The Third Ronnie

I was hoping I wouldn't have to do this however I feel I have no choice after such an outrageous, potentially libelous and probably calumnious statement was made about me in a recent review in the NBR.

The review itself is a good one and was written by a man with the rather funny name of John Daly-Peoples. I've never met Daly-Peoples and don't know if he wears glasses however after reading the following line I'm pretty sure if he doesn't he should.

"Gregory Cooper...looks a bit like Ronnie Corbett."

Ronnie bloody Corbett! Jesus wept. Apparently just beacuse my character is wearing over-sized glasses I bear an uncanny resemblance to the unfunny Ronnie in The Two Ronnies. The Ronnie who wasted minutes of every episode sitting in his big leather chair in his Lyle & Scott golfing V-neck laughing at himself telling one really long unfunny joke when the genius of Ronnie Barker could have been sitting in the chair fast asleep and been infinitely more amusing. Ronnie Barker died in 2005 however I bet if you dug him up and put him in a BBC studio he'd still be way funnier than Corbett.

This statement is even more truly, truly, truly outrageous than Jem and the Holograms and I cannot let it go unchallenged.

Let's contrast and compare a few photos that will prove Daly-Peep-holes is way out of line. Let's start with a look at me in the show.

Before we go any further take a moment to marvel at all the acting I'm doing. There's so much going on isn't there. I look fierce, frightened and frigid all at the same time. You know you're really cooking when you can convey three emotions at once although the greats like Olivier, Daniel Day and Shatner could get it up to five. If Olivier had been doing my role he would have added fustration and fury and probably a bit of flaccidity just to show off. Anyway, now let's have a look at Ronnie Corbett.

The glasses are a completely different shape. Completely different! It's this sort of lazy journalism that causes so much mental pain and anguish and potential loss of income. Imagine if this Ronnie Corbett comparison caught on, my career would be dead in the water as opposed to the treading water drowning state it's in now.

Other people I am regularly compared to are:

Hugh Grant...

 

Jason Gunn...

 

And John Roderick, a Hugh Grant impersonator from the Splitting Images celebrity look-alike agency in the UK. No offence John but I look heaps more like Hugh than you do. I think this is where my career should be heading. Why bother with all this line learning and theatre crap when I could be cashing in by whoring myself to all and sundry as a Hugh Grant look-a-like. I also look scarily like Hitler when I grow a wee moe and I'm sure there would be a niche market for that in Timaru or Invercargill.

Hitler, Hugh, Jason and Ronnie Corbett...god I'm versatile.

When Did You Last See Your Career?

I'm sure you will all be relieved to know the opening show on Saturday night went very well and we got a good review so I won't need to write a whole post bitching about reviewers. Everyone said their lines in the right places and nobody walked into the furniture. My laptop obediently sat in 'doze-mode' while its lid was down and fired up quickly when I opened it to do some computer acting. The lights didn't fall down, the set didn't fall down and nobody's pants fell down which was a bit of a shame as that's always a highlight. One of my fondest theatrical memories was going to see a marvellous farce called 'When Did You Last See Your Trousers', written by two legendary British writers Ray Galton and John Antrobus. It was staged at the Repertory Theatre in Christchurch and featured the current Christchurch mayor Bob Parker in the starring role. I couldn't find any images of that production but here's one of another production to give you an idea of why it is the best play ever!

What you are looking at here is comedy gold. All the necessary elements to leave every seat in the theatre moist and smelling of piss are present. Lots of middle-aged white people in their underwear, lots of doors and a tit-grab. The only element missing is a comedy chase in a circle...or is it....

God, I'm LOLANDLMAOANDROTFLANDLQTM all at the same time...and that's just at the set. This production was staged at the Edward Alderton Theatre at Bexleyheath in Kent and full credit to them. I went and saw the Repertory production decades ago with a friend who is now a very important man of arts so I will disguise his identity by calling him Craig Pooper. We laughed like drains through the whole thing, especially when Bob Parker delivered the immortal line, "Oh my god, I've shagged the au pair" with even better timing than Jude Law could have mustered. It also helped that we were both very very drunk and surrounded by ladies with blue hair.

After our opening on Saturday I went out to the foyer and got very very drunk again thanks to the kind sponsorship of Villa Maria. There were lots of actors flocking around talking in different accents and saying 'darling' to each other, lots of Remuera people who either couldn't stop smiling because of their face-lifts or couldn't start smiling because of their botox injections and lots of list MP's who looked confused about why they were there and what they were meant to be doing. There was also a lovely speech where Roger Hall found out he wasn't New Zealand's funniest playwright anymore and an exemplary selection of cold meats. All in all a fine and fun night.

We've done another two shows since them with forums afterwards where people get to ask the cast and crew important questions like:

'How do you learn your lines?'
'Is this your full-time job?'
'How do you not forget your lines?'
'Are you students?'
'Is it hard to remember all your lines?'
'Have you been on Shortland Street?'
'Have you ever forgotten your lines?'
'Were any of you in 'Where Did You Last See Your Trousers'?'

I've just been reading the synopsis of the Trouser play and it also features a gorilla, a punk and a randy constable so I'm going to try and get the rights and put it on myself at Vector Arena or The Basement. If anybody would like to audition just email me photos of yourself in your underwear running around in a circle.

Don't call me and I won't call you.

Another opening, another show.

It's opening night tonight which is always a special time in a thespians life. You get to give your fellow luvvvies cards and if you are especially flush little presents that cleverly relate to the piece you are performing. For example if you were opening 'The Importance of Being Earnest' you might give each other handbags with a baby inside, if you were opening 'The Crucible' you might construct poppets of all the other actors to distribute with needles inside the ones who are better than you or if you were opening 'The Merchant of Venice' you could buy a pound of different meat for each performer except for the actor playing Shylock who should never get a sausage. The only play where you are allowed to not buy pressies is 'Much Ado About Nothing'.

Anyway, I'm skint so I'm only doing cards tonight. Openings are always interesting as usually the whole house is papered. 'House' is a luvvie term for the people watching the performance and 'papered' is a luvvie term for all those cheap bastards who get free tickets to shows because someone thinks they are important even though most of them have plenty of money and could easily afford to pay unlike the people who really want to go and see the play who usually cannot afford to pay in excess of $50 bucks for a ticket and miss out on an experience they would get a real kick out of.

Openings also have people called reviewers who write things called reviews in which they tell you the plot of the show. These reviews then get printed in important publications like The New York Times, The Guardian and The Devonport Flagstaff and can make or break a production. I could write a whole diatribe about reviews and reviewers however I will wait until our review comes out on Monday to see if I have to or not.

Openings always have speeches afterwards, free booze and lots of other thesps in attendance who walk around with smiles on their faces and daggers in their eyes desperately trying to find someone to talk to who may be able to get them a big part.

We've already done two preview shows and they went well except for last night when I had a laptop malfunction. My character fiddles on his Lenovo laptop throughout the show and as I spend a lot of time sitting with my back to the audience the screen is quite visible to the punters. Everytime up until last night the laptop would doze so when I opened it up all the Microsoft Word mock-up spreadsheets and blogs were there ready to play with. Last night however the bloody thing had turned itself off and when I booted it up Norton Antivirus 2010 insisted on installing itself, Bill Gates really insisted I need to download 28 patches and the Lenovo itself really really insisted on trying to connect to the University of Auckland's wireless connection. Everytime I said no to Norton Antivirus it flashed back up again and I could hear the front row starting to snigger as I battled with the Symantec behemoth while trying to listen for my cue, which I missed while trying to stop the fucking Microsoft paper-clip helping me recover my Word files. It was horrible and threw me out for the next couple of scenes as I kept glancing at the screen waiting for the Norton window to reappear and start installing itself without my consent. Adobe decided it was a good time to update itself a few scenes later but by that time I was beyond caring.

At least it happened at the preview and not tonight. The lovely man who operates our lights and sound said he would fiddle with it to remove Norton and make sure it never turned itself off but remained in a permanent state of doziness, just like an insomniac or John Key...who may be coming tonight because he's only worth $50 million and needs a comp.

Right, I'd better stop here because I have lots to do and poppets to make.

Dried Fruits

I am now in the eye of the twister where all is calm and one can relax for a moment to watch flying cows or Helen Hunt. The past week has been a week of runs and blood. 'Run' is a luvvie term for doing the play in its entirety without stopping even when one of the actors gets clouted on the rim of his oversized glasses causing a nice gash above his right eye and a bloody run within the luvvie run. This happened on Thursday and during another run on Friday the actor who I shall refer to as 'Bill Sykes' whacked me in exactly the same place and opened up the cut again.

The one thing I have learnt from this experience is that my tissue is like tissue paper and my dreams of entering the ring as an underground, back-door, bare-knuckled, fisting gypsy prize-fighter were well and truly put to bed with a pillow on the face and a piano on the pillow. I blame decades of hydrocortisone addiction.

Bloody wounds aside the last week has gone relatively smoothly. It has been good to run the show from beginning to end and The Wicked Witch of the North has largely left us to it, aside from the occasional explosion of invective when I've gone down at the end of my line. Most reputable theatre schools have whole semesters devoted to going down as this is a sure-fire way of getting your hands on a big part however The Wicked Witch of the North transforms into an apopletic arsehole screaming antichrist whenever anyone has the audacity to downward inflect in his vincinity. I do know where he's coming from and it's all about keeping your balls in the air.

In most scripts every line one actor says is followed by another line unless it's the last line of the play when the curtain comes down and the audience depart to drink some wine and pretend they enjoyed themselves. When one actor has finished their line they are passing an invisible ball of energy to the next actor to polish one side of on their groin and pick at the seam before passing it on. If the ball comes your way and you fail to catch it you have missed your cue. If you don't immediately pick it up and throw it to somebody else you have driven a bus through your cue. If you hide the ball in your pants and claim to have never seen it and start crying you have dried.  'Dry' is a luvvie term for an opening night without any free booze however it also means forgetting your line. Experienced actors can cover up other actors dries by coughing, putting their foot on a chair or by cleverly asking the dried actor a question that cunningly has the line they have dried on concealed in it without the audience catching on. For example:

Clever actor playing Ophelia: 'Silly me. I've forgotten your name however I think it may be Toby. Toby or not Toby, may I ask this question?'

Grateful dried actor playing Hamlet: 'To be or not to be - that is the question....etc'

They are however on their own for the remaining 34 lines of the soliloquy unless they are an 'improviser' which is a luvvie term for actors who ask the audience to shout out toilet and gynecologist and then sing a song about it backwards.

Forgetting a line is not good however not cueing-up can be just as destructive to the theatrical experience. 'Cueing-up' is a luvvie term where-by you say your line as quickly as possible after the previous line, even if it means over-lapping the last few words of the poor sap who has the misfortune to be acting with you. But, wouldn't that mean the audience can't hear the start of your line? Indeed it would, unless you are an experienced actor and remember to always cap the line. 'Capping a line' is a luvvie technique where you say your line slightly higher and louder than the line before yours to pull the focus to yourself and away from the other actor as quickly as possible before the audience has time to think that they might be better than you. You will know you're watching a professional production of the highest calibre if every line is delivered louder and at a slightly higher pitch than the previous one. By the end of a really good show only dogs should be able to hear the dialogue although it will be far too loud for them as well. So remember, if at the end of the show the actors are not screaming at each other non-stop in falsetto you should ask for a refund because the play was rubbish.

This week is production week. 'Production week' is a luvvie term for going into the theatre to make sure you have the best dressing room and are not having to share it with an arsehole. Other people also do things like put the set in, rig things called pacifics, parcans and frennells, fiddle with their gobos and hang some clothes in our dressing rooms for us to moan and whinge about. It's usually a stressful time for all concerned, especially the director so I'm expecting spectacular fireworks and blood on the boards, hopefully not mine.