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And in the end they might even thank me with a garden in my name
Once again the Malden Public Library comes through with Kate Dunn's Exit Through the Fireplace: The Great Days of Rep (1998), a capacious, irreproducible oral history of repertory theatre in the UK. Its timeline of personal recollection runs from the 1920's into the decade of publication, documenting a diverse and vivid case for the professional and communal value of regional theatre without rose-glassing its historically shabbier or more exploitative aspects; its survey includes the subspecies of fit-up theatre which flourished primarily outside of England and devotes chapters to stage management, design, and directing as well as acting and the factor of the audience. It's a serious chunk of scholarship from a writer who is herself fourth-generation in the theater, which must have helped with assembling its roster of close to two hundred contributors. It's just impossible to read much of it without cracking up on a page-by-page basis. Despite the caution in the introduction not to view the heyday of rep as a perpetual goes wrong machine, the cumulative effect of thrills and tattiness and especially the relentless deep-end pace of getting a new play up every week writes its own Noises Off:
Howard Attfield was another actor who was caught on the hop. He remembers, 'I was playing an inspector, I forget the name of the murder thriller, and it was a matinée day and very hot and I remember standing in the dressing-room and I was having a shave, and I thought I had all the time in the world because my first entrance wasn't until the ending of the first act. The inspector comes in, says his lines and ends the first act. So I was standing there quite happily in my boxer shorts having a shave when I heard my call, which I could not believe, and I went absolutely wild. My costume was a suit, an inspector's suit, and a sort of a trench coat and a hat. Anyway, I thought I'd best put on something, the least possible, so I put on trousers and I remember putting on shoes without socks, then I put on the trench coat, did it all up as I'm flying out the door, grabbed the hat and went charging down the stairs, saying, "I'm coming, I'm coming, I'm coming," and I made it on to the stage just in time, but as I went on someone in the wings said, "Shaving foam, shaving foam!" and I realized that I'd got halfway through this shave and I hadn't wiped it off. Luckily it was on the upstage side, as I was coming on from stage right. So instead of looking at the audience, I did everything looking from stage right to stage left, and the upstage bit was foam in my ears and right round my face. I delivered the line and the curtains came down and I collapsed on the floor half naked and half shaven.'
Persons in this book set themselves on fire, fall out of their costumes, get flattened by scenery, fuck up lines, props, entrances, exits, sound cues, lighting cues, scene changes, the sprinkler system. The number of actors who started their careers as assistant stage managers appears to have been part of the apprenticeship quality of rep; the number of actors who were abruptly promoted because a lead had flanicked screaming into the night feels more telling. "It wasn't till many years later that I got into the truly creative side of acting. In those days it was a question of learn the lines and don't bump into the furniture." It is a tribute to the book's scope that so many of its names are unfamiliar to me when my knowledge of older British actors is not nil; it's not just a skim of national treasures. For every Rachel Kempson, Bernard Hepton, or Fiona Shaw, there's an actor like Attfield whose handful of small parts in film and television has barely impinged on me or even one like Jean Byam who was so strictly stage-based that it would never have been possible for me to see her in anything. At the same time, thanks to its compilation from personal histories, I have been left in possession of some truly random facts concerning actors of long or recent acquaintance during their repertory careers, e.g. Alec McCowen corpsed like anything and at one point became convinced that he could telepathically cause a fellow actor to forget their lines. Richard Pasco had such reliable stage fright that the manager of the Birmingham Rep would knock him up five minutes before curtain to check whether he'd been sick yet. Clive Francis had a stammer so bad it made him the bête noire of the prompt corner at Bexhill-on-Sea. (Robin Ellis did not have a stammer, but found it a lifeline during one particularly non-stop season to play a character with one because it gave him the extra time to reach for his next line.) Bernard Cribbins does not name the production for which he was required to transport a goat—an actual goat, from a farm on the moors—by bus to the theatre, leaving unexplained the reasons it had to be a real one. Of course it was medically possible in the '60's, but it is still n-v-t-s to me that Derek Jacobi got smallpox doing panto in Birmingham. That art was produced by this theatrical system as opposed to merely peerless anecdotes absolutely deserves celebration. As a resource for writers as well as theatre historians and actors, the book is a treasure. Details about interwar digs and mid-century tea matinées would not be out of place in Angela Carter. The less farcical side of all the blowups and breakdowns is the assertion by more than one interviewee that rep provided, if not exactly a safe, then at least a survivable space for a growing actor to fail in ways that were essential to their confidence and their craft: "If you didn't become a great actor in weekly rep, at least you learnt to control your nerves. Despite all the throwing up on a Monday, one seemed to be ice cool on stage, because you knew you mustn't give anything away and you mustn't make your fellow actors look bad." But also one night at the David Garrick Theatre in the late '40's Lionel Jeffries lost hold of a lettuce leaf that sailed out into the stalls and splatted itself dressing and all onto a member of the public and that Saturday a packed house came to see if he'd do it again. Opening the book at random is almost guaranteed to yield a story of this nature. Fortunately I was not onstage at the time, and nobody cared how much I laughed.
Howard Attfield was another actor who was caught on the hop. He remembers, 'I was playing an inspector, I forget the name of the murder thriller, and it was a matinée day and very hot and I remember standing in the dressing-room and I was having a shave, and I thought I had all the time in the world because my first entrance wasn't until the ending of the first act. The inspector comes in, says his lines and ends the first act. So I was standing there quite happily in my boxer shorts having a shave when I heard my call, which I could not believe, and I went absolutely wild. My costume was a suit, an inspector's suit, and a sort of a trench coat and a hat. Anyway, I thought I'd best put on something, the least possible, so I put on trousers and I remember putting on shoes without socks, then I put on the trench coat, did it all up as I'm flying out the door, grabbed the hat and went charging down the stairs, saying, "I'm coming, I'm coming, I'm coming," and I made it on to the stage just in time, but as I went on someone in the wings said, "Shaving foam, shaving foam!" and I realized that I'd got halfway through this shave and I hadn't wiped it off. Luckily it was on the upstage side, as I was coming on from stage right. So instead of looking at the audience, I did everything looking from stage right to stage left, and the upstage bit was foam in my ears and right round my face. I delivered the line and the curtains came down and I collapsed on the floor half naked and half shaven.'
Persons in this book set themselves on fire, fall out of their costumes, get flattened by scenery, fuck up lines, props, entrances, exits, sound cues, lighting cues, scene changes, the sprinkler system. The number of actors who started their careers as assistant stage managers appears to have been part of the apprenticeship quality of rep; the number of actors who were abruptly promoted because a lead had flanicked screaming into the night feels more telling. "It wasn't till many years later that I got into the truly creative side of acting. In those days it was a question of learn the lines and don't bump into the furniture." It is a tribute to the book's scope that so many of its names are unfamiliar to me when my knowledge of older British actors is not nil; it's not just a skim of national treasures. For every Rachel Kempson, Bernard Hepton, or Fiona Shaw, there's an actor like Attfield whose handful of small parts in film and television has barely impinged on me or even one like Jean Byam who was so strictly stage-based that it would never have been possible for me to see her in anything. At the same time, thanks to its compilation from personal histories, I have been left in possession of some truly random facts concerning actors of long or recent acquaintance during their repertory careers, e.g. Alec McCowen corpsed like anything and at one point became convinced that he could telepathically cause a fellow actor to forget their lines. Richard Pasco had such reliable stage fright that the manager of the Birmingham Rep would knock him up five minutes before curtain to check whether he'd been sick yet. Clive Francis had a stammer so bad it made him the bête noire of the prompt corner at Bexhill-on-Sea. (Robin Ellis did not have a stammer, but found it a lifeline during one particularly non-stop season to play a character with one because it gave him the extra time to reach for his next line.) Bernard Cribbins does not name the production for which he was required to transport a goat—an actual goat, from a farm on the moors—by bus to the theatre, leaving unexplained the reasons it had to be a real one. Of course it was medically possible in the '60's, but it is still n-v-t-s to me that Derek Jacobi got smallpox doing panto in Birmingham. That art was produced by this theatrical system as opposed to merely peerless anecdotes absolutely deserves celebration. As a resource for writers as well as theatre historians and actors, the book is a treasure. Details about interwar digs and mid-century tea matinées would not be out of place in Angela Carter. The less farcical side of all the blowups and breakdowns is the assertion by more than one interviewee that rep provided, if not exactly a safe, then at least a survivable space for a growing actor to fail in ways that were essential to their confidence and their craft: "If you didn't become a great actor in weekly rep, at least you learnt to control your nerves. Despite all the throwing up on a Monday, one seemed to be ice cool on stage, because you knew you mustn't give anything away and you mustn't make your fellow actors look bad." But also one night at the David Garrick Theatre in the late '40's Lionel Jeffries lost hold of a lettuce leaf that sailed out into the stalls and splatted itself dressing and all onto a member of the public and that Saturday a packed house came to see if he'd do it again. Opening the book at random is almost guaranteed to yield a story of this nature. Fortunately I was not onstage at the time, and nobody cared how much I laughed.
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It's on the Internet Archive! I just so much prefer reading on paper. Enjoy!
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And Sandi Toksvig's "Pocket Dream" (1991) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pocket_Dream
in which IIRC after 34 years her character was hauled from backstage to be a lead. It was very play-within-a-play plus audience participation of a sort. I was sitting in the front row and those of us near the front were given paper hats to make us be mushrooms as part of the scenery. Or something.
Now I've spent quite a while re-watching episodes of the first season of Slings & Arrows to find the bit where Nahum says "If I were bothered by vomit, I would not work in the theatre."
https://youtu.be/AkHq46v5S9k?si=EiGbdQGE49EXedkq start at 41:11
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I like the idea of the Stage Manager having their own Actor's Nightmare-like existence. I know Wilder played the role at least once.
in which IIRC after 34 years her character was hauled from backstage to be a lead. It was very play-within-a-play plus audience participation of a sort. I was sitting in the front row and those of us near the front were given paper hats to make us be mushrooms as part of the scenery. Or something.
That one I've never heard of! Oh, my God, it was just produced this spring at the Lichfield Garrick Theatre. I understand it's not literally the same Garrick Theatre in Lichfield, but I hope they had a Lionel Jeffries theater ghost for at least the duration of its run.
Now I've spent quite a while re-watching episodes of the first season of Slings & Arrows to find the bit where Nahum says "If I were bothered by vomit, I would not work in the theatre."
Nahum would have coped just fine with Richard Pasco and Alec McCowen.
(How can I not have rewatched this show in more than a decade?
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(Have you seen The Goes Wrong Show? Based on the Play That Goes Wrong, the weekly productions of an amateur theatre company with a reach that consistently exceeds its grasp, very funny. This is one of my faves although I also love the courtroom drama where due to a mix up between imperial and metric measurements all the sets are about 1/3rd of their intended size :D -https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x9snl2s )
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It honestly was! Both informationally and comedically. I started it on my way out of the library, obviously, and then I had to not read it while driving lest I end up resembling one of its anecdotes.
Have you seen The Goes Wrong Show? Based on the Play That Goes Wrong, the weekly productions of an amateur theatre company with a reach that consistently exceeds its grasp, very funny.
It was a toss-up between comparisons to The Goes Wrong Show or Noises Off and Michael Frayn won, but I have been shown some of it!
This is one of my faves although I also love the courtroom drama where due to a mix up between imperial and metric measurements all the sets are about 1/3rd of their intended size
Oh, my God. I haven't seen that one or, actually, this episode. Thank you for the link!
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I liked all your little mentions though already. Awww. <3
And a GOAT??? It's Bernard Cribbins, so I'm not even going to ask why. XD
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I thought of you often. Including at the one mention of James Maxwell, in context of the origins of the Royal Exchange. (Bernard Cribbins was very proud of having literally built the stage.)
I liked all your little mentions though already. Awww.
On the evidence of this book, Alec McCowen was a first-class raconteur who if he wrote like he talked, his memoirs should be gems. Please do not require yourself to look shocked that Clive Francis mostly contributes very funny stories about things he fucked up.
(The sound cues are probably my favorite. It reminded me of running slides for an archaeological class, which I also did very badly.)
And a GOAT??? It's Bernard Cribbins, so I'm not even going to ask why.
No explanation would be forthcoming!
"I remember you used to get your prop list on a Tuesday morning, I used to have to get strange things like a goat. There was a farm up on the moors about Oldham and I borrowed a goat and I used to have to bring it to the theatre on a bus. The driver used to make me go upstairs. I'd ask for one and a goat to Rose Bank, which was near the theatre."
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I'm glad, because any sort of surprise there would be difficult! I can't say I'm much surprised at Alec McCowen coming across as a great raconteur, either, really.
"I remember you used to get your prop list on a Tuesday morning, I used to have to get strange things like a goat. There was a farm up on the moors about Oldham and I borrowed a goat and I used to have to bring it to the theatre on a bus. The driver used to make me go upstairs. I'd ask for one and a goat to Rose Bank, which was near the theatre."
Ha. You know, my first thought was, it wasn't for James Maxwell's lot when they were in the Piccolo Players, was it? Overly realistic Ibsen or something, maybe. And, from that, it could have been! Because that's clearly happening in the Manchester area, which was where Bernard Cribbins did a season with them in the 50s, although I have a feeling he was attached to the theatre, so most likely it was still some local amdram's unwise pantomime choices, of course. But it is also true the group were without James Maxwell that season & he was the designated person for pointing out to the director-types when they'd come up with things that mightn't be okay with the actors...
I'll let you know if I ever find any of them mentioning a goat. XD
(The interview was on a site that's now gone, but Bernard said, I think, that he was just putting on another season in rep; they were these idealistic drama students trying to build a whole new kind of theatre and he'd never worked with anyone like them before. I think he said something like "everyone was screaming and yelling - it was wonderful!!" I hadn't realised that the connection had continued into the Royal Exchange days, so that's great).
I have put this book on my list for when I am allowed to buy books again, because clearly I need it. <3
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He was an acting ASM with the Penguin Players, pre-RADA, and patently on brand before he even had one. "I was always forgetting to set props on the stage so I was forever handing props to actors as they went on, saying, 'Would you mind putting this over there?' Once I even had to hand the murder weapon to the policeman who was going on and had to discover it in a drawer. It was a dagger and he had to secrete it in his raincoat pocket and sneak it into the drawer when no one was looking. I don't think any actor ever went on stage without having to take something on with him." There was also the the time he accidentally cued the national anthem instead of the incidental music and the audience in confused reflex action all stood up.
I can't say I'm much surprised at Alec McCowen coming across as a great raconteur, either, really.
"My chief ambition was for audiences not to know it was me, so that one tried to look as different as possible. If you were playing the straight juvenile, of course everyone knew, but for the audience not to say, 'Oh, look, it's our Alec!' was a great victory."
Fortunately for him, I am not on Tumblr and thus have no opportunity to start tagging relevant photos #oh look it's our alec.
I'll let you know if I ever find any of them mentioning a goat.
I agree that unwise pantomime is the likelier culprit, but I would be tremendously entertained if the inexplicable goat, like all roads, led back to James Maxwell.
I have put this book on my list for when I am allowed to buy books again, because clearly I need it.
Absolutely.
*hugs*
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Ha, amazing! XD
And I would say that I would tag Alec McCowen as "oh look it's our alec" from now on, except that I get the opportunity so rarely that I am certain to have forgotten by whenever I next get the chance.
I agree that unwise pantomime is the likelier culprit, but I would be tremendously entertained if the inexplicable goat, like all roads, led back to James Maxwell.
From what I've read of them, I would not rule out the goat!
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I believe I am in possession of the sole copy, but you can have it next!
(I am seriously considering trying to find a copy for myself. This one is from the UK, which is just how this library works.)
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The whole book is.
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it is still n-v-t-s to me that Derek Jacobi got smallpox doing panto in Birmingham. --WHAT. WHAT?! (but wait a minute, what does "n-v-t-s" mean? Did he get smallpox in the 1960s in Birmingham?!?)
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The whole book!
"I used to sit there with the sound effects, you had one or two LPs and on these were all the sound effects and in the dimness of the corner you had to try and set your needle at the right place. I was forever getting this wrong. I remember once we did a play called The Two Mrs Carrolls. The play finishes with the star saying, 'Oh to hell with all of you, I'm going to leap into my Ferrari and I'm going to race off to Monte Carlo and I'm going to play the wheel!' and off he went and slammed the door, and I'm there with my needle trying to get the sound of the Ferrari. He made this wonderful exit and there was the sound of a coach and horses! Then a terrible scratch as the needle was wrenched to the right position."
It just makes me happy.
--WHAT. WHAT?! (but wait a minute, what does "n-v-t-s" mean? Did he get smallpox in the 1960s in Birmingham?!?)
He did! He was the only member of the company who did! It was the only time in his repertory career he could remember being let out of a performance. Spelling out "nuts" as "n-v-t-s" is a gag my family got from Mel Brooks' History of the World: Part I (1981).
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