Tag: David de Keyser

An Attractive Young Note In Janie’s Diary, But Not In Mine, 14 November 1999…Or Do We Mean 12 November 1999

In Janie’s diary for Sunday 14 November, but not mine, the following reminder – presumably based on me saying to Janie, “let’s not forget to listen to…”

The Attractive Young Rabbi. Barry Grossman. 11:30 Radio 4.

Word must have reached me through the NewsRevue community that Barry Grossman’s radio series, The Attractive Young Rabbi, was about to broadcast.

What do you mean, you missed it at the time and now can’t get hold of it?

What do you mean, you heard it at the time but can’t remember it?

It’s there to be heard on the Internet Archive if you now where to look. Click this link, for example, and you’ll find the first series.

Tracy-Anne Oberman was also a NewsRevue (or more specifically, SportsRevue) alum, so this series was definitely a tribute to our NewsRevue “Class of ’92”.

Class Of ’92 Ivan Shakespeare Memorial Dinner, Café Rouge Holborn, 5 October 2017

There’s Barry in the Guinness World Record photo, with specs, holding the award.

I enjoyed listening to The Attractive Young Rabbi again. It is quintessentially BBC Radio Four comedy.

Postscript: Barry Grossman Writes…

Thanks Ian, except you and Janey [sic] must have missed it because it was actually on Friday, the 12th of November.

And there were no i-players, BBC Sounds or internet archives in those more innocent times. Perhaps you taped it on your reel-to-reel tape recorder the size of a house and listened to it on the Sunday.

I responded to Barry as follows:

Weird but clearly true that the broadcast was on the Friday not the Sunday, yet the note is unquestionably written in the Sunday section of Janie’s diary. 

My guess is that Janie wrote the note there because the Friday page was completely crammed with patient appointments.  The Saturday block is covered in notes about something completely different and unintelligible.  So the only space for an additional note on that page was the Sunday block. 

Quite right that there was no public domain technology to help us listen at an alternative time, but Janie did have a midi hi-fi thing in the maisonette that would enable you to record onto cassette from the radio.  I was out visiting clients that day, but she would have been able to press the record button on her midi gadget at the appointed hour.  My guess is that the note was a reminder to do that.

No gargantuan reel-to-reel tape recorder available at that time – that device lives in the flat and the flat was being refurbished that autumn.  Probably just as well – Janie was reluctant enough to press a “record” button on a bog-standard midi system.  My reel-to-reel would have seemed like something out of Mission Impossible to Janie…

… https://youtu.be/4y9NtHlJvbY …

…which would have made listening to the recording on the Saturday or Sunday…impossible.

The Designated Mourner, Wallace Shawn, Cottesloe Theatre, 1 June 1996

What an amazing piece of theatre this was.  The late great Mike Nichols, better known as a director of course, acted brilliantly, with Miranda Richardson and David de Keyser, all wonderful.

David Hare, better known as a playwright but also a talented director, did a grand job with the piece.

Wallace Shawn, perhaps better known as an actor than as a playwright, although also a very talented playwright, wrote it.  Not his best known; indeed possibly not his best piece, but, an excellent play.

Here is the Theatricalia entry for this play/production.

Despite all that role rotation, it came off superbly well for us.

Janie and I recognised the unmistakable back of Wallace Shawn’s head just in front of us that night.  A few years later, we chatted with Wallace Shawn at the Almeida when he turned up to see Miranda Richardson in Aunt Dan and Lemon; he waxed lyrical about how wonderful he thinks she is, seemed genuinely self-effacing about his writing and genuinely delighted that we had been inspired to seek out his plays by seeing this piece and of course My Dinner With Andre, one of my favourite films ever.

Wikipedia explains the plot – click here.

Bit early in the life of the web for on-line reviews, but I found this rather informative thing – click here.

Michael Billington was very taken with the play and production in the Guardian:

Billington on MournerBillington on Mourner Thu, Apr 25, 1996 – 2 · The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

Michael Coveney seemed less sure but still speaks well of it:

Coveney on MournerCoveney on Mourner Sun, Apr 28, 1996 – 65 · The Observer (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

We were really taken with it; discussing the issues for the rest of the weekend and beyond.

Hysteria by Terry Johnson, Royal Court Theatre, 29 October 1993

This was a very interesting play about a meeting between Sigmund Freud and Salvador Dali. We both really enjoyed it.

Here is the Wikipedia entry for the play.

Here is the Theatricalia entry.

Super cast, with Henry Goodman as Freud, Tim Potter as Dali. Phyllida Lloyd directed this production, which was the premier.

The play has oft been revived since.

Here is Michael Billington’s review from the Guardian:

Billington on HysteriaBillington on Hysteria Mon, Sep 6, 1993 – 25 · The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

Below is Michael Coveney’s review – not so keen:

Coveney on HysteriaCoveney on Hysteria Sun, Sep 12, 1993 – 49 · The Observer (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

We rounded off our evening with Chinese food from The Park Inn. Quite right too.

The diary suggests that we planned to have Marianne and Anil over for dinner the next evening, the Saturday, but Anil doesn’t get beyond a question mark and Janie is sure she has never met him, so my guess is that the whole idea fell though.