I am no great fan of Amateur Dramatics, with distant memories of a damp church hall in North Finchley, and the upstairs of a pub in Greenwich hosting uninspiring performances of some obscure French playwright. However, the lure of treading the boards to no less than the Bard himself was too strong and so it was, last Friday, in front of a hall packed with 150 excited school boys, that I stepped out into the lights for the first time since Sixth Form.
I was to play Leonato, the father of Hero, who believes that his daughter has been indulging in "extra curricular activities" and watches her being shamed on her wedding day. Five months of practice and much learning of lines and "exeunt stage left" had come to fruition and my seventeen line speech had been "nailed". The dress rehearsal had been suitably chaotic, the pre-performance hug had bonded us all sufficently and we were ready. So why did I line up on the wrong side at the start of the play and have to surreptitiously dash across the stage as the Narrator called out the opening lines? And why in my moment of passion as I harangued my daughter did I scream that she had "fallen into a pit of sink", when I knew it was a pit of ink!! Oh well, I guess I am making Much Ado about Nothing.
#01 May 2006
Comments...
as long as they supplied free wine on opening night, who would notice the minor errors
Posted by: | 12:55pm 1 May 2006
I don't think a load of adolescent 14 year old boys noticed too much either - more interested in the kiss between two of the teachers at the end of the play!
Posted by: | 7:04pm 1 May 2006
Sir, did you say you had been learning your lines for five months?
You need to wing it more, just like with year nine last week.
I turned down the chance to be in teachers stars in their eyes this week because of prior commitments. it pissed them off but I feel that the boards we tread on a daily basis are more hallowed than those of a stage with me dressed as Bobby Womack or Tupac.
Were you in detention the night of the party? We missed you.
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herbie
Posted by: | 8:31pm 2 May 2006
just rehearsing for five months, took me about 5 weeks to learn my lines though - I knew I had them when I could perform my speech in the swimming pool!
I think you should have done stars in your eyes, some of my best moments at school have been as part of Take That, Boyzone, 5ive and Backstreet Boys.
The C&C party clashed with the play so was busy celebrating - a la prochaine fois!
Posted by: sir | 9:37pm 2 May 2006