I thought I might go to Canterbury today to take stock, but I just wanted to stop instead. So I did. And largely I have no concerns about that decision.
The place I chose to stop in is remarkable. You’ve had me going on about catsitting in remote places so you know how happy I am doing it. I woke up here to peace and quiet. I’ll go to bed to the same. The creatures have a great deal of house to explore but they largely stay close to me. They’re underneath me as I write.
I’m in the middle of nowhere if you’re not a driver. I’m very well located if you are. This morning I got excellent coffee in the local village. This evening I went to get a curry. The curry house was flooded at half seven – apparently there’s an England match. Football and curry is a thing it seems. So the guy asked me to wait. I waited. They aren’t licensed. People were bringing in bottles from the nearest supermarket. I just had water and wondered. They eventually brought me an excellent curry.
Most of the day was just spent being here in my friend’s place enjoying the newness. My mobility and my relative peace about long drives – both are helpful for this kind of thing. It is only a month or so since i did similar for Liz up in the peaks. I’m very happy to have headspace here. I can’t even begin to tell you how peaceful it is.
Tomorrow I should probably look at some lines again for Monday, but I’m not gonna bite myself off before we start as I know the sponge and I know the process I’m going into and it isn’t AFTLS. There’s an actual DIRECTOR.
Up in the morning and over to Kingston. I’m trying out a van hire company that have lowloaders. The thing about a standard Luton is that those wheelie wardrobes have to be tilted which is a two man job if one of the men is buff and a three man job if not. A lowloader with a ramp I might be able to do on my own.
Problem is the van hire company take the full insurance excess as a deposit. £850. Plus £120 for a day of rental (which is bordering on extortion anyway). Not for me. I cancelled the whole shebang. Haven’t got enough in the coffers and the guy was a bit of a prick.
Then over to Vic’s to help with the old office move. I’m snatching all the hours I can as she needs it. I got a load dumped and then said goodbye at 2:40pm. “Oh but can you get those filing cabinets up to the office above?” Fuck.
Brian and Maddy had their wedding livestream starting at 2:45. Very restricted access to the ceremony so I couldn’t be there which is why I was working instead. But now I’m spitting as I’m listening to the beginning of the ceremony through my pervert glasses while I’m carrying filing cabinets upstairs for a man I’ve never met before.
Into the car park and onto the road. Brian’s mum reads the wedding sonnet as I’m fighting through the streets of Chelsea. I delivered that sonnet a few months ago to a couple in the Balcony Room with the engagement ring secretly in my hand. To charge it up with love.
In terms of traffic, on my way home, everything is pitched against me, buses cutting in, slow cars blocking me on lights. I’m able to engage in the streamed ceremony as I’m mostly in traffic. All I have to do is be at the Cadogan Arms at 4. It’s barely 3.
Suddenly I realise and understand why the traffic is blocking me like this. I go totally zen about it. I’m gonna drive past the door that they’ll walk out of when they’re married – it’s on my way home. It’s not somewhere you can stop. It’s a busy junction. I find myself thinking “can this be the universe making it so I drive past the door at the very moment they emerge?”
I’m in my blacks and sure enough, thanks to a bus blocking the junction for one turn of the lights, my timing is accidentally impeccable. So I’m laying on my horn as they come out. It was a perfect moment to see them on the steps as the confetti grenades went off. I think they were glad to see me welcoming them into their new grown up life together. I was trying to toot in a celebratory way. I don’t think anyone thought I was tooting them but the bride and groom. My black T-shirt was a happy show that Brian produced that I was involved in breaking.
I went home and got into wedding clothes. Came back out suited with vintage Indian silk waistcoat and a good thick wedding tie with a grey topper. No point owning this stuff if it doesn’t get use. I’m more and more angling towards being that guy who either dresses vintage or in blacks. If only I had the patience. And the shirts.
Brian and Maddy getting married is huge. I’m so proud of them both. Scary stuff, marriage. And she’s the other side of the world from her people. She’ll find her people here, or Brian will find himself a kiwi one day. But I like these two people and I like them together. They are kind, thoughtful careful people.
I couldn’t stay as long as I wanted as I’m having to look after a cat – the owner is working in Wales today on a show.
So I drove down to the peace and quiet before I got tempted with champagne for the speeches and toasts and all the stuff. Too risky to be in a boozy celebration before a two hour drive.
About now I reckon it’ll be speeches. Brian and Maddy are surrounded by good people. He’s done well to plug his heart and his work into London. It’s a hell of a town if you understand it. It shifts quickly but they fit it right now.
I do get bored of people telling me all about their ADHD. It’s so terrifically fashionable these days. Everyone wants a piece of it. And they’ll tell you about it like you’ve never heard of it before.
But yeah. With that one you’ve got me bang to rights BUT I am never gonna lean on it or use it as an excuse because that’s not my vibe. My brother has done the same with a much less manageable braindifferent thing. It would be ego for me to make a fuss of my helpful thing that annoys Lawful aligned people in D&D. It only really annoys that particular demographic. Sure sometimes people have publicly humiliated me in conversation when I’m showing empathy by telling aligned stories. Such people, I’ve learnt, are usually on the psychopath scale and can’t understand why someone would tell a story about themselves if it isn’t to manipulate others. “I had a similar experience that validates your experience” is alien to dead minds. So they attack. Fukkem. Shawly self obsessed baddies.
I am observeing how I can maybe make things easier for myself within the way my personal internal noise works.
The monomania thing. I either have to give a thing my complete focus to the detriment of everything else or I do my honeybee focus which moves from thing to thing semi randomly and never stays on one thing for long. With the mono it is how I get all my performance things done. It is my acting work mode. Focus on my craft and the people in the room with me, don’t wash my clothes. I’m frequently in that mono these days as I’m doing lots of brief corporate performances, well remunerated. “Am I worth it?” I find myself worrying and I am worth it and I know it now but it took ages. The other mode is multifocused and works well for events.
I can make it easier for myself in mono if I don’t worry so much. I never worry in multi I just DO.
Ffion and I keep doing these short jobs. We are very good at them now. Crazily so. We have a ridiculously strong offering. We work hard to prepare, we deliver looking great, we get great feedback and great photos, we have it strong.
But … you’ve seen my mental state leading up to this one simple job. I need to be kinder to myself. Of course I can learn whatever… That’s my job. With my spongebrain I’d be easy on a soap or something with a quick turnaround. The thing I need to do fully is to let myself off the hook about the fact that, craftwise, I’ve got this bullshit tightly sewn up now. Always room to learn, sure. But… you want it, you’ve got it, oh potential employer. And quickly. If the money is right.
We smashed it tonight and I’m conflicted about it but it was an AI company conference so it makes sense that the script was written by AI. Like all the other bubbles it’ll swell before it bursts. And it still has a good few years swell. The issue at the heart of our script tonight is clear: “the machine has promised greatness but given no implementation plan”. Nor will it. Because it is a huge mirror. It just feeds us back to ourselves. It is an incredible tool. It isn’t a replacement. It’s nothing.
The world is good because it’s messy. Our friends work for us because we can’t predict them. We are born of Eris. Hail Eris. Let’s never be too regimented or predictable. That’s how we die as a society.
And I’m off to bed. Misty is very happy to see me.
And they gave me a birthday meal and a birthday plate after work!!
I’m learning another AI script and I believe and hope that this will be the last.
They snuck in.
We were too busy to counter offer it, and AI is instant while human endeavour takes time. I would sooner the future people had nothing and we made no money than that I have to learn any more of this dross. And I’m happy to take the risk of putting myself out of a job over it.
We can still make human scripts and we will and we will pitch them and they will be good. No more of this stuff. No more.
This particular script refers forward: “this will be a call back”. There is then no call back. It suddenly magics envelopes that people care about without giving any reason for them to care. It tells us how the audience is supposed to react. “Big laugh moment” “Powerful pause”. None of this is earned. God it is so bad. It’s almost impossible for me to express what an atrocity it is.
I’m gonna learn this because it’s my job and I said I would. I’ll deliver it with skill and charm and then draw a hard line with the guys who book us. No more AI scripts. Let us bring the pitch and give us the time to do it. Properly.
And they want endless zoom meetings. I’m in rehearsal from next Monday in the day. I’m not gonna jump out to go to a zoom meeting. You work in an office, it’s your job to do that stuff and to make work for other people and yourself to justify your existence – I’m not gonna get swept up in it. You want an entertainment, I’ll make you one and I’ll keep you posted but not every five minutes.
Mel helped me learn the last one – the first AI script I had to learn. She and I will never forget one of the similes. “Like coins of sunlight kept for later birds”. It doesn’t matter what it is referring to – the poem doesn’t know anyway. But … That bad simile is the perfect example of why this stuff just shouldn’t exist.
It sounds okay if we aren’t examining it. We like coins. We like sunlight. We like birds. We even have a notion that the early bird gets worms. What of the later bird? The later bird gets coins of sunlight. “Kept”, not “saved” despite possible alliteration. AI has no jive. Assonance? Aliteration? Rhythm? Nah. Purpose? Nah. It’s reductive.
The work is the art much of the time when you get people involved. This stuff is so empty but… it’s ubiquitous suddenly.
Coins. So… what, shiny spots of sunlight? Kept for the birds that miss the dawn? (The previous line is : “the balance holds what memory has made” btw. I’m not withholding context here it is just nothing).
Nick Kershaw kept the tracker lines for The Riddle. They made no sense but we put sense on them. That’s kinda cute cos it’s human. Ditto Vampire Weekend exists. They just sing words that fit and their band is named after two things we like. They anticipated AI. But they’re full and it is empty. Everything creatively I’ve ever been part of within that tech is empty. Keep it out of art and it’s a useful tool because a lot of sectors just need to get things done and they can be done empty. You just can’t make empty art, it’s noise. Nothing more. A curiosity at best.
Yeah so I’m done learning this stuff if I can help it. It’s not right that people substitute this for other people’s creativity. This isn’t a stand for workers rights, it’s an expression of taste.
Meanwhile I’m going to bed to process my coins of sunlight. The later birds will enjoy them with their nuts of delight.
Oh God it’ll be my birthday when this is published. Happy happy happy. I’ll be forcing rubbish into my head with a plunger and vomiting it back out all day.
This was never going to be a relaxing day by the seaside despite me wanting one. I knew that going in. I was the one who booked the van.
There’s a whole hell of a lot of stuff that Lou has had in storage. The unit is about half an hour from hers and her grace period runs out at the end of the week. It is about to get expensive as storage does. It’s a rip-off as we all know by now, the storage game. Loadsa money so we can all do it later, whatever it is.
We hired a transit van and filled it. Bags and bags of fabric, man vs stairs. Fabric is heavy, kids. Lou was on unload and sort duty and needed to be as some of the stuff wasn’t going up. I was on yo-yo. Thankfully a young Sikh builder working in the block saw our predicament and got stuck in helping. About three quarters of the way through I collapsed into a chair drenched with sweat and panting. My heart rate was through the roof. I thought I was fitter than that but haven’t had a good run of theatre for some time. This is why people join gyms. Lou picked up my shortfall and it all got up up up into the sky palace. All those steps. Over and over.
Lou and I and the Sikh whose name I don’t know. Well done us. Hot sweaty work, yes, but satisfying. “You look exhausted,” said Johnny the Romanian builder, who had been watching us all graft. All I could do is grunt. He did help right at the end though. Unlike the English electrician guy but we knew he wouldn’t. He’s a lazy fucker.
Sweaty and knackered I hit the chair again and reaped the benefit of an almost forgotten morning impulse:
As I was buying my inevitable morning coffee, the chef at the café dumped four plump scotch eggs in a tray into the counter to put on display. “I’ll have one of those for later,” I said, and purchased his comestible at a fair price. This was me at my most inspired.
Reader, I am now that scotch egg.
Most of my inner juices had leaked out through my face and upper on the forever stairs. My tired and hungry molecules absorbed every bit of that meaty eggy delight. This is science, kids. Either I’ve just eaten the best scotch egg in the history of eggs-wrapped-in-spicy-porky- bits, or it came at precisely the right moment. Possibly both.
Oh porky egg, thank you for the power you gave back to me. I needed it.
In an attempt to do something healthier on the way home we stopped at the fish place round the back of Quentin’s gaff and ordered the biggest bream they had and five scallops. The scallops are already in us. I had to decapitate the bream with a bread knife but it is now wrapped in foil and baking away. Samphire and veg and tatties on the boil. Seaside fayre. Ten minutes to fish.
At some point tonight I’ll be that fish. I’ll get into a hot bath and swim around in it until all the aches and pains are loosened. This is essentially my weekend. I’m glad I get kicks out of doing hard work. Cos that was a schlep.
—
Full of fish. I lay in the bath for ages and I’m pickled. It’s equinox. The nights are getting darker.
Funerals are complicated. Of course they are. We want to celebrate but we want to mourn. We want to see old friends but we want to be mindful of people’s grieving. Austere celebrations. Life contrasted with death.
Today I got up and drove to Hollywood Road in a suit to load a dishwasher into the back of Bergman. Then I drove back up to Harrow on the hill. It’s thirty years since I was at school there but I still yesterday left my rucksack just casually on the right as you walk into Speech Room. It has my diary and keys and many important things inside it. Panic morning calls to school security led to it being found so I drove up to grab it from a lovely security guard: “I saw your show both times! It was great.” Bless.
Since I was on the hill, I stopped at the school outfitters and bought a Rattigan Society Tie. Purple with rats on it. Martin created the society. I was proud of my membership. I put it on immediately.
Then I drove to Canary Wharf and helped some guy called Paul load the dishwasher into the front of his black cab outside the Marriott Hotel. And then I drove to Essex and up a great big long driveway to Sewardstone Crematorium, in what must be an old deer run, to see off Martin in my RatSoc tie.
As you’d expect, there were loads of Old Harrovians there at the funeral. He was an inspirational teacher. There were some familiar faces to me, some familiar faces generally, and some who were both. We were all here to see off an inimitable gentleman, someone who had a big influence on any boy who went from that school into this industry.
He was only 72 or so which isn’t old these days. He was surrounded by his loved ones. “We are such stuff as dreams are made on and our little life is rounded with a sleep” on the front of the order of service. His sons both spoke, and did so with wit and eloquence. Louis did All The World’s a Stage as part of his eulogy. We had a medley of songs written by Martin, some thoughtful interludes with pictures – it was all very well balanced.
I stood there surrounded by many people I haven’t seen for thirty years. Then to the wake.
Mr Barron told me off for not having been to church recently. I had a chance to chew the fat and touch base with a few people. Then I got sad and slightly overwhelmed and without the option to disappear into my cups I chose instead to drink too much coffee, get sentimental, and drive myself away before I inadvertently turned into a blubbering wreck in my suit. Also I had a two hour drive.
I’m here now with Lou in the absolute peace and quiet. The journey was hard, my emotional landscape was all over the place. It still is. It was lovely to see people and see the old boy off but death is never nice. This advancing threshing sickle and we are all somewhere in the cornfield watching as it gets closer and closer.
Keep living as brightly as you can, that’s the way. These people like Martin have shone a light for us, and in our turn we shine for others. One friend I met through him texted that she couldn’t stop thinking of the lyric “without a song or a dance what are we?” He shone a lot of light for a lot of people, brought the music for us, helped propel us into positive versions of ourselves. Thank you Martin, for the music. The world is brighter for having had you here. I’m glad you had such a good send off.
There’s space in these ridiculous OH Plays for a celebrity cameo. The priest. At the Wanamaker we had Dom, who was in the year below me and went on to make loads of telly. He recently employed a good mate of mine in a big job. I got to thank him which was pleasant.
Today the cameo was an 88 year old civil servant, doing the stuff my grandad was doing but at a higher level. He was bright eyed despite movement issues. His joy of being on stage in the Speech Room was contagious. His portrait is on the wall in there. “I loved what you were doing with your eyes in that scene,” he told me. I have no idea what I was doing with my eyes but I’m glad of his approbation.
The Harrow Boys Shakespeare Play in Speech Room hasn’t happened for some time. It used to be an institution. Ronald “Ronnie” Watkins was a teacher (a beak) at Harrow. He was also instrumental to Sam Wanamaker’s campaign to rebuild The Globe. He was no longer teaching when I was there but had passed the baton to Jeremy Lemmon. Ronnie has a rehearsal room named after him downstairs at The Globe right next to where I work all the time. He and Jeremy taught generations of us how to vocally fill a difficult space. The Old Harrovian Play is all that’s left. They absolutely must reinstate the Harrow boys Shakespeare play.
My presence at The Swan at the Globe has absolutely nothing to do with the school connection but I’m proud of myself for having drawn that line. I had to do it longhand because when I was at school Jeremy didn’t much like me. Too awkward and lumpy in my adolescence I fear. Not gamine enough even if I suit a pair of tights. And certainly too scruffy. He still used me from time to time. I took what scraps I could. I was always Martin’s boy, and there was invisible politics. And then Andy stepped up with his grounded commercial musical theatre connections.
It’s mad when I think about it. This is what my father paid for, of course. We had the drama studio, where we could try stuff out. We had Speech Room. The theatre wasn’t built yet but we were doing everything we could despite that.
I learnt how to use my voice in Speech Room. There’s a reason it has that name. It’s a space that asks for conscious diction and shameless projection. I can work in film and dial it back, of course I can. I can dial it back for telly, for theatre. But in a space like speech room like the globe main stage like so many spaces, I know how to make sure the audience hears my words. With nuance. It is considerably harder for someone with no vocal technique to scale up to a place like that than the reverse. I know this and trust people to understand. They don’t.
Drive to the road. Play to the space.
What I did tonight was big. Because I’m playing Sir Toby Belch in Speech Room at Harrow School. You can’t get much bigger than that outside of Falstaff and without a fatsuit the solution has to be vocal and energetic to make the man vast.
I remember Ross Beckett, my housemaster, sending me to the Old Harrovian Play to write a punishment essay. Cymbeline. The one we are working on with The Factory. I still have the essay. “Hurrah!” he wrote, as his comment. Ross was a good man watching me negotiate the people around me.
It’s a good school, Harrow. Better be at that price. But it really is.
Here I am once again dressed in Elizabethan doublet and hose and tights. The doublet was made for Patrick Allen in the first series of Blackadder. Costumes often carry their origins sewn into labels.
I’m sitting on a stone bench outside Harrow Speech Room, listening to Tom giving Malvolio’s verse speech in Act 5 of Twelfth Night. I wonder how many times I’ve spoken those words myself now.
I’ll be going on for a jig soon. Then I’ll bundle straight into my car and down to Southwark to hopefully catch Mel and Flavia and Hex, maybe Ffion and Jack but they are probably long finished. There’s been an event on. I’d be doing it but I’m doing this instead so I sent Jack who doubtless smashed it.
Mel is off back to America tomorrow at 5am. She literally just came over for the event. I love her for it. And I want to see what I can see of her.
Monday night will be the funeral of Martin my old teacher. I can feel his hand over my work even now. He gave me the attack that often defines how I go about this business.
It’s a lovely group, the OH Players. Today was their AGM and I showed up and listened. They went into great detail about the money. The Sam Wanamaker cost loads, as I figured it would. I’m happy they did it though. I like the energetic relationship between the two venues.
—
Play is over. I ran into a lovely elderly lady with a stick as I ran to the loo after the show. She caught my eye and she was BEAMING. “That was so FUN!” she said and meant it. This is why we do this.
—
Mel and I are now in a kebab shop in Pimlico. I’m having steak and she’s having red wine. I’m gonna drive her to Heathrow. I missiondrove after the show to Waterloo, caught Hex the python who was working with Mel this evening, hugged Flavia and now I’m returning the favour as best I can from when Mel gave me the best week in New Orleans. Ok it’s just a kebab shop in Pimlico. But I’ve been working. “Hey I’ll show you all the best places” etc. But the night tube is inexplicably not running on the Piccadilly line so late night chauffeur is evidently the solution to the airport. Means I get to watch her drink wine and chat about life.
For which purpose I’m signing off.
—
It was lovely. She’s dropped off. It isn’t quite 3am. But it’s definitely time for bed.
There’s a wooden crate that used to contain two thrones. The thrones are now in the studio, lined up and ready for people who come in looking for costumes to sit in. Yeah alright they’re really just chairs. But they were used to sit Elizabeth I, in an immersive theatre thing.
The crate that was made to carry them was my focus today. But… I didn’t get to spend much time with that crate. Not as much as I had hoped.
Today was a proof of concept. I think it works.
I had ordered a load of soundproofing on Amazon and I’d employed Canice to help for the day with both Vic and I. Both of these thing were a good idea. We stopped at Vic’s office first because she needed some stuff to be taken to the dump. More than we expected. Much more. I thought we would get to the crate by 1pm at the latest. We didn’t get there until about 3.
Together, we rolled it onto its side. We restructured the sides as it was well made but made in a rush. We took the wheels off.
Then we had a wooden rectangle. We pushed it against the wall.
It’s gonna take a few more days to finish but we started with the soundproofing.
The adhesive it comes with? They might as well save their money and not bother, it’s useless. Typically though, I had a bottle of spray adhesive just randomly in the back of Bergman. Its probably been there for months but it rolled into my notice the day before yesterday. Serendipity.
I had to leave at half 3 to get to Harrow in time. So I left Canice sticking soundproofing into the box. By the end of the day it was all down and looking nice. But I’ll need a lot more.
I’ve ordered 48 more squares. You’re looking at 24. Apparently you should leave a few gaps but I’m no expert. I’ll carpet the bottom. The concept is to get some LED lights in there with the mic and the stool and arrange it so you sit inside on carpet and talk to the back of the booth. My original feeling was that it might be a better sound to sit facing out and have a shitload of old curtains stapled over the entrance, but current thinking led by Canice is to face into the box with some curtains behind. I’m worried the sound will be too dull but I’m no sound engineer. I am an engineer though I’m learning.
My hope is that when things are finished this will be a booth that can be useful for more people than just me. I have no fucking clue where my old condenser microphone is. But the technology has moved on so I’ll invest in something new when it’s built and it’ll be there permanently built in, with a stool, accessible to whoever I know who needs it.
I’m recording some short stories for an anthology. I was given an option of studio engineer in a studio for an hour only to do them both, or to record in a home studio (gratingly for the same rate even though they save on the engineer and rental). I’ve read one of them already on camera. We had an hour in the studio and it runs to 41 minutes. It’s absurd to try and get them both done in an hour of studio time. So rather than go to some expensive place and the publisher gets billed for more than they expected because they’re asking the impossible, I’m gonna build my own booth and then do it in my own time and do it so I’m happy with it.
Problem is, I’m suddenly completely swamped with work for about a month. This is what I wanted, of course, no doubt about that. But this is why people have a manager as well as an agent. “You really have to have your diary with you everywhere,” says Lou and she’s right. But I also need to write things into it. For instance Martin’s funeral, which I was never gonna miss, is impacting on time with Lou. Because part of this madhouse existence I’ve deliberately cultivated and am now reaping – part of it is stopping with people I love. Lou and her cat are in the diary over the next few weeks, I’ll be driving a van for Lou too. The worlds are merging.
Lovely Awaken is back for a London run at the end of October so you’ll all have to come see that and see me playing baddies. Halloween walk starts sooner than it might. Vocal booth coming up now with stuff I have to get recorded in it soon. I’ve booked a short film in Jersey. Peaky stuff still needs selling / shifting and my budgeted months of storage run out at the end of October. The People’s Republic Of Frestonia Unofficial Costume Knowledge Emporium Repository needs building. The self tape studio needs to be bedded in and powered. All these AI scripts for the corporate stuff… Oh lord. And I’ve asked for an audition for King Lear by AFTLS.
It’s a relief that Christmas Carol doesn’t look like it’ll be an “on” year this year. I’ve got so much on suddenly that I don’t know how I could cope with a crazy December. I’ll partition this all, as I do, and it’ll be lovely. But fuck. It’s all suddenly just snowballing and I’m having to play catch-up with myself.
Which is why I was swearing about having to do a dress rehearsal up in Harrow tonight for an open show just cos we are shifting venue. Sure do a run, or top and tail, but I don’t need to practice wearing clothes oh you have two photographers in? I’ll get into costume then. Maybe there’ll be more wonderful shots. Toby Belch. For the images.
Thank you to the people who went on the link I shared yesterday and gave some money. It’s a funny old thing, I don’t want to monetise this, I don’t really like the whole idea that blogs exist to sell things. I want to be different from that and I am. But I was genuinely happy to think of the two of you and know that you are still connecting to this nonsense. I forget sometimes that this stuff gets read let alone enjoyed.
So, mister Barclay, you say it went well? Yes. Thank you yes. It did. But you seem a little put out that it did? No no, I’m fine. I’m happy about it. If I might observe, you seem adrenalised but conflicted. There were hundreds of people there. We shut them up and they listened. For … Continue reading “Interview”
So, mister Barclay, you say it went well?
Yes. Thank you yes. It did.
But you seem a little put out that it did?
No no, I’m fine. I’m happy about it.
If I might observe, you seem adrenalised but conflicted.
There were hundreds of people there. We shut them up and they listened. For a rowdy room like that we had the only penny drop moment. And there are gonna be some great photos.
I’m sensing a “but”.
No buts. It was great. We’re good at this. Look, here’s a photo of the one on Sunday, taken by Richard Wadey. I like it for St Paul’s. I also recognise that expression. And look at the hat??
Thank you, mister Barclay. Yes the hat is … very big. And the mist behind of dusk with St Paul’s Cathedral looks magical, like you were part of something special. Which of course happened tonight as well?
Well. Yes. Yes it went very well tonight.
Did it?
It did yes it did. And they asked us to help with the raffle and the client was really happy generally with what we did…
And…?
You’re not my therapist.
I’m aware of that.
You’re just me but in a different paragraph.
Don’t try to be cute, Al. It went well tonight. What’s the problem?
Nothing.
Nothing?
Nothing.
Nothing?
Nothing.
.
.
.
.
*shifts*
.
It’s ok.
.
.
IT WAS WRITTEN BY ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE.
aaaaaah and there we are. Let it out.
IT WAS ALL REFLECTED NONSENSE FROM FUCKING CHAT GPT
mmmmmm yes nice go on?
AND WE MADE IT GOOD. BECAUSE WE’RE GOOD AT OUR JOB.
There it is. Yes. Mmmmm
IT SHOULDN’T EXIST THIS SHIT SHOULDN’T EXIST NOBODY SHOULD EVER HAVE TO LEARN THIS STUFF AND WE MADE IT GOOD.
oh yeah oh yeah fuck yeah
AND NOW THE PEOPLE WHO PROMPTED IT MIGHT THINK “IT” WAS GOOD RATHER THAN THAT THEY LUCKED INTO FFION AND I TO MAKE IT GOOD!
mmmmm yaaah mmmm go on
Wait. Are you getting off on this?
No.
You fucking are. What the fuck? You were there when we delivered this stuff. We made it sound fun and sexy, that’s our job.
Oh you did make it sexy. Even that gesture you made when you said the word “permission” with your back to that tree. You filthy dog.
I never… I would never be that broad than to welcome hundreds of people to my open body.
It got a laugh.
Yes, they understood it was a theatre thing. I was playing with a drunk audience. I know what I’m doing. It’s my job. That third one was late. They were hammered.
There was a videographer. He was following you around cos he worked out you were gonna give material. There’ll probably be a video of you saying “permission” writhing with your back against a fake tree circulating on the internet before long. You dirty dog.
Well … Come on, there’s only 140 syllables in a sonnet. If it’s shared it’s 70 syllables each. 3 syllables for one word is just … honouring the significance of the word in the journey.
You milked it you Shakespearean prat. You enjoyed it cos you know how words land on audiences. And you know that Ffion and you are experienced and bonded enough. And you know the Underglobe space so well that you can make anything look good there now. Even, I put it to you ladies and gentlemen of the jury… even a Script that you knew from the start was written By AI.
Well. Yeah. Maybe. Maybe you’re right about some of that yeah.
So what’s the problem?
So yeah I’m uncomfortable that I’ve been part of normalising lazy rubbish AI scripts into my own workplace.
Al. Think back. Do you remember corporate jobs in the past?
Well…
Remember when they asked you to make a mime show about bribing supermarkets to stock your products in three hours and you were paid in product? Remember when you had to run down the aisle dressed as an elephant for the launch of Tampax Jumbo? How’s about some of the dialogue that people in offices wrote that you learnt and delivered for those corporate training videos? These guys were just clueless. LLMs at least have eaten the work of people who can write. I bet corporate video scripts are better now than they were when you were making them to sell on VHS.
Those guys though, they were lovely but clueless. They weren’t writers at all sure but they were nice and they were trying. They were just making their training videos, getting the point across. Inevitably they were clueless about script writing. They dashed off those scripts without thought but with heavy agenda. The scripts were entirely on the nose, they were laughable if you zoomed out on them. Like PADI training videos. Media made cheaply and then so many people are forced to watch it.
So what’s the problem? Why not just let the LLMs into the creative space?
Is this the hill I’m gonna die on? I’ve always said we all choose one where we make ourselves irrelevant. It might be AI in creative space for me. Prompters are calling themselves artists. Fake videos are getting more and more convincing. We are all going to be presented with more and more guff that plays to our biases and it isn’t helpful that the notional leader of the free world is mad. Because he could say anything. So we can make anyone say anything. I don’t like that Ffion and I smashed it tonight with an AI script. Rhys said the other day they we could literally have just said the name of the company repeatedly for a minute and likely it would have had the same reception. I think he’s right. But … we want to believe our work has meaning.
How much were you paid for this evening?
I’m not telling you.
But it made it worth it for yourself and the client and the venue?
What price is the future?
Al. You’re being a ponce. And it’s because you’re an artist. You’re good at this. Take the money and run baby. They are genuinely lucky they got you and Ffion.
But you’re just me, talking to me, so isn’t this really just an absurdly narcissistic format for a blog from someone who is conflicted about their own life choices and trapped in a spiral of self worth and identity? Do you need money or something?
Why are you giving that link to people at this point in our conversation?
Because you made it months ago, and the only payment is from your girlfriend’s cat.
I’m not writing this for money.
Because you’re an idiot.
Screw you.
No. You have to work out how to somehow justify the time you spend on these blogs. You think about them sometimes for ages before you write them. And … think of the blog world now. How many Ai blogs are out there? Look at how much dross people can generate these days in seconds. It’s like what you did tonight. Very few actors would have held the space like that and impressed the client. You and Ffion absolutely smashed it with atrocious material.
I feel sick.
You should. But you need to try and work out how to make this blog at least cost neutral for yourself. You pay hundreds of pounds a year.
Ugh. Ok look. Life is expensive. But I’m okay with that cos I’m committed to getting this madness out there. Who knows why or for who. But it’s happening. It keeps me alive and accountable. I don’t share it.
Why don’t you share it are you mad? You need to persuade people to share something that is historically reliable. Some of them are shit. Most of them are ok. Once in a blue moon there’s a good one. But you’ve been writing every day without fail for almost 7 years now. Sure you’ve taken some blogs down for good reason. But what’s the point of doing this every day no matter what if you aren’t shouting about it?
Surely the fact I’m not shouting about it is the appeal, in this day and age? You want me to try and make some money? Fine. HERE IS MY DONATION LINK. Happy now?
And are you going to encourage people to share and subscribe if they like it.
