Paris for Love
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The reading in the cave was great. Conor Lovett IS Jude, which is a scary thought. And a tribute to the weird and timeless miracle of good acting. The first time I ever saw him act, he was totally convincing as an old man on the brink of death. Now, years later, he's totally convincing as an eighteen-year-old Tipperary orphan with two penises. Go figure.
(An aside: I know most of you proud and upright citizens avoid the theatre for religious reasons, but you might know Conor Lovett as Ronald, in The Mainland episode of Fr. Ted.)
We got great feedback from the assembled dignitaries (most of them theatre people, so their criticism was informed and knowledgeable). I was particularly happy with the negative feedback, because it was all stuff we can fix. The positive feedback was jolly nice too, though less useful. Most of the negative stuff was simply due to how brutally I'd edited it. I'd cut out so much to bring the reading down to 50 minutes that people, understandably, got lost. Scenes and characters weren't properly introduced. But the alternative would have been a two-hour edit where nobody would have got lost, but several would have died of hypothermia in the cave.
The finished show will be a lot longer, but the venues will be a lot warmer.
People laughed all the way through the reading, and the dinner afterwards was very jolly and went on for hours. A good start. One of the guests, Albert, reckons the cave is a lot older than the War, and that the Germans definitely didn't build it. As he fought his way across Europe back in the day, liberating Paris en route (he was in US Military Intelligence during the War), he should know.
He also liberated the very beautiful Micheline on his way through Paris. Sixty two years later, they're still married, and a heck of a good couple they make. Even Albert's family are beginning to think it might work out.
To quote the wise words of Jimmy "Bungle" O'Bliss, from Jude: Level 1
