Monday, 29 May 2006
Bank holidays,
who cocking well needs them? Well, not me thank goodness
as today I had to attend a read through/rehearsal of
my episode (or the first of my two episodes) of John
Sullivan's 'The Green Green Grass'. The show is a spin
off of Only Fools and Horses and has Boycie and Marlene
from that show (John Challis and Sue Holderness) with
various other new characters, one of them played by
my chum Ella Kenion. The rehearsal was in the BBC rehearsal
rooms which is a horrid, grey tower block somewhere
in horrid, grey North Acton (West London). As I stepped
in there I got a weird feeling of déjà
vu but I knew this was my first visit to these rehearsal
rooms so I just put it down to having been in quite
a few horrid, grey buildings in my glamorous career.
It wasn't until I was trying to find my way out of the
building (I went down to the ground floor assuming the
door and security man would be there as he was when
I walked in the building but he and his desk had magically
disappeared - well, he hadn't disappeared, I'd just
gone down in a different lift) when I passed a closed
canteen and I had an instant, almost photographic mental
flashback of the last time I had been in that building.
I had totally forgotten that our year at drama school
had been chosen by the BBC to be in a pilot for a sitcom
called 'Hands Together'. We had rehearsed in the same
building and all the memories came flooding back in
an instant. I suppose it must have been 1992 as we left
drama school in '93 and I remember us all being very
excited seeing someone like Joanna Lumley, or was it
Jennifer Saunders in the canteen. I used to have a VHS
copy of 'Hands Together' but I've just looked for it
and I can't find it anywhere; it's never been on telly
and imagine there are not that many copies kicking around.
We were all supposed to be members of a youth club in
the 1950's (or was it 60's??) which was a bit rich as
I think I was the youngest in our year at 24, I think
people like Andy Wilby were well into their thirties.
I remember watching it and remembering we were all pretty
bad in it… I think the people in the show (which
means our year at Central) who are still acting are,
me, Sean Dingwall, Catherine Tate, Lorna Brown, Ewan
Bailey, Karl Stimpson, Scott Handy Jonathan Koniac (big
sitcom star in Isreal now!!) and William Houston. The
others, I assume, have all opted for a life less precarious
and altogether more sensible than this ridiculous business
we call "show"….
