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Touring a Panto - the Reality!Dateline: 10th December, 2006I am shattered! It's Saturday night at quarter to ten and I have just begun to come round from an exhausting day. It was day three of our tour of Cinderella and what a killer it was! We thought it would be a bit difficult because we had an understudy for the Fairy/Prince, but that turned out to be not a problem at all. Indeed, after a day's intensive rehearsal with her yesterday, Roxanne was great and no one in the audience would have believed she was an understudy. No, the problems were very different. We set out in two vehicles: Billy, one of the Uglies (Septicaemia), was to drive the van with Roxanne and Viktoria (Cinderella), whilst I picked up Iain (Buttons) and Dylan (Ugly Sister Morticia). They set out from Sunderland and I drive from Sunderland to South Shields to pick up Iain, then on to Whitley Bay for Dylan (and his dad, who was coming to see the show). It was an eight o'clock start because the first show was at ten at a working men's club in Seaton Deleval, somewhere north of Whitley Bay. I reached the first pick-up point dead on eight, but no sign of Iain. By ten past I was getting worried, so I rang his mobile. He was frantically struggling to get his car started. He managed to get there ten minutes later and so we headed for what we thought would be the difficult point of the journey, the Tyne Tunnel. On weekday rush hours there are two and three mile tailbacks so we were hoping that, it being Saturday, we'd get through OK, but feared that might be a forlorn hope. It wasn't! We got through very quickly and in no time at all we were picking up Dylan and his dad Pete. Pete knew the quckest way to get us to Seaton Devlaval and we made very good time, so good, in fact, that we were there by nine and the place was locked up! No sign of the van, though, so we rang them. They were glad we had, because they were in Brunswick and didn't know where to go from there. No wonder - they were miles out of the way. In fact, they were heading for Seaton Burn, not Seaton Delaval, going north when they should have been heading east. By this time one of the club members had arrived and he talked them onto the right road. Meanwhile we discovered that the dressing room was full - of chairs! There was a huge space in the middle of the long concert room, with tables and chairs all around, so we ended up pulling the chairs out and having to bully the club officials to set them out in theatre style for the kids. At last the van arrived - just after half nine - so we unloaded, put up the set and the sound system, got into costume and were ready to start by five past ten. We were worn out already! None of us - and most of us have experience of touring pantos - had ever experienced anything like what we were greeted with. When Buttons went through his "Do you want to be in my gang?" routine, he was greeted with a chorus of "No!" from a very small audience in this massive hall. We knew we were going to have our work cut out. The company worked their socks off - they were absolutely superb and eventually brought round the most uncooperative audience I have ever seen in over fifty years of involvement in theatre so that, by the end, they were joining in and working with rather than against us, but what a struggle it was! The interesting thing was that at the end they were falling over themelves to chat to the cast and help us take the gear to the van. Their eyes were shining and they were full of excitement. They obviously hadn't had any idea of how to behave in a performance: it was all a completely new experience to them. It was a rude wake-up call to us though. As I said to the company as we prepared to depart, "If you play here and win them round, you can play anywhere. It doesn't get any worse than this!" I just hope these were not famous last words! But it was with a huge sigh of relief that we left Seaton Devaval behind and headed back towards the Tyne Tunnel for the next show, at two in South Shields. We were on the road before twelve and hit major traffic jams but we managed to get to the next venue just before one for a two o'clock show. The problems here were rather different. The hall already had a couple of hundred in so we would have to set up in full sight of the audience, but that wasn't the big problem. No, here the problem was one of logistics. The concert hall is on the first floor and access for bringing in gear is through a fire metal escape which keeps twisting back on itself - and we had four big flats, braces and weights, a full sound system, a big props box and eleven costumes to carry up. What we had to do with the flats was more than a little tiring: they had to be passed up from gound level to the first landing. Three people stood on the ground and lifted them vertically until two on the landing could lean over and grab them, then drag them up, over the rail and then carry them up the remaining stairs, across the dressing room and onto the stage. By the time we were set up, the place was heaving with hoards of little kids running around. There were at least four hundred people in their and the noise was deafening. Fortunately, when we were ready, a lovely lady named Pat brought them all to order and the appearance of the Fairy was greeted with enthusiasm. When Buttons came on to do his "gang" routine, we weren't just deafened, all the little kids came rushing to the front and were hanging on the front of the stage where they stayed throughout the hour and a half (plus interval). They were a fantastic audience to play to, so much so that Viktoria went out to talk to some of them at the interval and she was mobbed by kids and parents who wanted to take photos of her with their children. The second half was as enthusiatically received as the first and we couldn't but wonder that two audiences could be so completely different. So, get-out time. Lowering flats from the landing turned out to be much more difficult than lifting them up but eventually we got out and were away before 4.30. I dropped off Iain at his car, then ran Dylan down to the ferry landing so he could go back across the river, and then headed off to the supermarket because with yesterday's rehearsal I hadn't had time to do any shopping. I eventually arrived home just before six and felt very queasy until I realised that I hadn't had anything to eat or drink since breakfast at seven! But that's me finished. The company are on their own for the next three weeks. I couldn't stand the pace. I have to admit they're very solicitous - they don't like the idea of the old man doing any heavy lifting or putting too much of a strain on himself - and, in a way, it's nice that a very slim, petite 23-year old girl pushes you out of the way when you go to lift a heavy piece of gear ("It's alright, Peter. I'll do that.") but it does make you feel your age! They've got a number of three show days coming up (10am, 2pm and 7.00pm), but they're young and fit! Me? I'm directing a 30 minute version of A Christmas Carol for the North East Council on Addictions and starting work on creating a community play for the town of Jarrow, so I've got enough to keep me out of mischief, but I will pop out to see them in the middle of next week and for the final show of the run. It's really very hard to let go - you get really close to a company when you work so intensively - but we'll be working together again, there's no doubt of that. In fact, the agency has already taken seven bookings for next year's panto, s0 early in the new year I have to start on preparing for Aladdin!
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