Year of the King: An Actor's Diary and Sketchbook - Twentieth Anniversary Edition (6 page)

DUO FRANCO RESTAURANT Lunch with Ron Daniels. I developed a
great affection for Ron during Maydays, partly because we're both Anglicised foreigners - he's from Brazil.

`Servants do make life easier,' he says wistfully as we settle at our table.

`Oh God, don't they just? Being brought up with them finishes you for
life. I find it impossible to do any domestic work at all. It just seems the
most appalling waste of time.'

The restaurant is run by a swarthy brotherhood of Italians. They play
opera instead of muzak and sing along loudly as they pass among the
tables. The specialities of the day are told to you in aggressively thick
Italian accents, followed by a dark-eyed stare which challenges you to ask
them to repeat. This Mafia once-over is worth it for the calves' liver which
is the sweetest in the world. I urge Ron to try it.

We are on to our desserts before he says, `Right, let's talk business.'

`Yes please.'

`Channel Four are interested in a mini-series of Maydays, possibly in
four parts ...'

Clever tactics. I was expecting the Stratford season, get a Maydays
telly instead. But I'm not going to bite: `Sounds wonderful. It's a pity
negotiations aren't further ahead. It might help me sort out next year. I'm
so disappointed you've all failed to find anything else for me.'

`Paranoia, PARANOIA!' Ron yells in delight, disturbing one of the
waiters as he was reaching for his big moment in Otello; the man glares
murderously, but Ron is still laughing, `We didn't even finalise the Main
House season till last night.'

The plays will be Henry V (Adrian Noble directing Ken Branagh),
Merchant of Venice (John Caird directing Ian McDiarmid), Richard, Hamlet,
Love's Labour's.

`First of all,' says Ron, `I must urge you to have a play out after Richard.

I know you're a workaholic, but it is a terribly taxing part, vocally, mentally,
physically. Richard is notorious for crippling actors. They spend years
afterwards on osteopaths' couches. Trust me - you'll need a rest.'

`But isn't Roger going straight from Hamlet to Berowne?'

`Not the same thing at all.'

`Oh come on - Hamlet?'

`Not at all. Hamlet tends to stand there while things happen round him,
to him. Richard is doing, doing all the time, making everything happen.'

`All right, let's say I have a play out. What then?'

`A Robert Holman play. To be written specially for you. In Slot Five.
At The Other Place.'

I decline immediately. In the past I have not enjoyed having plays written
for me. The process is nerve-racking and seems to cramp everyone's style.
`Also,' I say, `I joined the R S C to do Shakespeare, not new plays. I've
spent my whole career doing new plays ...' The old refrain, growing
feebler by the day.

Ron thinks for a moment, then, `I'm wearing two hats now. One as
RSC director, the other as the producer of this Maydays series. If that
works out, we'll need every minute after Richard opens. We can film it up
in the Midlands if necessary. If that works out -'

`If, Ron. It's an "if", not a reality. It can't enter into this discussion.'

He thinks again. `Tony, we are setting up a season to introduce
the actors we believe are going to be the next generation of leading
Shakespearian players. You must be there. Your Richard must be in that
line-up.'

Not a lot I can say to that. Feel I'm losing ground all the time.

We leave the restaurant and Ron climbs into his car. `Well, I'll go back
and report,' he says cheerfully. `Don't worry. It'll work out. Just keep
reading Richard.'

`I'm resisting that actually. I haven't read it at all yet. Don't want to get
all excited if -'

`Get excited, get excited!' He grins and drives off.

Back at home I look at this morning's self-portrait again. It's better than
I thought. And it does have some of the oddity of that original moment.
This is a familiar syndrome. There is a stage with every drawing or
painting when it looks banal and clumsy. It's worth pushing through that,
working through the cliche to find out what made it a cliche in the first
place.

And the lips don't look even remotely like Laurence Olivier's.

All morning spent wrestling with myself: should I go and buy a new copy
of the play and read it properly? The Liverpool Everyman copy is useless
for anything other than dipping into. But buying a new copy is a kind of
commitment. It means I'm definitely going to do it. Am I not definitely
going to do it? I truthfully believe I could still forego it at this stage (and
must if negotiations continue as non-productively as they have been so
far) without it hurting too much.

Nevertheless ...

`Do you keep plays?'

`We do. What are you looking for?'

`Shakespeare.'

`But of course. Which one?'

Speaking the title aloud, particularly to a stranger, seems like a further
commitment. I play for time. `You do keep the Arden editions, do you? It
must be the Arden edition.'

`Ah. No. We only keep Penguins. They take up less room.'

`Oh.)

I stand staring at the row of Penguins, Richard III pulsating ever so
slightly among the Histories.

'Moving on from Moliere to Shakespeare?' asks the bookseller suddenly.

'Ye-e-es!' I laugh too loud, startled that he's recognised me.

`We could order an Arden. But I expect you need it immediately?'

`Uhm. Yesss ...'

`Which play is it?'

`Oh look, not to worry, thank you.'

I hurry from the shop. Reprieved.

RUDLAND & STUBBS FISH RESTAURANT Yellow light, wooden
panelling, sawdust on the floor. After Maydays, dinner with Shrap, Ali
Steadman and the director Mike Leigh.

The head waiter tells us that after Richard Gere ate here a few nights ago
many of the waitresses, and some of the waiters, made a bee-line for his
chair - which has since disappeared.

Mike is just back from Belfast where he's been researching for his latest
film. He looks tired and grey. `Northern Ireland bears as much relation to life here as ancient Tibet.' We all get worked up about the recent attack
on a church, where the congregation were mowed down by machine guns.

`Murder, murder!' cry Ali and I.

`It's not murder, it's war,' says Mike, with the weariness of one who's
had it drummed into him for weeks and weeks.

`Murder,' says Shrap, `is a bespectacled civil servant walking his dog in
Muswell Hill while a human head simmers on his stove. There is no
cause, no logic. It's just loopy.'

I find myself drifting in and out of the conversation. Images from
a recent television programme which featured interviews with Belfast
teenagers, boys of about fifteen with puffy eyes and shorn heads. The first
thing that struck you was that they didn't behave like other adolescents in
front of a camera, they didn't blush or try to show off; they just talked
very openly about death and looting, setting fire to buildings or cars. `It
doesn't matter,' they kept saying, in those accents which are themselves
like blades held gently against your cheek.

`Why not?' persisted the well-trained, well-spoken BBC investigative
reporter.

"Cause we've grown up with it. It's what we know'- which could be
Richard III talking. He's grown up in a period of fierce civil war, the Wars
of the Roses, and has never known anything else. It seems very important
this. Growing up watching street battles, people being maimed, yet another
funeral passing. It takes the character out of the Hammer Horror world
of ghouls, away from Mickey Mouse words like Evil, and towards something that is recognisable.

.. and that's the only relevant point that's been made so far in this
discussion. With respect.' Mike Leigh is proclaiming, finger held in the
air. He is an extraordinary man. Dauntingly articulate. A merciless sense
of humour, reminiscent of his work. His large, bearded head is sunk into
small shoulders, around which his little hands constantly dart, as if warding
off insects and fools, or conjuring, or working puppets. A favourite word
of his is `clairvoyant', and indeed he often knows what you're going to say
as you start a sentence, which can make conversations a little one-sided.

But tonight he is subdued by Belfast. I ask his advice about the Stratford
business. He hints that he doesn't think it a good idea. I know he didn't
like the Moliere or Tartufe productions. `Look, Richard's clearly a part
that you can play, that you will play, but are conditions right at this point
in time?'

We leave the restaurant at about half one. Smithfield Market is coming noisily to life. Giant lorries trundle into the floodlights. Men in bloody
aprons, breath steaming in the cold night air, carry carcasses into the great
halls. Inside I glimpse the rows of meat hooks and a man stirring a boiling
cauldron, stripping the flesh off a few heads.

BARBICAN Terry Hands, in black bomber jacket, kneading a piece of
blue-tak in one hand, chain-smoking with the other, talking about Richard
III:

`No one has really cracked the part since Ian Holm in 1964.' Terry has
done four productions of his own, and believes it is the play in which
Shakespeare made all his mistakes. `For a start he doesn't give Richard
a rest. Macbeth has the England scene, Hamlet has all that Ophelia stuff,
Lear's got the whole Edmund sub-plot, but Richard is on throughout.
With the terrible physical strain, of course, of sustaining a crippled position
all evening.' Tells me that when Robert Hirsh did it for him in his
Comedie Francaise production, he limped on alternate legs from night to
night, with two sets of costumes. `You might like to think along similar
lines. I've been advised by an osteopath that irreparable damage can be
done to the pelvis otherwise. It's a little known historical fact, but apparently after the original production Burbage said to Shakespeare, "If you
ever do that to me again, mate, I'll kill you." '

`Terry, is this meant to help me decide about next season?'

`Oh but I love that play,' he says, suddenly serious (I think), `there is
more pleasure in one broken-backed Richard than in ten perfect Hamlets.
I hate Hamlet.'

It only occurs to me afterwards that it was all a dare. He was saying to
me: never mind what else we might offer you, I dare you to try a Richard
III. What a cheek. Especially because, as tactics go, it has been the most
effective so far: I head off to the gym, determined to get myself even fitter
than ever.

CITY GYM Oh, the puffing and heaving and clanging of muscles and
weights, the bending and squatting and cycling and lifting and lowering.
Squeezed eyes, bared teeth, streaming faces, matted hair, clammy
clothes ...

`... eigh' ... ni' . . . te' ... elev' ... twel' ...' is the strained mutter
from the man in the mirror.

An unfair contest between puny wet flesh and those iron bars, so sleek,
so smooth, so cool.

`... twenny-si' ... twenny-se' ... twenny-eigh' ... twenny-ni' ...'
as Hawaiian favourites play in the background.

And the row of sit-up contraptions where men clutch their ears and
drag themselves forward to head-butt their own knees, heaving back and
forwards. And those strange exercises for the elderly, little bowings and
prayings and paddlings in the air and delicate steppings like stick insects.

And always that man in the mirror, thinking: I'll show you Terry Hands,
I'll show you R S C, `... foy-fi' ... foy-si' ... foy-se' ... foy-eigh' ...'

SAVOY TEA -ROOM Today is dedicated to thanking Charlotte Arnold,
the physiotherapist who bullied me back to full strength and health after
the operation. I treated her to the matinee of Tartuffe this afternoon, which
she's loved, and now insist on buying her the Savoy's formidable Full
Tea. `For giving me my leg back,' I say, having to use an American
soap-opera accent, but meaning it with all my heart.

The Tea-room is high and wide, all in rose and beige, and full of
chandeliers, mirrors, palms and nostalgia (although it doesn't actually
relate to anything in my own past at all). An elderly violinist in white jacket
and bow-tie, and a lady pianist in evening dress play old tunes. We should
all waltz and quick-step, but instead sit heavily, working our way through
these interminable and almost sickening Full Teas. Above us on the
balcony, a Mediterranean gentleman of considerable years and poundage
slumps into a cane chair and starts to spread over its edges as if there's
yeast at work, while staring at Charlotte through sleepy oily eyes, a bubble
of saliva popping on his slightly parted lips.

Charlotte is very pretty in a very English way. Blonde hair, large eyes,
cheeks like Worcester apples, and a naughty turn to her smile.

We discuss Richard III. If I do it, will she help? Research the deformity
and devise a safe way of playing it. I tell her I'm thinking of using crutches.
She thinks I'm joking and laughs. (Perhaps the idea is simply ludicrous.)
But she is keen to help. When she saw Moliere she was impressed by how
thoroughly I'd researched his heart condition, so she knows I am serious
about this aspect of the work. She has various contacts and says she could
arrange visits to homes for the disabled. `I know this sounds awful,' she
says, `but it all depends if they've got what you're looking for on the day
we're there.'

Whenever the subject of research comes up I always think back to an
argument with the playwright David Hare a few years ago, when we were both on the Royal Court Seminar at Louisiana State University. I had just
finished playing the Arab in Mike Leigh's Goose-pimples. There had been
strong protests from the Arab community and I felt I had betrayed those
Arab contacts who had helped me research the part.

`I know,' David had said, `we all feel that. And yet we take what we
need.' A smile that might have been self-parodying. `Perhaps it's a licence
we have as artists.'