Let’s just say that we wouldn’t now (writing 25 years later) attempt quite such a full itinerary for a Friday through Monday long weekend jaunt. Three plays at Stratford, a motorised hike to the Welsh Borders for lunch at The Walnut Tree before going on to Hay-On-Wye for some overnight- second-hand-book-buying on my part before stopping off for a long lunch at Raymond Blanc’s place (Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons) in Oxfordshire and then home.
I think we stayed in the Shakespeare for this trip. Janie booked it but only wrote down “Twelfth Night Room £115 per night” which I suspect in those days was a suite or certainly a superior room.
The RSC does far less modern material at Stratford these days (he says 25 years later), which is one of the main reasons why we go there far less frequently now.
On the Sunday morning, we drove on to Abergavenny. One of Janie’s clients had recommended The Walnut Tree Inn, with very good reason – we had a magnificent Sunday lunch there. It seems that the place didn’t have a Michelin Star yet when we visited, but it was certainly star-standard food and service. It has had a chequered history in-between times, improving and then losing its reputation, but in more recent years it seems to be doing extremely well. We’re glad.
Then on to Hay-On-Wye, where we stayed at my favourite stop-over place there – The Old Black Lion. I recall buying rather a lot of second-hand books at relatively high speed – some late afternoon/early evening on the Sunday, and then more first thing in the morning Monday. I think this was the trip upon which I found a pristine copy of The Boundary Book in a most unlikely place, something I had been seeking for several years. These days such things are not so hard to find while simply sitting on your backside, although my copy with the original bat-shaped cardboard book mark on a piece of ribbon is possibly still a rare find.
We had allowed more than two hours to get from the Welsh Borders to Le Manoir Aux Quat’Saisons, but should have allowed far longer for a cross-country narrow road hike on a Monday – lots of slow-moving rural vehicles with no chance of overtaking for miles. Janie phoned in to say that we would be at leats half-an-hour late for our 13:30 booking and was told that technically they take last roders at 14:00 but they would be flexible on that as long as we arrived soon after two…which we did.
It was a beautiful day and Raymond Blanc himself came out to greet us soon after we arrived, telling us with great charm that he had heard that we had experienced a difficult journey but that we should be sure to relax and enjoy our lunch at leisure. Fabulous food. Possibly the first time I had spent quite so much money on a single meal (£260, when that amount was real money), despite the fact that we only had a glass of wine each. An absolutely wonderful and unforgettable experience.
We had a few weeks off from theatre in late April & May 1998, but Janie and I did a fair bit of eating and drinking with friends instead.
30 April 1998 – “John Boy”
That is all the diary says, but my recent experience trawling medieval household accounts records for relevant factoids has led me to use a similar technique for my own stuff. I figured, if I could find a restaurant record in my archaic personal accounting system for 30 April 1998, it would have been my turn and I would, in those days, have named the place.
Postscript: John White chimed in to suggest that the place wasn’t Turkish but “a bit of upmarket suburban gastronomy.” I’m sure I recall something oriental about it – perhaps it was full of eastern promise – or just reasonably close to John’s beloved Orient.
2 May 1998 – David Party
I’m not 100% sure that 1998 was the year that DJ shlepped us all out in grand style to the Fat Duck to help Kim celebrate her birthday, but I have a feeling it was around about that year. DJ never let on where we were going in those days, sending vehicles for us at an appointed hour, so even Janie’s diary is silent on detail.
If it was The Fat Duck year, it was for sure a fantastic meal. Heston Blumenthal had not yet gone into the more excessive realms of food fancies, but was already wowing the crowds with magnificent food served imaginatively.
3 May 1998 – Mum & Dad Lunch
In the same way as Kim’s birthday inevitably (in those days) meant an event around that time, mum’s birthday falling three days after Kim’s meant more dining.
Not so high-falutin’, my household records tell me that Mum & Dad joined us at Lee Fook for lunch – they both liked a nice Chinese. This would have been the Westbourne Grove incarnation of Lee Fook, where the chef was memorably named Ringo.
9 May or 16 May 1998…The Latter, I’m Pretty Sure, Phillie & Charlie Staying At Janie’s Place
Diary confusion which i think was to do with a planned visit on 9 May being moved to 16 May, but for sure they came and I am pretty sure that Janie cooked something splendid rather than us going out on that occasion. In my diary for 16th it says “Duchess”, which might mean that Pauline joined us that evening but might also be part of the same diary confusion as Janie and I went to the theatre with said Duchess the following week. That event also might have been shunted a week.
Come to think of it, in those days Pauline would no doubt have joined us for that meal on 16th too.
Janie had been dying to try this place, which John White and I waxed lyrical about after our evening there the previous autumn. Janie and I got our opportunity soon before it moved away from my patch (Notting Hill) to a larger Soho location.
Anyway, it was supposedly fiendishly difficult to get into this place on a Friday evening, but Janie found a way, perhaps booking many weeks ahead, knowing that we’d want to dine late and wanted to be in Notting Hill the next morning.
Result.
Both of us remember it being a memorably good meal.
Here’s an interview and a lauding from The Standard a few months before our visit:
We both loved the place and the vibe and the food, as did Johnboy when we dined there.
So why did Janie and I want to be in Notting Hill on a Saturday morning rather than in Ealing? Because in those days we went to see a hygienist in Kensington on a Saturday morning. That’s why.
This play/production had enjoyed rave reviews and lengthy transfers. Unusually for us, more than a year after it first came out, we decided to book it and see what it was like.
We’re not usually shrinking violets as far as “no holds barred” serious theatre is concerned, but we found this play intolerable. Perhaps our emotions were heightened by the recent shock news about Janie’s twin, Phillie, whose radical cancer surgery had taken place a couple of week’s earlier.
My logged verdict:
Ghastly – we walked out at half time.
Charles Spencer was pretty plain about the piece in The Telegraph:
At that time, along with Fung Shing, one of our favourite up market eateries in Chinatown, this is yet another fine place that didn’t make it into the 2020s.
Then we went to see Scissor Happy at The Duchess Theatre. I wrote the following in my theatre log:
Works outing for Z/Yen – went very well.
Michael Moore’s drunken interventions were especially memorable.
Michael was the husband of one of our employees – Rachel. He was significantly older than her, indeed older than the rest of us. At first his audience interventions went down well with cast and audience, but he got carried away and for a while seemed to think that he WAS the show.
I remember several of our number being embarrassed about this – not least Rachel – although I also recall hearing on exit other audience members debating whether that funny old geezer was a plant from the show or really a member of the audience.
The Fung Shing meal was excellent in out private room. At that time Fung Shing was, in my opinion, the best restaurant in Chinatown. Writing 25 years later, it is another long-since defunct place, sadly.
Returning to Scissor Happy, though – I wonder what made us chose that play? Some sort of lowest common denominator thinking? Or perhaps it came recommended by someone…certainly not me! Not my sort of play at all.
Nor Nicholas de Jongh’s, who described it as “piffle” in the Standard:
My then-mate-to-be, Alastair Little, doing the celebrity chef bit. I don’t think we went to that bit – Janie and I didn’t tend to go to the big showpiece parts of such events – we just liked going around, picking up ideas and sampling things..
I’m not sure whether it was this occasion or another visit to one of these fairs, but I recall a very beautiful “English rose” of a young woman marketing Kentish wines, persuading me to try her wares. At that time (or at least this particular wine) was very ordinary wine at an above ordinary price. I have a strong memory of trying to find kind, encouraging and positive words about the wine without seeming interested in actually purchasing the stuff. She smiled sweetly throughout the exchange, so I am quite sure I got away with it.
…we did the “theatre plus big night out dinner” thing again the next night.
Look, Europe! was, I think, a one-off awareness and fundraising evening for anti-censorship campaign Index, done under the auspices of Harold Pinter and primarily aimed and about Iranian censorship.
Fine cast too – joining Harold Pinter were Joseph Bennett, Anna Friel, Rhydian Jones, Andrew Lincoln, Roger Lloyd Pack, David MacCreedy, Nadia Sawalha, Nadim Sawalha, Christopher Simon and Malcolm Tierney.
David Lister wrote the event up brilliantly as a preview in the Independent:
Janie and I were both very taken by the evening at the theatre, which was good drama and very thought provoking for its cause.
Dinner At Granita
Then a few doors down to Granita in Upper Street, which we had been meaning to try for ages. Apparently the spiritual home of New Labour, as Tony Blair and Gordon Brown are said to have made their leadership pact there a few years before our visit.
Tragically, not only were there no cabinet ministers to be seen in there on that Sunday evening, we didn’t even see Harold, Antonia and Co “after show”, which we thought must be a racing certainty.
We did still have a very good meal, though.
And to prove her superwoman credentials, after that action packed weekend, Janie went off at about 6:30 the next morning to treat her first domiciliary patient of the day. 25 years later – not a chance – we’d probably take the Monday off, if not the Monday and Tuesday!
Interesting (weird) evening. Programme missing – only insert sheet.
Actually the programme might turn out to be a play text which might turn up somewhere on my bookshelves.
I wouldn’t mind reading these plays again. This was Caryl Churchill in impenetrable mood.
Gabrielle Blunt, Jacqueline Defferary, Karina Fernandez, Bernard Gallagher, Valerie Lilley, Mary Macleod and Jason Watkins, directed by Max Stafford-Clark.
Then on to Old Park Lane Nobu for dinner. That place was the latest “in place to dine” back then, so we were keen to try it. Who’d have thought that, 25 years later, the signature black cod in miso dish would be something we can obtain from our local (Japanese) fishmonger and serve at home?
That was a lot of sensory stimulation for one evening – Caryl Churchill followed by Nobu. My guess is that Janie was very keen to try the place but could only get a late evening booking, so it sort of made sense to go after theatre.
To add to the excitement, we did it all again (in terms of theatre followed by dinner out) the very next day:
I remember this day very clearly, although I am sure there are many details the others can add. It would be super if John and Jenny were to chime in with their recollections.
Janie and I had planned to take public transport to the north side of the embankment on the Isle of Dogs and walk the Greenwich Foot Tunnel – I think it had recently reopened after refurbishment back then.
But while we were preparing to go out, the phone rang. It was my mum. My mum never used to ring on a Sunday morning – she would almost always wait for me to ring her.
Mum sounded distressed.
“It’s so awful, a tragedy,” mum said, through tears of anguish.
I thought something must have happened to my dad or some other close relative/friend.
“What’s happened, Mum?”, I asked. “Try to gather yourself and speak slowly.”
“What do you mean, ‘what’s happened’? You must know what’s happened. I know you don’t care much for the royal family…”
“…Mum, we’re going out shortly, we haven’t seen the papers or switched on the TV or radio this morning; just tell me what’s happened.”
We set off for Greenwich much later than we’d intended – so the idea of using public transport and a stroll through the Greenwich Foot Tunnel went out of the window.
Plan B was to revert to the Janie norm – we got into the car and drove to Greenwich. By the time we found somewhere to park (we hadn’t thought about that bit)…eventually finding a place near the market but some way from the Trafalgar…then walked from the parking place to the Trafalgar…we were quite late.
John and Jenny were neither fazed nor surprised that we were a bit late in the circumstances.
I remember John and I bemoaning the fact that a rich seam of our topical comedy for NewsRevue had died in that car crash along with the victims of the tragedy. We also had one of those, “when, if ever, will we be able to make Princess Diana jokes again?” conversations.
We had a very good lunch and talked about much else besides the day’s news.
I recall the four of us having a bit of a stroll after lunch.
After we parted company with John and Jenny, Janie and I wandered around Greenwich market for a while, as the car was parked near there and we were in no rush to get home.
I remember buying a dozen or so CDs that afternoon, more or less doubling the size of my CD collection. I had only bought a CD player for the first time a year or so earlier. Being a reel-to-reel and records dude, I was wicked-late to CDs. I bought mostly sixties compilations that day, plus a few iconic albums; Pet Sounds (Beach Boys), Gift From A Flower To A Garden (Donovan) and The Harder They Come (Jimmy Cliff and others) to name but three.
No pictures from the day that Princess Diana died, but here is one from the 1977 set. I couldn’t possibly have imagined what I’d be up to 20 years later, let alone 40 years later, when the following picture was taken.
Time Traveller. Me at the Greenwich meridian line 31 August 1977
Nikita’s Standard 22 Sep 1998, Tue Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
