For some reason, stuff at The Old Vic rarely works for us and this production of Antigone was no exception. It had been bigged-up in the media on the back of a big name cast, headed up by Tara Fitzgerald alongside Jonathan Hyde, Anna Calder-Marshall, Zubin Varla and several others, under the skilled direction of (and adaption by) Declan Donnellan.
More often than not, if the critics are divided, we side with Billington (Guardian) over Spencer (Telegraph), but Charles Spencer panned this production (perhaps more vociferously than our view). I’ll let him have the last word:
We don’t often go to the theatre “at Twixtmas”, not least because you don’t get a lot of serious drama over that period. But in 1996 someone decided to transfer this superb Theatre Royal Bath production to London over the festive season.
I’m pretty sure it was on this occasion that Janie and I ran into Jacqui Somerville, who was in the audience but I think connected with someone or something to do with the production.
In my log, Janie and I declared this event to be an
…excellent production…
I do remember this production well and especially fondly. Anthony Page directed, Janet McTeer (who won multiple awards for this performance), Owen Teale and John Carlisle were in it. There is a Theatricalia entry for it.
Postscript
Jacqui Somerville was indeed there that evening – she reports and reminds me:
…a light blew that evening above the stage and Janet McTeer was a consummate professional. Giggled for ages then clicked back into character.
It was a superb production. I think I blagged the last seat in the house!
Nicholas de Jongh rated this production/London transfer very good and wrote highly of it:
Jacqui Somerville had nurtured me as a writer in my early days (1992) so I was pleased to learn that she was to direct the 1993 Edinburgh run of NewsRevue. I cannot remember which of these submissions she used, but I do recall that I did rather well out of that run, which was my first year at Edinburgh in NewsRevue, having debuted in that city the previous year in Whoops Vicar Is That Your Dick:
But I digress. Here is my submission to Jacqui in 1993:
LIST OF SONGS SUBMITTED AND TAPE TRACK LISTING
JACQUI SOMERVILLE EDINBURGH 1993 RUN
Dear Jacqui
I enclose your fun pack of lyrics and tape. The pack includes some current ones, some golden oldies (none of which have been in the Edinburgh News Revue before) and one or two that I know you like. I have some good ideas in the pipeline and shall let you see them when they are ready.
Please let me know if there are any others that you can remember that you want. I have tried to choose the better ones.
I was reminded of this day in conversation with John Random in February 2021. I have just received a bundle of scripts and ephemera from Erica Stanton, Chris Stanton’s widow, including materials pertaining to the show, Swing Low Sweet Testicles.
John reflected on the show and mentioned a diary note about promoting the show on 15 December. I remembered seeing the show at that time, checked my diary and discovered that I saw the show on 17 December.
Below is the B-Side of the flyer for that show. The reviews must relate to an earlier Noel Christopher extravaganza, known simply as The Show, scripts for which also arrived in Erica’s bundle.
Swing Low Sweet Testicles itself mustered at least one decent review:
Can’t imagine where City Limits got that date range from – it ran from December 9th 1992 to January 17th 1993.
The cast and crew were NewsRevue stalwarts and most had been somewhat involved in my early successes with that mob.
I don’t think that Cliff Kelly had yet overlapped with my material in NewsRevue, but I might be mistaken.
Chloe Lucas had done a magnificent job of belting my Coal Digger song in the Autumn NewsRevue run preceding Swing Low Sweet Testicles. I’m pretty sure that the Coal Digger song, along with a couple of my others, was in the Christmas run of NewsRevue which I saw (for a second time) after Testicles.
Anyway, I rather enjoyed Swing Low Sweet Testicles. I was partial to Noel’s writing and was glad of the opportunity to see some of his less-topical, more-enduring material.
Below is the programme for the NewsRevue show that night, which I stayed on to see for a second time, having seen the opening night on 26 November.
Earlier That Day…Getting Into The Zone
My diary also records a memorable working day. Memorable for inadvertent, comedic reasons.
I was working as a management consultant for Binder Hamlyn at that time. On that day, I accompanied the National VAT Partner, Alan Buckett, to visit a large European Manufacturing Group, whose UK headquarters were out on the M4 corridor, to help them get their heads around something or other.
We were done with that by lunchtime and Alan suggested stopping for a bite to eat in Earls Court – a convenient stop on the way back to the City for him and a short hop to home for me, as I had an early-evening engagement with Testicles and didn’t want to go back to the City.
Alan parked his car and we walked down the Earls Court Road, in search of a wine bar/restaurant someone had recommended to him.
Ah, there it is…
…said Alan, striding towards the place he had been aiming towards.
But instead of walking down the stairs to, as I could see it, the entrance to the wine bar in question, Alan marched up the stairs and into…
Clonezone. I believe it is accurate to describe that particular store as a Gay fetishist fashion emporium.
I tried to stop him, but Alan had his stomp on and disappeared into the shop.
I waited outside for what seemed ages but was probably only a few seconds.
The tall, besuited Alan, who normally looked every inch a City gent, retreated from Clonezone rather sheepishly.
I smiled.
Alan and I went into the wine bar restaurant for a light lunch and a debrief.
Towards the end of the lunch, Alan said,
When you get back to the office, I’d just prefer it if you didn’t mention…
…I said that his Clonezone secret was safe with me. Alan is long-since retired now and I’m pretty sure, if he remembers the story at all, it’d be the funny side of it that has stuck in his mind.
Alan might well have shocked the clones within as much as they (and the place) shocked him.
I felt very sorry for the cast trying to learn such a difficult song at such short notice for their opening night. But no subject is sacred in News Revue and I think this version may raise the odd smile.
This is a little dig at John Random for his zealous blacklist of certain songs. If you really want to annoy John, all you have to do is use songs like “Chattanooga”, “My Favourite Things”, “Maria”, “YMCA”……….
When Paula was directing the show, her cast very specifically commissioned this odious ditty. Paula then spiked it, saying it was too nasty for public consumption. However, in the privacy of our own News Revue party, I think the least that Jon and Paula can do to compensate me is to give the song one solitary performance before it is laid to rest.
Now that 0898 is personga non grata, perhaps Clive Gehle could use this song to entertain the crowds in his wonderful J Arthur Ranker character. This song was never performed, so will be new to most of the throng.
Well that’s it. I hope the party is a barrel of laughs. No doubt I shall hear about it afterwards. Meanwhile, I shall be telling all my friends how good the new show is, and shall come and see you all again before Christmas.
This submission helps me to realise which of my songs (at least those that had a bit of longevity to them) had been in the show during that first year of writing for NewsRevue.
The old WordPerfect table doesn’t replicate, sadly, but I have tweaked to show the information reasonably clearly, I hope.
I cannot remember which were used, but I think I had perhaps three songs in that Christmas run – not bad for a newbie.
LIST OF SONGS SUBMITTED AND TAPE TRACK LISTING JACQUI SOMERVILLE (XMAS) RUN
Song Title/OriginalTitle/Artist on Tape Aprox. No. of Performances 7+ 4-6 1-3 Nil*
Side A of Tape
Coal Digger/Goldfinger/Shirley Bassey 1-3^ Closed to You / Close to You/Carpenters 4-6^ Kate Adie / Dream Lover/Bobby Darin 7+^ Ultimate Love Song / Nothings Gonna Change My Love/Glenn Medeiros 4-6^ Mama Mia Farrow / Mama Mia/Abba 1-3^ You Can’t Hurry Trusts / You can’t Hurry Love/Supremes 7+^ Snowbush / Snowbird/Anne Murray 1-3^ Mick’s Unpleasant Things / My Favourite Things/Sound of Music Cast 1-3 Coppers Dressed as Hippies Teddy Bear’s Picnic/Henry Hall 7+ Eugene Terre’Blanche Sweet Gene Vincent/Ian Dury & Blockheads 4-6 We’re a Member As Well I Remember it Well/Gigi Cast 4-6 Midnight Plane to Jordan Midnight Train to Georgia/Gladys Knight & Pips Nil Snatchbroker Snatchbroker Matchmaker Matchmaker/Fiddler on the Roof Cast 1-3 Stand By Your Bank Stand By Your Man/Tammy Winette 1-3 Steroids I Just Don’t Know What To Do/Dusty Springfield 4-6
Side B of Tape
Come Back Labour / Come Back My Love/Darts 1-3 Trucker Strikes / Summer Loving/Grease Cast 1-3 Maxwell’s Wife / Mack the Knife/Louis Armstrong 1-3 You’ll Never Watch a Game / You’ll Never walk Alone/Gerry & Pacemakers 7+ Mrs T / I Will Survive/Gloria Gaynor 7+ John Major Rock / Crocodile Rock/Elton John 4-6 Norman Lamont / Norweigan Wood/Beatles 4-6 Bye Bye NHS / Bye Bye Love/Simon & Garfunkle 4-6 As Time Goes By (Sketch and Medley) Falling in Love Again/Techno Twins / Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree/Andrew Sisters We’ll Meet Again/Vera Lynn / Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No 2 Mov 2 1-3^
* but should have been in by now.
^ still running in the show at the moment 8 November 1992
A rare, indeed mysterious visit to the Canal Cafe on a Tuesday.
I recall this only vaguely. The diary helps just a little.
When I dropped off my Woody Allen & Mia Farrow lyric the week before, I think I ran into Jacqui Somerville herself at the Canal. Either that, or I ran into Harriet Quirk who had a message that Jacqui wanted to meet me. In any case, Jacqui and I arranged to meet on a non-NewsRevue evening.
Jacqui had been directing the early spring run of NewsRevue – that was the first show I saw. I shall write up the story of my early correspondence and visits in the fullness of time. Jacqui had her own ideas about the show, including her own pet writers, some of whom were cast, which went down very badly with the regular writers.
Indeed, at the first NewsRevue writers meeting I attended, some told me not to bother submitting for a few weeks, others simply suggested that I don’t lose heart and resubmit material that had longevity for the subsequent run; which was in fact the John Random run that first used my stuff.
So I do remember Jacqui’s rendezvous request sort-of feeling like an assignation. What would the other writers think if they found out about it? Was she going to try and recruit me into the comedy writing dark side? Or to spy for the Russians or something?
In fact, I recall finding Jacqui quite delightful company, very encouraging and full of good advice/ideas for my writing. I had a little burst of creativity over the subsequent bank holiday weekend, which I’m sure was somewhat inspired by that Tuesday evening chat.
I don’t know whether Jacqui met up with any of the other regular NewsRevue writers over that summer to build bridges, but she certainly won me over and used plenty of the regular writers’ material (not least mine) in future runs she directed, not least the 1992 Christmas run.
I also recall running into Jacqui and her more serious theatre work in subsequent years.
I wonder whether Harriet remembers much about this tiny incident or indeed whether this short piece might be a magnet with which to re-establish contact with Jacqui, as part of our “class of ’92” reunion project?
Antigone Standard Old Vic 12 Oct 1999, Tue Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Antigone Taylor Independent 12 Oct 1999, Tue The Independent (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Antigone Billington Guardian 1 of 2 14 Oct 1999, Thu The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Antigone Billington Guardian 2 of 2 14 Oct 1999, Thu The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Antigone Spencer Telegraph 13 Oct 1999, Wed The Daily Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
