Those Who Deserve The Thanks (or The Mentors Who Took The Real Chance On You)

POGUE'S WORDS OF THEATRICAL WISDOM

“Ninety percent of talent is knowing what to do with it.”
--Charles F. Dickens, UK Theatre Professor & My Mentor—

Remember when Tom Hanks thanked his drama teacher as he accepted his Oscar for PHILADELPHIA? It was a moment I enjoyed, because when I’ve delivered my fantasy Oscar/Tony/Emmy speech in my head (and let’s be honest, any of us in this business…and probably a great many who aren’t…have composed that imaginary speech at one time or another), I always thank the unsung heroes…the folks who gave me a push up the ladder when I was also unsung.

Despite the profusion of no doubt deserving family, actors, directors, producers, and agents one needs to dole out gratitude to, the people usually overlooked in this “I owe you so much” exercise are…well, you can’t really call them “the little people”, because they weren’t!

They were maybe the biggest people in your life…the ones who may not have exerted the greatest influence on you or had the most significant impact on your career, but were a part of …perhaps the inspiration for…those little defining moments when veils lifted for you, connective tissue was provided, or decisions were made that altered your mindset or offered opportunity. The stepping stones or rungs of the ladder that allowed you to ascend to another level, see a greater vision, breathe a rarer air.

Once you’ve reached a certain height, gained a certain reputation, built a credible resume, it’s not that great a risk for the other guy to throw his lot in with you. But what about those who saw you when you were invisible? Who took a chance on you when you no one else would…those mentors who took their time to encourage and nurture your desire and fledging talent when it was still unproven?

My imaginary award speech acknowledges my high school teachers, Sara Hamel and Norman Yonce, who helped broaden my creativity.

(Below: My first starring role...in fact, my first role of any kind. Henry Spoffard III, in a non-musical version of GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES, directed by Sara Hamel. The lovely young ladies, r to l: Anne Durham, Jane Johnson, Vicki Conners (seated w/book),Cindy Ney, Rebecca Goshorn).

Certainly, college theatre professors Charles Dickens, Mary Stephenson, Wally Briggs, and Ray Smith would be included. Julieanne and I were fortunate to pay back the great debt we both owed to Charles Dickens, by being able to dedicate the UK Theatre Movement Studio to him.

(below: Me, as Claudio; Julieanne, as Isabella in MEASURE FOR MEASURE, directed by Charles Dickens at UK's Guignol Theatre).

Professionally, directors like Charles David McCally, Richard Vath, and Paul Giovanni boldly took a chance on my acting talent and hired me. Charles and Richard repeatedly hired me and kept me gainfully employed.

(Below: Me with Marianne Hammock in COMEDY OF ERRORS, directed by Charles David McCally, at the Globe of the Great Southwest. Marianne was the Courtesan; I played the gyspyish master of ceremonies/leader of a Comedia Dell' arte Troupe presenting the play. Egged on by McCally, I wrote the part myself; how's that for sheer brass...competing with Shakespeare with the some of the silliest doggrel this side of the Southbank? SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY referred to my role as: "The illusion was initiated by the introduction of an unctuous presenter who huckstered the audience in rhymed couplets.")





(Above: The Cast of MOVE OVER, MRS. MARKHAM, directed by Richard Vath for Country Dinner Playhouse in Dallas. That's me in the curly wig.)


Paul took me aside at a callback from an Ahmanson Theatre open call for a play he had written, THE CRUCIFER OF BLOOD. He told me, “Of the 300 people you see at an open call and of the eighty you call back, maybe only a couple a dozen have real talent. I want you to know, you’re one of those. But what even the talented people who come out here with their battered suitcases full of dreams don’t understand is: nobody cares. You have to make them care. I want you to know you made me care and I’m going to do all I can to get you in this show.” He got me into it. I and one another actor were told we were the first two ever hired from an open Equity call at the Ahmanson (Below: Me on the floor, between Charlton Heston & Jeremy Brett).

Jeremy Brett, who starred in the play with Charlton Heston, was another one who “cared”. One of the few true gentlemen I’ve met in the business. I remember once, at a cast party, he suddenly smiled and wagged a knowing his finger at me, “ You have this wonderful imagination that conjures knights and faery castles and dragons and marvelous dreams and you think no one sees it, but…they do!” That great kindness meant a lot to me and was never forgotten. It was just one of many encouraging generosities he showed me during the run of the show and after.

I would also mention Clive Trenchard and Janet Greek, through whose auspices, my writing was seen by my first agent, Melinda Jason, who also took a chance on me. And Melinda introduced me to Sy Weintraub. I couldn’t forget Sy.

I say Melinda introduced me to Sy. Actually, she sent me to meet him. For even though we had never met before, I had been introduced to him some time ago.

Sy, a producer, had just acquired the rights to Sherlock Holmes and was planning to do a series of two-hour films for network TV. I was excited. I had read the stories as a boy and had seen the Basil Rathbone films so many times that the phrase “Hello, what’s this?” was a permanent part of my repertoire.

Sy achieved huge success with Tarzan, doing films in the fifties and sixties and the television show with Ron Ely (Sy certainly knew which literary characters to exploit). This also worked in my favour; for when I had been devouring Doyle, I had also been plowing through Edgar Rice Burroughs. So I was intimately familiar with Sy’s cinematic efforts on the ape-man’s behalf…hence our earlier introduction, unbeknownst to him. But he was impressed by this and seemed eager to take a chance on me, an untried writer with no credits, only a couple of sample scripts and some plays (unproduced ones).

(Below: Me, with Gordon Scott, who was Sy's first cinematic Tarzan. I was signing PRINCESS OF MARS scripts and DRAGONHEART books for the Burroughs' Bibliophiles...of which I'm a proud member...at their annual Dum-Dum in LA.)



But the clincher was Timmy.

In one of Dr. Watson’s accounts of his friend Sherlock Holmes, the great detective exhorts the good doctor to remember “the curious incident of the dog.” It was my own curious incident with the dog that helped me out with Sy --Timmy.

Timmy had played the Bionic Dog in the TV series THE BIONIC WOMAN. A German Shepherd the size of a small Volkswagon, Timmy, now retired from acting, earned his Purina as Sy’s guard dog. And he knew his job. I mean, if left alone in the room with this critter, you made no sudden moves.

Sy considered Timmy an excellent judge of character and had been advised by the trainer never do business with anybody the dog didn’t cotton to. What can I tell ya? The big brute loved me. All over me…licking, nuzzling, sniffing my crotch. Couldn’t shake him: followed me everywhere. I’d definitely made an impression.

And my subsequent work fortunately did not sour the impression. Sy tried me out on a Frankenstein script he had going into production in a few weeks which needed a rewrite – a page-one rewrite. Ten days later, I gave him one. He and I spent another week on it, pumping more action into it without sacrificing what Sy called its “literary” tone.

Alas, the film ultimately fell through, but Sy was impressed enough with my writing that he brought me on to his proposed Sherlock Holmes series. Sy had been having trouble getting scripts that satisfied him, complaining that the American writers gave him recycled “Rockford Files” in gaslight and the British writers gave him “austere” MASTERPIECE THEATRE productions. Somehow, with my adaptation of Doyle’s THE SIGN OF FOUR, I managed to find the requisite blend of action and authentic Holmesian nuance.
(Above: Me, Dame Jean Conan Doyle...A.C. Doyle's last surviving daughter..., actress Cheri Lunghi, Sy Weintraub, and Dame Jean's husband...Sir Jeffrey Something or other on the set of SIGN OF FOUR. She was a very nice lady who quite liked my adaptations.)


If before I had been an aficionado of Holmes, I now became an expert. I re-read the entire canon (the annotated one) and when Sy called me from London to tell me the other script he had been counting on to start the series was dreadful and what could I do, I replied: “I can give you HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES in two weeks.” He had it in twelve days (Oh, I was energetic and hungry back then).
(Above: Ian Richardson as Holmes; Donald Churchill as Watson in HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES)


Two months later, I was in London, the only city in the world I ever wanted to visit, abroad for the first time in my life, the only other American connected to the project besides Sy. He put me up in a flat from where I could watch the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, gave me a generous per diem, bought me breakfast (and introduced me to the Scotch Egg, the most delectable breakfast food item known to man) and lunch everyday at Shepperton Studios where for the next three months I watched some of England’s finest actors, led by Ian Richardson as Holmes, speak my lines.

Sy didn’t make me rich but he gave me something much more valuable to a writer. Respect and Power. On my first jet-lagged day at the studio, I was going into a meeting with the director of SIGN, who had a few “inspirations” about script changes. Sy told me right before the meeting: “These scripts are where you and I want them and I don’t want to change anything, unless you think it’s right, so listen to the director, but commit to nothing.” What a wonderful cachet to be given going into a creative meeting. The director didn’t get his changes.

On set, actors would come ask me if they could change a line. Sy let everyone on the production know I was the in-house expert on Holmes and any questions should be relayed to me. I was in on every creative meeting. I was in on casting. Sy insisted I grab a pad and pencil and get my butt to rushes every day and take notes. He wanted me in the editing-room. When I protested I knew nothing about editing, he said: “It’s common sense. You’ll learn.” Of the six editing suggestions I made, they used five. Sy expressed his philosophy about producing to me once: “I learn everything I can about every aspect of the business. Then when someone comes up to me and tells me they can’t do something, I say, ‘Oh, yes, you can and here’s how…’ even telling them what lens to use, if I have to.”

He was an old-fashioned producer who refused to abandon either his passion or his power to the encroaching fashion of “the auteur” or “the package”. He was always the boss. He knew the difference between collaboration and capitulation, and he knew, despite the hype of “director’s vision”, that the “vision” came from and belonged to the script and that everyone who signed onto the project was there to serve that vision.

Sy was grooming me to be his point-man in England and write every episode of the series, if I wanted. But there was no series. The Networks just couldn’t wrap sweeps week around deductive reasoning and deerstalker hats. So the films ran rampantly on cable, won some European festivals, were embraced by the disciples of Doyle, and gave me more satisfaction as a writer than I’ve ever had since in this business.

The result is I got two films that actually resemble what I wrote. THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES has been called, “The best version of the Doyle classic to date…This deserved theatrical release but didn’t get it.” It remains my favourite of all my films. And it’s the only one that I still pull out from time-to-time and watch with unqualified joy, never having to flinch at mistakes and lament what might have been (Below: Ron Lacey as Inspector Lestrade in HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES).


Sy used to joke that he’d made me famous and now he couldn’t afford me. But the truth is all he had to do was ask; I’d have found a way to make it work.

Whenever I drove by Sy’s house, I always slowed the car to admire the massive sculpture in his back yard. It was a larger-than-life knight on a massive charger fashioned from some sort of shiny silver metal. One day, I drove by and noticed the knight was gone. I called Sy to find out he had moved, the knight had been sold, and Sy was now exploring the world of internet entertainment. That was Sy…always moving forward, on to the next thing, always ahead of the game.

Then, six months after that phone call, I woke one morning to read his obituary in the paper. He had died of pancreatic cancer in April of 2000.

After that, driving by Sy’s old house, I missed seeing that towering knight shimmering in the sun. It always reminded me of Sy’s chivalrous mentoring when I was just an aspiring talent looking for a chance to prove myself.

Thanks, Sy, for giving me that chance. Thanks for giving me one of the happiest times of my life. Thanks for respecting my talent and the work and spoiling me for every other experience I’ve ever had in the business. Thanks for never lying to me and keeping every promise you ever made to me. When I get beaten down in the development process or a production is going awry or the writer is getting screwed yet again, I remember my time with you and all your kindnesses to me and how collaboration is supposed to work and the memory is sweet.

The ideal you showed me and the example you set gives me the strength to climb back in the trenches each time and fight for what should be rather than what is.

(below: Douglas Hickox, director of HOUND & Sy Weintraub)

***

Okay, you’re clutching your gold statuette, the band is cutting you off, what unsung mentor haven’t you thanked yet?

POGUE’S WEEKLY MEDIA CHECK

POGUE’S WATCHING:

YOU NEVER CAN TELL. From the BBC Boxed George Bernard Shaw DVD Set. Shaw’s is a tremendously witty writer who makes me guffaw. The play is quite wonderful. With Robert Powell and Patrick Magee.

THE FURIES. With Babara Stanwyck and Walter Huston. The title, The Furies, is apt because this strange western is very Greek, also very noir.

POGUE’S LISTENING TO:

THE HAPPY TIME. Original Cast recording of the Kander/Ebb show.

SPOTLIGHT ON…VIC DAMONE. Sinatra said Damone had “the best pipes in the business.” I’m inclined to agree. Very smooth…and great song selection.

POGUE’S READING:

A COLLECTION OF HOWARD BARKER PLAYS. Notably VICTORY, THE CASTLE, and SCENES FROM AN EXECUTION. The last I saw in a terrific production years ago at the Ahmanson in LA with the magnificent Frank Langella and Juliet Stevenson. Barker is a fascinating writer who apparently is much more celebrated elsewhere than in his own home country of Britain. My colleagues at AGL, Artistic Director Rick St. Peter, and Associate Director, Eric Seale, would love this guy…Eric for his anarchistic qualities, Rick for his Brechtian aspects and his language. It is the language certainly that attracts me, which is poetry even when he utilizes what some might consider crude and offensive language. I also love his attraction for what seem to me, “epic themes”. He has an interesting theory of Theatre of Castastrophe..it’s first principle being art is not digestible, “but an irritant in the consciousness, like a grain of sand in an oyster’s gut…” A theatre company was formed…The Wrestling School…primarily to perform his work.

WRITTEN BY MAGAZINE, the magazine of the Writers Guild, which has a terrific interview and article on the brilliant Larry Gelbart, who I’ve been fortunate to meet on several occasions, and other interesting articles about writers of my age and older and how we deal with the “second and third acts” of our lives and careers.

Any weekly media recommendations of your own to make?

SCENE & BE SEEN

Actors Guild of Lexington’s spring fund-raising event, Scene & Be Seen, takes place May 9th, at Spindletop Hall, in Lexington. This year’s theme, The Silver Masquerade, celebrates the theatre’s 25th season. For details: http://www.sceneandbeseen.org/ . Come! Have fun! Donate! Support Theatre! Support this theatre!

Pogue's London Theatre Diary -Part 3

The Pogues continue their glut of theatre-going. Seen so far LOOT; EVERY GOOD BOY DESERVES FAVOUR; TWELFTH NIGHT; MIDSUMMER’S NIGHT DREAM; AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY; THE WAR HORSE; MRS. AFFLECK; BE NEAR ME; COMPLICIT (See Parts One & Two).

JANUARY 24 – DAY 11 – ENTERTAINING MR. SLOANE

Having been unsuccessful yesterday, Julieanne arose once again at the crack of dawn, after a sleepless night, to try and score a WAR HORSE ticket for today’s matinee. She succeeded this time, largely because she had made friends with the staff. Not making the cut after waiting several hours, she lingered mournfully in the book shop and lobby, when a box office pal took pity and discreetly signaled her over. He had just gotten a return.

With her afternoon planned, I toyed with the possibility of seeing a matinee of VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE starring Ken Stott and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio…or taking in THE WOMAN IN BLACK. But first I headed up north off Tottenham Court Road and Marylebone to Sam French on Fitzroy to pick up several more plays...most notably Stoppard’s version of IVANOV that Branagh just did; THE LAST CONFESSION by Roger Crane, and PAUL & NEVER SO GOOD, both by Howard Brenton.

I then toddled over to my Bloomsbury Bookshops by Russell Square. At Skoob, a delightfully cluttered, but well-arranged bookshop, with a great theatre section, I sought a specific translation of an obscure play I wanted. I came up empty on that one, but happily found another translation of the same play that I did not know existed. I also found another Pratchett hardback I need and a volume of John Osborne one-acts.

Heading home, I stopped by THE VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE box-office to see about matinee tickets…the good tickets available were “special” house seats in the circle or stalls that provided no preview discount and were outrageous. One of the “special” seats would have cost 66pds/40. An absurdly high price. I think all the West End musicals are driving the prices of straight plays up…although I had yet to encounter anything this high.

But the price made me re-think what my goal was here. Though I’ve never seen VIEW and like Stott, I debated whether I was just trying to fill some arbitrary quota of having seen a dozen plays this trip. I realized that I had seen or booked all the plays that had initially caught my fancy…and while I love to discover surprises once here, VIEW had always been something of a low-priority alternative. And while I have no prejudice about Brits playing very American pieces like this, I’d prefer to see “English” theatre when in England. So I took a pass and decided to stand pat at eleven plays unless WOMAN IN BLACK intrigued me.

After lunch, I strolled to the South Bank Book Market once again, but found nothing. I crossed the Waterloo Bridge and traipsed through Covent Garden, reading the reviews outside the Fortune Theatre where WOMAN IN BLACK was playing.

I have avoided this play for years because it has run forever and one fears “MOUSETRAP malaise” would have set in by now – reducing it to a clapped-out hoary old vehicle. But most major critics had revisited the play since 2000 and it had respectable reviews from respectable critics. My main purpose in seeing it would be as a possible play for AGL. But a four o’clock matinee was too late. I’ll keep it bookmarked for a Monday possibility. I did pick up a copy of the play to read.

ENTERTAINING MR. SLOANE that night was a hop-skip into the next street, venerable Whitehall…which used to also be the name of the theatre. They’ve chopped in it into two separate spaces and re-dubbed it the Trafalgar Studios #1 and #2. The last thing I saw there under its old incarnation was an interesting John Whiting play, A PENNY FOR A SONG, which starred Julian Glover and Jeremy Clyde (who used to be part of the old sixties rock group, Chad and Jeremy). In its new guise, we saw Frank McGuinness’ GATES OF GOLD in Studio Two where the actors were all but sitting in our laps.

Tonight Studio Two was serving as the theatre bar for Studio One where SLOANE was playing, which was arrived at through a stygian labyrinth of corridors and doors. Anything I hazily remembered of the old theatre, I did not recognize. Both the audience seats and the stage had steep rakes, but the whole thing had a cozy, dare I say shabby, intimacy that was probably appropriate for the play. We had good seats, three rows back.

The play was delightful. I’d not seen it on stage (only the film by Douggie Hickox, who had directed my HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES). I am now a confirmed Orton fan and need to read WHAT THE BUTLER SAW when I get home. The cast were all fine, particularly so Simon Paisley Day, who played Ed, the brother, and Imelda Staunton as Kath. During her seduction of Mr. Sloane, Ms. Staunton gets her kit off and flounces on in the sheerest nightie, exposing all her charms and fluffy bits. Cheeky lass!

(Ian Richardson as Holmes in my
Hound of the Baskervilles - 1983)

And what a joy it was to be ensconced back in one’s flat ten minutes after the play was over, getting one’s own kit off. It’s what I love about residing in this part of London. Everything you need for gracious living is no more than a thirty minute walk from your door. Theatre, film, shops, markets, museums, restaurants, scenery, greenery…all there!

I read Brenton’s PAUL before I went to sleep…about Saul/Paul of Tarsus and “the extraordinary phenomenon of faith” as the book blurb proclaims. Man, I loved this play! I must research it; I suspect its premiere raised some hackles and some howls. Probably water off a duck’s back to Mr. Brenton; given his history with ROMANS IN BRITAIN.

JANUARY 25- DAY 12 – THE DUKES

Sunday and rain, which put the kibosh on any contemplated major expeditions. We’d considered re-visiting the Museum of London, a fav of ours. No matter. Julieanne is so sleep deprived… no wonder, restless nights and trudging down in the grey pre-dawn to queue at the National…she is finally sleeping in. Part of this trip was for her to laze and re-coup from having directed THE FANTASTICKS. I slipped around the corner to Villiers to get the Sunday papers.

(St. James at Dawn. I wasn't there.)

(All the London photos posted Julieanne took.)

(Pelican Island in St. James)

Once the sleeper awoke and the rain slackened, we ventured over to St. James…our favourite park…and fed the squirrels and fowl. We then crossed the Mall and made our way to the Dukes Hotel tucked down a quiet, dead-end mews off St. James’s St. for a couple of really expensive drinks.

This is a tradition. I spent my first month in London at The Dukes when I came over to shoot my Holmes’ films in ‘82. So we savour the serene environs of its elegant bar, sit by the window, have a couple of drinks, and put a pretty good dent in the bowl of mixed nuts. It’s a nice way to idle an afternoon, particularly a rainy one. The wait staff is charming and impeccable. The bar is known for its martinis, but we don’t drink martinis.

It was more crowded than usual and we amused ourselves eavesdropping on a business conversation between two Spanish gents (one looked like an aristocratic Anthony Quinn) and an American couple. What little we could make out seemed to involve internet porn.

We meandered home via Piccadilly, fixed some dinner (trying to eat up all the groceries we had stocked), read the papers, watched some telly, and had an early night.

JANUARY 26 – DAY 13 – PACKING

No theatre booked for today. I had considered WOMAN IN BLACK; but since we’re going to the theatre tomorrow night with Deanna, I decided it best to use the evening for packing. Our timing, in order to see Deanna’s play, has coincided with a transition when several shows have just closed and others not quite opened. If we had stretched it a few days either way we might have caught a few more things…like GETHSEMANE by David Hare, not in the National rotation the last two weeks or my buddy Pete Postlethwaite’s LEAR opening at the YOUNG VIC the day after we leave. Despite the fact, it got critically crucified earlier, I’d have loved to have seen him in it. They apparently have re-tooled it. Anyway, it’s not been our best theatre trip, certainly by no means our worst and we still have PITMEN PAINTERS tomorrow. But if it not been for the National, it might have been a bit grim. Five of our eleven plays we saw there. The West End, over-run with its musicals, is looking pretty bleak these days.

The morning was sunny and Julieanne went to see her squirrels in St. James Park and visit Westminster Abbey…one of her traditions. I embarked on an aimless wander down Fleet Street, cut up into High Holborn, past the Smithfield Market (closed by that time of day), past what was once Newgate Prison, down Holborn into Bloomsbury, and back to Skoob.

I found another volume of Osborne plays, TIME PRESENT & THE HOTEL IN AMSTERDAM (The immensely talented and immensely self-destructive Mr. Osborne intrigues me after reading John Heilpern’s fascinating bio of him). Instead of choosing a hardback copy, I opted for a worn and somewhat water-stained paperback edition, because someone had diligently clipped, folded, and taped several original newspaper reviews of the plays on the endpapers, as well as an article on Jill Bennett, the star of TIME PRESENT, and Osborne’s wife at the time…his fourth, I think. They make fascinating reading and a nice historical tip-ins.

That night, we indulged in our usual last night ritual of strolling up the South Bank to Westminster Bridge, past Bodicea’s statue, up Whitehall, and into Trafalgar. We stopped in a few souvenir shops sizing up shot glasses for a neighbour who collects them and who watched over things at home. Back at the hotel, we hauled the luggage out of the storage room and did some preliminary packing as well as totting up our expenditures for customs. Nothing to declare; well under the limit. Mostly books, which don’t count.

(View from Waterloo Bridge)

(London Eye from the South Bank)

JANUARY 27- DAY 14 –THE PITMEN PAINTERS

Tuesday was mostly packing. Since the hotel lobby computer has not been working the entire two weeks we’ve been here, Julieanne went out to an internet café in the afternoon and printed up our boarding passes. Oddly enough, neither of us has really missed the internet, email, or phone. But we are missing the critters and are ready to get home. We have been discussing that we should probably make theatre forays to places like Chicago; Stratford, Canada; the Shaw Festival. This would not necessarily preclude coming to London as well; which is still the greatest city in the world and has the greatest theatre.

I’m glad we were ending our sojourn tonight at the National. We met Deanna and a friend of hers who used to work at the Dallas Theater Center in the Lyttelton. Once again, Deanna had snared us excellent house seats.

THE PITMEN PAINTERS, based on a true story of coal miners learning to paint, was a moving play about art, artistic expression, and the elevating power of art. I wept. It may have been my favourite of all the things we’ve seen. We all seemed to enjoy it. Not surprisingly, this story of working class men transformed through the power of art was written by Lee Hall, who wrote BILLY ELLIOTT, both film and musical, which embraces the same themes.

One speech particularly resonated with me, spoken by the art teacher who taught the coal miners: “…there’s a chance we can actually do something, but only if the working classes get off their fat asses and their high horses and use their power, their intelligence, and their creativity…and reach for a better world. If they give up and accept the scraps thrown to them, then we’re all fucked. You can’t have a rich culture if three-quarters of the people are disenfranchised.”

We now live in world that embodies what I call the “Arrogance of Ignorance”. Too many people don’t know anything and they are proud that they don’t know anything. History, culture, world events are things they can’t be bothered to know. Our attention-deficient, instant gratification minds no longer seek knowledge but clutter themselves up with insignificant information instead. We fritter hours away twittering, texting, relaying the dreary details of our shallow mundane lives on our cell phones or facebook or myspace rather that filling our time with anything substantial or lasting. We magnify the trivial and diminish the important as being to complex to consider. Our entertainment, political discourse, news pander to the lowest common denominator rather than reaching for the highest common denominator or beyond.

We slash our Arts funding and, worse, our Arts Education funding…thereby disallowing our children any glimpse of greatness or hope of enriching their lives with the possibility of something more than just working eight hours and then passively slumping onto the couch at night and having the TV wash over them with bland, non-engaging, mind-deadening pap.

I do not believe the role of the artist is giving the public what it wants. His job (and his dilemma) is to make it want what he gives. If you programmed nothing but Shakespeare and the classics (Shaw, Ibsen, Chekov, the Greeks, etc.) on TV for a year, people would watch Shakespeare and the classics and they’d like them. But they can’t appreciate what they’ve never been exposed to or had nurtured in them.

My pal, Roger Lee Leasor, quotes an old Jewish saying: “If you have two pennies, spend one for bread and one for wine: bread so you can live, wine so you want to.” He goes on: “Arts are wine. We do the Arts not because it will make us live, but because it will make us want to live.”

Anyway, as seems obvious by the above rant, THE PITMEN PAINTERS hit home for me. Deanna was not feeling well, so we didn’t stay for drinks after the play, but just walked back to hotel. I know how this is: once you get through something as momentous as she has, your body just lets up and says, “Okay, I’ve stood by you through it all, now it’s time for me to break down a little.” They’ve even kept her on the go after the show closed. She had to give a talk at the Garrick Club last Friday. Of course, I envy her this. I’ve been trying to get inside this famous theatrical club for years…just for a look. I’ve always had to content myself with a glimpse through the door at the theatrical portraits that ascend the wall by the stairs to the second floor (or, what the Brits call the first floor; our “first” floor being their “ground” floor).

On the way back, we spoke of Larry Drake and Jim Daniels, but Deanna has mostly been disconnected from these theatrical comrades of our mutual past. But then we’ve all gone our own paths and, in truth, I’ve never known her all the well. During our summer Shakespeare and dinner theatre tours eons ago, we would all, as a cast, do a movie, dinner or poker night, but even then Deanna seemed a person who valued her privacy. It was great to see her again and enjoy her deserving triumph. Still the best actress I’ve ever worked with.

(Deanna & I in our salad days at The Globe of the Great Southwest)

JANUARY 28 – DAY 15 – DEPARTURE & HOME

Julieanne was up at four, unable to sleep. We got ready and checked out at ten. Good thing we had gotten an international cell phone. My one call from the hotel was the only extra on the bill -- eleven pounds. We arrived at the airport around eleven. The cab fare was 12pds less than it had been going into town. Julieanne said it had something to do with time of day. Beats me. Terminal Five is quite nice and easy to get around in. Lots of shops and amenities once past security.

Those who complain about air travel, I suspect just don’t do it right…mostly rushing in during the last hour or half-hour, trying to get through ticket lines and security, rushing down corridors to departure gates and just not allowing proper time. I always come early…way early…and also leave plenty of time for connecting flights in the event of delays. I bring a book with me. I’d rather be in the terminal, calmly reading than out on the road, stressing whether or not I’m going to make it. It saves a lot of panic.

The flight home was as uneventful. Premium Economy was only a third filled and First class seemed almost empty. I don’t know how an airline can operate like this…and I want to know how I can get bumped up to First. I watched APALOOSA on the way back. It was the only film I actually went to a theatre to see last year. I’m a sucker for westerns. I’ve often been tempted to get into collecting western fiction; but have always pulled myself back from the brink, not wishing to open that can of worms. I don’t have enough time to read the stuff I’ve got. The snack they served on the plane was possibly the worst sandwich I ever ate; some sort of suspect fish. I don’t eat good fish.

In Chicago, the computer had lost us on our connecting. Because we had the paperwork, our booking agent got us on it and a lucky thing too. Flights were being cancelled right and left…there had been a big ice storm a day or two earlier in our neck of the woods. Fortunately, the flight to Cincy went out as scheduled. We arrived about 12 that night to a sea of silvery white snow and ice covering everything. The shuttle took us to our car and we spent the next half hour, sliding snow off it and chipping ice away. The parking lot had a small bobcat bulldozer that cleared away the snow piled behind car.

(the frozen long-term parking lot at the Cincinnati airport)

The roads were relatively clear, but vehicles, including my own were dropping ice off their metal carcasses. The trees were bent with the weight of the ice. But they looked beautiful, save for those that had been shattered and cracked under the onslaught. We got in around two that night, left the suitcases by the door, and crashed.

AFTERMATH

The following day, we picked up the animals from the kennel and, two days later, after having thought we had dodged the ice bullet, the power in the house went out. Fortunately, for only fourteen hours. Some folks in the state endured no power for weeks.

A few days later, London had its first major snow storm in years, which paralyzed the city and even forced several show cancellations. So it seems our timing was pretty good. We were gratified to read that the critics mostly agreed with our opinions about the several previews we saw. I’ve been devouring the plays and books I bought and, as ready as I was to come home, I’m already dreaming of going back. Framed on the living-room wall behind the piano is a piece of sheet music we once found at the Portobello Road Market. It’s entitled LONDON, I CANNOT LEAVE YOU. Pretty much sums it up. It’s with us all the time.