Up Out O' The Sea: The Show Must Go On!

We arrived in Margaretting with the sun STILL shining bright (are we ever going to get rain? Not that I'm complaining but it seems too good to be true!)  The set is up so we indulged in our daily ritual of a communal picnic in the sunshine, amongst nature and with bright blue skies above our heads. This is something I'm really going to miss, the moments we share as a team, sat down talking about our food (we are all such foodies!). I usually have some sort of spinach-orientated salad, Lisa T is hooked on mayonnaise at the moment so we get a surprising display every day of the wonders of mayonnaise; Sausages and mayonnaise, seabass and mayonnaise and sometimes she has things like polenta! (I'd never experienced polenta before this tour so I've learnt loads) Francis's delights are always a surprise too; sometimes he'll have a nasty little garage sarnie but at other times he has brought in the most delicious homemade spag bol, he's a very talented cook is Monsieur Woolf! Mike has moved on to salads now, gone are the pasties and Gregg's sarnies and in are the Suffolk deli specialities and exciting salads! And Laura, well Laura is the fiend of M&S super foods! And so to the show.....

Oh no the lights have cut out! Yep, the electricity stopped during Scene 9 and myself, Laura and Liza are on stage in pitch black. We stop the scene, the problem gets fixed and so we commence again, to a lovely applause from the audience. Phew...that was a close shave but the show must always go on!

And so to Syleham and Wingfield, the last time I was in this village hall was when I was 16 and with my friend Lucinda, dressed in 70's outfits for a friends 21^st! Oh the memories! It's a tiny space to perform but it has some lovely features: Victorian black and white photographs of the village in the early 1900's, exposed brick work, a bar, pool room and fabulous kitchen! This show went ahead without a glitch and the organisers even knew my parents, as Tweedy says in the play "Everybody knows everybody around here, so you can't fart without..."! We stayed in Syleham until 1am, drinking with some locals and enjoying the homemade sandwiches and cake they had provided for us. Bliss.

Thursday brought us to Brandon; another part of EA that I know well. I used to go to school in Mildenhall and many of my friends lived in Brandon. The Leisure Centre was a curious space, a bit like an air hanger we decided but we had masses of space and I remember how free I felt in that performance. After the show we indulged in a pint, and once again I knew the bartender; turns out he was in the year above my brother at school, and I know his younger brother. It's a small world.

Friday 13^th took us to Wells-next-the-Sea. How gorgeous it is here! A small theatre which meant our smallest version of the set, but a lovely warm feel to it with dressing rooms and raked seating for the audience. For lunch Francis, Laura and I went to a chippy where I was treated to my first battered sausage! I actually really loved it! Then we all went strolling, I walked along the harbour and sat taking photos of Poppies before ringing Tom (my boyf, who I now haven't seen for 2 weeks). 6pm brings warm-up time and some slight re-working of blocking due to the change from Traverse to End-On. 7:30pm and so it's show time; performing on Friday 13^th really didn't bother me. If you start thinking things are going to go wrong then you are setting yourself up to allow them to go wrong. We had a lovely theatre space, a great show and Friday 13^th won't get in any of ours way. OK maybe I was being naïve. Unfortunately, during Scene 6 an audience member had become poorly and we ended up having to stop the show, call an ambulance and postpone until we knew our dear audience member was in safe hands. I've been at the theatre before when this has happened but never been on stage. We stopped the scene, and waited for news. Once we knew our audience member was safely with the ambulance crew, the motions were put in action to start the play again from where we had stopped. The audience gave us a rapturous applause, and Laura opened the scene with great comic timing. God bless the Granary Theatre!

Saturday and the last performance of this week took us to Assington. Just FYI (for your information for those of you not down with the kids) we have now renamed Assington: BADASSington and you will learn why.... A really welcoming space with room to change into our costumes, enough space to be able to have a journey from dressing room to stage (I mention this because my character Emily runs in to the space, so I really value the venues that are big enough to accommodate the journey), and a gorgeous supper provided for us! We were treated like Kings! We had a table cloth, real cutlery, glasses and plates all laid out in front of us. Homemade soup, fresh warm crusty bread, jacket potatoes with mature cheddar cheese, salad, cheery tomatoes and elderflower cordial! Wow, we were left speechless and stuffed! Another great show, and a fantastic response from the audience. Many stayed afterwards to speak to us about the play and show their appreciation, we even had a glass of wine whilst doing the Get Out which was much needed after the week. We completed the Get Out in our fastest ever time, finishing at 22:40- bearing in mind when we started this tour we always finished at 11:05 and missed last orders at the pub. Booooooo. But not this time, well in time for last orders and so we headed to The Shoulder of Mutton....let the fun and games commence! The Lord Lucan's were playing live, the pub was full of lively fans and the drinks were flowing. We all danced along to the head banging music, topped up our drinks, danced some more, topped up our drinks again and danced until the sweat was pouring off our backs! It was SO GOOD to see Penny shaking her booty and head banging, she works like a dog and really cherishes these moments. Jumping on the spot, clutching her famous purple J2O she was in her element! I was wearing a leopard print all in one jump suit; I think it is a bit much for Suffolk! We left BADASSingon at about 1am I think, although don't quote me on that as I was verrrryyyy tipsy by this point. We loaded in the van at which point I remembered I'd bought us a bottle of Vodka. Need I say the rest of the journey was a haze. So know you know why we call it BADASSington; it rocked from the moment we arrived until the moment we stumbled back to the van. Rock and Roll Baby!

LM Hoctor x