In truth I remember little about this play/production. I logged it without comment, which doesn’t help.
Super cast and crew. Stephen Moore, Charlotte Cornwell, Gemma Jones and David Horovitch, directed by Robin Lefevre.
John Gross in The Sunday Telegraph gave it a modest review, which doesn’t help the memory much, 25 years later, other than making me feel better about the fact that I remember so little about it:
My diary reminds me that I went to a lunchtime party at Theodore Goddard’s offices (at the invitation of Graham Stedman) to witness the total solar eclipse, which the celestial bodies had obviously arranged to honour my father’s 80th birthday.
I think I made my way to Woodfield Avenue by public transport from that party, while Janie brought the car having spent the earlier part of the day working. I’ll rephrase that: I spent the earlier part of the day working by dint of being “looked after” by our company lawyers, while Janie had a more regular working morning in the company of several pairs of feet.
In those days, Janie obviously still thought of crossing the river to visit my parents as a major expedition beyond her normal boundaries. Her appointment diary entry reads:
3.00 pm – leave London for Peter’s party.
…in Streatham, which, apparently, is not in London. Anyway…
…the party went swimmingly well.
I’m struggling to remember who was there and we only have a handful of photos from that party, which were in “Mum’s Photo Box”, identifying only a few of the guests.
Pam and Michael Harris were there, as evidenced pictorially. The neighbours were there, in the form of Eardley and Adrienne Dadonka, plus John & Lily Hogan. Peter Harris (no relation) from next door confirms that he was away, unfortunately. Norman and Marjorie Levinson were there, the pictures prove. I remember Lionel and Dina Aarons being there. I’m sure that Stanley and Doreen Benjamin would have been there if around, as would Malcolm and Delia Cedar, John & Angela Kessler (my cousin, Dad’s niece), Len and Jacquie Briegal (cousins and close friends from Mum’s side), plus Leatrice Levene (Arnold had recently died back then). But I have a feeling quite a lot of “the usual suspects” were away.
I think there were about 20 people there all in all. The size of the crowd didn’t matter – Dad was no Trump (a little August 2024 topical joke there, as I write 25 years after Dad’s event). Dad had a great time as evidenced by the couple of photos I have inherited. I wonder who took them? They are the only pictures I have of the Woodfield Avenue living room from that angle, pretty much as it looked for most of mum’s life and nearly half of Dad’s.
I’m so glad that we did throw the party Dad wanted on that auspicious day. Dad wasn’t really a party person, but most of the time he did know how to have fun.
I know who took this picture of Dad: Me. August Bank Holiday Weekend, 1977.
Liberated from hosting The Duchess at The Proms, Janie and I went along to this concert on a Sunday evening planning nothing more than a light supper at my flat after the show. It was a Sunday evening and we both had ridiculously early starts the next morning.
Here’s the running order:
Johann Sebastian Bach, Singet dem Herrn, BWV 225
Joseph Haydn, Symphony No. 49 in F minor ‘La passione’
Joseph Haydn, Non nobis, Domine, Hob. XXIIIa:1
Joseph Haydn, Insanae et vanae curae
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Requiem in D minor (compl. Süssmayr).
This was an excellent concert. You don’t need to take my word for that – it seems it got rave reviews afterwards. It has taken me 25 years to check out those rave reviews, but that’s me.
In those days we used to take Janie’s mum, Pauline, aka The Duchess, to the Proms at least a couple of times a season.
She was partial to a bit of Mahler, and a bit of Ludwig van…
…and a bit of verbal ultraviolence, now I come think of it.
Anyway, this is what we heard:
Symphony No 7 in A major by Ludwig van Beethoven
Violin Concerto by Alban Berg
Adagio from Symphony No 10 by Gustav Mahler
Henry V: A Shakespeare Scenario – Touch Her Soft Lips and Part by William Walton, arr. C. Palmer (encore)
The Hallé Orchestra, leader Lyn Fletcher, conductor Kent Nagano, violinist Kyung-Wha Chung.
All that information and more is on the excellent BBC Proms stub for this concert, which also enables you to hear and read about the stuff we heard – click here.
Janie’s diary suggests that we ate at Golden Chopsticks afterwards, with the helpful name “Mr Chow” jotted beside the phone number. (Harrington Road…long since gone.)
I remember this play warmly, as does Janie. Kika Markham put in a superb solo performance.
I’m not sure how we came across this production – possibly Newsnight Review on the TV, which we were following in those days, as I don’t think we even knew of the Chelsea Centre Theatre prior to this.
It was well received by Susannah Clapp in The Observer.
It seems that the thing we saw is only part of a longer Tony Kushner epic. Declan Donnellan revived the short Kika Markham element that we saw, at The Young Vic in 2002 – here is a link to Michael Billington’s review of that.
In truth, I don’t remember all that much about this production. I’ve long been partial to a bit of Anouilh, which would have been the main reason we booked it.
Excellent cast, including Orlando Seale, Edward de Souza, Desmond Barrit, Ray Llewellyn, Roz McCutcheon, Amy Marston, Susan Tracy & Geoffrey Beevers.
This was a very good production of this iconic play. I had been keen to see a decent production of it and was not disappointed by the National’s effort.
I don’t think we’d heard for Michael Sheen before this production; he was excellent as Jimmy Porter and Emma Fielding was also excellent as the long-suffering Alison.
To the Questors with the Duchess of Castlebar (Janie’s mum) to see a student production.
No danger that The Duchess had to fork out for our tickets (I think she only took us to shows of any variety there on guest freebies).
Anouilh comedies tends to be quaint and within the grasp of student drama groups, so I suspect that the production was pretty good, but my log is silent on the matter.
I escaped the duty to reciprocate the freebie tickets with a dinner, because Janie and I went on to Rupert Stubbs’s 40th birthday do on Sailing Barge Resourceful in Chiswick.
Resourceful, now relocated to the estuary as a tea house
Given that we had fed the multitudes the week before for The Duchess’s birthday…
Judging by all the scribbles in Janie’s diary, she put a heck of a lot of effort into arranging a family do at Sandall Close for her mum, Pauline (Duchess of Castlebar)’s 70th birthday.
The out of town bits of the family will have stayed at local hotels.
The menu and arrangements look to me as though she got Murray Tollemache aka The Pie Man to cater this one. He was certainly one of our favourite dudes for Z/Yen functions at that time and the order list of pies is a bit of a giveaway.
Strangely, 25 years after the event (and many more years after Murray started The Pie Man business, he’s still going strong under the name TPM Catering.
Most of the family probably appreciated the effort that Janie had gone to. The Duchess almost certainly didn’t.
Coincidentally, Janie and I went to see Dinner With The Family with the Duchess the following week.
Disposing Gross S Telegraph 01 Aug 1999, Sun Sunday Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Disposing Billington Guardian 15 Jul 1999, Thu The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Disposing Curtis Standard 14 Jul 1999, Wed Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
