Everything done through the muggy fudge of tiredness today and got nowhere with the script.
Things were brightened somewhat by a lovely
5 star review on Chortle. It's an important place to get a good review and getting 5 stars here is an achievement I have only managed once before. The reviews this week have cemented this as a successful run and wipe out the memory of the couple of mediocre ones I got earlier. They may have come too late to make much of a difference to ticket sales (although you never know), but they will be helpful for the tour and also for my own personal satisfaction at a job well done. The audience reaction is more important, but the reviews are the way it is quantified. I am not eligible for any awards so a 5 star in Chortle is the closest I can come to the equivalent of a nomination. I am very pleased that this show, of which I was always proud, seems to be getting the recognition it deserves.
Then I had an enjoyable drive through the streets of Edinburgh with Robert Llewellyn who is doing a series of Carpool for the Dave channel. I did one of
his podcast shows last Christmas. This time he has more cameras and a crew with him who travel in a car behind, but it was essentially the same show, just a nice opportunity to have a chat about whatever we wanted. We drove down to where my car is parked to check it was still in one piece and unbroken into (it looked fine) and then headed down to the beach which I had never visited before, although we didn't stop and get out of the car (which would have defeated the point of the show). The hour passed quickly and I chatted openly, and hopefully was interesting and amusing enough to make the 15 minute edit entertaining.
I was just wiped out afterwards and decided to put all my script writing eggs in one basket, to relax before the show and then get an early night and spend the whole of Thursday sorting out script one of the Radio 4 show. I think this is a good plan. I hope it will work. Because my weariness was debilitating today. I made some unusual unforced errors in the show, even messing up the beginning part of the genealogy bit because I had been distracted by a slight verbal slip and someone moving in the crowd. I know that Booz begat Obed of Ruth. That's almost the easiest one. But I lost the track tonight.
I had also inadvertently covered my laptop with the curtain in the wings and so had to go and move it to get the slides working. The audience seemed a little sluggish too, but I battled on and it was a satisfactory show. There were more in than yesterday, possibly due to the good reviews, but I could sense that perhaps some of them had high expectations that I was not reaching. That can be the problem with glowing notices. People come to see it, who perhaps are not tuned into the humour and are doubly narked off when the 5 star show does nothing for them.
One man apparently left the auditorium at the end and when he got to the young lady kindly holding the bucket for SCOPE, he ripped up his programme and threw it in amongst the coins. Which is a particularly prattish way to show his displeasure. If he hadn't liked the show then it was my fault and not a woman from Front of House and certainly not SCOPE. He could have least have given the programme back to be reused, so it might make some money for the charity. What an awful form of protest. If he was a Christian he was a very bad one, showing neither forgiveness or charity, but my best guess is that he was a man who had read in the Scotsman that this was a show to see and then hadn't got any of the jokes. Which is fair enough. I will never be to everyone's tastes. But his way of showing his displeasure is unacceptable and I hope he feels ashamed of himself. As Michael Legge commented, it probably means I am doing something right if someone can react to the show in that way.
And plenty of others had enjoyed it well enough. I got given a Chorley cake by some of the people from the Chorley Little Theatre, where I will be gigging on the tour (see yesterday's entry for dates).
I made good on my resolution and came back home, watched a bit of telly, drank yet more chamomile tea and ate my Chorley cake.
Let's hope I get enough sleep to make tomorrow a more productive day.
