The Invention Of Love by Tom Stoppard, Lyttelton Theatre, RNT, 27 December 1997

We normally liked to see these “Cottesloe-type plays” at the Cottesloe, but we missed the boat with this one, seeing it a few month’s later at the Lyttelton.

Not really our cup of tea, this one. Janie isn’t all that keen on Stoppard in general and I found this one “a bit slow”.

I suspect we were both exhausted having worked all the way up to Christmas and then done the family bit for Christmas itself. I can see that Janie arranged a cab for Pauline, so I suspect this is the Christmas that Pauline came to the house and was thoroughly rude to my mum, dad, Hilary, Jacqui and Len – Len tried snipping back – good for him.

But away from the real life drama, this Stoppard drama was about A. E. Housman, with a marvellous cast, including John Wood as “the man in old age” and Paul Rhys as “a younger version of the man”. Also a selection of the usual suspects for fine National Theatre character acting, including Michael Bryant, Robin Soans, Benjamin Whitrow and John Carlisle. Richard Eyre directing – at the National for the last time. There is a Theatricalia entry – here.

Nicholas de Jongh in The Standard loved it:

Invention Standard de JonghInvention Standard de Jongh 02 Oct 1997, Thu Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

Paul Taylor in the Independent also loved it:

Invention Standard de JonghInvention Standard de Jongh 02 Oct 1997, Thu Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

My friend Michael Billington was also taken with it:

Invention Guardian BillingtonInvention Guardian Billington 02 Oct 1997, Thu The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

The Government Inspector by Nikolai Gogol, Almeida Theatre, 20 December 1997

“Back in the day” when we didn’t mind going off to the theatre in the pre-Christmas maelstrom.

Also back in the heyday of the Almeida. I’m glad we went, as this was a very good production indeed.

Tom Hollander as Khlestakov, the civil servant mistaken for the Government inspector. My neighbour, Iain McDiarmid, performing as the Lord Provost (rather than directing this time), Jonathan Kent directing. There is a Theatricalia entry for this one – here.

Nicholas de Jongh in The Standard was more taken with the production than the play…I am inclined to agree, not being a great lover of farce:

18 Dec 1997, Thu Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

However, my friend Michael Billington in The Guardian suggests that it is the production, not the play, that, if anything, errs towards farce in this instance:

20 Dec 1997, Sat The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

John Gross in The Sunday telegraph seemed to like it, admiring its universal appeal:

Waste Land & Government Inspector Sunday telegraphWaste Land & Government Inspector Sunday telegraph 28 Dec 1997, Sun Sunday Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

My records tell me that we ate at Granita after the show. As far as I know Janie and I didn’t make any sort of deal there in the Blair/Brown style.

A Few Poorly Explained Events In December 1997: Tropicana Restaurant With Bobbie & Roger, Bristol & Chinese Meal With Hussein & Saji, 5, 6 & 13 December 1997

Royal Swallow Hotel – Now Marriot Royal Picture by Elisa.rolle, CC BY-SA 4.0

The biggest mystery in this pack is the 5 December 1997 9:00 p.m. “Tropicana Restaurant with Bobbie & Roger”. Neither Janie nor I can remember Bobbie being with someone named Roger, nor can we remember a Tropicana Restaurant.

Not only that, but we checked in to the Royal Swallow in Bristol at 13:00 the next day, both having massages at 14:00 if Janie’s diary is to be believed…which it is. If I recall correctly, that was a treat to selves after a very busy time, which turned out to be a rather ordinary massage experience, a treat that we did not repeat at that place.

We’d have dined at Hilary & Chris’s place and exchanged Crimble presents, like you do…or rather like we did.

Chinese meal with Hussein and Saji (neighbours in Sandall Close) was, if I remember correctly, mostly me showing off my Chinese cooking skills after they had both admitted to knowing little about such cuisine the previous time we had dinner with them. I do vaguely remember that.

A “Works Outing” To Remember, From Detroit To Fung Shing Via Scissor Happy At The Duchess Theatre, 12 December 1997

One of the more memorable Z/Yen Christmas outings, this one.

In an attempt to start to big-up the event, we tried a west end evening, with bar drinks, theatre visit and dinner in a private room.

Perhaps the bar bit was not a great idea ahead of a silly play, Scissor Happy, that was relying on audience participation for laughs.

Anyway, we started in Detroit – by which I mean the bar in Seven Dials, long since defunct as I write 25 years later – not the City in Michigan, obviously.

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:

23 Oct 1997, Thu Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

Strangely, Charles Spencer in The Telegraph rather liked it, while admitting “it depends who is in the audience”. Too right!

24 Oct 1997, Fri The Daily Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

Beef On The Bone Risk Compared With Christmas Risk, Z/Yen Public Relations Stunt, 5 December 1997

A government ban on the sale of beef-on-the-bone, in late 1997, was very unpopular. The worry was “Mad Cow Disease” or variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans, although the connection and risks seemed very low to many of us.

I wrote a tongue-in-cheek press release for Z/Yen, which you can read by clicking here…

…or, if by chance the Z/Yen archive goes awry before Ogblog does, I have scraped that piece to here.

In truth, it was written more as a personal rant and internal Z/Yen team joke for Christmas that year than anything that I thought might really generate press, but strangely the Daily Telegraph picked up on it, called me for a chat about it and then published this piece – extracted onto the then nascent Z/Yen web site here...

…or, if by chance the Z/Yen archive goes awry before Ogblog does, I have scraped that piece to here.

The beef-on-the-bone ban was lifted in time for Christmas (1999) – so never let it be said that I have no influence.

Submission To Andy Coleman Re NewsRevue, 29 November 1997

Andy Coleman
News Revue
29 November 1997

Dear Andy

Glad to learn that you are doing the Christmas show and that you have gathered a great sounding cast.

I attach 1997 material which, in my opinion, has “best of” potential. I have recordings of all of these, so if you need recordings just let me know and I’ll drop them in to the Canal. (The Cafe, of course, not the actual wet place).

If you want any updates or rewrites (the attached material or other stuff of mine which you like) let me know.

Good luck and I look forward to seeing you soon.

Ian Harris

The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore by Tennessee Williams, Lyric Hammersmith, 29 November 1997

I wrote the following in my log around the time:

Unusual production; worked in many but not all respects.

Originally done at Citizens Theatre, Glasgow in October 1994.

This play is not, in my view, top notch Tennessee Williams, so there was possibly only so much that could be done with it. Philip Prowse did his best as director. Rupert Everett flamboyantly and memorably played the role of Flora Goforth.

Like us, Nicholas de Jongh was impressed by the performances but not 100% sure about the play in The Standard:

28 Oct 1997, Tue Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

Susannah Clapp in the Observer observed the performance as uber-camp

02 Nov 1997, Sun The Observer (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

Charles Spencer in The Telegraph didn’t like it much:

29 Oct 1997, Wed The Daily Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

A Driving Holiday In Morocco, 7 to 21 November 1997, Placeholder & Links

Our sole navigation device – which might be described as a “map nav”

Janie and I had a superb action and fun packed driving holiday in Morocco in the autumn of 1997.

I have now written this up from my travel logs as part of my “25 years on” series. You can start by clicking here or below if you like reading forwards:

Driving Holiday In Morocco Day One: Fes (aka Fez), 8 November 1997

Alternatively, if you like reading stories backwards, you can start with the ending here or below:

Driving Holiday In Morocco Days Thirteen & Fourteen: Relaxing In Marrakesh, Including Premature False Start To Our Journey Home, 20 & 21 November 1997

For enthusiasts of highly summarised words and pictures, the itinerary is shown below, followed by links to the photo albums, which contain over 200 items of eye candy, such as this one:

Below is a scan of the itinerary, which we arranged through Steppes East:

Below are the two photo albums (just over 100 photos each) on Flickr:

001 8 November 1997 - Only mules and pedestrians allowed in these Fes streets M_J1_Photo (2)
048 Palace de la Bahia - we had to leave out lots of good shots too M_J6_Photo (33)

Driving Holiday In Morocco Days Thirteen & Fourteen: Relaxing In Marrakesh, Including Premature False Start To Our Journey Home, 20 & 21 November 1997

La Mamounia for dinner

Resolved to relax all day…

Relaxing at Le Tichka.

…[until] false start when Travel Link turned up a day early to take us home!

This is a favourite travel agent cock up story of mine. There we were, having been touring rigorously for best part of two weeks, enjoying a blissful relaxing morning on our last day of holiday – looking forward to a well posh dinner I had booked for us at La Mamounia for our end of tour celebration, when an agent turned up and cajoled us poolside, “you need to leave straight away for your flight or else you’ll miss it”.

This incident was only 18 months after my own genuine flight cock up, when returning from Germany after Michael’s wedding. But surely, so soon after such an error, I couldn’t have erred by a whole day. I rushed up to the room and got our travel documents out of the safe.

This must have been the agent’s error, not ours. Phew.

The young woman was extremely apologetic and reassured us several times (including leaving a message when she got back to the office) that the error was all theirs and that they would return the next morning to collect us, as arranged.

Reverting to Plan A – a very light lunch, poolside, at Le Tichka

Dinner at La Mamounia was well posh and great fun. I think the music got a bit tedious for us after a while, but still we ate extremely well and enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. An excellent way to round off a wonderful holiday.

All the photos from the second part of our journey are on this Flickr album – click here or below:

048 Palace de la Bahia - we had to leave out lots of good shots too M_J6_Photo (33)

A placeholder and links for information about this whole trip can be found here and below.

A Driving Holiday In Morocco, 7 to 21 November 1997, Placeholder & Links

Driving Holiday In Morocco Day Twelve: Another Day In Marrakesh, 19 November 1997

Rose quite late. Cloudy morning, so changed plans re touring.

As part of our changing plans we delicately asked the concierge to find us a gentler guide who might take us to shops with less pushy merchants. I think the geezer listened.

Got excellent guide Moulay – went to see Ben Youssef Madrasa…

Janie & Moulay at the Ben Youssef Madrasa

…and the Saadian Tombs [see headline photo & below]…

…then back into medina proper, where we got some nice clothes for Janie at last and admired expensive antique shops.

Lunch at hotel, then restful afternoon by pool.

Super evening at restaurant Yacout – palatial surroundings and so much food and wine! Moroccan salads, chicken with olives, lamb tajine (we rejected a couscous dish) and pastilla au lait and almonds.

All the photos from the second part of our journey are on this Flickr album – click here or below:

048 Palace de la Bahia - we had to leave out lots of good shots too M_J6_Photo (33)

A placeholder and links for information about this whole trip can be found here and below.

A Driving Holiday In Morocco, 7 to 21 November 1997, Placeholder & Links