‘Marley Was Dead, But Charles Dickens Is Very Much Alive’

Tags

A Christmas Carol, A Christmas Carol film, Charles Dickens, Dickens and Staplehurst. A Biogrpahy of a Rail Crash, Ebenezer Scrooge, Jacob Marley, Mid Continent Public Library, Miriam Margolyes, Snow

Saturday 5 November was very similar in shape to Friday 4th, with two performances of A Christmas Carol at a single venue, in this case back at the Woodneath Library auditorium. Woodneath is only a five-minute drive from the Hilton Garden Inn, and I didn’t have to be there until 1pm, so I had a very lazy, and recuperative, morning ahead of me.

After the torrential rain of Friday, I was astounded to see low cloud and snow greet me as I arrived in the lobby for breakfast. Of course, the ground was so wet that none of the snow survived on the ground, but it was lovely to watch the big flakes float down.

There is not much to say about the morning, really (Wordle in 3, is worth a mention though!), I did a little more laundry, not that I really needed to, but it is good to keep on top of it and keep a full stock of white costume shirts in the bank. A day of two shows typically uses three shirts – one to be worn during the first performance, then a second one to change into for the signing session, which I will also wear for the second show, and then a third fresh one for the evening signing. There are days on tour when there is not time to get laundry done, thanks to travel commitments, so I have always tried to catch up as often as possible.

As the morning went on, so the weather cleared and by the time I was collating all of the costumes and props the sky was clear blue with the temperature rising. Kimberly arrived at 12.45 and we made the short drive to Woodneath where we were greeted by a somewhat panicky group of librarians, for they had discovered that when the furniture for the stage had been collected from MGC that morning, the guys had forgotten to load the leather armchair that takes on the multiple roles of Scrooge’s office chair, his bed and Mr Fezziwig’s desk respectively. By the time the discovery had been made there was no time to drive back to Independence, collect the chair and get it back to Liberty in time for the matinee, so we had to improvise. Fortunately, the Woodneath branch has been imaginatively designed and styled, so there were a few possible ‘understudies’ dotted around. I chose a fairly plain green vinyl one which, although a little modern, would do the job. As we placed this humble chair onto the stage, the famous line from 42nd Street came to mind – ‘Hey, kid, you are going out there a nobody, but you have to come back a star!’ I hoped that the chair would not crumble under such pressure.

With much larger audiences expected to attend A Christmas Carol than those that came to watch A Child’s Journey With Dickens two days before, the true flexibility of the brand new Woodneath auditorium was literally revealed, for a wall could be raised allowing a whole new area of seating to have a view of the stage.

With the minor emergency of the chair averted, I went into my usual preparations for a show – changing into my costume with 30 minutes to go. As the audience gathered, so they were entertained by the Dickens Carolers, who sung wonderful acapella arrangements of favourite Christmas songs. The group is highly popular in the Kansas City area, and for my shows a group of 4 (the entire choir is much larger) delighted the audience with their very witty and lively renditions. Having got into my costume, I stood in the wings and watched them perform, which really helped me get into the spirit of the day, as well as giving me a chance to gauge the responsiveness of the audience.

With five minutes to go I made my way to join Sara in the sound booth and watched the end of the caroler’s set from the back of the hall. At 2 o’clock they sang ‘We Wish You a Merry Christmas’, their final number, and left the stage to loud applause, which boded well for the next 90 minutes. Indeed, the show went very well, although my voice was still a little husky. The chair fulfilled its commitments admirably, and maybe was even a good omen, for when I flung my top hat into the air as Scrooge gets dressed ‘all in his best’ it landed squarely and securely onto my head, thereby earning me an extra, and quite undeserved, round of applause. I am often asked how often the hat lands on my head successfully, and the answer is very rarely, maybe two or three times each season. Usually, as it drops to the floor, I cheerfully pick it up, dust it down and say, ‘One day!’, which actually helps to established old Ebenezer’s new sunny and positive outlook on life. I haven’t quite worked out how to best respond when the hat trick is successful. Yesterday I simply stood at the centre of the stage with my arms spread, soaking up the applause, but I wonder if a better response is simply to carry on the scene as if it were an absolutely normal part of the script: maybe I will try that approach next time.

The audience reaction was wonderful, as it always is in the Kansas City area, where I have so many fans and supporters. I quickly changed into a dry costume (even more important with my throat being a little tender), and made my way to the lobby where a long line of people was waiting for me. My signing table was in front of the magnificent living moss wall, which provided a quite spectacular backdrop for the many photographs that were taken. Last year when I was in the area my Staplehurst book had yet to be delivered, so Kimberly had asked me to sign 200 bookplates which could be stuck in when the stock arrived. Now, even with the bookplates, everyone wanted their copy personally signed, and I can quite understand that. I recently bought a copy of Miriam Margolyes’ autobiography which had been ‘signed by the author’, but it would mean so much more if I was next to her chatting as she scribbled her name. I was actually filming with her recently, for a forthcoming TV programme, and very foolishly forgot to take my book!

When the signing had finished, my first job, as always, was to re-set the stage for the evening’s performance. A performer, or stage manager, will always do this immediately a show is finished, rather than waiting until the evening when, if there is a problem, it is too late to resolve. Once the stool was back in its starting place, the red cloth draped over the stand-in chair and the hat, scarf and walking stick back in the dressing room, I changed into my normal clothes and went to get my lunch, which the team had ordered in for me. Unfortunately, my salad hadn’t been delivered with the rest of the order, so Kimberly suggested we drive back to the deli, collect my lunch and then I could take it back to the hotel eat it there and have a short rest between shows, which was what I did.

Back to Woodneath, the original chair had been collected and now sat rather sheepishly, slightly out of position on the stage, whilst the replacement had resumed its life in the library, having had the briefest glimpses of show business. I positioned the original how I wanted it, placed the cloth over it, and went to get ready. Again, I listened to the carolers (a different quartet) as they did their thing equally as cheerfully and energetically as their afternoon counterparts. The audience was another large one, and they sounded to be equally responsive.

My voice was still not fully up to par, despite drinking a lot of water, sucking on Fisherman’s Friend lozenges, and doing all of my warm-up exercises. The good thing is that it does not feel sore or inflamed and I think that it is simply a question of getting used to being constantly on the road, performing every day. Sadly, I was not able to repeat the success with the top hat, so couldn’t try out my new idea – it may be a while until I can! The response was every bit as enthusiastic as the afternoon’s had been, and everyone stood and cheered and stamped as I bowed to all sides of the room.

The signing session was fun, and there were more gifts bestowed upon me, but the best moment was when a gentleman approached me (he was not standing in the queue), shook me very firmly and earnestly by the hand, and said ‘Marley was dead, but Charles Dickens is very much alive within you’. He didn’t say anything else, had no book or DVD to be signed, didn’t want a picture, he just said those words, which meant the world to me.

My time in the Kansas City area had come to an end, I said goodbye to the various MCPL staff who had looked after me so well, most especially to Sara who had run the shows expertly from the tech booth throughout my visit, as well as wielding the rubber plunger when necessary.

Kimerly took me to the nearby Longhorn steakhouse, where we celebrated with a couple of Ribeye steaks and baked potatoes, before returning to the hotel where we said our goodbyes for another year.

On Sunday morning I get to drive my Toyota Venza for the first time since Wednesday as I make the journey to Omaha to get together with more old friends and to continue my adventures

PS: A very happy birthday to my brother Ian, who has had such a positive and supportive influence of my career, and life. Celebrate well!

Channelling the Founder of the Feast

Tags

A Child's Journey With Dickens, A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens, Ebenezer Scrooge, Line learning, Mid Continent Public Library, Rehearsal

Friday 4th November would see me perform A Christmas Carol for the first time since December 23rd 2021, and to be perfectly honest I was quite worried about it, as in the build-up to the tour the words were just not coming back to me as easily as I would have expected. During the preceding weeks I have been doing a lot of rehearsal and line learning of A Child’s Journey With Dickens, which of course proved very successful, but when I came to A Christmas Carol it had been a bit of a struggle.

On Friday I woke with the knowledge that I would be tested twice later in the day, and that there would be nowhere to hide, so the morning would be given over to some serious rehearsal. Having completed Wordle (my usual score of 4 again) and had breakfast, I returned to my room, and prepared to run through the entire 80-minute script of A Christmas Carol. Outside heavy rain was falling, very heavy rain for a storm was lashing the Midwest with a ferocious intensity that was quite scary, and traffic edged along the busy freeway with thick clouds of spray hanging in the air. Occasionally an emergency vehicle’s flashing lights brought a splash of colour to the scene.

And so, I began: ‘Marley was dead, to begin with…….’ Amazingly, suddenly, unlike my previous rehearsals, the words just flowed. I slightly change my rehearsal from purely a vocal one to include the movements, which was rather difficult seeing as I had a tiny strip of floor between the hotel bed, the desk and the TV stand, but even then, everything came back to me. It was almost as if my mind had been controlling my rehearsal needs and had prioritised A Child’s Journey, before releasing the Carol into my memory when I needed it. I had never felt anything like this before, and it was equally reassuring and unnerving, for I felt slightly out of control.

The run-through finished, and I made some coffee and relaxed, thinking about what I had just been through, and decided to repeat the process in a little while. Firstly, I took the trip’s first load of laundry downstairs and caught up with some emails and admin. One email was from my brother who had seen that Dolly Parton was taking her Smoky Mountain Christmas Carol to London. In previous years when I used to perform in Pigeon Forge this was a very familiar production to me, so I sent a tweet to Ms Parton welcoming her to England. It would be amazing to unite the two shows one day! It would have been easy to stay online, but I forced myelf to start another rehearsal and launched into the script once more. Again, the words, the intonation, the pace, the expression all came from within, and it was if I had been performing the piece every day throughout the previous weeks. There was a huge sense of relief as I came to the end again.

Outside, the rain was till beating the ground and I started to gather everything that I would need for the show – two costumes, cufflinks, watch and chain. walking stick, top hat, red cloth to drape over the chair, Victorian penny pieces in both waistcoat pockets, and then it was 12.15 and Kimberly was due to collect me. I went to the lobby and joined the little group of staff and guests watching the torrent of rain falling from the clouds above.

Kimberly’s car pulled up under the portico, so I could get my costumes and bag stowed without them getting soaked, and off we set to join the streams of cars. The windscreen wipers couldn’t work fast enough to clear the water, so the journey was a slow one, but we still got to the Genealogy Center in good time. Usually in the KC area I have two shows each day in different venues, meaning that as soon as I have finished it is time to pack up and get on the road, but this year it had been decided that I would spend one day at MGC, with two shows, and one day at Woodneath.

The team was already there, Beth, Carmalita, Susan and Sara, and straight away I wanted to go through the music cues to make sure that the show would be slick and perfect – I was still harbouring those nerves from early that morning. Sara opened the sound equipment, and we ran through each sound effect, until we were sure that we were both confident. Next it was time to do a sound check from the stage and I started to run through lines again, and continued for much longer into the script than was absolutely necessary.

Having made all of the preparations I withdrew to the green room, where I got into costume and then began to make my final preparations. I did some deep breathing exercises, and then started my favourite tongue-twisters to make sure that my lips and tongue were working well: ‘Bibbity bobbity bought a bat. Bibbity Bobbity bought a ball’ and ‘She stood upon the balcolny, mimicking him hiccoughing and amicably welcoming him in.’ The important thing about these is to get every syllable pronounced, basically taking my father’s advice from years before, ‘always finish one word before starting the next’. In the second of those excercises it is the ‘ing’ sounds that it is easy to lose, as well as the ‘m’ on the end of ‘him’.

I had done all of the work and preparation that I could so now I sat down quietly to think about the show. I took a selfie of me in pensive pose, and when I looked at it there was an almost uncanny resemblance to my great great grandfather’s pose in an 1859 portrait, even the colour of the wall matched. I swear that I didn’t set out to recreate the Frith portrait, it was simply a happy coincidence. I was definitely channelling the founder of the feast.

At 1 o’clock Susan popped her head into the dressing room to check that I was ready and then went to the stage to make my introductions, while I made my way to the back of the hall to start the show walking through the audience as the somber music played.

What can I say? The show went so well, so smoothly, and the audience responded to all of the moments that previous audiences have – not just the big obvious ones, but also those little times when I listen for a gasp, a giggle or even for complete silence. Even the weather contrived to help, for during the Christmas Future scenes thunder began to rumble outside, adding a portentous and heavy atmosphere to the proceedings, and then stopped again when the story returned to Scrooge’s bedroom on Christmas morning. From a personal point of view there were a few moments of timing that were not absolutely perfect, but these were minor – A Christmas Carol was back in all its glory.

After I had taken my bows, I changed costume and made my way to the auditorium lobby to sign and chat. The reaction to the performance both from well-seasoned fans and first timers was extremely gratifying and for the first time that day I began to relax.

Once the last of the audience had made their wild dash through the rain to their cars, it was time to rest with over 4 hours until the evening show. The library staff had kindly ordered in lunch, in my case a salad, and when I had eaten, I pushed two chairs together, stretched out my legs and although I didn’t actually nap, just switched off.

The evening show was very well subscribed, although we didn’t know if the weather would put people off (the events here are all free, but attendees have to register, meaning that there is often a degree of drop off in numbers.) As 6.30 passed it looked as if almost everyone was coming, for the hall was filling up nicely, and it promised to be a really enjoyable evening. With 5 minutes to go I put my hat and scarf on and prepared to go, when I saw Sara, who I would have expected to be at the sound desk, walking down a corridor wielding a large rubber plunger. She gave me a wry look and said ‘Oh, the joys of being the building superintendent’ and off she marched with an air of resigned determination. Shortly afterwards Beth appeared to tell me that we may be delaying for 5 minutes or so, as there was a slight plumbing emergency that needed attending to – I didn’t ask for any details. It was not long until Sara was back, and we were ready to go.

The evening performance was another good one, although my voice was a little husky, probably due to the efforts I had put into the morning’s rehearsing as well as the first show. It was great to perform for such a large crowd, and it felt as if they were all engaged in the story. There were quite a few children in the audience, and they were giggling at the silly bits – snoring etc, and at one point I found myself playing to them too much and had to pull myself back into line. The response at the show’s conclusion was amazing, with shouts and whistles and whoops. It had very definitely been a good day

At the signing table there were more gifts, a drawing of the Child’s Journey stage by Aiden, and a painting by Paisley, whilst Lily, who gave me the picture the day before, was back with her mother too. I signed lots of copies of my book, as well as the A Christmas Carol DVDs which are available this year and posed for lots of photographs.

When all was finished, I packed up my belongings, said my goodbyes and Kimberly drove me back to Liberty, where we dined in a sports bar (a delicious salmon and mashed potatoes for me), before she took me back to the hotel. It had seemed a long day, but an ultimately successful one, the only negative aspect being that somewhere along the way I had mislaid one of my red cravats – maybe it fell off the coat hanger when I was running through the rain, but that means I only have one for the rest of the tour.

I may have lost a small item of costume, but I have NOT lost A Christmas Carol.

Opening Salvos

Tags

A Child's Journey With Dickens, A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens, Hilton Garden Inn, Mid Continent Public Library, Office Max

The first performance day of the tour inevitably started in darkness as my brain, still on UK time, decided it was time to wake, even though the clock by my bedside stated that it was only 1am. I managed to return to sleep briefly, only to repeat the exercise at 3-O-something, and again at 4ish. I finally gave in and made for the coffee maker at around 5.

I mooched around and wrote my blog post and completed the day’s Wordle challenge in 4 rows (yes, I have been caught in the net of the 5-letter word game, as have so many others), before making my way to the lobby for breakfast, which had a wonderful air of familiarity about it – the porridge (complete with a sprinkle of brown sugar and some cranberries) was thick and delicious, and the waffles were up to their usual standard.

My first show wasn’t until 2pm, so I had the morning to myself, most of which was given over to rehearsing A Child’s Journey With Dickens. I paced about my room, going through the lines over and over again. It was strange going through the entire script again, having carefully learned what not to say, what to leave out, back in September when I performed it at Old Sturbridge Village with Jennifer Emerson taking the role of Kate Douglas Wiggin. At that time, she had stood at a lectern giving Kate’s speech, whilst I had sat at a small writing desk chipping in occasionally with letters written by Charles Dickens himself – the split stage idea had worked well, until the two characters came together on a bench which represented the railroad car in which they actually met. With just me doing the show, I had to find ways of transitioning from Kate to Charles and back again, so I spent much of my rehearsal time going over those moves.

I also decided that it would be a nice idea to give Kate a sheaf of papers to hold, as if she were clutching the text of her speech (originally given in New York City in 1912), and for Dickens’s table to strewn with notepaper as he fired off his correspondence. Across the parking lot from the hotel is an Office Max store, and I planned to drive over there and purchase some suitable paper. Wait, drive? I could see the store! I abandoned my plan and set out to walk the great distance, which meant crossing a road which was not designed to be crossed, as is so often the way in America. I waited patiently until a suitable gap in the traffic appeared and made my move, remembering to look the ‘wrong’ way for cars and trucks.

Once in the store I found some nice ivory-coloured paper, which wouldn’t look too garishly modern on stage, made my purchase and returned to the hotel.

I was due to be picked up to be driven to the first venue at 12.15, so I made sure that I had all of the costumes and props that I needed and then headed down to the lobby to wait. I mentioned in yesterday’s post that there had been some changes at The Mid-Continent Public Library this year, and that my visit would be a very different one to that of years past, but actually things had a very familiar feel to them as Kimberly Howard, my long-time colleague and good friend pulled up outside the hotel to collect me. I first met Kimberly in, I think 1995 when she was a branch librarian at the Blue Springs branch of the library service, and I performed there during my very first tour. Over the years she rose through the ranks of MCPL to head up the programming side of the operation and thus became the person who booked and administered my visits. It was Kimberly who transported me all around the Kansas City region, who took me to lunch and dinner, who oversaw the growth of my audience numbers into the much larger auditoria that I now perform in here. But this year Kimberly took the decision to retire and move on, although she put in a special request to her former employers, asking if she could still be my chauffeur! So, although at an administrative level it was all change this year, for me the day had a wonderful feeling of reassurance about it.

We drove for about 45 minutes to the Midwest Genealogy Center, where my first performance would be held. It is a venue I have performed at in the past and in no time I was on the stage moving furniture around and getting things set just as I wanted them. In charge of all things technical was Sara Peterson-Davis, which was good news for we have battled recalcitrant microphones together in the past, so I knew I was in good hands. The whole of my visit this year is being coordinated by Beth Loecke, who welcomed me and made sure I had everything I needed. The stage already had a lectern and a large bench in place, but we still needed a small writing table for Charles to use, and after a bit of searching Beth mentioned that the props for A Christmas Carol had been delivered during the day and that there was a wooden table among them, and so my set was complete.

Soon the time for the audience to be let in arrived and I retreated to my dressing room until curtain up.

I had slightly changed my introductory remarks this year, bringing them a little more up to date, and had included the great revelation that I now perform regularly at ‘Highclere Castle, the setting for Downton Abbey’. I thought that this would go down well with an American audience, and so it proved as I could hear a gasp and murmur when those words were read.

Soon I was on stage and launching into the script, which flowed very well, the movements from stage right to left and back were OK, especially the one following Kate’s line ‘I prayed fervently that…the pangs of seasickness may be spared so precious a personage’, after which I reeled and stumbled across the stage, grabbing the bench and chair for support, as if I were on the deck of a heaving and pitching steamer.

There was one rather extraordinary error in my show, which hadn’t showed itself in rehearsals, and that was a matter of accent: I give Kate’s lines in a rather flawed New England accent, making sure that the ‘ah’ sounds such as in barn and farm were elongated into bahn and fahm, and that was ok, but the problem came after I had delivered George Dolby’s account of how he and Dickens prepared for an evening show. Dolby was Dickens’s tour manager and travelled with him throughout his final reading tours, making sure that every detail from ticket sales to the set up in the various halls was properly looked after. Dolby was a Scot, and so I naturally give him a gentle Edinburgh burr, which adds a little variety to the duologue of Kate and Charles. The problem was, when I came back to being Kate again, I couldn’t lose the Scottish accent! It just wouldn’t leave and for a while Kate Douglas Wiggin, born in Philadelphia, raised in Maine, seemed to have emigrated from the Scottish borders – very odd.

The scenes in the railroad car when the 10-year-old Kate chatted excitedly to her hero, telling him that she skipped the dull parts of his books, went very well and were wonderfully received by the audience, and the whole show came to a lovely conclusion. Beth had decided to have a Q&A session after the show and audience members were encouraged to write questions on small pieces of card, so that we wouldn’t need to have staff running around the auditorium with microphones. As usual when the request for questions went out everyone was rather shy and coy, not wanting to be the first, but eventually a small girl in the front row handed her card up – in fact it wasn’t a question, but she had sketched the stage with me preforming on it – what an amazing souvenir, and one that I will cherish! It had been signed on the back by the artist – Lily, aged 9. Thank you, Lily.

When the show was finished, I changed and packed up and Kimberley drove me back to Liberty where we had a late lunch in the local Penera Bread outlet – I had a Baja Bowl, which featured chicken, avocado, pulses, tomatoes and a spicy salsa dressing – it was perfect. There was not a huge amount of time before the second show of the day, which was to be held at the Woodneath Library branch, another venue that I am very familiar with, although this year I would be performing in the brand-new auditorium space, which had been constructed since my last visit. On walking into the lobby, the visitor is faced with a huge living wall of moss, giving the building an ecologically sound feeling. Once in the auditorium the fresh feel is continued as the seats are all various shades of green too.

Sara was at her place in the sound booth, Captain Kirk-like (I mean in charge of the great ship, not that she has any resemblance to William Shatner), and we did sound checks on an empty stage, for there was one slight concern: there was no furniture. Somewhere along the way the crew who was supposed to transfer the set from one venue to another hadn’t turned up (either had forgotten to do it, or had thought the collection was for the following day, depending on who one spoke to), so there was a slightly fraught period during which there was the possibility that we would have to source other furniture that would look very modern – and probably green.

Beth was onto the issue, however, and with a little over 30 minutes to go before the show was due to start the furniture appeared and all calmness arrived at Woodneath, just before the audience.

During lunch Kimberly and I had reminisced about the days when the library service had provided a portable microphone system that had a stubborn mind of its own and often refused to work, and it was Sara who coaxed life out of it, making her our official microphone whisperer. Thank heavens, we mused, that these days we were using much more sophisticated and reliable equipment. That thought came back to bite me on the bum, when I began the show, and my words were accompanied by loud cracks of electronic disobedience. It was obvious that a lead was loose somewhere, but short of disrobing on stage, there was not much to do about it. I took my own decision: the audience wasn’t a large one and the acoustics of the room were good, so I switched off the mic and went unplugged for the evening.

The show went well, and I managed to escape Scotland on his occasion, which was a relief. We had another Q&A afterwards and again after a slow start the questions flowed freely, including a few old favourites and some that required more thought from me before answering. As the clock ticked towards 8.15 we wound up the session, I took my final bows of the day and left the stage.

I mingled for a while with some of the audience members and posed for pictures, before returning to my green room (and it was green, naturally) to change. Before I left the theatre, I went to the sound desk so that Sara and I could find out what had happened to the microphone – I am due back at Woodneath on Saturday to perform to a much larger audience, so we wanted to make sure that we were on top of the issue. It seemed as if the main lead into the unit was slightly loose and was moving about, thereby creating the static noise whenever I moved. Sara tightened it up, and we ran a few lines to check that the repair was successful, before saying our goodbyes and goodnights.

The evening was not quite over, for Kimberly and I had been invited to dinner at the home of long-time fan Doug Streu and his wife Denise. Doug is a self-confessed A Christmas Carol addict, watching every film version multiple times each season. He comes to most of my shows, if not all, in the Kansas City region and was keen to say thank you by inviting me to his house, and also to honor Kimberly’s retirement from Mid-Continent. Our evening was a lovely one, with a simple meal of chicken, corn and potatoes, and good conversational banter. A fine way to wind down, but soon fatigue crept up on me, and it was time to say thank you and farewell. Doug and Denise sent us into the night containing goody bags containing banana bread, pumpkin bread, some brownies and in my case a bag of freshly ground coffee, as has become traditional over the years. They are truly kind people

Back at the hotel I could reflect on a successful first day on the road, and look forward to my first performances of A Christmas Carol on Friday November 4th.

Christmas Begins Now

Tags

A Child's Journey With Dickens, A Christmas Carol, Byers'Choice, Delta Airlines, Detroit DTW, Ebenezer Scrooge, Enterprise Car Rental, Field of Dreams, Heathrow Airport, Hilton Garden Inn, Kansas City, Mid Continent Public Library, The Shawshank Redemption, Toyota Venza

It is the start of November, and the leaves are falling from the trees, in England the days have been wet and squally, but with occasional crisp, fresh periods of crystal-clear sunlight creating a farewell finale to the beauty of Autumn before it is totally consumed by the dark winter months. Pumpkins were briefly displayed on doorsteps, including ours, and houses were decorated for Hallowe’en. The night of the 31st itself was busier on the streets of Abingdon than I had seen before and the atmosphere among the gruesomely attired trick or treaters was more akin to those we have witnessed in America films and TV shows.

All of this is an annual prelude to the first part of my annual American tour and on Tuesday 1 November I packed my cases ready to depart early in the morning of the 2nd. The build-up to my travel day had been quite stressful, as I had been unable to check in for my flight. The Delta airlines app insisted that I uploaded my Covid vaccination status, but when I did, the system refused to accept it, saying that the brand of vaccine was not approved in America and I would need to prove some alternative – which seemed odd, as I had travelled quite successfully only a month or so ago. There seemed no way to contact Delta, only endless pages of FAQs so I was not sure if I would actually be allowed to board a plane when I reached the airport.

On Wednesday morning I finished my packing and put on my new fleece jacket, branded for my tour emblazoned with the GD monogram and A Christmas Carol legend originally created for my website a few years ago. The corporate look was completed by a baseball cap and I was ready to tour!

My taxi arrived at the door at 6.45 and having said our farewells (which even after all these years never get any easier) I headed towards Heathrow airport’s terminal 3 building.

The traffic was heavy, and I was later arriving than I would have liked and to my dismay there was a long queue winding through the terminal leading to the bag drop. I found an official and she began to check me in. I held my breath as she asked to see my proof of vaccination, and after a cursory glance at the paperwork, she handed it back and sent me on my way – the first hurdle was cleared. There was still the matter of actually getting to the gate in time for the flight, but the Delta staff were on it, and called for anyone booked on the 9.40 flight to Detroit to come to the front. My bag was perilously close to the weight limit, but the agent at the desk caught sight of my fleece and asked about A Christmas Carol. I explained about my show, and we discussed the amazing production at The Old Vic theatre, which we had both seen last year. It was one of those lovely moments when the hustle and bustle of everyday life gave way to a moment of personal connection, although I was aware that my flight was starting to board, and I had yet to clear security.

I could build the tension even more by describing the taking off jacket and belt and watch, and having to wait to be patted down, as time ticked on, but actually the process passed quite calmly, and I arrived at the gate just as pre-boarding began. Unfortunately, I hadn’t been able to have any breakfast at the airport. I had eaten a single slice of toast at home to keep me going but was looking forward to a more substantial repast as I waited to board, but the heavy traffic and the long lines had scuppered that idea, so I would have to wait for the inflight service at 40.000 feet to satiate my hunger.

The flight was fairly busy, but I had an open seat next to me, which is always a treat, and I settled in for 7 hours across the Atlantic. As I sat, I noticed that the bags were being loaded just beneath my window and it was with a great sense of relief that I was able to witness my blue case being placed on the conveyor belt which entered the hold. It is always a reassuring thing to actually witness your bag being on the same vehicle as oneself.

My film choices on the flight included The Shawshank Redemption and Field of Dreams, neither of which I had seen for many years, and neither of which have lost their respective impacts (especially Shawshank). ‘Breakfast’ was a chicken pesto dish, followed by ice cream, which was surprisingly tasty. Beneath us were the icy waters of the North Atlantic, until we made landfall over Gander (‘Welcome to the Rock’) and headed up the St Lawrence over Quebec, Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto and on to Detroit.

Whilst in my seat I could glimpse the TV screen in the row ahead of me and on two occasions it sent memories and messages to me. The first was when it was in its screen saver mode and just displayed details of our flight: LHR-DTW, Heathrow to Detroit. It was the latter code that stirred the memories in me, for my acting career really started with a youth drama group in my home town of Tunbridge Wells, which was called Design Theatre Workshop, more commonly referred to as DTW. Almost everything I know about theatre I learned in my teenage years at DTW, and it is a time that I talk about at length in a new book about my theatrical life, which should be published in time for next year’s tour.

DTW didn’t exist purely to put on shows, it wasn’t just another AmDram group, but it encouraged its members to explore ways of becoming more creative.  The ‘workshop’ aspect saw us spend many evenings doing various improvisations and exercises, developing ways of creating our own theatre. I remember that one session was given over purely to feeling the strength of a gesture all the way through the arm to the very tip of the finger, every muscle tensed to create the desired effect and that is a technique that I use in my performance of A Christmas Carol today to bring strength and power to the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. I have much to thank DTW for, and it was lovely to wallow in a little nostalgia and think what those days have done for me.

The other subliminal message was less about the past but more about the future, for as we crossed the coast the flight map showed where various cities were in relation to us and for a fleeting moment the screen was filled with Portland and Boston – the journey taken by Charles Dickens and Kate Douglas Wiggin in 1868 and the subject of ‘A Child’s Journey With Dickens’ – which is to be my first performances of the 2022 tour. I took the hint and pulled out the script just to run over the lines to myself at 600 MPH. In the script Kate talks about the daily train to Portland dashing hither and thither at 12 miles an hour – such progress.

We arrived at Detroit in good time and the final hurdle of immigration was cleared easily. I retrieved my case, wheeled it down a corridor and rechecked it again, with no bother from any customs officers. Having once again divested myself of belt, watch jacket and shoes, I was allowed back into Detroit airport, having never actually left it, and I made my way to the gate where I would board a much smaller aeroplane to Kansas City, the first stop of the 2022 tour.

The second flight was completely full, so I had no luxury of an empty seat next to me, but once again I was sat over the hold hatch and therefore was again able to feel the relief that my bag was coming to KC too.

Kansas City is the venue that I have visited more often than any other, so the airport is a reassuringly familiar one, as yet untainted by the building programmes that render most airports indistinguishable from one another. The different terminals at Kansas City are a series of circular buildings looking rather like a moon base from a 1960s sci-fi show. I fetched my bags and boarded the shuttle bus to the car rental facility (I rather think I might have jumped the entire queue for the bus, just walking on when it arrived, but none of the other passengers said anything to me about it). The staff at the Enterprise Car Rental desk couldn’t have been more helpful, and actually walked me to my car, and introduced me to it – a very smart Toyota Venza hybrid SUV model. Having worked out how to switch the engine on and adjusted the mirrors I set off for the short drive to my Missouri home from home, the Hilton Garden Inn at Liberty.

It was about 6.30 by the time I got to my room, which to my English body was close to midnight, so I had an early supper at a nearby Olive Garden restaurant, before returning to my room for sleep

This year’s visit to Kansas City will be quite different from the past, but I will talk about that more tomorrow. For now, I have arrived, and the tour is about to begin.

The Dana Center, at St Anselm

Tags

A Christmas Carol, Applebees, Charles Dickens, Comfort Inn, Ebenezer Scrooge, Mid Continent Public Library, St Anselm College, The Dana Center for the Humanities

Friday saw me moving on once more, although this time only twenty minutes away to the city of Manchester and as my only show was not until 7.30 that night, I had plenty of time to relax in the morning.

Fortunately for me, a chance to remain in the hotel coincided with the first practice sessions from the brand-new Grand Prix in Jedda, so I made sure that I had my breakfast and was back in my room before the action happened. When practice finished, (and it was truly scary to watch, being a very high-speed track, running within a tunnel of walls and no room for error), I started dealing with the increasing number of emails relating to my forthcoming performances in England, and in particular, on that morning, the ones scheduled for December 20 and 21 at Highclere Castle, the ancestral home of the Carnarvons and also the setting for Downton Abbey. Before answering their questions about arrival time, length of the show, sound cues, and would I be bringing any guests, I allowed myself to wallow in nostalgia and recalled my first performances there two years ago.

I delt with a few other inquiries until it was time to pack my cases and continue my itinerant lifestyle. Although sunny there was quite a wind blowing, and as I drove along the freeway, I could feel my little car being buffeted; I couldn’t imagine what it must have been like to be driving one of the huge high-sided jaggernaut lorries (or semi-trailer trucks) that pound the roads of America every day.

Soon I was in the city of Manchester, with the beautiful, broad Merrimack River running through it and the old, red-bricked mill buildings well preserved along its banks. Before heading to my new hotel, where I hoped I could get an early check-in to allow me to watch the second Formula One practice, I made a detour to a nearby Walmart store, to stock up on a few essentials, as well as to buy a salad for lunch.

I was booked to stay at a Comfort Inn, and sure enough there was a room available for me, so I was able to catch the last half of the practice session which was eventually terminated when one of the drivers inevitably lost control and had a huge crash.

As the afternoon progressed, I was also able to call home again and have a lovely video chat with the family, who excitedly told me all of their news, until it was time for their baths and bed.

And I just relaxed.

During the afternoon an email came in from Kimberly at the Mid-Continent Library Service, who wanted to share some of the feedback from the guests who had attended my shows back at the beginning of November, and oh, were they wonderful to read. So positive and exciting and humbling, I found myself growing quite tearful and emotional as I read.

Darkness fell outside my window and soon it was time to drive to the evening’s venue: The Dana Center for the Humanties, at St Anselm College. St Anselm is a private school founded in 1889 and is based in a beautiful campus which includes a fully active Benedictine abbey.

I would be performing in the Koonz Theater, which was another new venue to me, although during the days of lockdown last winter I was able to deliver a Zoom lecture for the school, talking about my career and how I bring the works of Dickens to the stage.

As I pulled into the gates of the college, I followed the well-lit, blue signs along a variety of roads, until I found the Dana Center building. On entering I was instantly greeted by the sound of piano playing, as a recital was being given in one of the studios, the piece came to an end and appreciative applause broke out. On the walls were large posters advertising the many cultural programmes that are coming up, including one promoting my show that evening.

I soon found the theatre itself where I was greeted by Joseph Deleault, the Director of the Center, who had arranged for my Zoom event last year and who had been so keen to have me perform live, Joseph was working alongside a young man who was introduced as Aiden, and who was, as he put it, the ‘sound and light monkey!’ I had been in touch with Joseph over the past few days and had sent him all of the details of the show and the requirements for the staging, sure enough there on stage was the chair, stool, coat rack and table that make up my set.

Meanwhile Aiden was working through the script, and we spent plenty of time discussing lighting and sound requirements which he carefully programmed into the respective desks. Nobody had mentioned a microphone, so I tentatively asked if I would need one, Aiden replied that they could give me one, but the theatre had excellent acoustics and I really probably wouldn’t need one. I went up onto the stage and tried a few lines and got confirmation that I would be fine without any electronic aids, which is always my preference, and besides that, it seemed somehow disrespectful to come into a venue so dedicated to perfection in the performing arts and not to perform ‘unplugged’.

The next question to be resolved was whether I was going to do a one or two act show? I had sent both scripts to Joseph in the week and told him that as I had performed both versions within the last week, I could do either, as he wished. Now was decision time, and after a brief discussion we decided to go for one act. Both versions have their benefits: the one act performances builds and maintains the atmosphere right up to the end, whereas the two-act script allows Jacob Marley especially to have much more time in the limelight (maybe that should be ‘the lobster light’). Joseph made his decision: one act it was.

When Joseph, Aiden and I were fully satisfied that everything was ready, I went downstairs into the Green Room, where I relaxed until it was time to prepare for the show. I got into costume, and took a dark, brooding, arty picture of myself in the mirror, and then went up into the wings of the stage, from where I could hear the audience gathering. I find that staying in a remote dressing room is not a good way to ready myself for a show, I feel cold and detached; I much prefer being on stage feeling the flutter of nerves as I try to gauge how the audience are going to respond.

At 7.30 Joseph came to check that I was ready and then he walked onto the stage to welcome the audience and introduce the evening’s events.

As I described a few days ago, when I was on Long Island, performing for a new audience is always an interesting experience, for they don’t know what to expect from the show, and many of the little ‘asides’ are included in the script to reassure them that it is ok to respond, that we are on this journey together: don’t be intimidated. And in that effort I succeed, for the audience were soon laughing, calling out and enjoying themselves immensely. I was enjoying myself as well, for it is always such fun to perform on a large stage, looking out into the darkness and hearing the reactions. For his part Aiden did a brilliant job with the lighting and sound, gently fading between the cool mysterious tones that accompany Marley’s ghost and the warm joyful atmosphere of Mr Fezziwig’s ball.

I slipped a few extra lines in from the two-act script, but felt confident that Aiden would trust in me coming back to what he had in front of him, and sure enough he hit every cue perfectly.

At the end I took my bows to another, this time quite raucous, standing ovation, and left the stage with the cheering still filling the auditorium. I had agreed with Joe that I would do a Q&A session, but he had forgotten to mention it in his welcoming remarks, so when I returned to the stage everyone was gathering their coats and getting ready to leave, but Joe calmed them all down and said if they would like to remain then I would be taking questions. A few left but most resumed their seats, and soon the questions started coming from all sides of the house.

Eventually everything wrapped up at around 9.30 and this time the audience left for good while I went back down to the dressing room, elated and energised by a very succesful evening.

While I was packing up my things, Aiden came down to say that some audience members who had seen me perform before, had a gift for me, so I put my mask on and returned to the theatre where I was greeted by a couple from Salem who presented me with a hand-made, miniature witch’s besom, so that I may brush evil spirits away from the various hotel rooms that I would be staying in for the rest of my trip. I remembered the couple well as being immensely kind and generous and it was lovely to catch up and chat for a while.

With that it was time to leave, I thanked Aiden for his brilliant performance on the desks, and shook Joseph’s hand warmly, as we agreed that a repeat performance next year would be something that we would both enjoy very much. I loaded my car and, on my way back to the Comfort Inn stopped at an Applebee’s restaurant to pick up a takeout bowl of fish and chips, with coleslaw and tartare sauce, which I consumed in my room as the adrenaline slowly subsided, and I relaxed once more.

New Connections

Tags

A Christmas Carol, A Christmas Carol film, Charles Dickens, East Meadow Public Library, Ebenezer Scrooge, Long Island, Marriott Hotels, Mid Continent Public Library, The Great Gatsby

Tuesday morning saw the first of what, as regular followers will know, is an important ritual on my tours: laundry. Having woken and written my blog and made my first coffee of the morning, I emptied the two bags of clothing that needed cleansing and sorted them into coloured and whites (the latter pile comprising mainly of the shirts I have been wearing in the show), but with the dilligence of an accountant, I discovered that my numbers were out: I had performed over two days at Vaillancourts, meaning that there should have been be four shirts, but there were only two. I let my mind wander back and remembered that I had hung two shirts to air in the closet at The Beechwood and must have left them there.

You may remember in yesterday’s post I made a big point about sweeping through my room multiple times to check that I hadn’t left anything there, and you may (quite justifiably) imagine that I wrote all of that already knowing that I had left the shirts there, ready to reveal my folly for comic affect today, but that is not the case! I had genuinely thought that I had everything with me, and that for once I hadn’t left a trail of belongings in my wake, but sadly a leopard does not change its spots so easily, and there were my shirts back in Worcester.

At the Marriott hotel in Uniondale I am situated on the 7th floor, and the guest laundry is in the basement, so early in the morning I bagged up what I did have to clean and made my way to the lift which took me down the eight floors and opened to reveal a warren of corridors, with no signs to guide me to the laundry. As if I were in a maze at some large stately home I started to explore, turning this way, then that, following a direction and discovering it led nowhere, until at last at the end of a long corridor I discovered a lost subterranean city comprising a salon, a gym and the laundry room.

I had a bag of quarters with me, which I collect during my travels for such circumstances, but imagine my surprise to discover that these particular machines didn’t take quarters, they actually had terminals for credit cards.

My emotions at this point were conflicted, on one hand there was an amazing realisation that this innovation meant that the days of hauling bags of loose change around the country will soon be behind me, but on the other end of the scale was the sheer frustration that my wallet was up in room 768! Back through the corridoors, back up the lift, back to my room, collect my wallet and back down again. Soon two machines were spinning and splashing whilst I went up to the lobby to have some breakfast.

The restaurant at The Marriott is spread out around the spacious ground floor, and diners were dotted here and there lost in their own worlds. I was greeted by a lady dressed in jeans and a sweater who I had taken to be a customer, but who asked me if I would like orange juice and coffee, and then I attended to the impressive buffet. As I sat at my table another guest came in, an older man with a white beard (no, not HIM!), and a t shirt, it soon became obvious that he is a very regular guest as almost every member of staff came up to greet and converse with him, and he had a gentle charm with each, asking about their Thanksgivings, and their families, discussing their jobs and their lives. Quite how he had time to eat is beyond me, but he gave everyone as much of his attention as they needed, and did it with good grace. A very impressive individual who just by being in that restaurant, where everyone else sat at anonymous little islands, spread happiness and made people feel good about themselves. OK, on reflection, maybe he WAS that guy with the white beard, after all!’

After breakfast I returned to the laundry and loaded my clothes into the drier, which after another swipe of the credit card, started rumbling away, and I went back to my room to be lazy for an hour.

By ten o’clock my morning chores were done and I could go out for the day. As I was on Long Island, I had decided to visit the area which had inspired one of my favourite American novels, and ater a little research I set my sat nav to take me to Great Neck, better known in the literary world as West Egg, the home of Nick Carroway and Jay Gatsby. I had even downloaded an audiobook version of The Great Gatsby to accompany through my travels.

The first part of my drive took along one of the parkways that run the length of the island, and which apparently act as a guide to the international jets flying into JFK airport, for a constant stream of Boeings and Airbuses flew low over me with landing lights blazing and wheels down. Eventually I reached Great Neck, and drove to a neighbourhood that seemed to be the sort of place where Gatsby could have stood in his grounds gazing at the green light at the end of Daisy Buchanan’s dock across the water. Unfortunately, I could’t say for certain, for there was no way to get to the water’s edge, all of the properties privately protecting their own stretch of ocean front. The best glimpse that I got was through the locked gates of a yacht club.

I drove on, still listening to the book. I had studied Gatsby at college but I have either forgotten, or never realised, how funny parts of it are, and I found myself laughing out loud in the car. Of course, a student will never find a book funny, especially if a teacher says: ‘Now make a note of this, this is the author using humour for effect, this is a very funny passage…..’

My drive took me further east to Port Jefferson, where I alighted and strolled around a nature reserve and said hello to a family of swans who glided curiously up to me, and deciding that I was of no interest, glided away again.

The weather was cold, so I didn’t walk for long, but returned to my car to cross the island to the south shore and then ‘home’. Whilst I drove, I called the Beechwood Hotel and inquired about the two white shirts and to my amazement they said yes, they had them, and could I pop by and collect them? By a fortunate quirk of this year’s tour, it so happens that I will be driving straight past Worcester again on Wednesday, so a slight detour will not affect me at all. It is amazing when the stars in the universe all align and everything works out.

Finding the ocean at the south shore proved to be as difficult as finding it in the North had been and as flurries of snow were starting to swirl, I decided to head back to The Marriott. I had a couple of hours before I needed to go out, so I flicked through the TV guide to see what was on and to my delight discovered that Apollo 13 had just started, so I wallowed in nostalgia for a while – nostalgia for the events themselves, and for the film, which I remember watching for the first time in one of the large London cinemas and feeling the whole floor trembling during the lift-off sequence. The TV channel that was screening the movie gave it a rather uninspiring description that really didn’t do justice to the bravery and ingenuity of the characters involved, it read: ‘April 1970. Astronauts try to return alive.’ Not thrilling. I wonder how the same TV company would describe A Christmas Carol? ‘December 1843. Man sleeps and wakes kinder.’

As I watched the film, I also did some research into new Covid regulations that have been announced this week in the UK and discovered that I now have to take a PCR test on my return and not a LFT one. These tests have to be booked and paid for before a passenger returns and I had already booked the previously acceptable Lateral Flow Test kit, but now I had to spend another £50 for the PCR. These tests (one prior to each of my departures from the UK and 2, now 3, for my returns) have considerably added to the expense of this year’s tour!

As Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert and Fred Haise came back to Earth, I gathered a costume shirt and black socks for the evening and made my way to the East Meadow Public Library where I was due to perform. On entering the building, I instantly felt at home, for it was like returning to one of the branches of The Mid Continent Public Library in Kansas City. I was greeted by Jude, who had kindly treated me to supper the evening before, and she showed me to a room downstairs which was to be my dressing room. Boxes of pizzas and a bowl of salad sat on the table for the staff to grab as they made preparations for the evening.

The actual performance was to be in a small auditorium on the main level and when we entered, the floor was covered with leads and cables as the sound system was being set up. The acoustic in the room sounded pretty good but we tested the microphone anyway, and my sound man (whose name, I am ashamed to say, I never caught), did a fine job in balancing the levels. We then went through all of my sound cues, rehearsing each one so that he had an idea as to how to bring the effects in and how to fade them out again, and when I needed to speak over them. He was very diligent and as I left the room, he began to clear his equipment away and tape down the cables.

Jude had sourced items for the set from a prop hire company and so Scrooge had a very nice chair and table, but unfortunately, we didn’t have a hat rack to hand, so I simply placed another table behind the chair, on which I would be able to lay the hat, cane and scarf as required during the show.

Back downstairs I set to signing copies of ‘Dickens and Staplehurst’ which had been pre-ordered, and when I had finished that, changed ready for the 7pm start. It is always an interesting challenge coming to a new venue – the show doesn’t change of course, but the atmosphere around presenting it does. For example, at somewhere like Vaillancourt’s or at Byers’ Choice the whole team has done this so often that we all know exactly how it is going to work. Likewise, the audience at those venues is usually made up with a large percentage of people who have attended multiple times and know the style of what they are going to see and are excited to see it again; their anticipation also gives a sense of confidence to the ‘newbies’ in the crowd. But in a venue such as The East Meadow Library it is all new, so there is a sense of heightened consciousness and even nervousness in the build up.

Just after 7 Jude welcomed the socially distanced and masked audience and then handed over to me. The music started and I walked onto the stage. As was to be expected, the audience was quiet at first, not knowing if they were going to see a simple reading, or a rather dry Brit reciting a Victorian novel (albeit a much-loved one), but soon they began to warm up and I began to relax, meaning that the show got better and the audience became even more involved. It was a great shared experience for us all and by the end we were the best of friends!

Having taken my bows to a standing ovation, Jude turned the auditorium lights on and we started the Q&A session. There were quite a few children in the audience and their questions were especially good, one asked me ‘What is your real voice like?’, whilst another inquired ‘What is your favourite Christmas food?’ Other questions took us into the world of the minor characters’ back stories and of course favourite movie choices. But soon it was time to wind up and after taking another bow I returned to my dressing room as the audience left the building.

By the time I had changed it was just the library staff left and they congratulated me on the show as we all packed our things up.

A new connection has been made on Long Island and hopefully it is one that we can extend to future years and, maybe with restrictions eased, we can fill the auditorium to its capacity and really have a fun party. You never know, I may even be able to find the ocean…..

I said my goodbyes and drove back to the hotel where I had a delicious plate of grilled salmon and rice, before rising to floor 7 once more and bringing the day to a close.

Why Kansas City?

Tags

A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens, Dickens on the Strand, Mid Continent Public Library, The Dickens Holiday Fair

As the final ‘Bonus Blog’ of this part of tour I would like to address a question that came up at every venue during my time with the Mid Continent Public Library System, ‘Why do you come to the Kansas City area?’ The answer dates not only back to the very start of my USA touring in 1995 (although from one conversation yesterday I now think it may have even been 1994), but in fact even further back to 1974 when the first seeds for my attachment to Kansas City were sewn.

The story starts in Galveston Texas where members of the Galveston Historical Foundation, an organisation dedicated to the preservation and regeneration of the historic downtown area of the island city situated in the Gulf of Mexico a little south of Houston, decided to stage a Christmas festival to raise funds and awareness. Feeling that the festival should have a theme the Foundation decided to utilize the name of the main thoroughfare The Strand, which took its name from the street in London. So, a Christmas festival with an attachment to London led to the marketing team tapping into America’s love affair with Charles Dickens and A Christmas Carol, the festival would be Christened Dickens on the Strand, even though Charles never wrote about, or visited Texas. The temperatures in Galveston in December are warm and pleasant so it was decided to make ‘Dickens’ an open air event, with the city sealing off a large area to traffic. Vendors would be able to rent space and booths to hawk their wares, whilst a number of stages were erected so that there could be a constant programme of music and entertainment throughout the fair. Actors in exquisite Victorian costumes were booked to walk the streets and a Grand Parade would be held with Queen Victoria and Prince Albert at its head.

Visitors to the festival would have to pay an entrance fee to attend, but the board took an inspired decision to give a 50% discount for anyone wearing Victorian costume. Everyone likes a bargain, so it was assured that the streets would be filled with young urchins in caps and tatty waistcoats and pretty maidens in recycled bridesmaid’s dresses. Back in 1974 My father’s cousin and Charles’ great grand daughter Monica Dickens was living on Cape Cod and accepted an invitation to attend the inaugural festival thereby beginning the tradition of there being a member of the Dickens family at every event. After Monica the ebullient Cedric Dickens took over for a few years after which he passed the baton on to my father, David who attended with my mother at his side. During his tenure Dad presided over a great banquet during which he would regale the guests with readings from A Christmas Carol. My parents also took pride of place in the Grand Parade, siting in a horse drawn coach waving to the cheering crowds. Mum and dad loved their time at Galvaston and embraced the America zeal to do things on a giant scale with relish.

During his time at Galvaston Dad met with some folk either came from Kansas City or had relatives there, I don’t recall which, but who were keen to stage a similar event there. Of course the December weather in Missouri is not quite as reliable as that on the Gulf coast, so the new event would be held indoors, with the large downtown Convention Center being picked as s suitable venue. To ensure a suitably Victorian atmosphere the Missouri Rep theatre company where brought on board to build huge sets representing London street scenes, as well as costumes for Dickensian characters. Dad was invited to be a consultant on all things Dickensian and through himself into the project. The Dickens Holiday Fair launched in 1993 and Mum and Dad were there, at the centre of everything, signing, reading, parading.

In that same winter, back in England, I was making my first steps into the world of performing the works of Charles Dickens as I gave a single reading to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the publication of A Christmas Carol. I so enjoyed the project and received praise for it, that I looked at reprising the event the following year. My father was excited and proud that I was beginning to show some interest in our illustrious forbear and kept a close eye on my progress. Little did I know that he had an ulterior motive, for he and my mother had decided that their international travelling days were over and he was keen to promote my new show to both festivals. During the summer one of the senior board members from Gaveston was visiting England and Dad invited her to lunch. When the date was fixed he asked if I could arrange a performance of my show somewhere as a sort of audition. I found a venue, a private room above a pub, and a goodly crowd attended. I obviously did a decent job for I was invited to attend the next Galvaston Festival and on the back of that The Holiday Fair in KC also came on board. Details were sorted out by a good friend of mine, Paul Standen, who acted as manager to this fledgling performer, and soon I was boarding an American Airlines flight to Houston.

As this is not a story of Galveston I will simply say that I thoroughly enjoyed that festival and when it was all over I flew from Houston to Kansas City for the second leg of my adventure. Although I arrived on Sunday the Holiday Fair was not due to to open until the following Friday meaning that I had four unfilled days. There was a certain amount of media work to do but the organisers of the Holiday Fair rather wanted me out in the community spreading the word, rather than lounging in a hotel suite doing nothing, so they contacted the board of the Mid Continent Public Library and suggested that I make appearances in a couple of branches. I could do a reading as well as talking about the weekend’s event and try to encourage guests to visit.

My first evening’s commitment was at Raytown Library and I remember it vividly for there was an awful ice storm that night. I had never seen anything like that before and across the city fires were breaking out as power cables came down under the weight of ice. I seem to remember that we did a bit of Q&A on that occasion too and the same question that inspired this blog post was asked – ‘why did you come to Raytown? I answered: ‘The weather!’ The marketing team at Mid Continent had done a good job and there was a reporter and photographer at the library and the next Morning at breakfast my phot dominated the front page of the Kansas City Star’s arts section.

And that is how I came to perform in the Kansas City area and specifically for MCPL. Sadly the Holiday Fair didn’t survive and folded a year or two later, but I still kept coming back to Missouri and Mid Continent Public Library service is now my longest running venue.

I wrote the first half of this post at KC airport and then put the laptop away for my flight and as we soared towards our cruising altitude we passed over the top of the Convention Center, with its distinctive four towers, where it all began for me.

Thank You Missouri

Tags

A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens, Colbern Road, Ebenezer Scrooge, Mid Continent Public Library

Sunday 14 November was to be my final day of the the first leg of my 2021 tour, and I would be performing a Christmas Carol twice more. Kimberly was due to pick me up at 11.45, so I had the morning to myself. Slowly my body clock was beginning to catch up with reality (just in time to be completely confused again), and instead or waking at 3, I slept through to 4.45 which I know sounds ridiculously early (it is), but it marked some kind of progress! Having written and then breakfasted I returned to my room ready to enjoy a full morning of Grand Prix racing! I had discovered that not only would ESPN be showing the Brazilian Grand Prix live, but also the full British Sky F1 pre race build-up, which would start at 9. I made sure that I had fresh shirts for the two shows and that my second costume (the first was still in Kimberly’s car along with my hat and cane), was complete and ready. There would be no chance to return to the hotel between shows so I needed to have everything prepared for the whole day.

Preparations completed, I switched on the TV and became immersed in the murky world of Formula 1 politics – there had been lots of controversy over the weekend and various penalties had been meted out, not least to Lewis Hamilton, the British champion, who due to a technical infringement had been relegated to the back of the field for the ‘Sprint Race’ (held on Saturday to determine the starting grid for the main race), and even though he had fought through the field to finish 5th in that encounter, he had another penalty which took him back to 10th on the grid, so it had been a difficult weekend for him so far. There was a real sense of anticipation from Brazil which was infectious.

As race time approached I made another coffee and ate a muffin that I had brought up from the breakfast buffet. For 45 minutes I was able to relish what seemed to be one of the classic races as Hamilton surged through the field to be close behind the leader, his championship rival Max Verstappen. The race was just building towards a very exciting second half when the phone rang and the cheery girl on the front desk told me that ‘your ride is waiting’! Sigh, but work called.

We were returning to the Midwest Genealogy Center again, so there were to be no surprises in store, and as we arrived everything was being readied: Sara and her team were getting the stage ready and Lindsey was practising the sound cues in the technical booth. Philip and Ruby were setting up their i-phone cameras ready to broadcast my show to those who wanted to follow the live stream, rather than being in a live audience and in general there was a sense of concentrated activity in the room. Having hung my costume in the green room, I draped the red shawl (which represents Scrooge’s blanket, as well as becoming a representation of Tiny Tim), over the chair and once again hid the mice in the foliage of the Christmas tree which decorated the set. Lindsey had a couple of questions about the sound effects for A Christmas Carol, so we discussed those and also developed a system to ensure that the microphone was on, to avoid a repetition of the previous day’s mistake.

When all of the preparations were complete Kimberly drove me to the same petrol station that we had visited the day before where we bought a sandwich, fruit and a protein bar (finding one without chocolate was very difficult) and returned to the green room to eat our lunch, as the audience started to arrive. The Dickens carollers were back and doing an amazing job entertaining the crowd with a great zeal and energy which one more was bringing lots of applause and appreciation. At 1.30, with 30 minutes to go, Kimberly left to help the rest of the team and I started to get into costume. At 1.45 I made all of my final checks, shoes tied with double bows to make sure that the laces didn’t unravel with all of the movement, genuine Victorian penny piece in my waistcoat pocket, cravat carefully tied, pocket watch set to the correct time, and I was ready to go.

At 1.55 I switched the mic on and slipped out of the green room and stood at a spot where I could make eye contact with Lindsey, she checked on the sound board that the mic was on and gave me a thumbs up. At 2 Sara began the introductions, encouraging everyone to switch off their phones, and the show began. Once more it felt a very good performance, although annoyingly an electronic beep kept going off – at first I thought it was someone’s phone receiving messages, but as the show went on I began to think that it must be something in the room, for no one would repeatedly let their phone interrupt a show….would they? The most annoying moment was as Scrooge and the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come visited Cratchit’s house and just as I was saying ‘It was quiet. Very quiet’, sur enough the beep beeped. Annoying, but it didn’t disrupt the flow of the story and when I got to the end and took my bows the audience were standing and cheering. The show is in a good place this year, I have kept the pace up and not allowed myself to drift back to the ponderous, overly dramatic performances of previous years in which I tried to give every line drama and gravitas which just led to a serious of long pauses which fragmented the natural rhythm of the narrative.

Back on stage for the Question and answer sessions, and the first came from a young audience member Levi, aged 7, who asked did I prefer being an actor or an author? – A great question which gave me yet another opportunity to shamelessly advertise my new book! The answer though is of course being an actor. The session went on with plenty of good questions, including how did I come up with all of the different voices for the show which led to a sort of masterclass session running through not only the voices but also some of the theatrical ‘tricks’ I use to differentiate characters (citing the conversation between Scrooge and the charity collector on Christmas morning, in which Scrooge holds the hat and cane in one hand and the collector holds them in separate hands – a simple device to create two characters on the same stage together).

Eventually the session came to an end, and having taken another bow I left to change once more as the audience left. When I was back in 21st century garb and my costume was on its hanger, I returned to the room to say good bye and to thank Lindsey, Philip and Ruby for their help through the afternoon.

It was 4pm and Kimberly and I set off for the next venue, the Colbern Road branch of MCPL. As we walked to the car all of the furniture from the set was being loaded onto a large truck ready to take it on to Colbern Road. I have performed there before, but since my last visit the old branch had been flattened and a new, modern, shiny, futuristic steel and glass structure had risen in its place. It made for an impressive sight as we turned off the road and into the parking lot.

Inside was just as impressive, presenting an airy open spacious feel to the lucky library goers who have this in their community. We met with the branch manager, Seth, who showed me around: the room where I was to perform was already laid out with a temporary stage, with a black screen behind, at one side. Having performed in larger spaces over the last two days, this was a return to an old school style of Library performance, under the regular room lighting meaning I would be able to see every expression on everyone’s face throughout the show.

Having checked out the space Seth showed me an area of the library tucked away where I could lay and rest for an hour or so, before I needed to start preparing again, and before laying on couch I glanced at the shelves and what was there? An audiobook of A Christmas Carol recorded by yours truly, featuring a very young and slim image of me.

The rest was very welcome and I lay on the couch until 6, when it was time to go and do a sound check. Back in the room I found Chris, a sound engineer, testing microphones. He had set up two very large speakers (perhaps larger than the space truly warranted), at the front of the stage. I introduced myself and we did a good sound check during which he walked to all corners of the room making adjustments on an i-pad until he was quite satisfied.

Phil and Ruby were back to stream this performance too but Phil was having trouble connecting to a wifi network, without which the streaming would be impossible to achieve. Eventually a system was cobbled together using a personal cell phone as a hotspot and connection was complete. It had been a tense atmosphere in the room and we had to delay letting the audience in until everything was sorted, but that didn’t matter for the good old Dickens Carollers were doing the stuff in the main library.

I retreated to my dressing room (actually an electrical plant room and store room, but quite spacious enough for me to change and relax in) and got into costume. The carollers were now in the ‘theatre’ and I knew their set well enough by this time to know when it was almost show time, I didn’t need to look at my watch.

At 7 they took their much deserved applause, I slipped into the room, Seth stood on the stage and introduced me and the show began.

Seth returned to the stage to host the Q&A and the first question came from Colin in Lincoln. Now, this was an important question, for Colin has been a regular attendee to my shows along with his dad Doug, but this year Colin had suffered a serious illness while at college in Lincoln, Nebraska and was unable to return home to join us (Doug had been at shows the day before and generously given me a gift of banana bread and his favourite blend of coffee!) Colin’s question therefore was his chance to be a part of the event and he was watching the live stream from Lincoln (I was so relieved that Phil had managed to establish the connection therefore.)

The Q&A carried on, with thoughtful questions such as ‘what relevance does A Christmas Carol still have today’ and ‘what lesson would you like us to take away from your performance?’ I was asked if I had ever tried Kansas City barbeque, as my blog mentions all of the places that I eat along the way and BBQ didn’t seem to feature. I am ashamed to admit it in the heart of the best barbeque city in America, but I am not a great fan – I was taken to plenty of restaurants when I used to stay in the heart of downtown Kansas City in my early years, but maybe my delicate British constitution is not fully prepared!

And so my final appearance in Missouri this year wound down to a close, and I returned to my store room to change once more. I thanked all of the library staff and Chris the sound engineer who had done a superb job with all of the effects, and made sure I had everything with me before leaving the magnificent new library at Colbern Road.

Kimberly and I found a restaurant still open on the way home, although we seemed to be the only diners, and then continued the journey back to The Hampton Inn where we arranged to meet at 10 the next morning to get me to the airport in plenty of time to board the first part of my homeward journey,

In my room I hung all of my costumes up on the shower rail in the bathroom, so that they could air well before being packed away in a suitcase, and then it was time to sleep.

Thank you Missouri for looking after me so well.

The Penultimate

Tags

A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens, Dickens and Staplehurst. A Biogrpahy of a Rail Crash, Liberty Performing Arts Theater, LOnghorn Steakhouse, Mid Continent Public Library, The Signalman

The windy stormy weather of Friday had blown through and given way to another bright sunny Saturday morning, albeit with a winter’s chill to the air. My morning routine is now well set and as usual I wrote my blog and some of my touring memories before heading down to the lobby for breakfast (the oatmeal option this time). I was cheerfully greeted by another guest with whom I shared a ride in the lift the day on Friday. When I had told him that I was from England he went into raptures: ‘Oh! I love you guys, God, you know how to protect your history! I love England! I stayed in Wrexham for a while, such a great place!’ (to be pedantic, Wrexham is in Wales, but we will forgive him that). So, at Saturday breakfast he called across the lobby ‘Hey! My British friend, how are you!’ Which was a nice way to be hailed.

Having finished breakfast I went back to my room where another practice session from Brazil was being broadcast and I watched for an hour, which took me to 10. It wasn’t to be such a lazy day for Saturday would see me performing twice, and Kimberly was due to pick me up at 11.45. Alongside watching tv and having another coffee, I prepared my costume for the first show of the day, another performance of The Signalman, so it was the all black ensemble.

At around 11.30 I had a message saying that Kimberly was stuck in traffic so may be a little late but as it happened it wasn’t long after the agreed pick up time that the front desk called me to say my ride was waiting. We were driving to the Midwest Genealogy Center, where I have performed o a few occasions before. The main performance space there is a large room with a stage at one end, it was obvious from the amount of chairs laid out that the library were expecting a good crowd. The auditorium space was under the directorship of Lindsay, who had set theatre lights ready for the show, and undertook a good sound check, playing with the various levels and settings until everything sounded perfect. I was feeling a little hungry, so Kimberly and I drove to a nearby petrol station to buy some sandwiches and fruit, which I ate in my dressing room as the audience began to arrive.

I got into costume, fixing my microphone before butting up my waistcoat and at 1.55 I left the greenroom and stood on a ramp which leads to the stage (hidden from the audience). As the clock ticked further, I reached round for the switch on the mic and clicked it over as Sara, one of Kimberly’s team who I have worked with many times, took to the stage to make the introductions. Once again the excitement of having live events back in the library service was palpable and there were rounds of applause for almost every part of Sara’s opening remarks. Having gone through all of the official stuff and demonstrated her potential prowess as airline cabin crew, indicating all of the emergency exits, Sara welcomed me to the stage and I began. Strangely my microphone didn’t seem to be on, and I asked the audience ‘am I on?’ the answer came back ‘Yes!’ so on I continued, maybe Lindsay had got an absolutely perfect setting. The first part of The Signalman presentation is given over to talking about Staplehurst, and as I was doing that I was aware of the librarians scurrying around a bit, eventually Sara pushed a note onto the stage which read ‘Microphone Off!’, so I had been right, I reached around and clicked the switch again, and sure enough I was properly amplified.

The Signalman itself was very well received and I was pleased with my rendition of it. It is a piece that I perform spasmodically, but this was the third time I have done it on this trip, as well as once in England shortly before travelling, so it had gained a solidity and confidence that perhaps it doesn’t usually have. When I had finished I talked a little bit more about my writing of the Staplehurst book, which gave the library team an opportunity to collect written questions – the hall being too large to effectively take questions from the floor. Once all the slips had been gathered Sara would host the Q&A, and again there were some good questions: ‘Did Charles Dickens hold the Rail company responsible for the crash?’ ‘Did he have any premonition of the crash?’ While I was answering those questions a huge freight train approached rumbled along the tracks which pass next to the building, so I was able to cry Halloa Below there!’ Sara continued to feed me questions: ‘How did I come to be in Kansas City and how did I first hook up with the Library?’ (maybe the subject of a Bonus Blog), and then the inevitable ‘what age did you get into theatre?’ Cue the Rooster anecdote which of course brought huge amounts of laughter to the room. The final question Sara prefaced with ‘Of course you know that we are all foodies in Kansas City and think that our food is the best in the World, so bearing that in mind, where is your favourite city to eat in?’ Slightly loaded question one may feel! I gave a diplomatic answer saying that if I wanted fine beef then there was nowhere better than Kansas City, but for seafood then coastal cities maybe a better choice. I think I got a away with it.

Time was up and I took further bows before returning to the greenroom to change. When I gave the microphone back to Lindsay we discussed what had happened at the start of the show, she has seen me turn the mic pack on when I was changing (she had it muted on the desk, so there was no worry about me being heard), and then noticed that I turned it off again when I was waiting in the wings, so what must have happened was that I accidentally flicked the switch to on as I dressed, and then just before the show when I thought I was turning it on I was actually doing the opposite. I will be back at The Genealogy Center on Sunday, so we will make sure the same doesn’t occur.

Kimberly took me back to the hotel, briefly, so that I could get the costume for A Christmas Caro, including the top hat, cane and the red shawl, and then we drove on to the evening venue – the Liberty Performing Arts Theater where I would be performing in their 650 seat auditorium. It was dark as we drove and for the first time on this trip I saw Christmas lights adorning neighbourhoods, which gave me a warm glow inside! I will be putting up our own lights at home in the gap between my American trips and as I looked at the multi coloured bulbs twinkling, and caught glimpses of trees bedecked with white and golden lights, I really felt that Christmas was on the way.

Walking into the auditorium I could instantly see that it was going to be fun night – the stage was huge and would give me plenty of scope to play with.

Although the auditorium was large it felt remarkably intimate, helped by the stage curving out, as if reaching to the audience. Sara and other members of the team were decorating a small tree which would adorn my set and I thought that would be the perfect place for my daughters’ little mice to hide and watch the show from, so I hid them away among the boughs and baubles.

Far away at the back of the hall was stationed Lyndal in her tech box, and I mounted the steps so that we could discuss sound cues etc, when all of that was finished I descended to stage level again to do a sound check and, as with Lindsay earlier in the day, Lyndal spent plenty of time finding exactly the correct balance before pronouncing herself satisfied.

With the preparations completed I retired to my dressing room, where a wave of tiredness came over me and my body seemed to switch off – no energy. It may seem strange to say, but I wasn’t concerned by this. It is often the case that before a big show (and this was going to be a big show), the body seems to recognise that a huge amount of adrenaline and energy are going to be required shortly so it shuts down slightly, preserving itself. Sometimes in such circumstances I am almost on the point of sleep. I pulled up to chairs and just sat, alone, relaxing. I played a little backgammon on my phone, and waited.

With 30 minutes to go I got into my costume and starting waking myself up. On stage The Dickens Carollers, who are often called in by the library to entertain the audience as they arrive, were singing beautifully to loud rounds of applause: this was going to be a good night I felt. There is something wonderful about the solitude and anticipation of standing in a dark wing space in a theatre, preparing to perform. Even when I used to be in productions with a large cast I would always try to be alone in those final moments.

And then it was time to start. Steve Potter was due to make my introductions. Steve is the Director and CEO of Mid Continent Public Library, so an important man, but I first met him in 1995 when he was a branch manager at Blue Springs South, where one of his team was Kimberly: these two have been part of the system through my entire time performing for Mid Continent and are dear and good friends (Indeed, this year Kimberly celebrated 40 years with the organisation, which is an astounding achievement).

Steve made his introductory remarks and once again the announcement of the recommencement of live programmes brought a loud round of applause. He welcomed me to the stage, the first music cue started and I began my slow walk to Marley’s grave and began. The first clue as to how the evening was going to go would be when I broke the fourth wall for the first time, telling the audience that ‘I dont know what there is particularly dead about a doornail, do you?’ The response to the line was loud laughter and when I asked them to reiterate that Marley was as dead as a….’ the cry of ‘DOORNAIL!’ was enthusiastic and joyful. Yes, this was going to be a great night.

I loved every second of my time on that stage, in that theatre, it was energising, exciting, invigorating, and the audience were along for the ride at every moment. Once more I tried my new trick of velcroing the black frock coat to create the dark spectre, and once again I did it too early – more work needed on that effect, but I will persevere.

The standing ovation at the end was amazing, and I took bows to all sides of the auditorium as they cheered and whooped. I eventually retreated to the wings as Steve took to the stage ready to host the Q&A. The library team had already gathered plenty of questions, and Steve began running through them and we formed quite the double act up there. Some questions were familiar (how did you first start doing A Christmas Carol leading to the anecdote of losing the script in Tennessee), and then there were others such as ‘Where did the name Scrooge come from? ‘In these days of pandemic and isolation is there a parallel to be drawn with Scrooge’s solitude and ultimate reformation?’ ‘What age are you?’, and one from Gwen aged 6, just checking on the validity of my claims to be part of the Dickens family, with the testing ‘What was your grandfather’s name?’ It was fun session and maybe ran longer than it should have, but we were all having such a good time it was lovely to keep going. Eventually Kimberly whispered to Steve that it was time to wrap up and after taking one more round of applause I returned to the dressing room.

I changed and returned to the stage to retrieve the various bits and bobs that belong to me, and I rescued the girls’ mice as the library staff packed away all of the decorations from the tree. Lyndal was on the stage and I thanked her for all of the tech expertise (the cues had all come in at the perfect moment and levels, and had faded out as necessary). She was very excited and saying ‘you guys must come back again, I LOVED this evening!’

Kimberly and I loaded up the car and we drove back to the Longhorn Steakhouse near to my hotel where we met up with Steve for a lovely dinner. We chatted about libraries and communities, and I showed them images of The Word, where I perform in the UK, which they were suitably impressed by. We laughed about Steve’s name (he had touched on this during my answer about Scrooge’s name earlier), saying that for years, until JK Rowling came to his assistance, he had always been known as Mr Potter, the curmudgeonly old banker from Its a Wonderful Life. He said that on becoming Director of Mid Continent Public Library the first email he sent to all of the staff was instructing them to call him Steve and NOT MR POTTER!

It was late now, we were the only ones in the restaurant, except the staff who were sat around in their coats, and the adrenaline that had allowed me to sail on the stage that night was subsiding and exhaustion was returning. It was time to leave,

Sunday 14 November will be my last day of this leg and two more performances of a Christmas Carol will bring it to a close.

Where is Kazakhstan?

Tags

A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens, Formula One, House of Games, Mid Continent Public Library, Panera Bread, Richard Osman, The Signalman

Friday would see me back on stage performing once more, which would be good. However the only show of the day was not until 7pm so I had plenty of time to fill. As soon as I woke I could hear that the gentle, warm, almost late summer weather that I have enjoyed throughout the trip had changed. Outside my window I could hear the wind howling and moaning. In a way this was quite apt as my show was to be The Signalman in which Dickens describes the wind making ‘a wild harp’ of the telegraph wires. In my case it was an American flag flying just outside my room that was creating the morning soundtrack as it was tugged against its fixings and rattled and clanged in the gale.

I made myself my morning coffee and sat up in bed writing my blog post, as well as some material for a potential new book about my theatrical career and life on tour, The passage I was working on was of my earliest childhood memories of Christmas so I spent plenty of time wallowing in happy nostalgia!

I wrote until 7 and then went down to the lobby for Breakfast .The Hampton Inn at Liberty has always served one of the most impressive buffet-style breakfasts that I encounter anywhere on tour, and in particular the oatmeal and waffles. After a glass of orange juice I plumped for waffles, purely for tradition and old time’s sake and I was not disappointed. They were delicious.

After grabbing an extra coffee I returned to room, stopping at the front desk to collect a packet of book plates that Kimberly has asked me to sign for the library service, Although Mid Continent have ordered 200 copies of Dickens and Staplehurst, they were not due to arrive during my visit, so the signed bookplates could give people signed copies. There were 200 signatures to do, so I sat at the little desk in the room and began signing. It is amazing how much more quickly one can sign when you don’t have to pick up a book, open it to the correct page, sign, close the book and place it on the ‘done pile’, before reaching for the next book, opening it to the required page…etc etc. I got myself into a good rhythm and worked away until all 200 signatures were complete. Having finished I arranged the sheets of bookplates and a copy of the book for a photograph which the Olympian Publishers may like on their social media feed, and then packed everything away.

My timing was perfect, for I had a few minutes to spare before the first practice session from the Brazilian Grand Prix was being shown live on ESPN, so I settled onto the bed and spent a happy hour watching Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen battle it out on one of the classic, historic race tracks.

When practice finished, I did a little more writing and then decided to spend an hour rehearsing The Signalman and the moaning wind and the flapping flag outside my window gave the run through a much more authentic feel than usual. The Signalman is quite a short presentation, compared to something like A Christmas Carol, the script itself only running at 30 minutes (although my introductory remarks make the actual show a more meaningful length), so the rehearsal run didn’t take up too much time. Once I had finished I picked up the script as there were a few little phrases that I wanted to check on and tweak a little, and when I had practised those it was time for lunch. Once again I walked down to Panera Bread where this time I ordered a Ten Vegetable Soup served in bread bowl. Before committing myself I asked the server if the Ten Vegetable Soup was a broth (on the day of a performance I wanted to avoid anything made with dairy) and I got the helpful reply that ‘It is soup made with vegetables’ Well with that sense of clarity I went ahead with my order! When the soup came it was indeed a broth and it was indeed made with vegetables, I didn’t count them but I imagine that there may have been 10. It was delicious and warming and nourishing.

I had managed my time well for when I got back to my room the official qualifying session from Brazil was just beginning so I resumed my former spectating position and watched as Hamilton beat his rival to pole position. Sadly I will not be able to watch the rest of the weekend’s action due to my shows, but being able to catch Friday’s events was a nice bonus for me.

After Qualifying had finished and ESPN had returned to football I switched off the TV and did another complete run through of The Signalman, just to make sure that those little tweaks had settled into my mind, and then satisfied with how things were I settled down to relax and perhaps nap (my body clock still being all over the place and waking me at silly hours of the morning).

At some point in the afternoon I saw that my brother Ian was online, and as we chatted he mentioned that my favourite round of my favourite TV quiz had been on in the UK the day before. The show is called Richard Osman’s House of Games, and the round in question is ‘Where is Kazakhstan’ in which celebrity contestants are shown a blank map of an area of the World and have to pinpoint various places, however they are not given the names of the places but a question – so they not only have to know the answer to the question but also the location on the map. So, the round that Ian told me about was based on the USA and he thought that I may like to try and play. These were the questions:

Q1. The city in which the title character sits on a bench in Forest Gump.

Q2. Mount Elbert, the highest point in the Rocky Mountains.

Q3. Where is Yale University.

Q4. The major city that completes the title in the 1944 Judy Garland musical ‘Meet me in….’

My answers were as follows:

1: Savannah, Georgia

2: Probably somewhere near Colorado

3: Upstate New York

4: St Louis in Missouri, not far from where I am currently based.

I found a blank map online and placed four points on it as my answer:

I did pretty well, but frustratingly the one I got wrong was Missouri!

Anyway, that passed a pleasant amount of time and it was nice to chat with Ian.

The rest of the afternoon was spent somewhat lazily watching the end of Back to the Future II and the beginning of Back to the Futre III until it was time to prepare for the evening’s show. At 5.30 I showered to re-energise myself and just before 6 I had a call from the front desk telling me that Kimberly was waiting for me.

The evening’s shows was in the Woodneath branch of the MCPL which is only a five minute drive. I have performed at the branch on many occasions and was welcomed back by the staff there like an old friend. For The Signalman I was performing in the Community Room, a large self contained space away from them main Library and at one end a stage had been erected. Kimberly had sourced some material to create the idea of a set, including hand held oil lantern, which would be useful during the Signalman’s description of his repeated hauntings. There was a great sense of excitement and anticipation in the Library as my appearance represented the first in person large event staged by the programming team. In the same way as at the church in Burlington, Friday evening’s show marked a move forward for the organisation and a gradual easing of restrictions.

Not only was I to perform for a live audience, but the event was also being streamed online so that anyone not comfortable sitting with a crowd could watch from home. As well as a normal sound check therefore I had to spend a little time with the filming crew making sure their camera’s (actually i-phones on tripods) were in the correct place and would capture all of the presentation.

The audience started arriving early, as they always do in the KC area and soon the hall was filling up nicely, there were many old friends in the group but I tried to maintain a good distance and kept my mask on until the last moment.

At 7 o’clock the show started and I prefaced The Signalman with an introduction based on the new book (much more accurate than my old intro used to be!) and then launched in to ‘Halloa Below There!’ The Signalman is much more intense and dramatic than A Christmas Carol and there aren’t many laughs to help it along, but the audience were silent during the most dramatic patches and there was suitably stunned gasp when I finished up with the revelation of Dickens’s death being exactly 5 years after Staplehurst.

The show over we then moved onto the Q&A section and after I made a few more remarks about how I actually came to write the book, we opened the floor. There were good questions: How long does it take me to learn a new script, at what age did I first know I wanted to act, what novels would be good to start reading for someone returning to the works of Dickens, does the family feel a duty to preserve Dickens’ legacy, do I perform other works, non Dickensian? It was a fun session, but soon it was time to wind up. I took another bow, replaced my mask and the audience disappeared into the night.

When I had changed Kimberly took me to a nearby grill (a lot of restaurants are closing at 9pm, so choice was a little limited) and I ordered a burger with, bizarrely a fried egg on top – I have never had t make a decision between sunnyside up or over-hard at 9pm before, but that’s what was my final decision of Friday 12 November 2021!