Lauren's Birdsong Blog: Cork: Week 13

Cork: Week 13

So, did you enjoy Geroge Banks' Exeter blog? If you did then get set, as here's his take on our week in Cork. If you didn't enjoy it, tough. Here's Cork anyway!

Now I know what you’re thinking and yes, last week’s blog probably was the most distinguished piece of writing you’ve ever come across, but hold on to your hats, because I shall endeavour to best it with this blog instalment about the mighty Cork.

First thing’s first then, did I have digs ready? Absolutely not. I hopped on a plane at an ungodly hour Monday morning with the genius plan of booking digs when I arrived. But there was no need! At the airport Peter swiftly offered me a spare room in the house he had booked for himself, Simon and James. Done and dusted. Did I stay there? Not for most of the week, no. But more on that later.

We arrived into Cork and after Peter and I failed to operate the hire car’s Satnav (then drove in the wrong direction for half an hour) ended up in our digs. There was a pool table. Immediately plans were drawn up for a competition but, tragically, we never quite got round to it. The odd game occurred and people’s competitive blood started to bubble up (I am the MOST competitive, obviously) but on the whole, we kept things friendly.

We arrived at the theatre later on and couldn’t believe how tiny the space was. The set was crammed onto the stage and the backstage was the tightest we had encountered yet. Though we’ve become quite adept at adapting to the space around us the smallness here meant quite a big change was in order. The ‘trench entrance’ that is used throughout the play was no longer available-there simply wasn’t space to travel through it in the wing, so instead of turning left out of it, you turned right and past the ‘tunnel entrance’ which had black cloth draped over it to mask our wandering feet. Easy, right? After a quick sound check we were told what changes to entrances and exits had to be made and we hastily jotted them down. My usual dressing room partner on the tour is Malcolm but this week we found ourselves all in one dressing room for the first time, the boys in one and the girls in another. The atmosphere, as you can imagine, was pretty raucous-jokes and jibes started to fly pretty quickly, but it’s always interesting observing how people get themselves focused just before the play goes up. Everyone seems to have that moment when the task at hand clicks in and they head off into the darkness of the wing.

Cork Theatre - Beautiful but quite a narrow Proscenium
arch (the frame of the stage) and quite shallow.

Beautiful old fashioned boxes, not used for this show
as the view would be very restricted.

The first show went up relatively hitch free but, of course, some people forgot the changes. Given that we had done the show nearly one hundred times by this point it is understandable, it becomes a part of your muscle memory, but it resulted in what quickly became known as the ‘walk of shame’, illustrated for your convenience here.

I shan’t name names, but there were very few who didn’t have to complete the ‘Walk of Shame’. Do you think I missed my calling as an illustrator?

That evening in the pub something incredible happened. I had my first ever Guinness. In Ireland. Bought for me by an Irish woman-our very own Sinead. It was INCREDIBLE. After a brief lesson in how to drink it from Sam (9-10 sips, with the suds in the glass of a well poured Guinness an indication of how many you’ve had) and another pint or two of the black nectar I found myself moving on to Whisky. Though the aforementioned entrance swapping seems like a tiny thing, it’s something that shoots a little bit of new energy into the play-having to engage your brain whilst moving through the piece. As a result we found ourselves in high spirits, joking about the slipups, and decided to move onto one of Cork’s bars across the bridge and a little further into town. We tore up the dance floor well into the night and I ended up on a sofa in the girl’s flat. Shocker.

Sinead, Me and my first Guinness.
The black nectar, very tasty indeed

The next day Sam, Jonny and myself shuffled into town for a sure fire hangover cure-a late breakfast/early lunch in the Gourmet Burger Bar, just round the corner from the theatre. Needless to say we crushed through our tasty meals and proceeded to spend most of the day drifting through the city, exploring some shops and other bits and bobs. That evening another show and another night not spent in my digs. My father was in Ireland for work so we both stayed in a B&B close to the theatre. He came to watch the show, not having seen it since close to when we opened and we found ourselves chatting with the rest of the company afterwards about how much the piece has changed. One of those things you forget as you roll along.

The Burger boys looking a little grey after a night’s boozing.
Sam flying the flag for what we agreed is the best hangover cure

Wednesday saw another outing for the three burger boys, this time we headed to the cinema to watch Spiderman 2 (which we all enjoyed). We ate popcorn and sweets, had nachos smothered in fake cheese and sugar filled slushie ice drinks. We felt like kings. Very fat, super unhealthy kings...but kings none the less. The show was particularly enjoyable that night, due in large part to a very vocal audience member. Perched on the front row was a very sweet lady who, every time Sam’s character Evans uttered a sentence with dirty connotations (and that’s a lot, if you haven’t seen the play), proceeded to be titillated enough to audibly exclaim ‘Oh Jesus’. Credit to Sam, he kept it together...I don’t think I can say the same for those of us in the wing. They became our favourite two words that week.

That wasn’t the only interesting thing to happen that evening. Later on Sam was accosted by a gentleman in the pub toilet, enquiring as to whether or not he had seen the theatre ghost. Apparently it is a gentleman looking for his hat and can be seen wandering the building, appearing in locations as diverse as the auditorium to the fly towers. The man produced compelling reports of eye witness accounts and even photographic evidence, but alas, our search for him proved in vain. I also ended up back in my own digs that night, which is arguably even spookier, and enjoyed some incredible food prepared by Simon’s partner Wendy-affectionately referred to as Mrs. Bear, obviously.

On Thursday Simon, James and I ventured off to visit the grave of Oliver Reed-a particular hero of Simons. It is located in a tiny town a little drive away from Cork and you need to obtain the keys to the graveyard from his local pub. The story goes that his wife wanted to bury him on the grounds of his house, but the other regulars insisted he be buried close by so that they could say good night to him upon closing time and she granted them their wish. Indeed we met people inside who used to socialise with the big man and they told us fond stories of their time spent together, he was obviously very dear to them. The grave had a little statue of Bulls Eye, Bill Sikes’ dog in ‘Oliver!’, perched next to it and people who came to visit left unopened cans of Guinness behind the grave in tribute to the actor. I always find it interesting being in a graveyard, I think it’s fair to say we found ourselves a little more subdued and reflective on the car journey back.

Oliver Reed's grave
(Stolen from Simon's twitter page)

People still leave offering of booze for him to enjoy…..

The week continued to whizz past, lovely houses and a very warm reception every night from the audiences. We had no matinees for the week and it allowed us to recover a little physically, the demands the play makes of your body really do creep up on you.

Saturday was a big day for Simon, an ardent Arsenal fan, as the FA cup final was on. Our next week was in Hull so he wasn’t overly keen on arriving there on Monday only to witness a victory parade at the expense of his beloved team. The pressure was on. Jonny travelled over to watch with us in our digs, whilst there he insisted on wearing a toga fashioned out of a bed sheet and that we all refer to him as ‘Santiago’-telling us he was going to school us ‘Roman style’ at pool. To be fair to him, he’s very good, but to this day he has offered no explanation in regards to the character he adopted. After a very tasty lunch we settled down for kick off. I won’t go into the ins and outs of the match but it was fairly gruelling for Simon, not helped by Jonny and Peter cheering absurdly loudly for Hull. The game went into extra time and we had to leave for the theatre. Things got tense as we desperately searched for a radio station reporting on the game on the drive over, Simon barricaded himself into the dressing room as we made our way to the stage and eventually surfaced for warm up with a big smile on his face. He could face Hull next week.

Jonny, as ‘Santiago’, and Simon settle into the FA cup final,
while the La Liga decider plays on the iPad. Football mad

That night I stayed on a sofa yet again, this time at the flat of Lauren and Alastair and my memory is so hazy of events that week that I couldn’t even tell you where I stayed Thursday or Friday. I’m pretty sure I only stayed in digs twice. Who knows... I promise I’ll get better. Other goings on that week included Sinead’s mother coming to watch the show and, just like her daughter, insisted on buying me a Guinness too (my first from a first generation Irish woman you see) and we had one of our more interesting talkback sessions after the play. Normally they take place with the audience remaining in the seats and the cast coming out onto the stage, but in Cork they just invite everyone into the bar with the actors sitting on stalls along it and the audience at tables scattered around the room. It makes for a very relaxed atmosphere and it was a wonderful session. Some people also ventured out for walks during our time there in the lovely Irish countryside, to my shame I can’t say I joined in.

The Post-show discussion took place in the bar

On Sunday we dragged our hungover selves into the airport VERY early and we had only taken a few steps in when Carolin realised that she had left her passport in her case, which was now on the truck hurtling to its next destination. After the initial panic of being stuck in an airport subsided, the very helpful and sympathetic staff managed to arrange for her to fly and she landed safely back in the UK with the rest of us, no interrogation necessary. I have never seen panic so clearly etched onto someone’s face, bless her.

Just before I sign off, I wanted to mention something I had forgotten about Exeter. During the week I came in to work through an understudy rehearsal as Stephen. It was a very interesting experience and a reminder of just how different a part can be when played by another actor. Though I couldn’t imagine the play with different people in the roles now it’s amazing to see how the actors you work with can shift and become such different and clearly defined characters. I suppose it’s one of the reasons I love doing what I do.

Well, that’s it, my last blog entry for the tour. I apologise for the tardiness. As I write this there’s only a few weeks left and I can’t quite believe the tour is winding down. If you’ve been to see it I hope you enjoyed it and if you haven’t yet I hope you get a chance to come along and say hi. It’s a play we love and are proud to be in. See you at the theatre.

George Banks

Twitter: @1georgebanks

Lauren butts back in:

Thanks to George for another great blog. Just to add a couple of things about our week in Cork:

The pub that we drank in most evenings, is right next door to the theatre and called 'Dan Lowrey's', which incidentally is what the theatre used to be called until it was renamed The Everyman. The landlord was really accommodating to us, not minding if we were hanging around a bit finishing our pints after last orders and on the Friday, he even laid on food for us after the show and stayed open later. This was great for another reason too: It was mine, GMoss' and Malcolm's 300th SHOW!! As the three of us did the tour last year we're just a bit ahead of most of this year's cast, who would be celebrating their 100th show the following week in Hull (more of that next time). Sinead celebrated her 300th the next day and naturally, we had a few drinks on both occasions to toast our longevity!

A big thank you to all the staff at 'Dan Lowrey's' and the staff at the theatre who looked after us so well. Particularly to Naomi, the in-house producer who was so helpful to Sinead, and also to Mark and his crew who worked so hard on getting the show in and working in a short space of time.

We've got some exciting blogs coming up for you. We're hoping by this time next week you'll be almost completely up to date with Hull, Doncaster, Colchester, Dundee and Leicester, so do keep an eye out for almost daily new blogs. We've also got another guest blogger; our director, co-produceer and performer extraordinaire Alastair Whatley will be telling you all about Colchester.

In the meantime I'll leave you with a few more pictures of a ramble I took around Cork one day.