Below is a clip filmed by Ian Cassidy in 1999 at a Street Ahead day in the centre of Manchester it shows James Macpherson, Mike Lister and Bill Palmer doing an old vaudeville routine known as the Chair Snatch. We learned the routine from Emil Wolk, who directed, Crash Cabaret and he learned it from Johnny Hutch the legendary acrobat. The full show is here. Hard to believe it’s not been speeded up and that we could once actually move this fast.
Whilst moving some archive boxes in the office to investigate a damp patch I came across these photographs. I am guessing they are from the eighties and feature myself, Stuart Mitchell and Julie Ward. We had a street theatre company, the predecessor to Avanti, called Street level and were commissioned by North West Arts to create scenarios advertising their arts newspaper ‘The Artful Reporter’. The shtick was the girl was ‘in the know’ reading the fascinating paper whilst various ‘characters’ peered over her shoulder to get a peek. We hoofed around Manchester for a morning and improvised these shots. Interestingly they were taken by Martin Parr now photography royalty. Julie also did OK and was until 2020 an MEP for the North West.
The final gig of the summer and it could not be in a more lovely place we are in the Loire valley for five days, its unseasonably warm and the crowds are out. The festival is well organised both in terms of production and artist support, let’s not even mention the catering least it sounds like we were on holiday. There is also a lot to see including Cie Bivouac show – À corps perdus which is a spectacular piece of acrobatic story telling with a brilliant musical score, some triggered stems and some live cello, played on an amazing two tier mechanical rig with a full sized trampoline built high above the revolving stage! My personal highlight was probably Farfare Jo Bitume playing an impromptu version of Frank Zappa’s ‘Let’s Make the Water Turn Black’ in the dressing room. Here’s a link if you don’t know it.
We were at the Spoffin festival in Amersfoort in August making a version of the Spurting Man. For the duration of the festival we became a new town fountain, covering the existing one with a stage.
Another in the occasional series from my slight obsession with artists cases. This one is Eric Morecambe’s makeup case. I like the fact its on old cigar case, presumably one owned by the man himself and that he never felt the need to replace it with some swanky bit of kit. Seems to speak of the post war sense of ‘make do and mend’. “A touch of carmine on the nose to de-note comedy” as an actor friend would quote into the mirror just before going on.
Ghost Train