How Time Flies

This year is positively flying by.

It's already the middle of February and I'm not sure where the time has gone. Perhaps it's because as I get older, time moves faster. The theory is that each day is a smaller fraction of my existing life, and therefore moves more quickly. I'd like to think that it's because I've been busy. Mercifully that has been the case since the year started. A mix of corporate jobs to replenish the bank account, and some enjoyable and engaging filming on a new series in Northern Ireland. Albeit in temperatures of -3°C with no  protective layer of underclothing. Period costume can be quite exposing. Sadly my contract prevents me from a picture, but suffice it to say, silk shirts, wigs and lots of white faced seedy acting went on.

 It's a difficult time of year if your calendar is not full. Everybody busy talking about new starts, and lots of magazine quizzes on "How to Get a New You" can leave you  with that cold and lacking in thermal underwear feeling if you haven't got anything in the diary.

The twitter feed of the Actors Centre shows that lots of people start taking workshops as part of their New Year resolution. Something they've been planning to do for a long while is spurred into action by the sound of the calendar pages turning from January into February, and the sight of Easter eggs in the shops. Personally it's never too early for me to spot a Cadbury's creme egg, changed recipe or not. I welcome them just as the Actors Centre welcomes our new arrivals. Whatever your reason for coming into the building, we're glad to see you.

One of our initiatives has been to engage with drama schools on a more positive level and it's starting to bear fruit. This years graduate population, ready to hatch in June and July, will see us gain our largest upsurge in membership for quite a while. The Alan Bates award has been launched, with a fabulous new prize fitting out the winner in quality threads from Ted Baker. Showreels and photos and websites and subscriptions are all great and fab parts of a brilliant prize, but a large dollop of material goods just adds the icing on the top.

Hopefully many of the huge number who have signed up as members will be in the building, between jobs of course, to take advantage of a new workshop or skill session.

Put a session in the diary now.  It's always good for us to do something new, even when we're not sure about it.  I'm told that keeps us young. I'm still basking in the reflected glory from being accosted in Boots in Bromley last week by a young person who recognised me from a film I made 15 years ago. Obviously the moisturiser I was buying at the time is working. In order to act on this " keep young and challenge yourself motif" I've put myself up for a new workshop at the AC.  It's entitled "You're Having a Laugh"  and it's billed as "eight actors, four scripts, three hours, one director, who knows? The chance to explore just what it is in language that induces laughter.  How do you make a text work in your favour?  How do you extract the laughs from the scene and yet keep it believable and truth. I've no idea how it will work, but it's an experiment, and it's something new. In the meantime I have the joy of an  "Off the Record" chat on Friday the 20th with the delightful and gorgeous Celia Imrie  at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane.

Then it's not only time that will be flying as I'm off to the States on a job for 10 days of which only five involve work. Now that is my sort of job, particularly as I know that it will be followed by a week in Dubai with my partner celebrating his coming significant birthday. And no, it's not his 60th!