Dundee: Week 17

Dundee: Week 17

Guess Who's Back? Back Again:

Last week Alastair mentioned that Jon and Anne-Marie visited us in Colchester to see the show and to tell us about a few changes in the final weeks of the tour. One of those changes was that Tim Speechley was rejoining us in Dundee as Company Manager for our last 5 weeks. Those of you who read the blog last year will remember him as 'Tim S' (to combat the plethora of 'Tims' we had on that tour) and he looked after us for the 7 month tour. By the end of it we all knew each other and our habits pretty well and so it took maybe 30 seconds on fit-up day for myself, Tim and GMoss to fall back into our old easy banter.

Tim S

'How does it work again?'

'Oh yeah. I'd forgotten about him….'

Ugh o'clock:

I mentioned in the Hull blog about our travel arrangements on the tour and how a lot of people had opted for the very early morning flight from Cork to Manchester and were completely exhausted come Sunday evening. I had made a similar boo boo with Colchester to Dundee. I hadn't realised that I would be able to get home between Doncaster and Colchester, so, worried about my flat/post/plants etc, I opted to go back to Eastbourne from Colchester and then fly up to Edinburgh on the Ugh O'clock (6:30am) flight on the Monday morning. I was very good and made sure I went to bed at around 9:30pm on the Sunday, so even getting up at 3:40am would still mean that I would get around 6 hours. It was ok, but I was feeling it a little bit come the afternoon! I forget that what I could do in my 20s is that much harder in my 30s!

Jonny and George at Departures

An early flight calls for a good breakfast…...

'Is that it????? I'm not getting on that….'

Whilst the more civilised took the train. First Class, of course

Coming back:

I've worked a lot in Dundee over the years, both at The Rep (where we were with Birdsong) and The Whitehall (which is a smaller converted church venue). In fact, one of the happiest periods of my career were spent on a contract I did at the Rep back in 2009, but I hadn't been back there for over 4 years. It was great to be back, I'd forgotten what a nice place it is to work and very little had changed. Very sadly, over the last few years we have lost some of the people I used to work with to illness. Phylis, the marvellous wardrobe mistress, John who was production manager and Rep actor Robert who I remember being outstanding in a production of 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf'. A few other staff had moved on to other jobs, but it was great to see Carol, Mikey, Colin (who was stellar at helping to put my sound in) and Emma again. 

I had been telling the company for ages that they would love it at there and the venue did not disappoint. It was one of the smoothest get-ins we'd had and Alastair was delighted with the intimate, but spacious stage and auditorium. As he quite rightly pointed out, it would be our last intimate space until we got to Eastbourne as we had some Goliath venues coming up.

The Rep auditorium

Simon and Jonny. I have no idea what they're doing…..

Good digs/bad digs. Dig, dig digs…..

I know we've banged on A LOT about digs on this tour. But wherever you are it is one thing that everyone has in common each week and one question we all ask each other: 'How's your digs?'
Digs can be difficult in Dundee. Rooms in houses are fairly scarce and the guest houses and hotels can be quite expensive. There's some beautiful places to stay outside Dundee, but if you've flown up and don't have a car then this can be difficult.
We were in two very different camps this week. Sinead had come through beautifully by finding some student flats about a 6 minute walk from The Rep. Sam, Lucy, Carolin, Lizzie and myself were in one on the top floor which meant a very big climb up a lot of stairs, and Sinead, Peter and George were in a flat below. They were pretty basic, but each flat had a good sized kitchen and lounge area and the letting company had bought us bedding and some kitchen utensils (usually the students provide their own). There were a couple of downsides to the flats; they were very studenty and so we only had a single bed each with plastic mattresses (you can guess why they put these in…..). The blinds and windows had to be operated with long poles (which they only provided one of per flat) and the blinds were very thin and did nothing to block out the morning sun. There were also very noisy fire doors which, if not closed properly using the door handle (why is it that people can't seem to use door handles properly these days? It's a massive bug bear of mine which I've experienced up and down the country in a variety of hotels…) then they had a tendency to slam very loudly with the sound reverberating down the concrete walls. That said, they were in a really good location. Close to the theatre and shops and we were all aware of what we were getting in advance. Sinead said she was having her 'student experience' as she didn't go to Uni, but to RADA, which doesn't have the traditional uni accommodation set up.
The boys, GMoss, Alastair, Jonny, James and Simon on the other hand were staying outside Dundee in a beautiful lodge right near some lakes where they could also fish. I was quite envious as they seemed to be having a great 'boy time', chatting into the night, cooking and drinking wine. GMoss even caught a 'large trout' (the relevance you'll get if you've seen the show) and they cooked it for their supper. GMoss had driven up and Alastair had hired a car so they were able to have a bit more flexibility with where they were staying and what they were doing.

Alastair and Simon explore their lodge….

Which was in a beautiful setting

Alastair and Jonny have just heard about our student flats….

Birdsong on film:

The day after we opened, some of us had a bit of an early start again. A company were coming to film some of the tunnel scenes and interview a couple of the boys. This lasted for about an hour of so and the finished version was shown on the Scottish news at 6:30pm that evening. It was a great bit of publicity and certainly seemed to boost our audience numbers. Well worth the early start!

George at a radio interview taking it seriously

Alastair less so……..

Half the population cheers, the other half groans:

Yep. It was that time again. A period that can divide couples, families and friends like no other. The World Cup was starting and England's first game was on the Saturday night (after the show. How fortunate!) of our Dundee week. Not to be too much of a cliche, but to be honest, the boys were far more interested in this than the girls (and GMoss and Alastair who really didn't care at all), although most of the girls attended the various World Cup watching parties after the show. A couple of us had a very early start the next day to get to the airport for 7 and 7:35am flights, but Peter and James (on the 7:35am) are hardy chaps and stayed up. There were a few disappointed faces in the car the next morning, but people were still hopeful and positive….. You can see where this is going for the next few blogs, can't you?

It's all very exciting…….. Nooooooooo!

Peter went to the boys to watch the football. As he had an early start they
kindly gave him a bed…… in the corridor. 

Out and About in Dundee:

Dundee has a lot going on. Not only do you have The Whitehall and The Rep, which is one of the most respected producing houses in the UK, there's also the HMS Discovery ship which you can take a tour of. St Andrews, the homes of golf, is just over the water and a mere 25 minute bus journey away. There's the quaint Broughty Ferry village, just a few miles away, not to mention Arbroath, where you can get one of the famous Old Smokey fish. In Dundee itself there are a couple of really good bars and clubs for after theatre activities at very reasonable prices - Malcolm and I got 2 large glasses of red wine for £6 (yes, for the two!) in one pub. The DCA (Dundee Contemporary Arts) is just across from The Rep and has a great bar downstairs with a good outside seating area. And of course there's also Tonic. The bar that sells over 50 different types of burger, all with hilarious names like The Whale burger or The Greenpeace burger (a veggie one).

HMS Discovery

Admiral Whatley.
Let's hope he's not really steering!

Simon worries that he's going to have to do this in the show….

The beautiful Scottish countryside is only just outside Dundee

Lucy and Peter go exploring

Sam and Lizzie have some down time in one of Dundee's bars

Time to say goodbye again….

I realised right at the start of the week how much I missed working at The Rep. It's one of the nicest places that I've ever worked in and, as ever, it is that people that make it. We were brilliantly looked after by Steve, who was with us all week as our duty stage manager. We hadn't worked together at The Rep before, but we realised that we had crossed paths briefly at Wycombe Swan in 2007! Carol, from front of house, was looking after company and audience alike for most of the week (we did allow her a bit of time off!) and all in all it was a great week. Everyone left in high spirits (well, except for the football….) not only because we'd had a good week, but also because we had another one of those rare Mondays off! We weren't due in at Leicester Curve until the Tuesday and so everyone had their fingers crossed for a bit of sunshine for the two days off. We were also excitedly anticipating what Curve would be like. It was built only a few years ago as a completely new approach to theatre going. Parts of the walls around the stage can be lifted so the general public can get a look behind the scenes. It would be a new experience for many of us and one we were all looking forward to.
See you there next time!

Oh and I promised you more from James The Joker. Here's what he got up to backstage in Dundee:

Lizzie came across him after a 'near miss' with a ladder

Berard considers a new career in construction….