claytoncast

 So we ended last week's blog with a report of some absolutely brilliant customer service from Amazon.co.uk. No doubt it left a warm glow in your heart. I can also report that this week Richard has experienced some brilliant customer service from Apple. Both of us are Mac boys. This week we have downloaded the latest operating system - Lion. It didn't exactly agree with Richard's MacBook, but a visit to the Apple Store meant that they reinstalled all his software, helped him download the new operating system and got him up and running - at no charge whatsoever. It was the installation of Lion that led to my own customer service experience this week. Having successfully installed the new operating system on my laptop and on my desktop I was having a few problems with backing up to a mobile disc that I use for  storage.  So after rehearsals on Tuesday afternoon (that's rehearsals for “Wedding Band" a new play by Charlie Baker which I'm directing for the Gilded

Well it's been another joyously busy week. Filming in Weatherfield again. A whole day spent in the bistro. And then the last three days have been spent rehearsing a new play for Edinburgh in a gloriously Gothic church hall in Oxfordshire. I was a little dubious about having to go down to the wilds to  rehearse, and as I set off on Friday morning having been at home for less than 12 hours I can't say I was in the best of spirits. The joy however of being on a rehearsal room floor is what I have always enjoyed most about what I do. Working with actors, solving problems, being creative and watching good people being funny is a pleasure and privilege and that's what I've just had for three days. I was able to stay with my good friend Lorraine whom we had by coincidence spent the weekend with only last weekend. This yielded the joy of the three-minute drive from  digs to rehearsal room through some of Oxfordshire's most beautiful countryside in the early morning sun.

Now before  you get too worried about the title  it doesn't mean that things have become so bad that I've taken to prostitution.  What  I am talking about is that this week I spent my first two days working on the country's most famous soap opera. I have walked down “Coronation Street" And I do mean physically. It's a little bit like when David Tennant took me into the Tardis when I was working on Doctor Who. I had no scenes in the Tardis and indeed sadly no scenes with Mr Tennant. But in the spirit of the incredibly generous leading man that he is, he knew that every boy who worked on the show wanted to see inside the Tardis. And so it was with The Street. You want to see the real thing. You want to walk down it. Thankfully the delightful and charming actor Andrew Lancel  who is playing my son took my new wife and myself for a stroll. We visited the Rovers, and we  saw familiar living rooms that we have watched on television for many years.  Coronation Street d

At this time last week I sat here looking at my diary finding it rather empty for the coming week. It prompted a retrospective look at the diaries I've kept in the past. The greatest thing about being a freelancer is that you never know what a week may bring. On any given day the phone may ring with job offers or interviews - how the anticipation has changed since the days when one had to pick up the phone to find out who was calling. Now the smart phone flashes the name of the caller, so my agent is  trumpeted in advance. The initials AHA guarantee I take the call.  Monday brought a call asking me to go up to Manchester on Wednesday for a meeting for our premiere Northern soap opera. I've been up for it before. I had a small role back in 2005 - who can forget Mal Quillan and his chain of wine bars and night-clubs in Wetherfield? In 2007 I got very close to being a new regular character and last year I went up there for a role for a six month stint. None of these proved s

One of the reasons I gave up writing a diary as a teenager was the fact that each evening I had to think of something interesting to put into it. I kept a diary from roundabout 1972 until early in my professional career around 1979. Last Friday I took a post holiday trip up to see how mum was, and to take her much sought-after  ration of duty-free perfume. I found myself skimming through my old diaries which are now kept in a rather tattered bureau in the corner of what passes for my bedroom at  mums house. Some of my days were so fascinating I can't believe how I survived them!  “Got up. Had breakfast. Went to Rotherham. Watched TV. Had bath. Went to bed" As you can see I was a teenager on the cutting edge! Every so often though as I flicked through the pages a day would come back into focus. A day that had caused me to write more than “had pizza. Went to bed" My visit to the "Magpie television" studios in 1972 to interview the actress Diana Rigg as the re