Family

I don't have a Father and have not had one for most of my adult life so Fathers Day has tended to pass me by much of the time. The concept of family life has bemused me ever since. I did not have a particularly good relationship with my Dad, although it was probably not much different than any other teen-son/father relationship. His death was sudden and to be honest I have never really been able to mourn him as he seemed so alien to me and I was so young, mentally at least, when he died of heart failure in 1981. I think my older brother was more affected by it as his teenage years were more angsty and there were lots of unresolved issues between the two of them. I remember him punching the wall in frustration when he died and the tears he shed. At the time I wondered why I shed none?

I have a very large family - six brothers and sisters and because of age differences and a mother who has managed to alienate so many of us, we have all gone on to lead separate lives. I am the only one who has moved out of Gloucester and in retrospect it was the only possible thing to do.

Large families do not necessarily make happy families. My parent’s was not a particularly happy marriage from what I could gather and I was too young to remember my father before the stroke that debilitated him for nearly a year. Essentially I grew up with a younger sister and an older brother in the home – my elder siblings had fled the nest and already building families. Father would be at the pub every night without fail and as I entered my teens my mother began seeing other men behind his back. We were encouraged to cover for her so I spent many nights growing up, praying that our mother would be back before my father got home. If she wasn’t, there would be trouble. No violence, to my knowledge but arguments, screaming, tears and trouble.

I spent many years thinking I understood my mother’s behaviour after dad’s death. Her re-marriage into a loveless union in order to have a nice home for once in her life. My new father didn’t like me and the feeling was quite mutual, but I left mother alone understanding how she needed the security he offered. It never occurred to me the damage my mother was inflicting not only on me, but on my younger sister, who was forced to move out and spent the next ten years suffering various mental breakdowns and entering a string of abusive relationships. When the step-father died two years ago mother was at last free to live her own life in a nice house where her family would be welcome. I visited her then and found it very difficult to talk to her. We had not held a proper conversation, a mutual understanding, for over 25 years. What can one say after this much time? I love you? I miss you? It’s so good to be able to communicate with you again after all this time? It was too late.

Since then, it appears I have another step-father. I was never informed of my mother’s new marriage, was not invited to the wedding and to this day, have no idea of my mother’s name. I have decided to keep it that way.

By a sheer fluke, however Me Julie's father, Jim will be arriving on Sunday for lunch. It has been a fair few years since I have seen him and Julie only invited him assuming he would once again refuse. He didn't - and he arrives on Sunday along with Julie's sister Sarah and her two boys William & Taylor.

So rather than spending a leisurely Sunday in bed with Lloyd he will no longer be coming over and frankly I don't blame him in the slightest – families are weird. It will be nice to see Sarah and the boys again - I shall take the boys swimming as it appears they both remember the last time I took them – 7 years ago. Seeing Jim will be odd, a bit like having a grown-up over for dinner. Let it be a day for Fathers. Jim will get a little drunk I suspect. Vincent in Ireland should be being spoiled rotten. I am sure that some bear community somewhere will be celebrating with a Daddy special in XXL or the Kings Arms.

I shall think of my father too and say a little prayer for him and all Fathers who are fighting for a chance to be allowed the right to communicate with their kids. I have learned through experience that not all mothers are natural parents.

A Mellotron

Until today I didn't know what one of these was! Perhaps a Doctor Who monster? Really did not know. As of this evening, I have been asked to illustrate the front cover of the definative book about them. Want to know what one is? Look it up!!!!! Except you, Chris, who no doubt will be bristling with excitement over the project I am sure.

Sex & The City

The fabled day finally arrived when on 28th May Sex & The City – The Movie opened in the UK. I dragged my poor unsuspecting date along to watch it at a very late showing in Leicester Square. Now let me say I am a fan of the series. I do not consider myself an unquestioning fan. I avoided much of Series 1 as I found the characters hard and decidedly un-likable. I have just revisited Series 2 & 3 on my new BT Vision service and it was nice to be reminded how great it became. It was not because of the shoes, and not because of the sex. It was simply because of the great writing. With this in mind, the movie could have been a stinker but the writing holds up and my date seemed to enjoy himself almost as much as I did. I shall not spoil the plot for those who have not seen it yet but fans will LOVE it and it manages to appeal to any newbies too.

I has just occurred to me however, that the movie may get a frozen welcome from those who work in the wedding industry. The average wedding now costs upwards of £20,000 and as Big cowered in the back of his limousine and watched Carrie scuttle to her humiliation in her gorgeous Vivienne Westwood frock I asked myself, are outlandish weddings guaranteed to frighten off the Groom?

Loving Art, Hannah and Martin - but not at the same time

My first week back in town meant getting straight down to The Landor Theatre in North Clapham where a new small musical would be premiered called Loving Art. I was rather excited about this for several reasons. Firstly, the Landor has a reputation for good musicals and secondly, it would be a good chance to gossip with Scott about what had happened since I had been away – particularly on Doctor Who and I’d Do Anything. That part of the evening went well and Scott bought me up to date but sadly Loving Art was execrable. Utter trash that finally changed my mind about the Landor. I had seen a couple of things there recently and none of it had been good but I felt it might have been a glitch. Nope. Loving Art has won the award this year so far for Turkey on the Fringe.

The following evening – keep up – I went to the newly renovated Courtyard Theatre in Hoxton to see Hannah and Martin. No, these aren’t a couple of installation artists it is a play. Could I get anyone to go with me? Fat chance! On paper this one is a stinker reeking of headlines such as ‘thought provoking’, ‘turmoil’ and ‘thematic’. The extremely un-sexy PR, and there is no other way this play can be promoted, is in fact a real diamond. A jewel of a story with a relatively strong cast and a second act that had me on the edge of my seat – gripping stuff. It’s a shame that the set looked like it had been put together that afternoon. I should have known it was going to be good when I finally realised that nobody was going to be there with me.

Gone - but not forgotten

Upon returning to the UK the biggest theatre news to hit me was the fact that Gone With The Wind, which opened on 22nd April will close before the last week in June. This is the closest I have ever been to a monumental failure – Gareth was on the crew and Lee was an ASM. I saw the opening night and quite frankly, I cannot understand where the money came from for it to open it was such a corker. That’s two big closures in less than six months (Desperately Seeking Susan being the other) – life on the West End must been feeling pretty grim at the moment. Still, I have Zorro - El Musical to look forward to in July – gulp!

Out Of Action

It may seem like a lame excuse but my laptop has been in the shop for repairs, hence the delay in blogging. Gareth, bless him, managed to spill a drop of Red Bull in the keyboard resulting in keys shorting left, right and centre. Until it is picked up, I have been using his keyboard and have managed to do a little bit of proper work. The rest of the time I just seem to have been cruising Wikipedia. If all this makes me seem a little lazy that is not the case and I shall try to publish some pieces – albeit without the facility of loading pictures – not that my camera has seen the light of day since NYC. Gosh, I am crap at the camera stuff!

It's Official!

For those readers who are interested, I have now stopped being a gentleman! :-)