Mansfield Park & Ride Pitta & Port....

Rehearsal Week 2.

When it comes to doing Austen you're decidedly in Received Pronunciation Land, and that you might think would be right up my proverbial cul-de-sac, but apparently you've then got to differentiate between them.  Peppering the Christmas shows with dubious characters like authentic Arab street traders with Julian is always a lot more pleasant in that you egg each other on to more and more ridiculous excesses; I'm sure there is probably still a fatwa out on at least one of us, but with Austen you have to be a bit more held, using muscles to hold up your spine.  Posture, Timothy!  Also with the Austen, you get the inevitable cry of 'Look at the BBC Boxed Set' hand crafted by Andrew Davies out of lace and Anna Maxwell-House-Martin, and filmed somewhere in Dorset through a catering tub of Vaseline.  'Couldn't you be a bit more like him?'; the subtext to this question is 'Copy him' and is always accompanied by the statement, 'But I don't want you to copy him'.  I am similar to Beryl Reid only in this respect; she said start with the shoes and work up.  I start with the shoes and although I try to work upwards, I've never been exactly sure what she means, but am confident I will at least have shoes in this performance and they will shine...

I'm told I will be wearing a nice dress for one of my characters.  I have seen the joke shop breasts and know they cost about four quid.  I feel like a lingerie model at Berlusconi fondue party.  I know that the dress will be beautifully hand sewn and it will be a bugger to get in and out of.  I asked "Could it be front fastening."  No, came the swift reply; of course not as that would affect the structural integrity of the garment and possibly the universe.  Oh, I replied with a cheery smile but inside I felt a little bleak.

As usual, I am trying to get down to a fighting weight of about 15 stone.  To this end I am trying to drink less Adnams and limit myself to two bag of Salt and Vinegar Chiplets (Family Size) per week.  Of course I know that by the second week of performances I will be popping round to the kebab shop for a comforting Pitta stuffed with various 'meats' of provenance unknown.  The medicinal glass of port, for the 'voce', will soon become a nightly occurrence and cries of 'Cockburn's anyone' will echo around the workshop.  But, hell, it's Christmas!

The cast all seem remarkably talented and laid back.  However, it's only week two so I suppose we might be getting a bit more twitchy as the opening night approaches and some of those lyrics aren't going in, the oh-so-authentic hook and eye fasteners are still causing me difficulties as I'm sewn into my period mittens and there's no-one backstage available to help me.  Such is the stuff of the actor's nightmares.

Ivan pops out to Peterborough with some regularity assuming the same aspect of stalwart resilience as Captain Oates; but does he really need those huskies. As long as we don't update our Facebook status on his steam-powered laptop he seems Buddha-like in his serenity: start worrying!

Greg