AlBarclay

I still kinda like my new Timberland Boots, they look nice, but I think this event has put paid to them as my new everyday footwear. They crush my toes together and that’s fine if you are doing a normal day and care about aesthetic. But … I have a habit of Tiggering until I drop and the pain I was in at the end of this pretty normal hours day was enough to make me realise I needed a solution for tomorrow. In the mid term I’ll be shelling out for a new pair of Brashers. In the short term I moved to the wonders of technology, I used one of the internet disruptors. Uber still employs humans at least. I’ve seen about 5 of those cunting self drive cars in London since I’ve been back. They’ve always been full but I know now. Little fuckers.

Helen is staying at mine. I went on Uber and I booked a courier. First it was Mujeeb, up in Knightsbridge, with his Honda. He was sitting outside a Turkish delivery place near Harrods. He didn’t move for ages. Eventually he cancelled and Bilal popped up, south of the river. Albert Bridge is closed, and Uber was trying to send him on all sorts of ridiculous diversions but he stuck to his guns and sped across Chelsea Bridge in excellent time. We were all watching in real time. “Why do these shoes matter so much to you?” asks Hannah, Luke’s girlfriend. Because my feet are fucking killing me already, and at the end of the day I got my working hours for tomorrow and they are 8am to 3am (and that means close of play which might end up being 4am frankly). I was already expecting that, but I wasn’t expecting hurty feet and I’m not going there. Bilal was a superhero. The whole thing with tip cost just over ten quid and now I’ve got shoes I know I can walk in for hours tomorrow. Up and down stairs loads too. But I’m gonna need another pair of Brashers. I wrecked them in just over two years, and that was Paris mostly. They got hacked into instead of my feet. That’s what you pay for. Paris and Kumano and heavy heavy daily bashing. But Brashers were my dancing shoes when I was raving. If they can keep me dancing for 48 hours with occasional little sips of water and a chip off that plate for the salty taste oooh then they are the shoes I need to wear whilst my body falls apart because of that yummy misspent youth and that ill advised but delightful young adulthood.

I wonder sometimes if I might take one of those things again nowadays.I haven’t one  for so long now. The world moved in and the time is never right. I don’t really feel the need to plug in plug out in that way, and Jesus I don’t want the next day when it all feels so bleak and heavy unless… Unless… Well, let’s see if there’s any seratonin left …

Not that such musings are relevant to events Al.

Tomorrow he’ll be heralding in the booze, part of a team of sober pied pipers leading just 300 people to various different booze concessions. It’ll be the usual for events Al. Troubleshooting, working out what people think isn’t their job and making it his, being point of contact for people stuck in stalls, carrying bags of ice, emptying slops, politely informing people, cleaning, working out where the thing is, organising the thing if it isn’t. He’ll have to try to remember to write this piecemeal as I go, cos bedtime will be deadtime. It’s gonna be a busy day but one I’m good at. And I’ll be comfy and swanky in my (cheap off vinted shhh) white Gucci trainers.

I’m parked at the North west border of my borough. From thence it is a ten minute walk to the Ibis Shepherd’s Bush, where I’m staying tonight. I could commute without too much concern, but I’ve learnt to take the question out of it and be in the hotel room with everyone else for these jobs. Predictability is important.

This will be the fourth consecutive year that it has worked for me to do this particular event. A different venue in London every time, and a team that is growing more and more familiar. These are good people and we know the job very well now. It’ll be a lot of work, but good work and we will smash it out. This year a bit bigger than previous.

Today I just took it easy in anticipation of a few days graft to come. I had a hot bath, went back to sleep for a bit in the daytime tangled up in Boo who has decided she likes to sit by my head if I’m sleeping and play pattycake if my hands are available.

We all went to Pizza Express tonight and had the briefing. Ali is here, from Paris Olympics. He is totally recovered now – that terrible cough that made me worried sick for him in the dusty warehouse – it was undiagnosed asthma and now he’s drugged up and a new man. We had a moment this evening reminiscing. It was a really strong time together, supplying and troubleshooting those games, negotiating all the individuals, stitching together communications, buying fucking screws. There’s nothing like the crucible of relentless random hard work to brand and secure friendships. Bless him, he came to Othello with his missus. “I’ve never seen a Shakespeare before”.

So … I’m in bed and it’s early for me, but the morning will be early too. Brian left a coffee outside my room this morning at the time I’ll be starting work tomorrow, and by the time I found it it was freezing cold. I’m looking forward to a few days of honest work, and so is my bank balance. I’ve got friends in my bed the next two nights! Shame I won’t get to see them but happy to be earning and making space for them. I still want auditions, but there was one year I sang ‘Boy for Sale” at 4am in a Premier Inn over this job. They recalled me for Sowerberry, got weirded out by me going barefoot in the recall, and went with someone else. I loved having the chance and – good that Annelie had at least seen me. Musical theatre was never my bag so it was a throw of the dice and one I’m happy to have made. The more people that see us the higher the chances of working more.

Event now though. All that stuff can wait. I’m gonna go to sleep and lose the next few days.

I’m plugged back in to London. But not feeling the need to go out in it. My decisions are being made by my budget, largely. We were gonna order burgers from Five Guys but thankfully I proposed a countermeasure. Brian and I went to the shop and got mince, eggs, onion and garlic. I then rolled it all around with some spice and we had home made burger instead. Cheaper and better. Just harder to do when the lazy tracks are well laid. I’m glad that we all managed to avoid the takeaway again. It’s a small victory, but … I’m fed up of giving my money out willy nilly. I have to settle my expenses. And I absolutely have to empty that fucking unit as it’s murdering me.

Right now it is 11pm on Sunday. I’m in bed with the blanket on, trying to pluck up the courage to go brush my teeth in the cold. Today has been all about nesting with cats. That’s ok. Tomorrow will be starting a little event with old friends. It’ll get busy so I’m okay with it being peaceful for now.

I’ve got Lou’s quilt on the bed. I was worried about the cats attacking it, but I’ve decided I’m happier having it on and risking cats than only using it in digs. It is heavy and comfy and a helpful reminder of how awesome she is. So far it has just had a little bit of affectionate claw from Misty. Boo appears to have grown out of midnight foot hunting. In fact, both of the cats seem to respect the sanctity of human sleep. What a remarkable thing. I’m used to cats that shout you awake in the morning because they want their munge.

I’m not gonna be awake much longer. Things are gonna get busy from tomorrow. I’m looking forward to the event though – lots of old friends. Happy collaboration. Even Ali P is gonna be there, the other side of our Janus Head in that mad Paris Olympic warehouse. He’s a beautiful human being and I’ve missed him.

I thought I’d drive to Walthamstow. Turns out that’s something I would regret. Couldn’t find parking anywhere. Eventually got a pay and display spot. Paid for the maximum three hours, knowing I would be there for a little more.  Some fucker camped it. Issued the ticket as early as possible after the expiration. I got back to Bergie and loudly wished sickness on him. I paid money to park there and I would have paid for longer had it been possible. There were spaces around me for other drivers. Once again, the car tax, and the letter of the law over the spirit. I hope he gets nasty boils on his arse. Fifty five quid.

I drove there to see Soho Theatre Walthamstow, and to attend a workshop from a new friend. The theatre is great, there at the top of the hill, surrounded by impossible parking options and hungry wardens. Up on the third floor, Callum and Emma were working with people on Patrick Tucker’s stuff. I only met Callum recently, but he’s been running in this mad game for longer than I have. He loves similar things. And he is carrying the torch from Patrick Tucker. Patrick came to my school when I knew I’d be an actor. He did a workshop that I’ll never forget on cuescript Shakespeare, up at the top of The Butler Centre, where I used to go to Flambards every week. Back then I was a kid but I already knew I wanted this life, somehow.

I went to Chalke Festival with some of them last summer with Henry V. All things being even I’ll get to come back this year – they’ve been asked to bring The Scottish Play – cue scripted once again. I love this kind of work, I love how hard it is and what it reveals. Geeky rigour. I’m always on for that kind of thing.

On the way home I saw a Korean butcher. I pulled up and bought a brilliant ribeye for a good price and when I got out some guy was about to ticket Bergie again. I drove away. “Oh thanks, is parking still restricted here on a Saturday?” No ticket issued, but I didn’t trust that fucker. Making a note of it here to remind myself of the date and circumstances as I reckon he is gonna try and make out like he had issued the ticket already but he won’t have photos and I’ll have to go through the adjudicator. I’ll wait and see. If he tries it then he can have the arse boils too, but if not I’ll let him off and the Walthamstow guy can get double.

Apparently confidentiality is terrifically important. If someone took a photo and put it on social media it would invalidate all of our courses. So says the man running our Speed Awareness Course. For that reason I won’t write his name, but : there’s a picture of him in his attic where he’s driving like a lunatic. Geddit?

It’s him and another guy, they do an hour and a half each of presenting a bunch of slides in a PowerPoint. The voiceovers are human and the graphics is CGI not yet AI, so I’m able to focus without rage.

I drove at 35 on a straight empty road at night. I was too tired to make my primary scan the sides of the road and my secondary scan the road itself. I made the mistake of prioritising looking at the road, and missed the camera.

None of that would wash as an excuse had I driven pell mell into some poor family’s prize anteater. They would have a critically injured anteater and I would have been even later to get to bed. “I was tired and the road was empty” wouldn’t wash for the sad family of the anteater. Plus my children and my granny won’t be confident to drive with an anteater injurer. I have now learned my lesson boy howdy.

Said lesson was delivered in an old transport museum an hour and a half drive from Imperial College where I invigilated the morning shift. I didn’t want to be late so had to floor it to get there and I’m glad I did as now I know the error of my ways. I’m a new man guv, honest I am. I can feel myself walking lighter than when I came into that course. The scales have fallen away from my eyes. I feel free. Bright. I could sing. SING!

“This is a fucking waste of time,” John grumbles. My neighbour on the right agrees with him. I’m between two ladies, I’m one of the youngest of the twenty four people in this room. Our facilitator is trying to bring lightness to a room full of pissed off old people. I’m here and not on zoom mainly because I’m curious to see this executed in person, and partly because I hate zoom meetings with a deep burning passionate zeal. Most of the people here can’t operate their phone.

But on my left: “Alexander! My name is the same as Alexander the Great’s mother!” She is enjoying being here. She doesn’t get out much perhaps. It is adult learning. I try take a leaf out of her book. She gets me a cup of tea. Might as well enjoy it while it is in front of us.

We play guess the speed limit. We watch hazard awareness videos and guess what is going to be drawn next on the screen. We see a parked van and have to guess what the hazard will be. Will it be a car? A falling piano? A workman in the road? The reason we can’t guess what they’ve made up is because the made up car we are following is driving a little faster than the previous made up car where the hazard was more predictable. Of course. Now I understand. 

For the second half I can barely see the screen anyway. I took my lenses out to rest my tired eyes. My neighbour has taken out her hearing aid. “It’s bliss,” she winks.”Selective hearing”.

I am now more aware of speed. I was expecting to have to look at a load of pictures of dead kids. Thankfully it is more practical than that, less of a guilt trip.

I think on some level something has likely got through the barriers. Mostly the fact that if it is 30mph and people keep crashing at 35 they are only gonna drop the road to a 20 and nobody wants that shit. Toe the line now, hopefully avoid losing more liberty down the line? Boiling Frogs. “Why are you on this course? Because they offered it. Because points on the licence would be more expensive.”

£2400 in that room.

140 million in revenue annually. They try and balance it against a notional “cost” from injury of 24.2 billion. There’s even a slide to tell us this . “Yeah but that’s insurance companies and private individuals and so on,” pipes up one wag in our group. Occasionally I look behind me and see how royally pissed off everyone in this room is looking. I’m sitting towards the front. So I can see the screen. Ish.

I’ve got my piece of paper to take home. Learnt a couple of bits and bobs. Hopefully that’ll be it for at least three years.

Sleep now.

Sammy sent me a photo today of a Cresta Run timesheet. It was for The Willoughby Cup. Her cousin was riding and she knew enough about me to know it would be familiar and interesting.

I haven’t been back to St Moritz for decades. I went under my own steam a few times after dad died and we lost the flat. The last time I went I was was still at drama school. I stayed in the Soldanella, but round the back, looking after an old guy who was a friend of dad’s who had been shocked by a car crash he’d had on the way up the pass. Urs gave me a deal in an unused staff room, so long as I took care of Kyle. He was feeling old. We played backgammon for higher stakes than I was comfortable losing, and I won thank God. I marched him to the cash point the next day. “You’re your father’s son”.

It was cathartic to go back there, fund it with a double six, ride again. I would have been so fucked if dad’s ghost hadn’t brought me that lucky double. Kyle couldn’t believe it either. “Double or quits,” he tried and I said I had to stop. O knew he was good for it. He was the one who named the stakes. I was being hustled. Dad again: “You can make profit from hustlers as long as you pull out earlier than they think you will.”

I wouldn’t be able to get near my times now on the Cresta. I was incredibly good, briefly.

The timesheets haven’t changed. It brought it all back to see him as an SL rider, in the Willoughby Cup.

Digby Willoughby was my first boss. The cup is named for him. He was a Gurkha Colonel, and he was an incredible man, in many ways. I worked for a season as a Tower Boy for him, running the timing machines and doing odd jobs. Putting the flag up in the morning, getting to know the various people who came through the club. I flew back to London from time to time to audition for drama schools. It was that time. My Guildhall first round audition was one such time, a stolen couple of days. It cost me anything I might have earned. I’m so glad I did it.

Digby was compact. Traditional. He hated all the technology that was coming in to this amateur version of Bob Skeleton. The Willoughby Cup is a new innovation that plays to his strength. You ride on a club toboggan in normal clothes, no skin suits. They have a seat that slides forward and backwards on the frame. If you are forward, your weight lifts the knives from the back runners out of the ice so you steer with momentum only but you are faster. If your weight is back, the little knives are in and you can influence your direction a little bit.

Basically for Junction riding on one of those things you have to ride full forward until just before Shuttlecock when you have to pull right back, right hand forward, pull up to Nino’s broom and then push yourself into a good line round the top, coming forward just as you exit and enter Stream. Then, so long as you can control the careening toboggan away from hitting the sides in the straight you’ll have a reasonable run through Scylla and Charybdis and a good time if you don’t stick your feet in. There are some fine points of steering and line, but if you’re on a trad you aren’t doing what I was doing as a young man and trying to see how fast it is possible to go. I preferred riding from top, but I had a death wish. Were I to come back now, I would start in Junction season.

It’s funny to think I got really fucking good at something and I haven’t been able to afford going out there since. I love it though. Dad is buried there. It is part of me, that valley town where I spent so much of my childhood. But the people we laughed at growing up, wearing their furs, spending way too much on everything – they haven’t stopped spending. And daddy doesn’t work there anymore.

I miss the place though. Oh lord. This season no go but perhaps next season I’ll finally get back out there. My handicap will be awful, in light of my old times. I’ve learnt caution in some small measure since those days. Not much caution, but a bit.

A friend of mine has been done over by a client to the tune of forty grand. It’s an old friend of his, he put his trust in him, ran up loads of costs, did up his gaff and now he’s blocked on everything and he’s gonna have to pay a solicitor. That puts my money woes into perspective. Forty grand. Lawks alordy.

This evening I helped him load up a dehumidifier, some cables, a tile cutter and a chair. We got it all into Bergie and I drove it over to his place in exchange for a beef pie. The pie came with gravy and mash, kale and peas. A fine exchange if you ask me. And it was good to catch up with him. Helps me remember there are other people in this struggle. We met in 2002 and we are both still at it. Both have light in our eyes. But both of us need to dump from time to time to keep that light. I could have stung him for petrol but a pie will do under the circumstances.

I got home from pie and changed my sheets. He’s only in Pimlico, one of my local friends. I try to see him a few times a year. It’s always pleasant.

I feel like I’m gonna need a really good sleep tonight though, so pie might have been a heavy choice. I’ll settle it with some chamomile. My dreams have been very very busy the last few nights and I’ve frequently woken myself up mid sentence.  It’s likely my brain processing away all the travel in America, and all the Shakespeare, calibrating back into this flat with the traffic noise and the friendly nocturnal cats. But it means I’m not feeling rested right now.

In other news, I washed my ruff today. Put it in a pot with a load of vanish and boiling water. Now it is on the draining board as it is soaking. I want it to drain thoroughly and dry in shape. That might take a few days. I washed it because it was covered in makeup and yellowing badly in the middle, and I thought I might have to lend it to Jack to cover me for a Shakespeare gig next week, but the client has decided to drop their money on a band instead. We are keeping our prices in the region of what we would like to be paid. No point dropping them to guarantee the client bites, that way you end up pulling the bottom out of your own market. The ruff has needed cleaning for a long time now and I wasn’t sure I wanted to risk it. With Lou’s advice of putting it in the pot, it seems to have come out fine. Annoying it won’t get put to use this time.

A quiet day today but I wanted that. Would prefer to be acting of course, but I didn’t spend much, didn’t make much, got a free pie. My only expense was a chai latte in Maida Vale, for over a fiver! It is getting unsustainable these days not to carry home made coffee in a keepie cup. I’m pulling out my delivery habit, might have to do something about the takeaway coffee habit too, particularly when I’m near home and there’s a coffee grinder.

Let’s go back in time.

Reading. Elgar Road. 1995 – 1997.

A little house rented out to three students. Me, Adrian and Tim. The gas oven igniter doesn’t work. We have to throw a lit match into the back of the thing to get it to take. We do this daily for months and never remove the matches, which calcify into a strange monument to unsafe cooking.

At night, often into the wee hours, the three of us dream with each other, downstairs. We all love theatre. We are all creatives. We all love to make things happen. I’m the President of the Drama Society at Reading University and the three of us have managed to get a big budget from the student union. We are programming. I’m the actor. Tim is the director. Adrian is the writer. That’s the base dynamic, but we experiment with roles.

The soundtrack is from CD. We are playing Loreena McKennit, the Braveheart soundtrack, Under the Pink by Tori Amos, Jagged Little Pill. Late night music. Sometimes we play cards. Shithead, or Magic the Gathering. We write scenes and perform them for each other and with each other. We write whole screenplays. And we believe forward. We believe hard. In each other, in hope, in hard work.

I don’t often put my memory back to those days. They were happy and focused. I prefer not to look back too much, certainly my halcyon days will always be yet to come, but they were happy times back then.

This was the tiny community from which I launched into this dumb job I still do. This was the hope and the rigour at the start. Three brilliant clueless boys, who rushed home on Friday night to be in time for Friends, who wrote poems for each other. Who went to London to watch theatre and wanted to make it ourselves.

Adrian married a singer and moved to Leeds. He had a kid and he writes still, as prolific as ever. His stuff is and always has been brilliant. He has had good recognition now for it, and he has stuck to his principles and his work ethic. Various awards have happened. I’ve heard people describe him as “legendary” and honestly, I agree with them. He is.

A while ago I did some readings for a podcast called Starship Sofa. I wasn’t paid for them, used them as upskilling excuses. I wanted to get better at editing etc and refine my home studio. I stopped doing it once I was happy with my sound. The guy who used to book me recommended me to a guy who is building an archive of video recorded Dark Fantasy short stories.

The long and short of it is, I got booked and paid to record a fantasy short story. When I told them of my history with Adrian, they sent me one of his stories to read. I did it at a studio in West London, right next door to my favourite casting director. It’s where I went with Sammy to direct her reading a book about light-en. They are very rigorous there. We recorded it on two cameras simultaneously and we had just an hour. With faffing and way too many notes from the engineer at the start, we had to rush the hell out of it. I still can’t quite believe we turned it in on time, but we did, and we did it well. Me reading one of Adrian’s short stories to camera. It’s a delight. It is so familiar to those long long evenings dreaming in Elgar Road.

This is the brief: “A young king is deposed by his grand vizier. Having been ditched in a cavern to die, our feckless anti-hero has a face nobody knows, a bag of money, and a vicious revenge streak a mile wide.”

It is written in a very unusual person. And it is read by a very unusual person.

I’m very very proud of this weird thing we’ve done because it connects so deeply to so much of the strange history that got me to wherever the hell I am. If you have time and inclination to consume this unusual tale, please do, it rings through my life and my passions. And Jesus for the love of God please leave a positive comment that isn’t about the sound levels. That’s on the engineer, not me. The guy was a bit of a harlequin, bless him.

I should have shared this when I did it, but it came out of the edit when I was in full rehearsal for As You Like It. I didn’t have the headspace to look outside of Shakespeare. Now I do, I would like to share this with any and all of you. It is 40 minutes of sparky writing, embodied by yours truly. Enjoy.

THE FACE OF THE KING – By Adrian Tchaikovsky. Read by Al Barclay. With a moustache.

While my agent forwarded the video of my audition, I went to invigilate an exam. There’s a guy who does it who is really really old now and he sometimes falls asleep. One of the others pointed it out. “We should say something!” “

“No,” I said. I’m in charge, thankfully. “He evidently needs the money or he wouldn’t be here. We have it covered.” She only noticed because there were so many of us we were totally fine for every eventuality. When people have too much time on their hands they start to look outside themselves at last. Sadly some people carry judgement into that look. “I’m not falling asleep on the job,” she maybe thought. “Why should he?” Because he’s in his fucking eighties, and he’s no more or less useless than you are when I ask him for something, darling. He’s just making use of the downtime while you’re demonstrating busy. You are both achieving precisely the same result. I know if I ask him for something he does it well. Much of the communication in an exam room is via sign and whisper. He can’t whisper for shit, but neither can she.

But this is why I long ago realised that working in an office would be death to me. I love people, but there’s a path of least resistance taken by those who haven’t got a deep vocation, and I just don’t understand it. Who knows what he’s capable of, who knows what he has experienced already, he’s still showing up for work – unless he starts working against us he’s welcome, and the fact he’s unusual makes him doubly so. I’m not gonna jeopardise his earning when we have too many invigilators in the room, it is dull as shite, and he has a snooze because there’s literally nothing to do.

This passes the time and helps with the bills. It is the opposite of vocational. But I’m able to send in auditions around it, and if I’ve got lines to learn it is a really good focused environment. I will continue to tick it over. And hopefully so will he. And hopefully nobody will tell on him. Because it honestly didn’t affect any of us.

We have to get better at leaving people alone unless something needs to be done. The idea of people’s needs and desires – measuring ourselves against them and that idea… This is at the heart of so much of the bad thinking we have at the moment. “I’m not eighty so I don’t need to sleep, why does he?” “I’m not terrified and alone in a country the other side of the world so I don’t need to be taken care of, why should they?”

People are magnifying things arbitrarily to serve their own agenda. “These old people are sleeping on the job so you can never sleep. They want to take all are sleep from are childrens! Vote Reform!” I wish things were less reactive than they are, but this is where we’ve got to.

If you’ve eaten any of these negative narratives, if you’ve been fed phrases like “suicidal empathy,” try to look at the agenda. It’s hard to have a reckoning with yourself but this cruel frightened bullshit is really prevalent at the moment and it isn’t going to get any better in the short term unless people realise they are being manipulated with their own fear and selfishness.

Another 9pm bed. I’m just getting more and more rock and roll.

I drove up to a friend’s. I had a self tape. The client wanted a full length body shot on the slate which is always an absolute ballache. I did it and got my friend to pull out from the ident by hand. It always shows too much, the chaos of our little flats. The artifice of the barriers and lights. This is part of the craft, I’m okay with it, but there are people with a big room in their house who can just casually do the full length shot in landscape and have clean edges. If it’s summer I might go outside for it. Today we just let them see reality. A rectangle of barrier and then a human flat surrounding it. So be it.

The script is set in England, my character is English. My character’s vocal idiom is American. There were five details that slightly clang, some more than others. I chose to send the version written down, rather than to anglicise it. No point in being too clever, I figure. And if they like the version of me that calls my trousers pants, they’ll know I can substitute words.

Nice to have a shot at something so quickly on coming back. This one would be good casting for me, I reckon.

I got to hang out with friends in Camden afterwards, but honestly I’m not made of the stuff I used to be. I don’t want to spend money and time drinking until bedtime. I’d sooner go home and eat nice food, play with the cats and get to bed at a reasonable time. Boo and I hit the laser pen and now I’m contemplating going to sleep without even using sleepydrink, and its ten past nine. Who even am I?

I need to put time aside to tidy my bedroom though and fully deconstruct my case. I sacked the cleaning lady before I went to America so I no longer have the reluctant reset button that she sometimes provided when there wasn’t a major Jehovah’s witness conference to watch on YouTube. Got to actually clean up after myself again. Lordy.