The theatre world, like the movie world, has loads of awards ceremonies. Many baubles and imaginatively contoured statuettes are handed out: for best actors, best directors, best designers. But now I think a new theatre award needs to be introduced: the Courage Award for Pure Emotional and Physical Bravery.
This year it must surely go to Dwane Walcott, an excellent actor playing the role of Marcellus in the current white-hot Barbican production of Hamlet – with Benedict Cumberbatch playing the lead. Walcott is understudying the role of Hamlet. He has to have Hamlet’s 4,042 lines in his head, ready to go at short notice; in the unfortunate event of Cumberbatch being ill there are no cancellations, no refunds. The show goes on.
While Benedict is at home under the duvet with a packet of Day Nurse and a cup of hot lemon, Dwane would have to stride on to the stage as Hamlet and face up to the sea of Cumberfans in the audience, who have flown in from Wisconsin, Osaka, Sydney and Guadeloupe for this one night only, with their precious once-in-a-lifetime tickets, mobiles turned off.
The understudy “moment” is often a path to greatness: it’s how the young Shirley MacLaine got her big break on Broadway. But I hope that should Cumberbatch call in sick, the Barbican authorities have fitted the box office with toughened glass.
Phone buddies
Some people are very good at being decisive and masterful in telephone conversations. I am not one of them. For some time we have had an estate agent’s board outside our home, because it is advertising a summer fete at our son’s junior school. This was in fact some time ago. I sort-of thought that once it was over, the estate agent would tour the streets in a van, taking down these boards. But no. It remained up.
Eventually I called up in a rather ineffectual and diffident way. The man answering the phone spoke at what I would say was around 120% of the volume needed; he established that I wanted neither to buy nor sell and then asked what I in fact wanted. “Could you possibly take down the summer fete board?” I replied in my feathery and unimpressive manner. There was a pause.
“Peter,” he said with a great sense of urgency, “I’m going to start a conversation with my team about this right away!” “Oh, thank you,” I said submissively. And then, while hanging up, I think I heard him say, “Thanks, buddy!” before the line went dead. I’m not sure I handled this correctly.
Dirty modern scoundrels
Australian tennis player Nick Kyrgios has caused uproar with his attempt to disconcert his opponent Stan Wawrinka by saying to him, loudly enough to be picked up by an on-court microphone: “Kokkinakis [a fellow player] banged your girlfriend. Sorry to tell you that, mate.” I’ve heard of gamesmanship but this is ridiculous.
Recently, I contributed a DVD extra to a new edition of the classic 1960 British film School for Scoundrels, in which Ian Carmichael plays a hopeless chump and loser who has to be coached by wily Alastair Sim in how to win at the game of life.
A key moment is the tennis match in which Carmichael must play the cad, Terry-Thomas, cunningly putting the bounder off his stroke with cheeky tricks and impressing the young woman watching, played by Janette Scott. And all without obviously infringing the unwritten rules of courtesy and fair play. School for Scoundrels recently had a dire modern remake. Audiences worried our modern world was just too unsubtle for it. Sadly Kyrgios has confirmed those fears.
