Skip to main content

My Sedaka Shame.


In 2010, I achieved the dubious distinction of fluffing the bass part to 'Happy Birthday Sweet Sixteen' in front of its composer, Neil Sedaka.

This career highlight / lowlight took place during my opening night in the West End Musical, Dreamboats and Petticoats. I had a reasonable excuse for my mistake, to be fair, as I was appearing in the show two days earlier than expected, and had only found out I’d be on a few hours before curtain up.

I was shopping in Sainsbury’s when I received the call. The Company Manager told me that one of the cast had fallen ill – and while I was under no obligation to come in, as I wasn’t yet under contract, it would really help them out if I did.

‘Sod it’, I thought. ‘I might as well get my first show over and done with’.

Spin forward a few hours and I was standing in the wings of The Playhouse Theatre, newly clean-shaven, about to make my West End debut. The turnaround was so quick that I’d barely had time to look at the script. I just had to trust that I’d know what to do when it came to it.

The theatre teemed with history. Hancock’s Half Hour and Steptoe and Son were recorded there, along with many of The Beatles’ BBC radio sessions. The ghosts in that building were immense.

To compound the pressure, my unexpected first appearance happened to also be Tony Christie’s last night in the show. Neil Sedaka, who was his friend, had come along to see him off. So, not only was I on with very little notice, I was also backing Tony Christie in front of Neil Sedaka. Ridiculous.

Sedaka joined us on stage before curtain up, to say hello and pose for a photo with the cast. As I shook his hand, I remembered that the first single my mum bought was one of his. Life can be weird.

The Christie version of the show closed with ‘Is This The Way To Amarillo?’, which was written by Sedaka. I hadn’t needed to learn it, because I wasn’t supposed to perform with him.

“Do you know it?” asked the M.D. in the interval.
“I think so. It’s in A with a key-change to Bb, isn’t it?”

Thus was the sum total of my rehearsal.

I got through the show on adrenalin alone. It was a hell of a buzz. My biggest mistake of the night, predictably, was during 'Happy Birthday Sweet Sixteen'. Still, if you're going to fuck up, you might as well do it in front of the original artist.
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

Shakerpuppetmaker.

Have Parker from Thunderbirds and Noel Gallagher ever been seen in the same room? The resemblance is uncanny. So much so, I think something’s afoot. If my suspicions are correct, I've stumbled across a secret that will blow the music and puppet industry wide apart. In the mid-60s / mid-90s at least. It doesn’t take long to see the signposts. There’s the similarity between the name of Oasis’ first single, Supersonic, and Supermarianation, Gerry Anderson’s puppetry technique. The Gallagher brothers would often wear Parkas . Live Forever was clearly a reference to Captain Scarlet and Standing on the Shoulder of Giants to the size difference between Noel and his bandmates. The more you think about it, the more brazen it gets. It’s fishier than Area 51, Paul is Dead and JFK's assassination put together. The only glitch to the theory is scale . According to Wikipedia, Anderson’s marionettes were 1’10” and Gallagher is 5’8”. How does he maintain an illusion of avera...
Read more

Comedy That's Worth a Letch.

Today, I nipped to Letchworth to meet with illustrator (and one-time - two-time - comedy poet) Mushybees, to discuss an event Mostly Comedy will act as surrogate parents to as part of Letchworth’s Arts Takeover in a couple of weeks. Months ago he got into contact to see if we’d be up for co-organising a comedy stage as part of Letchworth’s weekend of arts-based attractions in July; something I’d provisionally said yes to, before things got hectic in the lead-up to Edinburgh and we didn’t take it any further. Despite not getting down to the nitty-gritty straight away, we managed to pull a line-up together in a back-and-forth of emails yesterday, leading to me getting Glyn’s blessing and us deciding we’d officially go ahead with it (whatever ‘officially’ means in this context). In reality, it’s not complicated: from 12pm until 6pm-ish on the 22 nd July, Glyn, Mushybees and I will host four Edinburgh previews from four acts (including me), before Nor...
Read more

"Heh Heh Heh Helection Half Hour."

Thursday morning’s a time I look forward to, as the episode of Hancock’s Half Hour that was broadcast that week becomes available to listen to on iPlayer, and consequently becomes the soundtrack to my bath. Today was no different, with this week’s instalment being the frighteningly appropriate ‘The Election Candidate'. In the episode, Tony is convinced to stand for parliament as a celebrity candidate (*cough* Donald Trump *cough*) and while it’s definitely one of the best - though let’s face it, pretty much all programmes that exist have stood the test of time wonderfully - my favourite moment has to be when Hancock is asked who’ll he’ll vote for, before he’s convinced to through his own hat in the ring. “Neither of them,” he replies. “I shall show my contempt by going down to the polling booth, taking my form, crossing both their names out and writing ‘get knotted’ in”. (Some things never change.) The episode was first broadcas...
Read more