Tag: Chris Webster

A Visit To Halifax To See A Revival Of Casablanca The Musical & The Ward Family, 26 September 2018

Your lyrics live on, Ian; we are reviving Casablanca The Musical at The Workshop in the last week of September…

Out of the blue, I received a letter from Mike Ward in early September to the above effect. As it happened, I had a couple of clear days, the Wednesday and Thursday of that week.

I felt very much motivated to see a revival of that show; I had written the lyrics for several songs. Also, to all intents and  purposes, that show brought the house down at the old Actor’s Workshop in Halifax; the place was tragically razed a few weeks after Casablanca The Musical’s first production in 2001:

Casablanca The Musical by Magnolia Thunderpussy, Actor’s Workshop, 18 September 2001

It had been many years since my last visit to The Workshop in Halifax; I think my previous visit was soon after the new place opened, phoenix-like from the ashes of the old place – perhaps 2004.

Anyway, I picked up the phone and called Mike, only to learn that speaking on the telephone doesn’t work very well for Mike any more:

I’m wirtually deaf phonewise, but I think you said you would like to see the wevival of Casabwanca on the Wednesday. Wonderful.

I then remembered why the Rick character is styled, in Mike’s book for Casablanca The Musical, as Wick. I also remembered some only marginally successful attempts at familiarising Mike with the use of e-mail back in the day.

Old style correspondence by post followed, mixed with some e-mails via Richard Kemp, to make the arrangements for my visit.

It was a similar itinerary, I think, to my 2001 visit for the same show, except this time I took an AirBnB apartment in town rather than a night in the Imperial Crown.

I got to the Workshop around 16:00. Mike and Richard (especially the former) looked after me and gave me a guided tour. Whereas on my previous visit the new place looked spanking new but devoid of all the props and costumes that had been lovingly accumulated at the old place…

…now, the new place reminded me of the old place; chock-a-block with stuff that might come in handy for some production or another. Cast-offs from the RSC and some smaller regional theatre companies. All sorts. Ever a theatrical magpie, is Mike Ward.

Then to the house, where Lottie had prepared a most delicious meal of fish soup. Their daughter, Olivia, was there and would join us this evening for the show. I hadn’t seen Olivia since the early days of meeting Mike, through son Adam who briefly wrote for NewsRevue, in the mid 1990s. It was lovely to see Olivia again; of course it was lovely to see all of them again.

Lottie spoke very highly of the revival production, which she had seen when it opened, the night before. In fact, she talked it up so much I think she and Mike were a bit concerned that we might be disappointed after such a build up; but they needn’t have worried.

Mike departed ahead of me and Olivia, enabling us and Lottie to chat, eat and drink some more, before Olivia and I headed off to The Workshop.

I thought the show really was excellent. Better than I remembered it from the first time – perhaps because Mike had edited the book a little – perhaps other elements of the production were just slicker and tighter this time.

Any resemblance purely coincidental?

For sure, I thought the big numbers, such as La Cage Au Wick’s…

The cast performing La Cage Au Wick’s – starting the second half of the show suitably silly

…and the Ouagadougou Choo Choo…

Ouagadougou Choo Choo, Casablanca the Musical, Actor’s Workshop Halifax, 27 July 2001

…worked especially well this time around, with more energy and poise, together with a musicality beyond my rememberings from 2001.

I was genuinely delighted and very impressed. Mike invited me to congratulate the cast backstage, which I gladly did. Several members of cast and crew stuck around to chat for quite some time after the show.

Lots of fun.

The morning after, I read the programme and was much taken with the “dissenting programme note” by Philip Ralph, which I commend to you:

Casablanca the Musical, Actor’s Workshop Halifax, Philip Ralph’s Programme Note: “Dissent – Who Do You Choose To Be?”, 27 September 2018

New Year Revels 1997, Actor’s Workshop, Halifax, 2 January 1997

This was my first visit to The Actor’s Workshop in Halifax.

It was an unusual start to the new year, that year, in several ways. Janie’s and my diaries both suggest that we had planned to attend a party at Anthea’s for New Year’s Eve, but we are pretty sure that party didn’t happen in the end.

After new year’s day, Janie had a diary full of work for the rest of the week, while I got in the motor to do a round trip taking in Halifax for the New Year revels show and then, the next day, a visit to a soft drinks factory in Nelson, Lancashire, across the Pennines.

Naturally I chose a freezing cold, snow and ice early January for that trip.

The journey to Halifax I recall being problem free (motorway more or less all the way) and of course I received warm hospitality from Mike and Lottie Ward when I got there.

I had met Mike in London two or three years earlier and had submitted material to the New Year Revels show for a couple of previous years, but this was my first (of several) visits to The Actor’s Workshop.

I was clearly impressed by the show. My log reads:

Much better than I expected. Did justice to most material and more than did justice to mine.

There were lots of in-jokes in the show and programme about The Ridings School, Halifax, which, in 1996, had:

…received nationwide attention when staff said 60 of its pupils were “unteachable” and school operations were temporarily suspended while the headmaster and other leading staff were replaced.

I don’t think the entire cast and crew were really alums of The Ridings School…but perhaps they were.

I stayed at The Imperial Crown Hotel in Halifax on that occasion. I think we ate a fine meal pre show at the Ward’s House. That must have been the first occasion I met Lottie and I have a funny feeling that Adam (whom I met at NewsRevue and through whom I had met Mike) was there on that occasion – perhaps also Olivia.

Janie (who was not with me, remember) wrote more details and contact numbers into her diary for that trip than I did into mine – including the local Halifax police and the AA – I suspect she scribbled down the latter two after seeing the weather forecast!

The drive across the Pennines from Halifax to Nelson early the next morning (3rd January) was truly nerve-wracking but I got there and did whatever I had scheduled to do at that factory for most of the day before setting off in the still treacherous driving conditions back to London.

In those days I was still driving “Red Noddy” the Honda Civic, which, although air conditioned, was still a late 1980s vehicle not ideally suited to freezing conditions. I struggled to stay warm throughout the journey and started to itch terribly before arriving at Janie’s place…

…covered in Hives.

I itched through Robert Lepage’s Elsinore the next (Saturday) evening, but that, as we say, is another story.