N.T. LIVE: “PEOPLE”

Setting aside the contentious issue of whether, for various irritating reasons, I might have to cancel at the last minute,  or, at the very least, forego actually eating, whilst also trying to neatly side-step the suggestion that we’ve had quite enough of our attempts at having something resembling a social life “ruined” over the past couple of years, once again we found ourselves attending another “N.T. Live” event, this time the play being shown on the big screen for those of us living outside the city of London being “People” a new play by Alan Bennett.

Things had not looked all that promising as I ended my working day with one of those busy little half-hours that keep on making it difficult to actually get away at the time I had planned to – emails, back-ups taking longer than usual, unexpectedly chatty telephone calls, etc – all spent with half an eye on the land-line wondering whether there’d be a last-minute hitch coming via a call from the hospital, but, eventually, I was able to lock up the office and dash around to the car and scream desperately (and possibly alarmingly) through largely co-operative traffic to get to where I was going, and I only had to pay two quid for the last parking spot in Didsbury when I got there, before hunting down the restaurant (the rather alarmingly named “Mud Crab”) where my fellow not-quite-actual-theatre goers had already parked themselves and were already making their plans for what they were going to eat.

One very tasty hamburger later (and I did rather feel that I had to wolf it down so I didn’t get to fully appreciate it - and I paid for it indigestion-wise later, I can assure you…), and happy to have finally found a “proper” “Diner-style” burger within at least extended driving distance of my house, we headed to East Didsbury CineWorld to battle our way into the chaos of a stupendously busy car park, which does, at least, happily indicate that the “N.T. Live” experiment is something of a roaring success, at least on the outskirts of Manchester.

There were, of course, other issues...

Chance meetings with other “Theatre Folk” from my dark and dismal past proved (1) How terribly nice they can be, and (2) How awful I am at dealing with the “unexpected” meeting, but it was actually pretty good to see them.

The play itself was smashing, and all rather wonderful, although I will admit to feeling too tired and depressed by the other things going on in my life at the moment to fully appreciate its subtle charms on just that viewing. I'm not going to go on about it at any great length here, not least because I don’t really like “spoilers” so I’d rather not commit any myself, but, suffice it to say, that the performances and the script really were rather top-notch and it was really rather encouraging to discover that that old master-wordsmith Mr Bennett is still able to wrangle such impressively sharp and astute dialogue even now, and create such wonderful roles for such great female actors (and their male counterpoints of course) whilst taking the audience down such unexpected pathways.

There were so many quotable lines, too, because he does have an good ear for a well-honed turn of phrase, and such a lot is said during the course of the play about the British and all of our strange and eccentric passions as much as saying so very much about the state of the nation and what it thinks of itself, both of its charms and of its seedier underbelly, as we splutter along in this brave and not so new century.

Perhaps the greatest observation that is made is one that I had to be reminded of as I looked back on my big night out in the very cold light of the morning after, but with which I cannot help but agree:

“PST: People Spoil Things!”

And they do. I certainly know that, being a “people” myself, I certainly do...

The thing that has most stuck with me, however, as I think back upon the production is a magnificent scene change at one point which is a true wonder of stage craft and really has to be seen to be believed. The old “Stage Crew” head I still have on these now heavily weighed down shoulders could have wept at the sheer bravado of it.

Afterwards, we had to dash home to have any chance of getting home before a brutally late hour on a school night, and we drove home in a gale with builder’s sand and other debris lashing against my car’s paintwork in a most alarming way.

The next morning, I got up feeling pretty exhausted, there was snow on the ground again, the gales were howling and the cricket score was not encouraging, but at least I’d had yet another rather wonderful night at the not-quite-actual theatre.

“N.T. Live” - Give it a whirl some time, I really don't think that you’ll regret it if you like a bit of theatre.

Whoever first had this idea of allowing the rest of the world to see the best of what’s going on upon the London stages definitely had a touch of inspiration about them on that day.

Now, if only we can get them to start making them available on some kind of shiny disc...