76 hours
Monday morning, I was back to it. Today publicity photos were going to be taken. I spent the morning sorting out dressing for the market scene. Lettering on banners, cheeses galore and plenty of goods on the M&S stall. With a few roses added for good measure, we were ready.
Lots of lettering was needing to be done, so with the aid of the photocopier and carbon paper I drew things out and started painting them. By late afternoon three of the actors headed off to put on costumes and prepare to have their photos taken. Marie, Pierre and Fifi arrived in their fab costumes, the first time I’d seen any of them along with the set.
Tuesday morning I popped into the Co-op to see what might be cheap for my tea, sadly the sad gits isle was pretty empty, I’d not be saving any money on tasty morsels unless I fancied eating many toffee apples!
Much of the panto scenery had now been stashed behind the backdrop, time to work in the six foot space back there and leave the stage to the actors. But what to start on? I decided to try to finish off all the stonework walls so that numerous roses could be added. But that wouldn’t keep me going for the remainder of the day, so after the first colour I changed to work on the kitchen set. This would be needed for a rehearsal tomorrow of what is known as the slosh scene, so any painting I did on it would need a coat of glaze over it for protection. This meant I ended up doing quite a long day. Just about everything on two pieces of set were completed, just magenta dots to add at a later date.
Wednesday morning it was time to get the big dustbin out, grate up shaving sticks, add a drizzle of glycerine with some hot water to make the slosh, all mixed up with a paint stirrer on the end of an electric drill. The large rose for the proscenium had it’s petals stuck together into one big flower. The new paper version of the rose far better than the one I’d made last week which was really rather butch, a rugby player version of a rose.
Late afternoon the Pippins arrived and started work on another scene, in the laboratory. Once they’d cleared the set I could carry on with painting up the rest of the kitchen scenery. The biggest problem most Scenic Artists have to cope with in life is the mixing of certain colours, pink and especially grey! I needed two shades of grey for the fridge, I started off very tentatively with just a small blob of white, then started to add black to reach the correct shade. Thankfully this worked and I only ended up with a small amount of grey rather than the usual bucket or two of fictional shades! Just pink dots to add to the kitchen and that scene will be finished.
Thursday we were joined by Dave Snell. In previous years his brother Ade has built the set for Chippy, Dave lives in Bloxham, not far away and is also a carpenter. We were in need of a narrow table for the show. Try as we might we’d not managed to find a suitable table cheap enough to cut down, four turned legs had been purchased from ebay and Dave was here to put them together with a top narrow enough to get on stage and strong enough for people to stand on. By the evening it was ready for rehearsals, filler needed leaving overnight before I could start painting it though.
During the day I laid out objects on the laboratory bench and table, then met with John and the actors to check what items would be needed for experiments. Everything was labelled up, we just need to find time now to fix things down, cut holes, attach strings and add lights to everything. I would like to pass this on to someone else, but they really need to be concentrating on so much more, it’ll end up being me.
I made sure that I was finished in time to catch Sainsbury’s before it closed and got back to my digs just before 9pm, cooked some pasta which didn’t involve chicken, then sat down to watch the Traitors final half an hour after it had started. Mick had been warned, so I got no spoilers from him. So I’d managed to watch both finals of Traitors and GGBO pretty soon after they happened, so no-one could spoil the outcome. One winner was a shame, the other very well deserved.
Friday. Lights in roses, handheld, around the set and the giant one for the proscenium. Paul spent time on gearing up a remote controlled car to be really rather slow. The walkdown set got some added colour, then I added lots of gold curly bits to some frames. Bits and bobs had a coat of glaze added to help them keep clean. Just about everything is now painted with it’s final colours, just the final touches to make things sing that bit more. Final job of the day was to give the floor a second coat of teal, two weeks of actors and crew walking and moving everything on it had taken it’s toll.
Mick was up very early to catch a train over to Wigan, along with Paul Balmer they assisted Chris on NB Elektra up the flight. Hopefully Mick will be along soon to tell you about his day.
Saturday morning. The stage felt sticky under foot, for some reason the emulsion has a sticky dry finish. This sadly meant that by the end of a busy day on stage the floor looked pretty much as it had done before I’d put the second coat of base colour on it!
Four hours was set aside for a stagger through of the show. I’d opted not to put my dungarees on this morning as I’d be sat taking notes, this surprised many people as they are not used to me being in civies. Six handheld roses were made from scratch during the stagger through, lots of notes made.
I filled up with a jacket potato for lunch getting ready for an evening painting the floor. The Lighting Designer focused his lights, thankfully finishing a little early. Brilliant, I thought I’d be able to get things masked out on stage and spray the design on. Well except the sound designer was about and was positioning speakers here there and everywhere. This meant that the stage got filled with pieces of scenery, making it hard to mask things out never mind tidy up the 2nd coat of paint from last night. Eventually I managed to get the stage cleared, a dryish roller did the job of cleaning up the floor, only for it to be walked over whilst still wet! I wasn’t impressed!! Touched up again I now had to wait for things to dry.
Sound checks were happening, but pretty quickly stopped when I turned the compressor on to spray the floor, there’s no ignoring the constant noise! Thankfully the spraying didn’t take too long to do. A cuppa and chat whilst fans aided drying, by 10pm I was able to start applying the first coat of glaze. Fans positioned again, another cuppa this time accompanied by a mince pie whilst waiting for the floor to be dry enough to do the second coat. All done, things washed up and out of the building at a little after midnight, two hours later than planned, at least it wasn’t 2am!
No lie in on Sunday morning, I had a rendezvous with Liza from the costume department who is also staying at the same digs. I was just about ready by 9am to catch a lift to Burnham station to hop on an Elizabeth line train into London. Liza headed off to meet a friend and visit some exhibitions. I swapped trains and carried on to Stratford, then a bus to Hackney to my brothers house.
Mick had headed down yesterday and we had a very pleasant evening with Andtrew and Jac. However, Mick was out when I arrived. He was on a very important trip to the Left Luggage at St Pancras station to collect a bag containing his laptop that he’d left on a train earlier this week. On Tuesday Mick had headed to Oleanna to hook her up, program the inverter. On route, he’d collected our second Brompton from being mended in York. When he reached Oleanna he opened up the electrics cupboard and realised he was missing his bag with laptop in it. He worked out where the train he’d been on was going to and when it would return. He headed to meet it in Nottingham, only to find the luggage shelf empty. A left luggage request was made straight away and thankfully by the end of Tuesday news came through that his bag was in London, hopefully still with everything inside it. Thankfully everything was present and correct and his laptop was soon unlocked.
A very nice meal with Andrew and Jac, slow roasted lamb with potatoes and a salad, followed by a winter Pavlova, all accompanied by plenty of wine and conversation. A very good Sunday had by all.
0 locks, 0 miles, 8 train journeys, 2 many hours working, 1 new laptop, 1 left laptop, 1 boat still needing winterising, 1 set nearly painted, 2nd and 3rd coat, 1 large footed sound designer, 3 days of the magic food bowl, 7 hour roasted lamb, 20 hours with MIck, 1 more good Sunday. 1 apology for a late posting.