To Blog, or not To Blog, that is the Question. OR Does Twitter and Facebook fill the gap? The Answer? Fish.

I think I've already mentioned that when I started this blog it was really a way to promote Maverick Theatre, without having to pay for a web site. And in a sense now things have moved on web wise with the Mavs, this is less justifiable. And now I Facebook and Twitter, I wonder if this blog has any personal relevance. The whole argument about WHY people blog/Twitter/Facebook is another thing altogether. But in 1997 I kept a diary about the making of a play at the Billesley Pub in Birmingham. Called ' A Ghost of A Chance', it was unusual for me, because it was the first time I had directly worked with nationally well known artists for a protracted period of time. Before that my biggest 'star' had been Sir Derek Jacobi playing my non-physical Hamlet's Ghost. But that had just been an afternoons recording at the R.S.C. Thrilling, I have to say, but just an afternoon. But for 'Ghost' I'd won an award through the Royal National Theatre, it was packed with nationally known talent even though I was still completely unknown by the industry and the co-star of the play, which, by the way, I had written, was a young boy I would have to professionally look after. So it was a fairly unique experience all round for me. I'm not quite sure why, but I kept the diary. Johnnie S as ever acted as editor and proof reader and made it into a book and we sold copies during the week long run of 'A Ghost of A Chance' and it sold rather well.


What a blog looked like before the internet. Our book cover from 1997.


I only have one hard copy of the diary now - the others were all sold - and I'm not sure what happened to the original. As I couldn't afford a new computer, it probably now languishes on some hard drive in a poorer part of the middle east. And that's one reason for blogging. The industry seems to keep them archived. I think I have all the blogs I've written on this site. And that can only be a good thing. A positive Web 2.0 initiative which means if you're a poor little theatre git as I was with knackered second or third hand computers that crash and burn regularly, you at least will still have your musings on a hard drive somewhere. Yes, I know there's always paper, but if I want to print another copy of my 'Ghost' diary, someone is going to have to sit down and retype it all. If it was online, it'd be a copy and paste, thank you very much.

On the downside, I also recently came across a Word Document (pre Apple!) I kept after we finished 'Ghost'. And it's almost embarrassing in its content about things that mattered hugely at the time and about which now I never think. The boy from the play was a huge part of my life then. I was in loco parentis and legally responsible for him, but he's a grown married man now and although I might like to know what he's up to I rarely give him a thought, unlike - my God, 14 years! 14 years ago when he had a huge profile in my life.

But then I also found a casual entry I'd written about my Uncle Mike, who developed a terminal and terribly unfair brain tumour at 49 years old. We went to see him in Hospital and I'd completely forgotten how it was. My Mom, Mikes sister, was also suffering from cancer and was in a wheel chair. We raced then both down the corridors! It was saddening to read this account. But maybe that's the glory of the blog. More detail than Facebook or Twitter. Room to expand. Time to search the soul and lay it down. The fact that a blog is out there for all to see in one sense makes it a broadcast rather than a diary or journal, which have always been perceived as something intimate and secret.

Of course the real reason to blog lies with my fish. When I announced the death of my monster goldfish, people I didn't even know sent me comments. How cool and lovely and positively human is all that then.

So yeah, I might carry on blogging. Big Respect for da Fish!

Captain, my captain.

One of my cohort on my MA - do you see how easily I slip into the language of academia now, eh? - the hugely qualified Nick (all the males on the Creative Producing MA are called Nick. A masterstroke of organisation by the Course Director, Andrew), worked out that we probably only have about 8 academic weeks left at Uni. Which is amazing really, because we only started a few weeks ago. It is actually 6 months now, but that's my point. It only feels like a few weeks. But then a strange thing is starting to happen. Because it's a course for theatre producers, our final project, obviously, needs to be a production. Now I've been brimming over with productions for about 40 years, although many of them were played out with my Action Man and in my head. I only started making them professional theatre projects in 1992. So the thought of a production project feels quite natural. And really, the problems I am facing with the final production for my MA are no different to the problems I had BEFORE uni. It could be argued the problems are greater, because not only have I been doing the academic work necessary for the MA, I've also been keeping Maverick Theatre going, with Debs help. We launched a new youth theatre this year, for crying out loud. And I need to find £25k to get Maverick on its feet - the second half of the £50k I knew we'd need two years ago. Things are getting critically tight this month. And a friend said to me yesterday, what's changed? You came to Uni knowing how to produce. Have you learned any new core skills. And I suppose in one sense the answer is no. But one thing I have learned is the sheer bloody glory of education. Being in a place where one is forced to think critically and assess one's place in the world. Looking at ones contemporaries and being able to make decisions based on instinct supported by fact. (And learning to write one instead of you. One's Mother would be very proud.)
So although I couldn't put a finger on a specific new fact I've learned from the M.A. I feel different about everything and there are numerous skills that have been honed and developed by the course and the tutors. I will, I think, be in a much better place when I graduate, pass or not, than when I started.
Life changing then. That'll do, eh?

Not only developing my Producer skills, I also know where to buy the best value Salt Beef sandwich in the West End. I'm a lucky boy, being at Birkbeck.