CEILIDH MINOGUE

WHAT A WEEK. First run of An Inspector Calls- check. Final rehearsals of Vincent in Brixton before tech week- check. Ceilidh- check. 

Yes, that’s right, I said ceilidh. And that is definitely not the phonetic spelling of it. A Ceilidh- (pronounced kay-lee… like if Peter Kay and Ang Lee hooked up, had a kid and decided to go double-barrelled)...

... Is a traditional Gaelic social gathering, which usually involves the playing of folk music and dancing. Or if you’re a bunch of actors, a lot of free styling and a few high kicks thrown in for good measure.

To sum the story up, the cast of Theatre by the Lake’s summer season invaded the quiet sleepy village of Portinscale, occupying their village hall and conquering their ceilidh. Job done.

I managed to get a couple of quotes from a few of the locals who survived the attack…

Local 1: “It’s so nice having the actors join us… They’re so… *searches frantically for an inoffensive yet appropriate word*… UNINHIBITED!”

Local 2: “It’s lovely to see people… erm… *same desperate searching face as previous local*… EXPRESSING themselves. *wipes sweat off his brow*. Really lovely.”

Initially, there were a few sticky moments in the festivities… Namely, when the acting company BY CHANCE won three raffle prizes in a row. Mutterings of “FIX” were heard amongst the ranks but luckily all was forgiven as nobody chose the top prize: Alan Titchmarsh’s biography, ‘Nobbut a Lad’.

The highlight of the evening was during a dance called the Circassian Circle, not too dissimilar to The Caucasian Chalk Circle (Brechtian reference, 10 points if this was my A-Level drama essay) when we all clasped hands in a circle (hence the title), skipped into the middle and finished with a gentle right legged kick.

 

I said a GENTLE right legged kick.

The hero of the night was Peter McGovern, who not only flourished the skip with a perfect high kick, but promptly landed on the floor, styled it out and then when asked -in jest, by the caller- to demonstrate the move again, not only counted himself in “And 5, 6, 7, 8…” but executed a high kick with the extension and point that Darcey Bussell would’ve been proud of. 

Other stars of the night included Ben Ingles, who, when instructed by the caller to creep to the top of the ceilidh dance, literally dropped to the floor and commando crawled the length of the village hall. Champion.

Gareth Cassidy performed an entire dance whilst giving a fully accurate and detailed impression of Pauline Quirk in character as Susan Wright of Broadchurch fame, dog on a lead included. 

And Bella Marshall’s ‘Wall Dance’ left spectators redefining the meaning of the verb, to dance.

We changed the face of Portinscale and it in turn, changed us.

Next week is tech week and Vincent takes the stage!

But until then… DOSEY DOE YOUR PARTNER!

TO KAYAK OR NOT TO KAYAK

I am SUNBURNT! Yes, the sun has finally come to Keswick and my face, the first of many of my body parts to burn, is the colour of a well ripened beetroot. Were I to climb a mountain at night, (and I’m not ruling anything out right now) I would serve for a perfectly good beacon and or camp fire. Whichever was in greatest need at the time.

To celebrate the sun arriving, I decided to pack up my troubles in my old kit bag and go Kayaking. Now, I haven’t stepped into a Kayak since I was a Brownie, circa 1995, and the last time I ventured in, not only did I capsize myself and ruin my Brownie guide sash but I got shat on by a seagull. Or a pigeon. I’m still not sure which… But vengeance shall be mine. (I also got shat on whilst Morris dancing with Brownies. I probably deserved it.)

We kayaked all the way round Derwentwater, rowing INTO the wind. Yes, INTO the wind. I have very little upper body strength at the best of times, let alone when my stringy triceps are forced against a medium to strong wind (breeze). So guess who was lagging at the back? Bringing up the rear, if you will? Yep, me.

I tried loads of distraction techniques, pointing out the mountains, the cormorants, the algae, in the hope that while they were all gazing wistfully at them, old no-guns over here could put the pedal to the metal and catch up! It did not work.

However, it was worth every second of armony (arm agony… it’s a melange) because at the end of the trip we were rewarded with scones the size of South America. Literally, they were HUGE. Nichol End Marine Café, I salute you! http://www.nicholendmarine.co.uk/cafe.php

Keswick is a trap, because in the sun it feels like I am on holiday, surrounded by incredible scenery, a lake to swim in, mountains to climb and scones to eat… It’s very easy to forget you’ve got a job to do! I blame the bank holiday weekend, one extra day and it all goes to pot!

But it is back to work, serious work, An Inspector Calls work. I have finally learnt all my lines and am “off-book” as we say in the biz. *luvviealert*.This is brilliant as I am now able to use my right arm when acting. And I do some GREAT right arm acting.

The set for An Inspector Calls is epic, a raised diamond platform with dining table and chairs set in front of a huge background of industrial cogs which move throughout the play at various pivotal points. The only thing I’m worried about is falling off the diamond. Nothing major then.

I can’t believe I have already been here five weeks and we open Vincent in Brixton in two… GAHHHH! My friends have threatened to come and watch and sit in the front row bedecked in the Dutch football kit. A different sort of beacon to my face. I have threatened blue murder if they follow through... 

I’ll keep you posted.

DAZZA VAN GOUGH

Week two of twenty-eight: DONE. Like Blind Date, Addidas poppers and Tony Blair’s time in office, it is OVER. And what a couple of weeks it has been; I have joined a company of players (Thesps not Pimps), I have scaled a mountain, I have acquired a Dutch accent and last but most certainly not least I have set foot in the only nightclub in Keswick- ‘The Loft’.

Many good men and women have been lost in ‘The Loft’ and those who have survived have never been the same again. I, for one, am a shell of my former self… I think it was the third playing of ‘Let’s Get Ready to Rumble’ that did it. But, hey, who’s complaining?! Not I, said the Little Red Hen. Not I, said Laura Darrall.

So, the end of week two has dawned and I have embarked on a Dutch adventure into the life and loves of one of the most revered yet puzzled painters of all time- Vincent van Gough. Or Vincent in Brixton rather, to give the play its title. Nicholas Wright can thank me later.

Vincent in Brixton tells the story of when the young van Gough came to live in London, with a family called the Loyers. He consequently fell in love with the daughter only to be rejected and transfer his affections onto the mother… or so the story goes.  

I play the character of Anna van Gough, Vincent’s eighteen year old sister (hence the Dutch accent), sent over by their parents to find a job as a governess and to inadvertently and SUBTLY sort her brother out. Her methods for doing so involve a lot of nosey cleaning (second term of drama school was comedy mop work so I’ve got this one down) and downright interrogation (third term was scene studies from The Bill- perfect).

This is me...

Uncanny isn't it.

The set of Vincent in Brixton is INCREDIBLE. We are performing in Theatre by the Lake’s 90 seat studio and it is being transformed into a fully functioning Victorian kitchen complete with running taps and a working hob. Throughout the play sprouts are peeled, a fishcake assembled and tea is brewed; the audience will have a complete 4D experience. Smellovision, eat your heart out!

These past two weeks have been a whirlwind of research, discussion, playing and rehearsing and has finally culminated in our first run of the play. If I say so myself, it wasn’t half bad! A few slip ups with the old mop and bucket but other than that a blooming good run. 

In the words of D: Ream... ‘Things can only get bettterrrrrrrrrr!’

This is not mine.

Next week brings a new play and the beginning of proper repertory rehearsing- alternate plays on alternate days. Headless chicken, at the ready Sir! 

An Inspector is calling and we shall answer him…

LAURA IN THE LAKES

I have LANDED. In a heap of belongings, wellies and a pair of straighteners which have instantly been made redundant (Rain + My Hair = Frizzimanjarlo), I have arrived in the North. And it is raining. Quelle surprise!

The rain in the Lake District is leaps and bounds away from the rain in London, not just because of the obvious geographical distance but because in the North one is not afeared that said rain will corrode one’s face.

However, the rain in the Lakes does not come danger free, oh no. What the bracing, tumultuous, Wuthering Heights-esque downpours do is much, much worse… They call to my inner frolic.

Now we all have an inner frolic in us somewhere, that need to skip and grin like we’ve done a really good fart and no one’s heard.  The frolic is usually equated with the playing of S Club 7 or unexpectedly finding oneself in a meadow or failing that, a BodyForm advert.

But not in the Lakes, the rain is what does it here. As soon as one single drop falls, I am INSTANTLY Elizabeth Bennett trekking over the fields to Pemberly to rescue my flu suffering yet perfectly composed sister Jane, with muddy skirts and flushed cheeks, accompanied by nothing but the hidden yet unrecognised to desire to bump into Mr Darcy.

‘Yes, I do have a vivid imagination’, she answered to the child psychologist. Couple that with a pink bicycle/wicker basket combo and a strong desire for adventure and that’s me covered. There is even a café in Keswick called ‘Laura in the Lakes’. It was obviously meant to be.

SO. I climbed my first hill this weekend. I say hill… It was most definitely more of a hillock. However, along the way I found something which has potentially made my life, or at least seven months of my life. Many of you will have seen this incredible discovery already as I have brutally plastered it over every social medium available to my fat fingers.

As I was stomping up said hillock, I came across this sign…

As we say in Gloucester- THAT’S THE BADGER! I literally had to stop to wet myself. ‘BADGERS FOR ½ MILE’. Who do you think discussed this with the badgers? Do they know not to stray beyond the half mile? Is it a badger/human compromise? Or was one badger adamant for ¾ mile but got shot down?!

‘Alright lads, you’re allowed to build your dens up to the stile but no further, do you hear me?!? We’ve made a pact. Remember the Magna Carta? No, why should you, you’re badgers. The Magna Carta is utterly irrelevant to your place in this world. Unless King John harboured strong views on culling… which I can’t rule out entirely… But ANYWAY, this is your half mile and you stick to it! Alright?!’

What happened after that, we’ll never know. We’re just left with this brilliant sign and a hope for the future of badgers throughout the land.

What I should be telling you about is rehearsals, the theatre and the people. But I’m afraid the badgers, the rain and the bicycle may have SLIGHTLY distracted me.

I promise to fill you in (like Craig David) in more detail next time. But to sum them up for now I shall use a quote from a little known play called As You Like It… 

‘O wonderful, wonderful, and most wonderful wonderful! And yet again wonderful, and after that, out of all whooping!’

ACTING AND RAMBLING

I, LAURA DARRALL, SWEAR TO BE AN EXPERT RAMBLER AND PRO-ORIENTEERER BY NOVEMBER 8^TH 2013.

Bet you weren’t expecting an opening like that! (SAID THE ACTRESS TO THE BISHOP... Stop it. Stop it now.) 

So yes, it’s official. I am moving to the Lake District for seven months, Keswick’s Theatre by the Lake to be more geographically specific. LOVE geographical specificity. 

Try saying that after a couple of G and T’s with a wine gum in your pie hole. I have. It’s easy. 

(Note to the reader… I’m lying.)

Thus, in the words of Wyclef Jean, “I’ll be gone 'til November”. I can think of many other great Wyclef quotes to throw into the mix but they probably don’t fall into the appropriate category. But then again, neither do I.

Also did you know Wyclef’s middle name is ‘Jeanelle’? So he’s Wyclef Jeanelle Jean. I think I might change my average, if not slightly regal middle name of ‘Elizabeth’ to ‘Dazelle’. Laura Dazelle Darrall. In the words of my third year university tutor, “It works.”

(Said tutor was often found sporting a crushed velvet poppered shirt with the one of the poppers casually un-popped revealing a rather large outy belly button. I won’t be following suit.)

I digress and the frozen North beckons… as does an acting job! HUZZAH! I will be doing three very different plays in rep throughout the Keswick season: Vincent in Brixton, An Inspector Calls and She Stoops to Conquer. (Predictive text on my phone keeps insisting it’s She Stools to Conquer. I refuse to correct it and can’t promise that I won't make that into a nickname… )

I have spent the last three years of my acting career understudying so it feels INCREDIBLE to finally be able to sink my teeth into parts (euphemistic wheeeey!) which I can call and make my own. Don’t get me wrong, I have enjoyed every minute of understudying and have learnt shed loads but I have paid my dues and am done. DONE.

Anna, my character in Vincent in Brixton is Vincent van Gough’s sister and thus requires a Dutch accent… I think 90% Borat and 10% German is the right accentual ratio. Right? RIGHT?! Keswick does not know what’s about to hit it. 

Me in a mankini, that’s what.

The theatre is situated on a lake (naturally, being in the Lake District and being called Theatre by the Lake) and is surrounded by hills; hence my declaration and determination to become proficient in rambling and orienteering. I was a girl guide once; my Morris dancing badge has not failed me yet!

I’ve also decided to teach myself the ukulele while I'm up there… I'm thinking a slightly kookier version of Maria from The Sound of Music. Just with sheep instead of goats and a ukulele instead of children.

So over summer, if you prick up your ears and squint to the North, you may see on a distant hill, in a far-away vale, a tiny creature inappropriately attired, squeaking in Kazakhstani, murdering a pygmy instrument and stomping at a gradient.

And that my friends will be me, acting. Acting and rambling. It’s six of one half a dozen of the other.

FERRY EGG GOES LARGE IN EDDERS!

You just can't beat your friends can you? I mean, you can if they make you reeeeeally angry but generally it is frowned upon. JUST KIDDING. (As all Dazza’s friends start backing away and arming themselves with various kitchen implements against her. Kitchen implements would never stop me. The whisk is my friend.)

ANYWAY, what I actually mean is that nothing compares to hanging out with good friends, laughing until you wet yourself (I’ve definitely done that. Thank you Tena Lady.) and sobbing on their shoulders until you’ve left snail trails of snot on their new Warehouse jumper (Definitely done that too. Thank you Kleenex.)

So my three best friends from secondary school and I- Denmark Road High School for Girls Gloucester, dontcha know! It sounds posh but it wasn’t- we were a bunch of ragamuffins who rolled our skirts up and drew penises on each other’s science books. Speak for yourself Dazza. Alright I will.

So we decided that instead of having a hurried one night reunion, where we normally drink too much and don’t chat enough, that we would treat ourselves to a long weekend in Edinburgh. I shall now refer to it as Edders. That’s right. The scots hate me.

We booked ourselves in to a loooovely apartment (a cross between Hitch’s black and silver batchelor pad and a show home- perfect) to ensure a good chunk of quality time and chatter and quickly settled down to cook ourselves a roast chicken and LOADS of mash. LOVE. MASH. MMMMMM.

The trouble started when I had to book us a taxi. Now, I often have the tendency to go into automatic pilot when I'm on the phone or texting, throwing away ‘Love you’s!’ and x’s like there’s no tomorrow. Work colleagues and tax collectors have often been puzzled by the sheer volume of affection bookending our correspondence. 

And this time was no different. I was on the phone to what was potentially William Wallace, having taken up a second career in taxi driver management and was attempting to book us a car into the centre.

Firstly, due to the chameleon like nature of my accent, I started picking up his lilting Edinburgh tones- BAD MOVE. DEFINITELY OFFENSIVE. Secondly, I couldn’t really hear him on the end of the phone so to remedy this I was speaking really loudly. EQUALLY OFFENSIVE. And then finally, I rounded it off with a ‘TAKE CARE, LOVE YOU, BYE!!’ Silence. He did not love me back.

After dancing around the kitchen like mentalists to some hard core 90’s RnB, reliving our teenage years with the likes of Usher, J-Kwon, Terror Squad and the Backstreet Boys (Camilla Barnes’ fault.) we got the forsaken taxi into town and headed straight for Arthur’s Seat.

For those of you who have never been to Edders or read David Nicholl’s book ‘Once’, Arthur’s seat is the main peak in a group of hills overlooking the whole of Edinburgh and it is a challenge which must be undertaken.

Now when we were at school, all four of us had a very distinct aversion to P.E. It may have been the kilted sports skirt that our P.E teacher insisted on wearing or the sheer fact that hockey in the freezing cold at 9am on a Monday does nothing for hair which already has a tendency to frizz… Either way, be it menstrual cramps, migraines or acne, we were determined to get out of it.

And now, having grown up, we decided to climb a big fuck off hill. It was never going to go well. 

We started off fine, great pace, minimal sweat, pleasantly flushed cheeks and a spring in our step. But as we got further up, the sweat became less minimal, more maximal and the pleasant flush became beetroot.

We paused half way up for a comfort break and were taking in the view when we noticed a hill opposite us… with loads of people standing on the top. Our stomachs and our sweat glands sank… I flagged the nearest dog walker down and wheezing asked him, 

‘Are we (WHEEZE) walking up (WHEEZE) Arthur’s Seat?! (WHEEZE REPEAT TO FADE)’

‘Och no Luvvy!’ He laughed, ‘This is Salisbury Crag!’

SILENCE.

‘SALISBURY FUCKING CRAG?!?!?!?!’

The four of us looked at each other. And resignedly picked ourselves up, wiped away our sweat tashes and walked back down the hill. 

But having grown up in Gloucester; you learn a certain resilience to life and gain a grim determination in many things; be it hiding from chavs or getting into Liquid under-aged, you become hardened. 

And so there we were, four intrepid explorers intent on reaching Arthur and his seat.

And we did! After a gruelling hike with many slips, stumbles and swear words, we stood at the top of Arthur's Seat, perused our lands much akin to Mufasa and we smiled.

BEST. MINIBREAK. EVER.