claytoncast

Sitting at my desk on a Monday morning on my first S_warm free day and it’s wonderful. The past eight days have taken us to Hell and back. Organisationally a nightmare, creatively stifled, and yet it contained moments of such beauty and focus that I am more convinced than ever that this sort of event is a positive step for the National Youth Theatre and for the public at large. To watch the concentration of my cast as they took forty five minutes to cross Jubilee Bridge at Charing Cross using a series of numbers and yellow umbrellas was a joy. To see members of the public engaging with them spontaneously, little girls grabbing mum’s umbrella and joining in – a delight. And to stand with my partner and watch 500 white suits cross the Millennium Bridge at Sunset was just breathtaking. After all this I need a holiday. We are heading to Valencia at the end of September, but that’s nearly a month away. First we have the joys of that great British institution the Bank Holida...

I’m currently swarming! For those of you who haven’t been able to follow me on here or on Facebook, S’Warm is a huge cast happening being created by The National Youth Theatre and which takes place over five days starting this Wednesday at Battersea Power Station and ending next Sunday in Canada Square. It has five directors, one overall director and god knows how many people working on it. It is rehearsing open air in Battersea Park and at times it’s hell. I arrive home exhausted, drained and quite often demoralised. It’s frustrating and infuriating. Without going into the why and wherefore, it’s the sort of thing that brings out the dark side of my heart. I have twice thought of leaving And yet.....in my core cast are the 74 young people for whom I am responsible. They listen to me, they work hard for me and they show me what is possible. They have helped me learn new street slang. They give of themselves without question, and they show me the way. Education is so often a two w...

I like lists. I feel I am on top of things if I have a list of things to do. It doesn't matter if it’s a long list and nothing on it has been done. As long as there is a list I feel there is a sense of order in my life. This week has been a week for lists and order. It’s been the first week of “Swarm” in Battersea Park. 500 National Youth Theatre members, six marquees and a a toilet wagon. Regular readers will be thrilled to know that it was only two days in when an additional row of ten portaloos were deposited on site. The toilets are at least more in number if not cleaner. With marquees, a large parade ground and more lists and checks than one would think possible, it’s hardly surprising that the nickname “Swarmwitz’ has started to stick. I have 78 young people who in the main are great. Keen, fun to be with and committed. We've lost a few during the week who decided the project (or perhaps my handling of it?) were not for them. but the ones who have made it to Saturda...

End of Term There’s been a real end of term feeling this week. Wednesday saw the last of the CPS role play programmes. Conducted in a deserted office building overlooking the Thames it really felt very end of term indeed. Rows of deserted desks with deserted work stations and printers, monitors and scanners just left lying around. I’m hoping in this age of new Government frugality that they are all going to find new homes in a new building rather than just be left there and thrown out, but things looked pretty desolate in there. Friday evening saw a picnic in Green Park with Richard’s team from work and what a pleasant evening it was. While resisting the temptation to join in heavy duty frisbee throwing session, I lounged in a deck chair feasting myself on the very best that £60 of Marks and Spencer food vouchers could buy. I’m always so thrilled by Central Park in our time in New York, and yet we have fabulous parks here in London. the big parks more than match the majesty of Ce...

This week has been another hot and sultry week in the capital. Not a week for wearing suits and trying to look corporate. That’s what I’ve been doing. I long now for the start of August and three weeks of rehearsal clothes and spending the time in Battersea Park with five hundred members of the Youth Theatre. I am sure that when I am in the midst of it my thoughts might be different, but stay glued reader and find out. I’ve found work difficult this year. Not the getting of it although there has been less of it about as my accounts which have just reached year end show, but the performing of it. The number of jobs I have had which I have actively enjoyed can be counted on the fingers of a Gary Neville gesture - (Impressed by the footballing reference there I hope). “Doctors” was fun, but that’s as far as it goes really. Some of my corporate stuff usually brings me joy, but this year it’s consisted of underpaid jobs for the public sector where even the tea and biscuits are below par...

After a couple of days corporate role -play this week , Friday saw me taking a trip up to Doncaster to spend a day with Mum. South Yorkshire is my past. It’s my childhood, it is deeply ingrained in me and yet these days it seems a very foreign and strange place. The centre of Doncaster has a new state of the art shopping mall, the Frenchgate Centre which links directly to the station and the bus station. It’s ideal for days out with Mum as she can get a bus from outside her house into Doncaster, I can get off at the station and we can meet within yards of where we have both arrived and get the lift straight up into Debenhams. Emerging in perfumery. How nice! The other great thing about the Frenchgate centre is that from it you can’t see Doncaster. You could be anywhere, except of course for the people. This was the accent of my childhood, but now hearing it spoken loudly in Superdrug, or bellowed across the malls , it bears little recognition to the middle class faux northern cam...

I'm a TV sport widow today. Rich has spent the last three hours hooked to the British Grand Prix and we now have a small window of life before the World Cup Final tonight. It's not his fault. In fact he gets a great deal of joy out of it, and seeing ones partner and the person you love happy is a great thing. I only wish it was something we could share, but try as I might I cannot muster any enthusiasm for televisual sport. I once got very excited when Torvill and Dean were in line for a gold medal at the Ice Dance championships in Sarajevo, probably more at the thought of Christopher's gargantuan thighs pounding the ice and flinging Jane around like a rag doll than anything else. As a child I remember having to be quiet during the 1966 World Cup final. I watched it at friends, and our Saturday afternoon play was stopped as we were told to sit quietly on the sofa and watch the television. The news that the scratchy black and white pictures were to continue for half an hours...