Round The Twist: A Nice Slice Of Ham...

What a week! We began with two sessions of tech on Monday, finishing Wednesday morning. We don't have a hugely technical show: the greatest amount of faff came from the prop-wrangling, and the need to adjust a couple of set changes. Nevertheless, I felt quite nervous throughout the tech, which in hindsight I believe came from my anxiety over my performance. I don't really "lead" this show - all five of us have a pretty equal burden in that respect - but I function as the centre round which the rest spin, and I hadn't had that responsibility before.

The three dresses went increasingly well, though I found them extremely exhausting. In any run, actors develop something they call "show fitness", which means they learn to perform the show increasingly efficiently. I didn't have that yet, and consequently I burnt far more calories per dress than I did in the final show of the week.

Opening night went very well indeed. I performed much more smoothly than I expected, and we received a couple of great reviews. I had to shoot off as soon as the show finished, as I had an audition the following day in London. As a bonus, I got to see my partner, Holly, who had spent the evening putting curlers in her hair for tomorrow's filming.

The audition at the Drill Hall went well. One of my favourite bookshops lies about a three minute walk away, and usually they offer some second-hand items for a pound. On this occasion, I found, and bought, 14 of such books. Win! I returned to Ipswich with half a tree in my bag.

We had a smaller audience on the second night. I use a rather hammy delivery for this show, which I think works well for the Oliver Nicklefield character and "his" interpretation of Tiny Tom, but as a result I felt less in contact with the audience than usual. With a smaller audience, I decided I had to talk to individuals during my narration, and found this allowed me to retain sufficient ham and increase my connection with the audience. So now I do that no matter what size the audience.

More good reviews followed, and on Saturday we came to our first double show day. Now, I find that I have to plan my meals quite carefully for shows, as I burn a lot of calories on stage. And so I worried that the quick turnover between shows - less than an hour - would cause me to run low on energy for the evening performance. However, this did not happen. By the end of the week, I had begun acquiring show fitness, and I had also made a habit of consuming a mince pie and glass of orange juice during the interval, to get me through the most energetic part of my show, just at the beginning of the second half. I also staggered my dinner, eating half at the beginning of the break, and the rest about twenty minutes before the second kick-off. The combination of safeguards proved effective.

Right, that's it! I'll write a little more regularly now that we have opened and I have my days back.