Mold: Week 9
Where be that to then?
It's actually in North Wales, not too far from Llandudno where we celebrated our 100th show last year, and very close to Chester. We were playing Clwyd Theatr Cymru, which is both a receiving house and a producing house and much, much bigger than where we had been the week before!
Summer is here:
Now, I do owe you an apology. I did say that I was going to write the blog for Mold last week on our week off, but to be honest, I was much too busy having a nice time. It does mean, however, that I'm not boring you this week with a blog entitled 'What I did on my school holidays'…… Instead I am bringing you another exciting insight to the life of a touring company. Also, I bring the news that…. Summer is here!!!!! It began about halfway through our week in Wales and has seemed to continue into Bury St Edmunds, which is where I am writing this. Summer would not be summer, though, without a final downpour. This hit as I was driving to Mold on the Monday morning, but I was quite happily pottering along the M23 when…… My windscreen wiper snapped. This has happened before (the linkage breaks underneath the bonnet and so the drivers side wiper just stops and you can't keep the other side going as it just catches the other one and then the both snap, blah blah blah) and it is probably one of the most terrifying things that can happen when driving on the motorway in pouring rain. But, because it's now the third time this has happened, I do have an emergency stash of cable ties and so after a brief (and damp) stop I managed to get everything working again and continued on my way. I have to say that at this point I didn't hold out high hopes for the week. I thought the wiper was something of an omen….
Not so much 'Damian,' more 'Delightful':
How wrong I was. I LOVE Theatre Clwyd. It's set just outside of Mold high up on the hills and has beautiful views of the surrounding countryside. The venue itself is not just a theatre, it's also a cinema and three art galleries. We were in the 'Anthony Hopkins Theatre', but there is also the smaller 'Emlyn Williams Theatre' and the studio. Wales' primary producing theatre, it plays host to about 900 public performances a year in addition to touring throughout the UK.
It was nice to have so much space back in the wings. It not only makes the show itself easier, but also means the the get-ins and outs are usually quicker and smoother as there is space to put things out of the way. In smaller venues you usually end up having to navigate your way around bits of set, furniture and technical equipment whilst packing up or getting things out. The crew there are all fantastic and worked really hard to get everything ready for the show. Nick and Chris were our duty stage manager and lighting technician for the week and they both had lovely deep film star voices which were lovely to listen to during the show! We had a several different front of house managers during the week but they were all really friendly and cheerful and one lady in particular caught the eye of the boys.
Clwyd is one of those venues that pretty much has everything you could possibly want. It even has a catered Green Room, which is something you don't find in most theatres these days. Pretty much every theatre has a Green Room of sorts and they vary greatly in quality and comfort. Quite often, in a smaller venues there isn't much room and so it could just be a small dressing room with a fridge and a kettle. Worthing, for example, is very short on space and so there is a Green Room 'area' at the top of the stairs with a mini-fridge and a kettle. When we were in at The Gaiety, in Dublin, last year, their Green Room (which is actually kitted out in dark green, beautiful leather!) has a serviced bar (only open after the show, of course!) which is available to all theatre staff and incoming companies. Both the National Theatre and Plymouth Theatre Royal have catered Green Rooms, meaning that there is someone there cooking hot and cold food which you can buy for a pretty reasonable rate, but Mold is the only other place I have found which also does this. For a few quid, Carol and her staff will make a selection of food and she definitely does requests. This meant that we were pretty well sorted before matinees and in between shows. Sam's girlfriend has worked at Theatre Clwyd and so Sam could also remember a few good pubs and bars for post-show drinks and The Glasfryn, which was just down the road, became our local.
So my wiper was not an omen. No. But I wasn't the only one to experience car trouble on the way up. Think back to my Durham blog. Do you remember the little adventure Alastair and George had with Omm 4? Well, Omm 4 returned at the end of the York week. Having forked out a fair bit of money (more than £500 but less than 1K) to get it back on the road (and MOTed) Alastair sent me the following message at 3:43pm on Monday afternoon:
'Omm 4 broken down on M5……..'
Oh dear. Poor Omm 4 and poor Alastair. You'll be relived to know that he did make it in time for the show!
Back to Mrs Miggins:
Ah. Digs. Digs. Digs. I haven't really bored you with tales of digs for a few weeks, so it's about time you had a few stories.
The only downside of the theatre in Mold is that, due to its out of town position, there aren't that many digs close to the venue itself. Malcolm was the closest, in what has been named by other companies as 'The Hobbit House', because it looks like the sort of place you might find Bilbo Baggins. Some of the boys were in a beautiful self-contained house a bit of a drive away, Simon was having 'Bear time' and staying on his own for the week and Roger, GMoss and I were about three miles away in a beautiful spot right on top of a hill. Roger had a little cottage about halfway down the drive and GMoss and I were in the main house which had an outdoor alarm which set of a cuckoo noise if anyone crossed the cattle grid (yes, you read that correctly and it is as bizarre as it sounds).
As for the rest of the girls…. Well…..
Now, Selma and Lizzie had made a bit of a 'boo boo' when booking the digs they were to be sharing with Sinead. When they booked them, they thought that they were a 40 minute walk to the theatre - which is not too bad, not ideal, but do-able. None of them have cars you see. On closer inspection (arrival), they realised that the beautiful lodges they had booked were actually a 2 HOUR and 40 minute walk….. 'That's ok,' they thought. The taxi to the lodges was only £9 from the train station. The train station being in Wrexham, though, not Mold. Sinead got a cab into the theatre on the Monday morning and was charged £30…… However, they were alright in the end as knight in shining armour, Sir George, rode to their rescue as he had a car that week and so drove them home most days and they did managed to find a taxi company that did the journey for half the price Sinead paid on the first day, which meant that it was cheaper coming in to work. They did have to spend one night on the boys sofas though, as they got stranded at 2am and couldn't get a taxi…..
'Ladies and Gentlemen, due to illness the parts of …….. will be played by…….':
That's right, it was time for our understudy run. Now, originally we wanted to do this in Worthing, but as you know from reading my Worthing blog (quick, go back and read it now if you haven't!) we'd had to change a few entrances and exits and scene changes that week due to space issues. We soon realised that it would probably be the worst place to do an understudy run as everything was so different. We decided that Mold would be better as everything would be back to normal.
Do you remember who's understudying who? I told you a few weeks ago, so go back and check if you've forgotten, or if you haven't read that particular blog yet (I can't remember exactly which one it was…). All of the company came in to help and so we had a few cast members playing completely different parts to normal. Alastair would be giving his Stephen Wraysford as that is his biggest understudy role and so George very kindly offered to do (and learn!) the part of Evans as Sam was playing Tipper in Act I and Shaw in Act II. Simon was playing both Berard and Shaw in Act I (complete with some speedy costume changes) and just Berard in Act II, giving Sam a chance to do both of his understudy parts. Likewise, Lucy was playing Lisette in Act I, but as Lisette has less to do in Act II, she would then change to play Jeanne and Lizzie would cover the Lisette parts in Act II. Selma would, of course, just be doing Isabelle and James did Adams and Barclay as well as two Shaw scene changes which would be covered by Alastair in the event that Simon had to play Shaw and Berard in a live performance (seriously, are you following this? It is incredibly confusing, I know). Unsurprisingly, it took two people to cover Lucy's normal roles of Marguerite and her German and British soldiers as she does a lot of the scene changes as well as the the bits she does backstage, so it was decided that Carolin would play Marguerite on stage as well as the soldiers, but GMoss would do all the scene changes and backstage bits. This also meant that Roger would cover GMoss' usual backstage cues and do the setting and striking of the tunnel pieces. Basically, almost everyone was doing something new. Even I was kept on my toes as we were using a violin back-up file which Dom, our sound designer, had created in Birmingham. On this we have some of Sam's violin pieces recorded as well as some other bits and pieces that would change in the event of Sam being off. However, if he did play Tipper, he would still play some of the violin bits (but he wouldn't if he played Shaw), so there were a few quick edits to do as we went along and I had to concentrate.
Malcolm and Peter had the slightly easier jobs as they were playing their usual characters, but even then they still had to be alert as we were running as we would in a performance, meaning that there would be no prompts if anyone dried (forgot their lines) and everyone would have to help each other out.
Everyone had specially printed out sheets that I had been compiling over the last couple of weeks where everyone's movements and who they were playing were mapped (it had really made my head hurt doing that as so much goes on) and all the cast had written down exactly where and how they change into what costume as it would be a mammoth job if Sinead had to do that for the whole cast!
Only the official understudies wore costumes to save Sinead from having to get every costume clean again for the evening show and Lucy definitely got the prize for best hair as she looked lovely with her Lisette ringlets, Sinead did a great job there.
So, we were off. Everyone did a fantastic job and the run went really, really well. There were a few highlights which I shall now share with you:
Summer is here:
Now, I do owe you an apology. I did say that I was going to write the blog for Mold last week on our week off, but to be honest, I was much too busy having a nice time. It does mean, however, that I'm not boring you this week with a blog entitled 'What I did on my school holidays'…… Instead I am bringing you another exciting insight to the life of a touring company. Also, I bring the news that…. Summer is here!!!!! It began about halfway through our week in Wales and has seemed to continue into Bury St Edmunds, which is where I am writing this. Summer would not be summer, though, without a final downpour. This hit as I was driving to Mold on the Monday morning, but I was quite happily pottering along the M23 when…… My windscreen wiper snapped. This has happened before (the linkage breaks underneath the bonnet and so the drivers side wiper just stops and you can't keep the other side going as it just catches the other one and then the both snap, blah blah blah) and it is probably one of the most terrifying things that can happen when driving on the motorway in pouring rain. But, because it's now the third time this has happened, I do have an emergency stash of cable ties and so after a brief (and damp) stop I managed to get everything working again and continued on my way. I have to say that at this point I didn't hold out high hopes for the week. I thought the wiper was something of an omen….
Not so much 'Damian,' more 'Delightful':
How wrong I was. I LOVE Theatre Clwyd. It's set just outside of Mold high up on the hills and has beautiful views of the surrounding countryside. The venue itself is not just a theatre, it's also a cinema and three art galleries. We were in the 'Anthony Hopkins Theatre', but there is also the smaller 'Emlyn Williams Theatre' and the studio. Wales' primary producing theatre, it plays host to about 900 public performances a year in addition to touring throughout the UK.
It was nice to have so much space back in the wings. It not only makes the show itself easier, but also means the the get-ins and outs are usually quicker and smoother as there is space to put things out of the way. In smaller venues you usually end up having to navigate your way around bits of set, furniture and technical equipment whilst packing up or getting things out. The crew there are all fantastic and worked really hard to get everything ready for the show. Nick and Chris were our duty stage manager and lighting technician for the week and they both had lovely deep film star voices which were lovely to listen to during the show! We had a several different front of house managers during the week but they were all really friendly and cheerful and one lady in particular caught the eye of the boys.
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| View from the dressing room windows |
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| Theatre Clwyd Green Room |
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| It even has a TV!!! |
'Omm 4 broken down on M5……..'
Oh dear. Poor Omm 4 and poor Alastair. You'll be relived to know that he did make it in time for the show!
Back to Mrs Miggins:
Ah. Digs. Digs. Digs. I haven't really bored you with tales of digs for a few weeks, so it's about time you had a few stories.
The only downside of the theatre in Mold is that, due to its out of town position, there aren't that many digs close to the venue itself. Malcolm was the closest, in what has been named by other companies as 'The Hobbit House', because it looks like the sort of place you might find Bilbo Baggins. Some of the boys were in a beautiful self-contained house a bit of a drive away, Simon was having 'Bear time' and staying on his own for the week and Roger, GMoss and I were about three miles away in a beautiful spot right on top of a hill. Roger had a little cottage about halfway down the drive and GMoss and I were in the main house which had an outdoor alarm which set of a cuckoo noise if anyone crossed the cattle grid (yes, you read that correctly and it is as bizarre as it sounds).
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| G Moss and I were up a hill out on the moors….. |
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| Up a long drive. Roger was round the bend (not physically or mentally, I mean his cottage was round there….) |
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| Boys playing a game in their digs. You know the one….. |
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| He wishes |
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| No, I can't make it out either. |
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| Boy time |
Now, Selma and Lizzie had made a bit of a 'boo boo' when booking the digs they were to be sharing with Sinead. When they booked them, they thought that they were a 40 minute walk to the theatre - which is not too bad, not ideal, but do-able. None of them have cars you see. On closer inspection (arrival), they realised that the beautiful lodges they had booked were actually a 2 HOUR and 40 minute walk….. 'That's ok,' they thought. The taxi to the lodges was only £9 from the train station. The train station being in Wrexham, though, not Mold. Sinead got a cab into the theatre on the Monday morning and was charged £30…… However, they were alright in the end as knight in shining armour, Sir George, rode to their rescue as he had a car that week and so drove them home most days and they did managed to find a taxi company that did the journey for half the price Sinead paid on the first day, which meant that it was cheaper coming in to work. They did have to spend one night on the boys sofas though, as they got stranded at 2am and couldn't get a taxi…..
'Ladies and Gentlemen, due to illness the parts of …….. will be played by…….':
That's right, it was time for our understudy run. Now, originally we wanted to do this in Worthing, but as you know from reading my Worthing blog (quick, go back and read it now if you haven't!) we'd had to change a few entrances and exits and scene changes that week due to space issues. We soon realised that it would probably be the worst place to do an understudy run as everything was so different. We decided that Mold would be better as everything would be back to normal.
Do you remember who's understudying who? I told you a few weeks ago, so go back and check if you've forgotten, or if you haven't read that particular blog yet (I can't remember exactly which one it was…). All of the company came in to help and so we had a few cast members playing completely different parts to normal. Alastair would be giving his Stephen Wraysford as that is his biggest understudy role and so George very kindly offered to do (and learn!) the part of Evans as Sam was playing Tipper in Act I and Shaw in Act II. Simon was playing both Berard and Shaw in Act I (complete with some speedy costume changes) and just Berard in Act II, giving Sam a chance to do both of his understudy parts. Likewise, Lucy was playing Lisette in Act I, but as Lisette has less to do in Act II, she would then change to play Jeanne and Lizzie would cover the Lisette parts in Act II. Selma would, of course, just be doing Isabelle and James did Adams and Barclay as well as two Shaw scene changes which would be covered by Alastair in the event that Simon had to play Shaw and Berard in a live performance (seriously, are you following this? It is incredibly confusing, I know). Unsurprisingly, it took two people to cover Lucy's normal roles of Marguerite and her German and British soldiers as she does a lot of the scene changes as well as the the bits she does backstage, so it was decided that Carolin would play Marguerite on stage as well as the soldiers, but GMoss would do all the scene changes and backstage bits. This also meant that Roger would cover GMoss' usual backstage cues and do the setting and striking of the tunnel pieces. Basically, almost everyone was doing something new. Even I was kept on my toes as we were using a violin back-up file which Dom, our sound designer, had created in Birmingham. On this we have some of Sam's violin pieces recorded as well as some other bits and pieces that would change in the event of Sam being off. However, if he did play Tipper, he would still play some of the violin bits (but he wouldn't if he played Shaw), so there were a few quick edits to do as we went along and I had to concentrate.
Malcolm and Peter had the slightly easier jobs as they were playing their usual characters, but even then they still had to be alert as we were running as we would in a performance, meaning that there would be no prompts if anyone dried (forgot their lines) and everyone would have to help each other out.
Everyone had specially printed out sheets that I had been compiling over the last couple of weeks where everyone's movements and who they were playing were mapped (it had really made my head hurt doing that as so much goes on) and all the cast had written down exactly where and how they change into what costume as it would be a mammoth job if Sinead had to do that for the whole cast!
Only the official understudies wore costumes to save Sinead from having to get every costume clean again for the evening show and Lucy definitely got the prize for best hair as she looked lovely with her Lisette ringlets, Sinead did a great job there.
So, we were off. Everyone did a fantastic job and the run went really, really well. There were a few highlights which I shall now share with you:
- Carolin losing her cue sheet for Marguerite within the first 2 minutes of the show and only finding it at the end, meaning that there was a wonderful moment in the confrontation scene (where Azaire finds out about Stephen and Isabelle's relationship) where she ran on as a soldier and got ready to go over the top…..
- GMoss playing Turnwright (and the spoons) in the first bar scene…...
- Simon drying on one of his lines as Shaw. Which is the part he does every single night on stage……
- Lizzie coming on too early as the nurse. Which is the part she does every single night on stage…….
- Alastair as Stephen proclaiming that 'My mother died before I was born, my father left when I was four….' (Think about it for a moment…)
- George not only learning the part of Evans, but also singing the whole of his song in Welsh. He also wore Sam's radio mic for this in order for the offstage hummers to hear and so it was amplified around the auditorium. Brave man.
- Selma running off as Isabelle crying and rushing so convincingly that she slid and then tripped over her red skirt which was too long for her, yet still managing to make it look completely dignified.
- Sinead, after this, doing the fastest hemming anyone has ever seen and managing to get the skirt pinned up to a better length just in time for Selma to re-enter.
- Simon singing Berard's song in the terrace scene…... That is all.
- Peter playing Alastair in going over the top scene, managing to look suitable terrified.
- Looking up at the going over the top scene at the end of Act I and suddenly realizing with horror that our leading lady was standing at the top of the central ladder (which is the only one that has to be completely supported by the person at the bottom) with Peter at the bottom…..
- Alastair proving that not only does he know this years version of the script very well, but that he can also remember all of last years too. Which completely confused George. I kept having to turn to him and saying 'last year.'
- Me having a bit of fun with the recorded cheers in the Barclay speech (the only point where there were no understudies on at all, I should add!) and managing to make Malcolm corpse!
- Lucy forgetting to pull the stage left door out of the drawing room scene position, meaning that in that in the following scene we had a first world war dug-out with frilly curtains and gold door knobs…..
Although there were plenty of funny moments and we had fun doing the run, everyone took it very seriously too and it was a great success. Everyone worked really hard and as a reward I gave out 'understudy prizes' to everyone at the end. These were in the form of Easter Eggs, large ones for the understudies and George (for learning Evans) and smaller ones for everyone else. We then went out for a meal at The Glasfryn and when I came back I found that my lovely, lovely company had bought me a massive egg and left it on my prompt desk. I do love them.
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| Lovely Lucy as Lisette |
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| Gorgeous Selma as Isabelle |
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| The Terrace scene with Simon as Berard |
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| Lucy and Jonny as Lisette and Gregoire |
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| Carolin serving drinks as Marguerite |
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| Selma and Alastair as Stephen and Isabelle in The Red Room |
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| Peter getting ready to 'Go Over The Top' whilst Alastair as Stephen counts down the seconds |
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| Sam doing Tipper's death scene |
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| Terrifying. Terrifying. Carolin up a ladder. |
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| Jonny accepting his prize |
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| Bear with his Lion Egg (closest I could get to a Bear…) |
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| The next day we found a review of Alastair's performance….. No. Not really. There was a darts board in the corridor (see what I mean about a great venue) and someone was playing tricks……. I suspect GMoss |
Leisure time:
So, apart from understudying, what else did we get up to in Mold? I'll start with me as I had a brilliant week getting out and about.
I had a bit of an explore of the Welsh countryside on the Tuesday when I met up with a friend for lunch. He had been recommended a marvellous little river pub called 'The Boat Inn' in Erbistock. It is one of those wonderful places that you don't come across all that often as it's pretty hidden away and unless you know it's there you might not find it. You drive over a mile down twisty little country lanes until you come to this tiny bit of land by the river with a beautiful church and this pub. The food was lovely and inside there is plenty of space to eat with roaring log fires in each room. On the ceiling of one room there were hundreds of cups hanging from hooks on the beams and outside there was a great 'Dos and don'ts' notice, clearly written by someone with a sense of humour. If you're ever in the Chester/North Wales area, then do try to get down for lunch or an evening meal. The postcode is LL13 0DL and your Sat Nav will take you straight to it.
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| The Boat Inn |
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| The Church right next to it |
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| It really is right on the river |
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| Ceiling of cups |
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| The Rules of The Boat Inn No Naked People is a particular favourite |
On Thursday night I went up to Blackpool for the night. The weather was absolutely gorgeous. I love Blackpool and I'm always telling people how great it is. Unfortunately, as was the case when we were there with Birdsong last year, when I'm there with a show it's usually the winter and so is pretty bleak and you nearly get blown off the seafront, so no one ever believes how glorious it is when the weather is good. I had a nice treat of a leisurely breakfast in bed and stayed until about 3pm on the Friday when it was time to head back to Mold. On the way back to my car I passed the cenotaph. I'd forgotten how striking and well maintained it is. The words inscribed on the wall behind it are particularly meaningful to me: 'Sing softly. Be Still. Cease'. These also have an added impact when you're doing a play like 'Birdsong'.
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| Glorious day in glorious Blackpool |
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| View of the tower |
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| Like being abroad |
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| Blackpool Cenotaph |
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| The words inscribed behind really affected me |
James and Peter played host to an amazing chilli night and later on in the week, along with Alastair, went for a long walk up a very big hill. Lucy, George and Carolin also went for a long walk up another very big hill.
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| Chilli night |
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| Peter and James walk up the hill whilst Alastair takes a photo (No idea who that other bloke is) |
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| Celebrations as they reach the top |
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| WE ARE MEN. WE HAVE CLIMBED HILL. |
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| George, Lucy and Carolin up another hill. Somewhere in North Wales. |
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| Don't get too close |
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| Carolin wonders if she can get a lift back down….. |
You can see from the photos what amazing weather we were having.
Ok, ok. I know. I've completely overused 'amazing' and 'marvellous' in this blog, but the week in Mold is one of those weeks where you are reminded of why you love touring. Being at a great venue with great people, meeting people, having fun, working hard, catching-up with old friends and seeing a bit of the countryside. Before I started touring 8 years ago, my geography was rubbish. I even asked if you needed a passport to get into Scotland (and my family are Scots/Dutch, so that was pretty embarrassing). But since I've been touring, my knowledge of the UK has improved so much and I've seen so many beautiful places that I often wonder why we bother going abroad on holiday….. Oh yeah. The weather……
And speaking of holidays, we were all about to embark on one. George bought everyone a little extra Easter treat on the Saturday and then we were off, about to spend more than a day apart for the first time in 12 weeks………
See you in Bury St Edmunds!
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| Heres a picture of Jonny pretending to be The Walrus. Just because. |
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