A favourite writing boozer of mine, Dylan Thomas sofa-surfed a few doors down for a short time in WW2. And the lovely management let me use a space in the pub for a Dylan Thomas Day get together a few years ago. It was online as well as being live. I said to the manager there could be a good turnout and a good bar take. There was. Nearly 200 people turned up. All but one online! I did my best to up the beer-take mind. And I have done my best ever since! Lovely pub, lovely management. Next to the Thames. Not much not to love!
We’re at the Duke of York in Fitzrovia. A controversial pub sign and connections with Anthony Burgess’A Clockwork Orange.’ Join us every Saturday to find out more. http://www.LondonLiteraryPubCrawl.com.
“The Edinburgh Fringe is stupid. It’s too tough. It’s too brutal and bloody ridiculously expensive and in spite of occasional successes I’m never doing Edinburgh again.” So said one Edinburgh Fringe veteran to me in 2013. I won’t name him here. But then he said the same to me the next year. And the year after. And the year after that…! You get the idea.
“Ignore him,” says his wife. “He’ll be back. He always comes back. Edinburgh is like a drug.”
And as the train pulls slowly out of Waverley Station, I feel an unfathomable sorrow. Maybe it’s because there’s still some of the Fringe left to go and I’m suffering FOMO. (Fear of Missing Out!) which I often do, but it’s not just that. It’s not even been the sort of Edinburgh festival fringe I’m used to. Last time I was here I had two productions of my own and there were nearly 4,000 shows. This time it’s around 180!
So in spite of travelling light to the 2021 Fringe Light, with only two bags, at the end of my stay at Fringe ‘21, I walk very heavily out of my not very cheap budget hotel, past the Waverley Pub, over the Royal Mile, past The End Of The World (pub) past the baked potato place toward the train at Waverley Station on the way to Kings Cross. For the first time in years, I’ve not had a show (or two or three!) to worry about. None of the usual stresses. And there’s actually a seat reserved for me on the train! Normally on the last day of the festival there’s a lethal lack of space on all the trains, oversold by the grasping gits who run the services! Just saying…!
Now I HAVE been rushing round like a mad thing for a week and talking to people and doing radio shows and podcasts and I DO feel a bit knackered. But I mainly feel sad to be leaving. So why? What is it? Is it the people? Well, actually, in once sense, yes it is. Because after the years here, I now know people, lovely artists, who I only see – and very much look forward to seeing – in Edinburgh in August. Mmm! So maybe my fringe legends’ wife was right.
It’s taken me a while to try and work it out and I think it almost is a kind of drug. Edinburgh is the biggest open arts festival in the world. So there is nothing else like it in the world. The fear, failing finances and fatigue that we experience here is unique in the world. As are the friends, fortitude and fame that might (rarely) result from being here too.
Yes. I think that’s it. The human experiences at the Festival are unique in the world. Different to a West End opening. Different to a new tour first night. So. One way or another, I shall be back with at least one production next year. Along with my Fringe Legend Friend who, as I was leaving this time, said, “No. I don’t think so. Not next year. It’s too tough.”
Brian Travers, one of the founders of UB40, in the Hare and Hounds, Kings Heath, Birmingham. PHOTO: Robin Valk.
Summary:
Nick Hennegan gets morbid down the pub.
So sad. RIP #UB40 talent and decent, lovely Brummy bloke, Brian Travers. We would occasionally meet up at the Hare and Hounds pub in Kings Heath and spoke about a musical idea a while ago. Not to be now. But Brian and the band were true to the Bohemian spirit with their record label, DEP.
Then Rolling Stones drummer, Charlie Watts. Then a DJ I used to work with at BRMB Radio in Birmingham. And since I recorded this little ramble, I heard that an actor I knew when she was 18, who went on to become a successful agent, has also passed away! All under 60! What a week!
As you’ll know if you’ve read Nick’s Edinburgh Festivalblog on www.BohemianBritain.com – it took him a while, but thanks to the Pleasance Press People, Nick Hennegan finally got to see ‘Bacon’ with the actor – and jeweller – Pip Utton! Known for his one-man shows, Nick and Pip talk about his life, career and what he thinks about Adolf Hitler! From Nick’s blog and Resonance FM show.
Us, in the Assembly Gardens. Alex (Standup Jack Dennis) had to stand up and run off to do his show at Bannerman’s, 55 Niddry Street – 4pm ever day except Saturday. Admission is free. Tell him Nick sent you!
Full disclosure – I now consider Guy Masterson a friend and indeed I adapted the book and directed him in Charles Dickens’A Christmas Carol.(Yes, it IS touring this Christmas, thank you for asking! Schedule to follow soon!) But I first met Guy when he performed this piece at R.A.D.A. in London as part of the Dylan Thomas Centenary festival. Arranged by another Welsh-rooted performer and producer, Griff Rhys Jones, I was involved due to the London Literary Pub Crawl, so although this version is not new to me, it was once!
Guy Masterson
Dylan Thomas’ play for voices is about a day in the life of the fictional Welsh town of Llareggub (spell or say it backwards!) and its fractious, fantastic, fatalistic, funny and sometimes freaky inhabitants. Many think it’s based on New Quay, others Larne, both places Dylan lived in Wales, but the characters are universal. They moan and mourn and love and lust, and occasionally and hilariouly plan murder – and Guy Masterson performs them all perfectly. Using clever sound, shadows and physicality, we’re transported back to the crazy, lovely town. It’s a big ask to present UMW as a one-person show, but Masterson is the master of the genre. Occasionally Thomas’ text and language is so rich and heavy it can fall out of the ear and concentration is required, but as with all great performances, it is obvious that Guy Masterson really knows, and really likes these characters – and we feel his warmth for them. This was the ‘semi-skimed’ version – cut down in duration for the Edinburgh Fringe, but even when a young man squealed with delight and ran on to the stage to hug the performer, not once, but twice, Masterson simply smiled, returned the hug, pointed him back to his seat and took us straight back to Llareggub, without missing a beat.
There’s a reason Guy Materson has been performing Under Milk Wood for so long. He does it briliantly. Well done to Assembly Festival for bringing it back this strange festival year. Go and experience the original Coronation Street. See the Master Masterson and, as Dylan Thomas puts it, begin at the beginning…
