grandes machines » de la R.S.C. Alan Howard joue le Prince Hal, puis Henry V – c’est un comédien plein de fougue, un très bel Hamlet 1970. Son compagnon de beuveries, le bedonnant Falstaff, c’est Brewster Mason, dont la corpulence et la voix de basse prédestinaient, comme Orson Welles, à incarner Othello, en 1971. Son Iago d’alors était l’acteur gallois Emrys James qui tiendra cette année le rôle d’Henry IV, après une série de « villains » et un éblouissant et pathétique Roi Jean en 1974.
Malgré des rumeurs de « grand chambardement » au sein de la R.S.C., le Royal Shakespeare Theatre est un centenaire prestigieux qui se porte bien.
Article publié dans Les Nouvelles Littéraires, le 21 avril 1975.
Tuesday, 7 October 2008
Monday, 6 October 2008
Le Festival de Stratford upon Avon
Le « Grand Will » réincarné
Sous le regard indifférent des cygnes, à l’ombre des saules pleureurs, vous faites la queue pour obtenir des billets de théâtre. Il est dix heures ; le guichet de location vient d’ouvrir ; les hippies qui ont dormi sur les marches du Royal Shakespeare Theatre seront les premiers servis.
Notre contemporain
Si, après des heures d’attente au bord de la rivière, vous arrivez à décrocher, à l’arraché, mais dans la dignité, un billet, alors préparez-vous à recevoir un choc. Comme l’a dit, ici même, Matthieu Galey, « Shakespeare n’est plus tabou ». En voyant les représentations de la R.S.C. à Stratford on se demande s’il l’a jamais été. Il y a longtemps que Peter Brook et Terry Hands traitent Shakespeare comme leur contemporain. Mais ils ne sont pas les seuls. Les metteurs en scène de la R.S.C. sont sept comme les Merveilles du Monde, ou les nains de Blanche-Neige. Tous des hommes. Serait-on misogyne dans la « Maison de Shakespeare » ? Il y a une femme pourtant, elle s’appelle Buzz Goodbody, elle a vingt-six ans et n’est encore qu’assistante. Cette année, cependant, elle monte seule Comme il vous plaira, fin juin. Signe particulier de Buzz : elle est marxiste et le fait savoir.
Autre personnage : l’érudit, l’ancien prof de Cambridge : John Barton, gentil, barbu comme un faune, les yeux bleus un peu fous. Il se prend d’ailleurs pour Shakespeare, il « fait » du Shakespeare et il trompe les savants avec ses vers. Sa dernière trouvaille : faire jouer Richard II et Bolingbroke par deux acteurs qui se relaient dans les deux rôles – sur le thème du jeu théâtral Richard II prend tout à coup une autre dimension. Les protagonistes : Ian Richardson (Marat dans Marat/Sade) et Richard Pasco prennent tant de plaisir à ce jeu de masques qu’ils veulent tente la même expérience avec Claudius et Hamlet.
Tout se passe démocratiquement dans cette maison, le directeur, Trevor Nunn, n’étant là que pour harmoniser les discussions toujours longues et mouvementées. Ce rôle pacificateur lui va bien : il a l’air d’un sage oriental, longs cheveux, barbe noire et yeux légèrement bridés. Cette année, il ne dirigera pas, il se repose sur ses lauriers de l’année dernière, et se remet de sa surprise : le succès de l’Orgie Romaine qu’il a montée en 72. Les quatre tragédies romaines de Shakespeare sont très mal cotées au Box Office en général, peut-être parce qu’on ne les avait jamais jouées ensemble.
Terry Hands, lui, ne chôme pas, stimulé par son triomphe en France et en Angleterre avec la Comédie-Française, il a mis en scène – toujours pieds nus, pour être fidèle à son image – Roméo et Juliette. Gageons qu’il y a des hochements de tête désapprobateurs dans le public, parmi la vieille garde, mais les jeunes sont enthousiasmés de ne plus avoir à ingurgiter Shakespeare comme une potion.
Stratford-sur-kitsch
On ne peut encore rien dire de la quatrième pièce de la saison, on sait seulement que ce sera La mégère apprivoisée mise en scène par Clifford Williams (rappelez-vous le scandale causé par Le Vicaire et Oh ! Calcutta, il en est responsable), avec en vedette Alan Bates, pour la première fois sur la scène de Stratford, s’en s’être fait trop prier. La plupart des acteurs anglais rêvent de faire un petit tour sur les planches du R.S.T... Il n’y a plus de troupe permanente : la compagnie était fière de son homogénéité mais elle se sclérosait. Les contrats à long terme enchaînaient les acteurs qui se sauvaient à la première occasion. Il y a toujours des Artistes Associés, ils ont droit, comme les Comédiens Français à une mention sous leur nom, et on peut en voir la liste sur les programmes de la R.S.C., mais combien d’entre eux n’ont pas joué à Stratford depuis des années ! On renouvelle partiellement la troupe tous les deux ans. Shakespeare a besoin de sang neuf. Mais il y a des fidèles, des acteurs comme Ian Richardson qui sont restés plus de dix ans avec la R.S.C., se sont évadés momentanément de « l’Usine de Confitures » (comme on appelle le R.S.T.) et sont revenus « pleins d’usage et raison... »
Est-il besoin de parler de Peter Brook, le globe-trotter, l’enfant terrible de la R.S.C., l’insaisissable, qui terrifie les acteurs et les fait sortir d’eux-mêmes ? Ceux qui ont vu Marat/Sade et, cet hiver à Paris, Le Songe d’une nuit d’été, sauront à quels dons de magicien je fais allusion. Si l’année prochaine vous avez le courage de faire la queue à Stratford-sur-Kitsch, vous pourrez peut-être voir un de ses spectacles. A moins qu’il ne soit alors en Alaska ou à la Terre de Feu. Mais les six autres apprentis sorciers et adorateurs du Barde, seront, eux, fidèles au poste, unis dans le même amour de Shakespeare. Mais un amour iconoclaste.
Article publié dans Les Nouvelles Littéraires, le 11 juin 1973. C'est cet article, qu’un des acteurs épingla à l’Entrée des Artistes du RST, qui me permit de faire connaissance avec Terry Hands.
Sous le regard indifférent des cygnes, à l’ombre des saules pleureurs, vous faites la queue pour obtenir des billets de théâtre. Il est dix heures ; le guichet de location vient d’ouvrir ; les hippies qui ont dormi sur les marches du Royal Shakespeare Theatre seront les premiers servis.
Notre contemporain
Si, après des heures d’attente au bord de la rivière, vous arrivez à décrocher, à l’arraché, mais dans la dignité, un billet, alors préparez-vous à recevoir un choc. Comme l’a dit, ici même, Matthieu Galey, « Shakespeare n’est plus tabou ». En voyant les représentations de la R.S.C. à Stratford on se demande s’il l’a jamais été. Il y a longtemps que Peter Brook et Terry Hands traitent Shakespeare comme leur contemporain. Mais ils ne sont pas les seuls. Les metteurs en scène de la R.S.C. sont sept comme les Merveilles du Monde, ou les nains de Blanche-Neige. Tous des hommes. Serait-on misogyne dans la « Maison de Shakespeare » ? Il y a une femme pourtant, elle s’appelle Buzz Goodbody, elle a vingt-six ans et n’est encore qu’assistante. Cette année, cependant, elle monte seule Comme il vous plaira, fin juin. Signe particulier de Buzz : elle est marxiste et le fait savoir.
Autre personnage : l’érudit, l’ancien prof de Cambridge : John Barton, gentil, barbu comme un faune, les yeux bleus un peu fous. Il se prend d’ailleurs pour Shakespeare, il « fait » du Shakespeare et il trompe les savants avec ses vers. Sa dernière trouvaille : faire jouer Richard II et Bolingbroke par deux acteurs qui se relaient dans les deux rôles – sur le thème du jeu théâtral Richard II prend tout à coup une autre dimension. Les protagonistes : Ian Richardson (Marat dans Marat/Sade) et Richard Pasco prennent tant de plaisir à ce jeu de masques qu’ils veulent tente la même expérience avec Claudius et Hamlet.
Tout se passe démocratiquement dans cette maison, le directeur, Trevor Nunn, n’étant là que pour harmoniser les discussions toujours longues et mouvementées. Ce rôle pacificateur lui va bien : il a l’air d’un sage oriental, longs cheveux, barbe noire et yeux légèrement bridés. Cette année, il ne dirigera pas, il se repose sur ses lauriers de l’année dernière, et se remet de sa surprise : le succès de l’Orgie Romaine qu’il a montée en 72. Les quatre tragédies romaines de Shakespeare sont très mal cotées au Box Office en général, peut-être parce qu’on ne les avait jamais jouées ensemble.
Terry Hands, lui, ne chôme pas, stimulé par son triomphe en France et en Angleterre avec la Comédie-Française, il a mis en scène – toujours pieds nus, pour être fidèle à son image – Roméo et Juliette. Gageons qu’il y a des hochements de tête désapprobateurs dans le public, parmi la vieille garde, mais les jeunes sont enthousiasmés de ne plus avoir à ingurgiter Shakespeare comme une potion.
Stratford-sur-kitsch
On ne peut encore rien dire de la quatrième pièce de la saison, on sait seulement que ce sera La mégère apprivoisée mise en scène par Clifford Williams (rappelez-vous le scandale causé par Le Vicaire et Oh ! Calcutta, il en est responsable), avec en vedette Alan Bates, pour la première fois sur la scène de Stratford, s’en s’être fait trop prier. La plupart des acteurs anglais rêvent de faire un petit tour sur les planches du R.S.T... Il n’y a plus de troupe permanente : la compagnie était fière de son homogénéité mais elle se sclérosait. Les contrats à long terme enchaînaient les acteurs qui se sauvaient à la première occasion. Il y a toujours des Artistes Associés, ils ont droit, comme les Comédiens Français à une mention sous leur nom, et on peut en voir la liste sur les programmes de la R.S.C., mais combien d’entre eux n’ont pas joué à Stratford depuis des années ! On renouvelle partiellement la troupe tous les deux ans. Shakespeare a besoin de sang neuf. Mais il y a des fidèles, des acteurs comme Ian Richardson qui sont restés plus de dix ans avec la R.S.C., se sont évadés momentanément de « l’Usine de Confitures » (comme on appelle le R.S.T.) et sont revenus « pleins d’usage et raison... »
Est-il besoin de parler de Peter Brook, le globe-trotter, l’enfant terrible de la R.S.C., l’insaisissable, qui terrifie les acteurs et les fait sortir d’eux-mêmes ? Ceux qui ont vu Marat/Sade et, cet hiver à Paris, Le Songe d’une nuit d’été, sauront à quels dons de magicien je fais allusion. Si l’année prochaine vous avez le courage de faire la queue à Stratford-sur-Kitsch, vous pourrez peut-être voir un de ses spectacles. A moins qu’il ne soit alors en Alaska ou à la Terre de Feu. Mais les six autres apprentis sorciers et adorateurs du Barde, seront, eux, fidèles au poste, unis dans le même amour de Shakespeare. Mais un amour iconoclaste.
Article publié dans Les Nouvelles Littéraires, le 11 juin 1973. C'est cet article, qu’un des acteurs épingla à l’Entrée des Artistes du RST, qui me permit de faire connaissance avec Terry Hands.
Saturday, 9 August 2008
Drat, I could have made a killing!
A few months ago, I bought two pairs of tickets for Leonard Cohen at the O2 on 17 July (see why here). A couple of weeks before the show, I managed to sell the extra pair on eBay for a few pounds (no, really, only a few pounds) more than its face value. Before the man announced he was coming back on 13 November, and now also the following night (if that concert is sold out too, he will have filled 60,000 seats in London – not bad for an old guy of 74, is it?), my tickets were something very precious and some people did buy seats for hundreds of pounds on eBay. But I’m not a ticket tout, I wasn’t trying to make a profit, I just wanted to get my money back. The few extra pounds certainly didn’t cover the hassle and time spent trying to get those precious tickets. Still, someone bought them and I was very happy.
Forget Leonard, though, it’s tickets for the new RSC Hamlet with David Tennant and Patrick Stewart I should have bought seats for! I’m on the priority mailing list, I could have got tickets (for the Stratford and London runs) very early on for £40 and sold them on eBay for around £300 (that's their current price).
Problem is, I don’t watch Dr Who or Star Trek and I had no idea a whole lot of mad fans would suddenly want to sit in the theatre and watch the longest play in the Shakespearean canon. I think some of them are in for a shock and a disappointment: when it comes to supernatural beings, there is a ghost in Hamlet, but that’s about it – and there are no intergalactic creatures at all.
The RSC has ‘asked people to desist from bidding for the tickets. As part of our terms and conditions, they are not to be sold for commercial gain. The tickets are for their own use.’ However, unless eBay closes the auctions down, I can’t see how the RSC can stop people from buying and using those tickets.
People’s names are printed on the tickets, but in order for them not to be used the ushers would have to check IDs at the door; or the RSC would have to scour the auctions, draw lists of performance dates and seat numbers, and the ushers would have to check tickets against those lists every evening. I don’t see it somehow.
Forgot to say: it’s not just that I’m not a fan of those TV programmes, it’s that I don’t really like David Tennant and Patrick Stewart. The former was a terrible Antipholus of Syracuse in a dreadful production of Comedy of Errors a few years ago. He was good in a wonderfully frightening play entitled The Pillowman at the National, but, basically, I think he lacks charm – and he makes faces. As for the latter, I’ve known him – as an actor – for nearly 40 years. I’ve seen him in dozens of RSC productions: he is what you might call a ‘solid performer’, i.e. someone who’s never very bad, but rarely very good. He was pretty good as Antony in the latest RSC Antony and Cleo, and I remember him as Launce with a hilarious, gloomy dog in The Two Gentlemen of Verona, in 1970, but I can’t think of any production where one came out saying, ‘Wow, wasn’t Patrick Stewart amazing!’ Oh, and he nearly killed me once, but that’s another story...
Also, I feel a little bit Shakespeared out: I have seen all of the guy’s 37 plays ten, nay, twenty times over. Even the obscure ones (Timon of Athens, Titus Andronicus...) I’ve seen at least three times. I need a Shakespeare moratorium. The thought of seeing another production of Hamlet gave me a migraine, so I didn’t book. My loss, obviously.
Slapping the silly – and ignorant – fans who wouldn’t touch Hamlet with a barge pole if it didn’t have TV stars in it!
And the RSC for pretending to be surprised by what’s happening. Yeah, right!
Addendum (31/08/08): The day I was nearly killed by Patrick Stewart:
I was watching a poorly attended matinee of a very bad production of Titus Andronicus, with PT in the title role, at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford. I was sitting in the front row; there were several empty seats on either side of me. In the course of a furious fight, at some point in the first half of the play, PT let go of his heavy sword (the RST craftsmen pride themselves in creating ‘authentic’ weapons), which did several somersaults in the air – watched in disbelief by me and a few hundred people – before landing vertically at the foot of the nearest seat on my left, i.e. a few centimetres from me. There was an audible gasp from the audience, as the sword remained there, swaying gently. The look of horror in the eyes of all the actors on the stage was something to behold, but they never missed a beat. I don’t think I heard much of the play after that. In the interval, PT and several of the actors rushed towards me to ask whether I was all right. They were pretty shaken up too. The sword was unstuck from the floor and everything went back to normal. The second half proceeded without any other drama – either in the auditorium, or on stage (unfortunately).
Forget Leonard, though, it’s tickets for the new RSC Hamlet with David Tennant and Patrick Stewart I should have bought seats for! I’m on the priority mailing list, I could have got tickets (for the Stratford and London runs) very early on for £40 and sold them on eBay for around £300 (that's their current price).
Problem is, I don’t watch Dr Who or Star Trek and I had no idea a whole lot of mad fans would suddenly want to sit in the theatre and watch the longest play in the Shakespearean canon. I think some of them are in for a shock and a disappointment: when it comes to supernatural beings, there is a ghost in Hamlet, but that’s about it – and there are no intergalactic creatures at all.
The RSC has ‘asked people to desist from bidding for the tickets. As part of our terms and conditions, they are not to be sold for commercial gain. The tickets are for their own use.’ However, unless eBay closes the auctions down, I can’t see how the RSC can stop people from buying and using those tickets.
People’s names are printed on the tickets, but in order for them not to be used the ushers would have to check IDs at the door; or the RSC would have to scour the auctions, draw lists of performance dates and seat numbers, and the ushers would have to check tickets against those lists every evening. I don’t see it somehow.
Forgot to say: it’s not just that I’m not a fan of those TV programmes, it’s that I don’t really like David Tennant and Patrick Stewart. The former was a terrible Antipholus of Syracuse in a dreadful production of Comedy of Errors a few years ago. He was good in a wonderfully frightening play entitled The Pillowman at the National, but, basically, I think he lacks charm – and he makes faces. As for the latter, I’ve known him – as an actor – for nearly 40 years. I’ve seen him in dozens of RSC productions: he is what you might call a ‘solid performer’, i.e. someone who’s never very bad, but rarely very good. He was pretty good as Antony in the latest RSC Antony and Cleo, and I remember him as Launce with a hilarious, gloomy dog in The Two Gentlemen of Verona, in 1970, but I can’t think of any production where one came out saying, ‘Wow, wasn’t Patrick Stewart amazing!’ Oh, and he nearly killed me once, but that’s another story...
Also, I feel a little bit Shakespeared out: I have seen all of the guy’s 37 plays ten, nay, twenty times over. Even the obscure ones (Timon of Athens, Titus Andronicus...) I’ve seen at least three times. I need a Shakespeare moratorium. The thought of seeing another production of Hamlet gave me a migraine, so I didn’t book. My loss, obviously.
Slapping the silly – and ignorant – fans who wouldn’t touch Hamlet with a barge pole if it didn’t have TV stars in it!
And the RSC for pretending to be surprised by what’s happening. Yeah, right!
Addendum (31/08/08): The day I was nearly killed by Patrick Stewart:
I was watching a poorly attended matinee of a very bad production of Titus Andronicus, with PT in the title role, at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford. I was sitting in the front row; there were several empty seats on either side of me. In the course of a furious fight, at some point in the first half of the play, PT let go of his heavy sword (the RST craftsmen pride themselves in creating ‘authentic’ weapons), which did several somersaults in the air – watched in disbelief by me and a few hundred people – before landing vertically at the foot of the nearest seat on my left, i.e. a few centimetres from me. There was an audible gasp from the audience, as the sword remained there, swaying gently. The look of horror in the eyes of all the actors on the stage was something to behold, but they never missed a beat. I don’t think I heard much of the play after that. In the interval, PT and several of the actors rushed towards me to ask whether I was all right. They were pretty shaken up too. The sword was unstuck from the floor and everything went back to normal. The second half proceeded without any other drama – either in the auditorium, or on stage (unfortunately).
Saturday, 19 May 2007
Grotesque and unseemly
Back in February I wrote about the huge part Ian Richardson played in my life (see Old and desolate). On Tuesday, three months after his death, a memorial service was held at the Actors’ Church – St Paul’s Covent Garden. My partner and I were lucky to be able to attend it. Here you will find a lovely account of what it was like, by the writer Brian Sibley, and here a complete list of all the famous theatre/film/TV folk who came to pay tribute to their late colleague .
What these articles don't mention is that Helen Mirren started crying even before the service began and could hardly be heard when she read out the moving ‘Dirge Without Music’ by Edna St Vincent Millay. It was very endearing.
What they don't tell you either is that we all came out of the church to be met by a swarm of paparazzi, professional autograph hunters and pushy elderly fans of both sexes. What is wrong with these people? Have they no shame?! OK, there had been laughter as well as tears during the service, but this was still a sad occasion. Who turns up at such an event and behaves as if it were a press night? I always thought that celebrities were fair game, that if you spent your life courting publicity you couldn’t complain if your privacy was invaded. I have changed my mind.
We were chatting with the actor Michael Pennington (whom I’ve known for 30 years) when a man sidled up to him, opened a folder and asked him to sign photos of himself. Michael, who’s the gentlest of souls, signed photo after photo – five or six, I think – with good grace. We were indignant on his behalf. When I said, ‘How much will these fetch on eBay?’, the guy pretended they were for a friend of his in New Zealand!
Most of the famous folk let themselves be photographed too: the last thing anyone wants is to be splashed all over the tabloids and being described as unhelpful and rude to ‘the great British public’. It was painful to watch.
After saying hello to a few more people and being stared at a lot (‘Are they famous, do you think?’ ‘Nah, don’t bother with them!’), we walked away and wandered around Covent Garden. About an hour later, we went in search of somewhere to eat. We ended up in Catherine Street and walking past one of the restaurants we noticed a couple of the autograph hunters who’d been at the church earlier, standing outside in the cold, apparently waiting for something, or someone. Obviously, a few of the ‘celebrities’ were having lunch there. They were going to be accosted and pestered again when they came out.
Slap!
What these articles don't mention is that Helen Mirren started crying even before the service began and could hardly be heard when she read out the moving ‘Dirge Without Music’ by Edna St Vincent Millay. It was very endearing.
What they don't tell you either is that we all came out of the church to be met by a swarm of paparazzi, professional autograph hunters and pushy elderly fans of both sexes. What is wrong with these people? Have they no shame?! OK, there had been laughter as well as tears during the service, but this was still a sad occasion. Who turns up at such an event and behaves as if it were a press night? I always thought that celebrities were fair game, that if you spent your life courting publicity you couldn’t complain if your privacy was invaded. I have changed my mind.
We were chatting with the actor Michael Pennington (whom I’ve known for 30 years) when a man sidled up to him, opened a folder and asked him to sign photos of himself. Michael, who’s the gentlest of souls, signed photo after photo – five or six, I think – with good grace. We were indignant on his behalf. When I said, ‘How much will these fetch on eBay?’, the guy pretended they were for a friend of his in New Zealand!
Most of the famous folk let themselves be photographed too: the last thing anyone wants is to be splashed all over the tabloids and being described as unhelpful and rude to ‘the great British public’. It was painful to watch.
After saying hello to a few more people and being stared at a lot (‘Are they famous, do you think?’ ‘Nah, don’t bother with them!’), we walked away and wandered around Covent Garden. About an hour later, we went in search of somewhere to eat. We ended up in Catherine Street and walking past one of the restaurants we noticed a couple of the autograph hunters who’d been at the church earlier, standing outside in the cold, apparently waiting for something, or someone. Obviously, a few of the ‘celebrities’ were having lunch there. They were going to be accosted and pestered again when they came out.
Slap!
Sunday, 6 May 2007
Small pleasures from small favours
Since I’ve already denied women the right to make fools of themselves by taking up pole dancing as exercise and learning it at public classes, and thereby contributing to the backlash against feminism, I thought I would now deny women the right to have children at an age when they should be playing with their children’s children or enjoying retirement. But too much has been said about that 63-year-old mother-to-be and the subject has gone stale on me.
Instead, I want to slap people who, having acquired a little bit of power, suddenly take themselves seriously and refuse to do other people small favours, when it’s no skin off their noses.
My partner and I went to Stratford-upon-Avon for Shakespeare’s Birthday (April 23rd, in case you’ve forgotten when it was): the Royal Shakespeare Company had planned masses of events and we thought it would be good fun.
We hadn’t booked for anything (we’d learned about it too late), but we managed to attend two very interesting events (one about playing Cleopatra – with Harriet Walter and Janet Suzman; the other about the Sonnets – with Patrick Stewart and my beloved John Barton). There had been a few tickets left for the first talk, but the second one was booked up. Nevertheless we thought there might be some returns so we queued anyway. There weren’t, but just before the start we were let in, together with four or five other people, because there was space and because they took pity on us. We stood, or sat on the floor, at the back of the room, and spent a wonderful, stimulating two hours.
There was one more event we ‘didn’t mind’ attending: an interview with Judi Dench. It was to take place in the big marquee that had been erected in one of the theatre gardens (and where we’d heard the two Cleopatras earlier that day). For this too tickets were unnumbered and the queue to go in was unbelievable: it went round and round and round… We, and a very small group of other unfortunate, ticket-less people, waited for everyone to be seated. We had money in our hands; there was plenty of standing room on the side of the seating area and there didn’t seem to be any reason why we couldn’t be let in. That’s when I noticed her – Bronwyn Robertson, the most officious woman ever, and I more or less knew we were waiting in vain.
She could have said to us, “You’ve been waiting so patiently; there’s only a few of you; this is the last event of the day; I cannot deprive you of the pleasure of listening to Dame Judi, who’s come specially today – a Sunday – to give this interview. Please come in!” But she didn’t say it and everyone wandered off (one person was in a wheelchair – you’d think she would have allowed them in), disappointed. We did hear the interview for a while, because we discovered that, if we positioned ourselves in a special spot, behind the marquee, and listened closely, we could hear every word. Unfortunately, the questions were so lame and banal and so unworthy of her talent that we gave up halfway through. But that's not the point.
It would have been so easy for Bronwyn to make us all happy. But, no, it was in her power to deny us and she did. I wonder if she got any satisfaction out of it.
I first met Bronwyn in 1974, when I lived in Stratford and needed a job. She was secretary to one of the directors; she was obstructive and annoying. She was then put in charge of something or other and she carried on being unhelpful. I must have been introduced to her a dozen times. She always forgot who I was. It requires a special kind of person to ‘forget’ completely someone they see practically every day.
While I’m slapping people who deserved it in the past but who only got the utmost courtesy from me because I was still hoping to have a career with the RSC at the time I might as well mention Diana Minchall. We met in 1977, when we were both attending the Summer School and were staying in the same B&B. She knew no one; I knew everyone. By the time she went back to London she knew everyone too. Two years later, when she got a job with the RSC (in the Publicity Department), she had a head start. I had told her about the vacancy so she could apply for it and when she got the job she promised to return the favour. Yeah right!
Not only did she not help me in any way but, within a few weeks of her taking up her new post, one might have thought she was the RSC’s Artistic Director, judging from the way she started behaving. I stopped being in the secret of the gods because my contacts assumed she was giving me lots of info and I didn’t need to be told anything.
She was there for about ten years and I never got another chance to get a job with the RSC. Instead of being a help she was an obstruction. I’ve been wanting to slap her smug face for a very long time. There!
When I used to work at Penhaligon’s I had access to perfumes that everyone valued immensely. I was in a position to give my friends a few samples from time to time. And why not? My mistake is that I’ve always expected others to derive as much pleasure from doing (or returning) favours as I have.
I’m sure Judi Dench would have been very sad to know that half a dozen people were turned away that day – for no good reason whatsoever – because of some self-important official.
Slap!
Instead, I want to slap people who, having acquired a little bit of power, suddenly take themselves seriously and refuse to do other people small favours, when it’s no skin off their noses.
My partner and I went to Stratford-upon-Avon for Shakespeare’s Birthday (April 23rd, in case you’ve forgotten when it was): the Royal Shakespeare Company had planned masses of events and we thought it would be good fun.
We hadn’t booked for anything (we’d learned about it too late), but we managed to attend two very interesting events (one about playing Cleopatra – with Harriet Walter and Janet Suzman; the other about the Sonnets – with Patrick Stewart and my beloved John Barton). There had been a few tickets left for the first talk, but the second one was booked up. Nevertheless we thought there might be some returns so we queued anyway. There weren’t, but just before the start we were let in, together with four or five other people, because there was space and because they took pity on us. We stood, or sat on the floor, at the back of the room, and spent a wonderful, stimulating two hours.
There was one more event we ‘didn’t mind’ attending: an interview with Judi Dench. It was to take place in the big marquee that had been erected in one of the theatre gardens (and where we’d heard the two Cleopatras earlier that day). For this too tickets were unnumbered and the queue to go in was unbelievable: it went round and round and round… We, and a very small group of other unfortunate, ticket-less people, waited for everyone to be seated. We had money in our hands; there was plenty of standing room on the side of the seating area and there didn’t seem to be any reason why we couldn’t be let in. That’s when I noticed her – Bronwyn Robertson, the most officious woman ever, and I more or less knew we were waiting in vain.
She could have said to us, “You’ve been waiting so patiently; there’s only a few of you; this is the last event of the day; I cannot deprive you of the pleasure of listening to Dame Judi, who’s come specially today – a Sunday – to give this interview. Please come in!” But she didn’t say it and everyone wandered off (one person was in a wheelchair – you’d think she would have allowed them in), disappointed. We did hear the interview for a while, because we discovered that, if we positioned ourselves in a special spot, behind the marquee, and listened closely, we could hear every word. Unfortunately, the questions were so lame and banal and so unworthy of her talent that we gave up halfway through. But that's not the point.
It would have been so easy for Bronwyn to make us all happy. But, no, it was in her power to deny us and she did. I wonder if she got any satisfaction out of it.
I first met Bronwyn in 1974, when I lived in Stratford and needed a job. She was secretary to one of the directors; she was obstructive and annoying. She was then put in charge of something or other and she carried on being unhelpful. I must have been introduced to her a dozen times. She always forgot who I was. It requires a special kind of person to ‘forget’ completely someone they see practically every day.
While I’m slapping people who deserved it in the past but who only got the utmost courtesy from me because I was still hoping to have a career with the RSC at the time I might as well mention Diana Minchall. We met in 1977, when we were both attending the Summer School and were staying in the same B&B. She knew no one; I knew everyone. By the time she went back to London she knew everyone too. Two years later, when she got a job with the RSC (in the Publicity Department), she had a head start. I had told her about the vacancy so she could apply for it and when she got the job she promised to return the favour. Yeah right!
Not only did she not help me in any way but, within a few weeks of her taking up her new post, one might have thought she was the RSC’s Artistic Director, judging from the way she started behaving. I stopped being in the secret of the gods because my contacts assumed she was giving me lots of info and I didn’t need to be told anything.
She was there for about ten years and I never got another chance to get a job with the RSC. Instead of being a help she was an obstruction. I’ve been wanting to slap her smug face for a very long time. There!
When I used to work at Penhaligon’s I had access to perfumes that everyone valued immensely. I was in a position to give my friends a few samples from time to time. And why not? My mistake is that I’ve always expected others to derive as much pleasure from doing (or returning) favours as I have.
I’m sure Judi Dench would have been very sad to know that half a dozen people were turned away that day – for no good reason whatsoever – because of some self-important official.
Slap!
Friday, 9 February 2007
Old and desolate
Patrick Magee as Sade and Ian Richardson as Marat
... that’s how you feel when the idols of your youth disappear. Gods should not be allowed to die.
The actor Ian Richardson died this morning, in his sleep.
I am in shock.
The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as performed by the inmates of the Asylum of Charenton under the direction of the Marquis de Sade (at the time of its release in the ’60s, people joked, 'I haven't seen the film, but I've read the title') or Marat/Sade, directed by Peter Brook, changed the course of my life – literally. I owe my love of the theatre to that film and it's because of it (and more especially because of Ian Richardson, who played Marat) that I stopped studying psychology at the Sorbonne and took up English instead. The first time I saw it, I stayed for two performances and nearly missed a train I had to catch that evening.
I will write more later.
Update (10 February): By the time the world became aware of him, Ian Richardson was already past his prime. Yes, he was wonderful as Francis Urquhart in House of Cards. Absolutely wonderful, but...
I was there. I was there, night after night, matinee after matinee, in the dark and womblike auditorium of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, standing at the back of the stalls, leaning on my railing, lapping it all up: the scenery, the costumes, the music, the verse, the emotions. I was there when Ian Richardson was a god and he knew it and he had the audience hanging on his every inflection, when his voice soared... ah!...
Don’t just take my word for it. Every review of every play he was in mentioned the voice, but this is what Roger Lewis says in his book Stage People:
He sings his sentences, his voice swooping from a bellow to a whisper, from a hoot to a silence. Richardson’s voice is his instrument; he is conscious of it and proud of it; he plays upon it and with it. He can draw out a single word into an alarming stutter of syllables, like a libretto fragmented and reproduced under the stave; he’ll then speed ahead, putting a girdle around a paragraph in four seconds.It was the voice above all. But also the poise, the stillness. And the wit. And the sense of danger too. There, on the stage, not preserved in aspic for posterity.
He’s gone and hardly anyone is mentioning Shakespeare. My 20-year-old self would never have believed it. It makes me very sad now.
I knew Ian Richardson – a tiny little bit. I lived in his Stratford house, with two other girls, for the best part of 1974. He wasn’t there; he was renting it out to us. The house was very cold; my room was the coldest of all, but I didn’t care. There was a throne from some past RSC production on the patio; Marat’s tin bath was rusting at the bottom of the garden; his acting editions of Penguin Shakespeare were sitting on the shelves in the living room (they got thrown away a little later and I now wish I had ‘stolen’ a couple of them, but I didn’t dare at the time). Fans used to walk past the house, stop and point at it. Told you he was a star.
He used to scare me to death, from time to time, by turning up unannounced (always accompanied by his wife, who usually remained silent) and demand to know why the lawn hadn’t been mown (the neighbours were always complaining). I’ve heard Marat and Francis Urquhart and Angelo and Richard II yell my name from the bottom of the stairs and then discuss mundane things. It was wonderful.
Later that year, when I was working at the Aldwych Theatre (dressing the tallest actor in the company, of course – some kind of hazing I believe it was), we used to pass each other backstage every night and exchange no more than a smile, except once, when he said something so bitchy about someone we both knew that I was in hysterics for the rest of the evening. That’s also how I want to remember him: rather camp and mercurial.
I visited eBay last night: lots of people are trying to cash in on Ian’s death and flogging photos and letters signed by him. I have a few of those, among them a very grumpy letter: I had reproached him for wasting his time on rubbishy stuff (it must have been before House of Cards), and he had written back defending his choices. I wasn’t convinced, and I was right: a few years later, he said in an interview that he bitterly regretted not doing stage work any longer, and Shakespeare in particular.
I also have the waistcoat he wore as the Government Inspector at the Old Vic (I didn’t steal it; I bought it for a few pounds at a charity auction). No, you won’t find it listed on eBay either – not now, not at any time in the future.
What else can I say? I saw him recently at the National Theatre, in a play, and also talking about his career (I went mainly because my younger self would not have missed it and I owed it to her). He was just as entertaining as ever. He said he would probably never act on the stage again (a premonition?) and his one regret was that he’d never got a chance to tackle King Lear. He sounded happy, though.
There’s no doubt about it: it was the voice that did it.
Update: To hear the voice that mesmerized me 40 years ago, click here
Wednesday, 28 June 2006
Tête à claques XI
Told you the mellowness wouldn’t last long.Before you go on reading, please answer this question: did you enjoy Truly Madly Deeply? If you’ve answered, “Oh my god, it’s my favourite movie; I’ve seen it 25 times and cried soooo much each time,” you can stop reading now because this post will upset you.
If, on the other hand, you’ve answered, “Ugh! That movie made me want to throw up: it was so syrupy and fake and the acting was disgusting,” then please carry on.
Juliet Stevenson was the main culprit and I wanted to slap her very hard for it when the film came out, all those years ago, and I can’t wait one minute longer.
I used to adore her. I saw her in her very first part at the RSC in 1978. She was 20 years old, I think, and fresh from drama school. She’d got the part of a servant in a marvellous production of The Taming of the Shrew because the actress who should have been playing that part had broken her leg or something, and she made a great impact in that small part. I got to know her and the following year she even stayed in my flat in Paris, while I spent the summer in Stratford. I saw everything she was in and was never disappointed. She had a superb, distinctive, grown-up voice and she was always good. She was also very serious and dedicated and had unbelievable self-discipline.
And then Truly Madly Deeply happened and that was it. She became the most mannered actress ever – a kind of caricature. My partner’s theory is that she was praised so much for her performance in that film that she must have thought that was what the public wanted from her so she gave it more of the same. And she started playing fluffy (she doesn’t have the physique for fluffiness) and scatty women because she was offered other parts like that after that landmark film. Her voice got shriller too.
I stopped being able to watch her, but I don’t give up easily on people and I’ve seen her in other things since then – just because I keep hoping that one day she will be the powerful performer she was when she was young. Tonight my partner and I saw her in a terrible production of The Seagull, directed by the perverse Katie Mitchell. Perverse because she decided to go against the text all through, without any reason whatsoever. Perhaps tomorrow’s reviews will reveal that the nonsense we saw on the stage had some profound meaning, but I doubt it. Juliet wasn’t bad, but she couldn’t be good in such a preposterous production. I’m afraid I hid from her, when she walked by in the foyer after the show. “Darling, you were wonderful!” I couldn’t possibly have said that to her – no way.
I’m slapping Dame Juliet (it’s only a question of time…) for being such a disappointment.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
