‘You can’t beat the thrill of a live audience,’ Grandad will say. ‘Seeing their faces at tense moments in a play – hearing the applause – there’s nothing like it.’
‘And that moment when you get a standing ovation for the first time. Absolutely magic, darling,’ Mum will add.
‘But you have no record of it!’ Dad will say. ‘Whereas if you pull off an amazing performance on TV or film, it’s recorded for all time. People can watch it again and again.’
Grandad will immediately scoff at this. ‘What does that matter? You’ve had the satisfaction of knowing you’ve performed well and that the audience have been entertained. Who cares if it’s all recorded on some piece of tape or on some digital file or something? It’s what’s in here that counts.’ And he taps his head, and then his chest, as if to say his memories are in his heart too.
‘And what about when things go wrong?’ Dad will say. ‘What if you don’t have that great performance you’re hoping for? When you’re filming, you can stop the recording and start again. You can make sure that what goes out to your audience is the best version you can make it.’
‘Oh, those endless takes and re-takes!’ Mum will moan, putting a hand to her forehead in mock despair. ‘I simply can’t bear it, darling. Too boring for words. And especially when you might have done everything right, but the silly old lighting isn’t right, or the sound wasn’t switched on or something.’
‘Well, at least you have the chance to fix it,’ Dad will argue. ‘I can’t cope with the stress in the theatre, not knowing if the scenery’s going to fall over, or my lead actor is going to forget his lines. I want to be able to control what exactly the audience gets to see.’
‘You’ve got to live dangerously in this business,’ Grandad will say. ‘It gives you an edge, knowing you only have one chance to get it right. People have come to see you tonight and tonight only. You need that adrenalin rush to give it your best shot.’
‘I don’t want people to see my work for one night only,’ Dad will respond. ‘And I don’t want it to only be seen by people who can afford to go to the theatre. TV and film are for everyone – and not just when it comes out first, but for years and years afterwards.’
Sadie never says much during these discussions, but I can tell she agrees with Mum and Grandad. When you come from a theatrical family, these are the types of conversations you have over the dinner table instead of talking about sports or politics or gossiping about the neighbours.
‘Have you got any plays coming up soon, Grandad?’ I asked him now.
‘Hamlet is the next one,’ he told me. ‘We’re hoping to open after Christmas.’
‘Oh, are you playing Hamlet?’ I asked, excited.
Grandad once played Hamlet in a production that ran for over two years it was so popular. Sadie has the poster framed and hanging on their sitting room wall. Grandad was very handsome and looked every bit the tragic hero.
But Grandad shook his head. ‘No, that’s a young man’s role. I’m going to be Polonius, the advisor to the king. He’s a bit of a bumbling, interfering old fool, so I should be just right for the part, eh Sadie?’
‘Well, you said it, not me,’ Sadie told him, laughing and ruffling his hair affectionately.
‘How about doing some rehearsing with me, poppet?’ Grandad asked, polishing off the last of his scone. ‘You can read Ophelia, Polonius’s daughter.’
‘Sure,’ I said, taking the copy of the script Grandad handed to me and searching for Ophelia’s lines.
When I was younger I used to think Shakespeare was so boring. The language was just too difficult and it all went over my head. It was Grandad who got me interested by explaining to me that one of my favourite films, The Lion King, is actually based on Hamlet. It’s all about a good king who has an evil brother who’s jealous of him and wants to be king himself. After that I looked on Shakespeare in a new light, and actually, when you take the time to understand the language, the stories are amazing. Already I had been secretly practising the part of Juliet, one of Shakespeare’s younger heroines. She was thirteen so only a little older than me. I loved her character and hoped I might get to play her some day.
I didn’t know the part of Ophelia so well, but with Grandad’s encouragement I threw myself into it. As always happened, I found I was losing myself in the role, homework and school and worrying about what Hannah had said all forgotten as I thought about Ophelia’s worries instead. No wonder I loved acting so much – it was the best form of escapism anyone could want.
Our Star Club meeting was due to start at 5pm, so Sadie dropped me home just before then. I let myself into the house and dumped my schoolbag in the utility room. Then I went out to the back garden and slipped through the gap in the hedge that Hannah likes to call the secret passage into her garden. Hannah was already there, setting out pens and paper on their garden table.
‘Hi, Meg. Did you get your homework done at Sadie’s?’
‘Yes, it didn’t take too long. How about you?’
‘Some of it, but I had to leave the rest because Maisie needed help with hers. I’ll have to finish later.’
Hannah always seems to help out a lot with her younger brothers and sisters, but especially at the moment because her mum is recovering from a broken ankle. Actually, when it happened it looked like we might have to abandon our plans to put on a show for Maisie’s birthday party. Hannah’s dad was away in China and her mum really needed her to help look after the younger ones. But I suggested we include the kids in the show instead. It ended up working out really well – Zach and Bobby, who are nine and seven, did some scenes from Star Wars, mostly them fighting with lightsabers, which the kids in the audience loved. And Maisie dressed up as a dog and did her own version of ‘My Favourite Things’. The only one who wasn’t in it was Emma, but she’s only a baby.
Thinking back to how much fun we’d had doing the show, I couldn’t wait to get started again.
Hannah still looked a bit preoccupied, though. She looked like she wanted to say something, but then she just stopped herself. I wondered if she was still feeling bad about what happened earlier.
‘Is everything OK?’ I asked her.
‘Oh … yes … well, I was just wondering, did you say anything to Tracey about your mum and dad?’
‘No – I thought about it, but Sadie doesn’t think I should,’ I said.
Hannah looked relieved. ‘Oh, good. Look, I don’t want to put ideas in your head or anything, but the thing about Tracey is …’
Whatever Hannah had been going to say was interrupted when Laura and Ruby appeared in the garden – Zach had let them in through the front door.
‘What a day!’ Ruby said, flinging her Star Club notebook onto the table and collapsing onto a chair. ‘As if it wasn’t bad enough having to go the dentist, then we get homework on the very first day. And horrible long division too! That last sum was impossible.’
‘Oh no, I still have that to do later,’ Hannah groaned. ‘I was leaving it until last. Is it going to take me all evening?’
‘I didn’t think it was too bad,’ I said cautiously, wanting to reassure Hannah without insulting Ruby – actually, I’d found it fairly straightforward.
Laura seemed to have no such qualms. ‘It was easy!’ she said. ‘We did those sums all last year.’
‘Well, it seems to have all melted out of my brain over the summer,’ Ruby said. ‘What did you get for the last one?’
‘Seventeen, I think it was.’
‘WHAT? I got 32.6783.’
We all burst out laughing at Ruby’s horrified face.
‘OK, enough of long division for the insane,’ Hannah said. She sat up straighter in her seat. ‘I call this meeting of Star Club to order!’
Hannah always likes to start off our meetings in an official way. She had even done up an agenda – a list of everything we needed to discuss, in the right order.
‘So, the first item on our agenda today is to choose a new show,’ she
said. ‘Has anyone got any suggestions?’
‘Should we choose something from another book we like?’ Ruby said. ‘It worked really well with Ballet Shoes.’
‘We could, but I thought it would be fun to write something original ourselves this time,’ Hannah said. ‘Laura, have you got any stories we might be able to use?’
‘Weren’t you working on something earlier in the summer?’ Ruby asked. ‘You didn’t let us read it. In fact you haven’t shown us one of your stories for ages!’
Laura glanced sideways at me, and I smothered a grin. I knew why she hadn’t shown us her last story. Over the summer, when I had been trying not to talk about my dad so I wouldn’t have to lie to my new friends about where he was working, I had taken the secrecy a bit too far. Laura had got it into her head that my parents were involved in a custody battle over me, that my mum had run away with me to Carrickbeg and that my dad was going to try to find me and kidnap me. Laura has a wild imagination, which is great for writing stories, but not always so good for handling real life. She’d let her imagination run away with her that time all right. She’d even written a story based on what was going on, though when she found out the truth she absolutely refused to let any of us see it – I think she was pretty embarrassed about the whole thing.
‘I didn’t finish that one,’ she said, giving a slight cough. ‘I’ve started a new one instead, but it’s going to take me a while to make some progress with it. I think it would be better to just adapt another story so we can get started quickly.’
This was exactly the right argument to win Hannah over – she definitely didn’t want any delays with us getting started. ‘OK, let’s do that then. What should we do?’
‘How about adapting a fairytale?’ I suggested. ‘A sort of modern-day version of one, maybe?’
‘That could be good fun!’ Hannah said. ‘And it would still be original if we were doing a new version of one. My favourite was always Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.’
‘Too many parts in that one,’ Laura pointed out. ‘There are only four of us!’
‘Good point,’ Hannah said. ‘Snow White and the Three Dwarves doesn’t sound quite as good really! Well, how about Goldilocks and the Three Bears? There are four parts in that.’
‘I’m not sure how we could make it modern though,’ Laura said, putting her head on one side to think.
‘Maybe the bears could be eating bagels and cream cheese instead of porridge,’ Ruby giggled.
‘And they could have reclining chairs instead of armchairs,’ I joined in.
‘OK, I’m not sure that’s going to work,’ Hannah said, tapping her pen on her notebook. ‘Let’s have a think for a few minutes – and don’t suggest something unless you can think of how we can modernise it!’
I saw Laura and Ruby exchanging quick smiles. Hannah was in full-on Star Club director mode and wasn’t in the mood for any messing! She didn’t notice the smiles, gazing into space as she tried to come up with an idea. Hannah was a great director, I thought, a bit like my dad, and some other directors I’d seen over the years, totally focused on making things happen.
We were quiet for a few minutes, thinking. Then, tentatively, I put forward my own childhood favourite. ‘How about Cinderella? It doesn’t have too many parts, and it should be easy to do a modern version. Cinderella could be going to a disco instead of a ball.’
‘That’s a great idea,’ Hannah said, beaming. ‘That could work really well. Let’s just think about the parts and see if it would work. We’ve got Cinderella, the two ugly stepsisters, the fairy godmother and the stepmother.’
‘Don’t forget the prince,’ Ruby giggled.
‘Maybe that’s too many parts,’ Hannah said, frowning. ‘I don’t really want to have to get anyone else involved this time. It would be nice to do something just the four of us.’
‘We can double up on parts like we did last time,’ I said. ‘Laura did a great job of switching between Madame Fidolia and Nana.’
Hannah’s face brightened. ‘That’s true. It could work if we just plan out the scenes properly.’
‘Have you got a copy of the story?’ Laura asked. ‘I’m not sure if I remember it properly.’
‘I’m sure Maisie has a copy somewhere,’ Hannah said, jumping to her feet. ‘I know I’ve read it to her often enough. I’ll go and see.’
‘Well, don’t tell her what you want it for,’ Laura warned. ‘She’ll only want to be one of Cinderella’s mice or something.’
‘Oh God, that’s a good point,’ Hannah said. ‘I’ll just sneak it out without saying anything.’
When we were rehearsing Ballet Shoes last summer, Maisie had kept pestering Hannah to let her be the dog. Even though there is no dog in Ballet Shoes. She got her chance in the end when we turned our performance into a variety show, and she had done a fantastic job. But I knew Hannah wouldn’t want her trying to take part in Cinderella – she seemed quite keen on making it just the four of us this time, which I could understand.
Hannah came back with a huge hardback copy of collected Disney stories. ‘This one was in the playroom,’ she said, putting it down on the table with a thud. ‘I know we’ve got the old Ladybird version too, but it’s in our room and Maisie’s in there so I can’t smuggle it out without her asking me a million questions.’
‘This one should be fine, the story is basically the same,’ I said. I started flicking through the pages to find the right story.
‘Should we try to do the whole story, or just pick out a few key scenes like we did with Ballet Shoes?’ Laura wondered.
‘Let’s do the whole thing. It would make more sense,’ Hannah said.
‘Oooh, wouldn’t it be fun to do it as a pantomime?’ Ruby exclaimed. ‘I saw it in the Gaiety once and it was brilliant. We could have singing and dancing then too – and the pantomime dame would be so much fun to do – you could play her, Laura!’
Laura immediately took offence to this suggestion, not impressed that Ruby thought she would be convincing as an elderly, overweight, comic figure who is usually played by a man. Ruby rushed to reassure her that this wasn’t what she meant at all. As they were squabbling, my mind was whirling with the thought of us putting on a whole pantomime ourselves. We could have a whole chorus of dancers and singers and the jokes you always get with pantomimes would be fun to write and to act. Maybe Grandad could make us some scenery so we’d have a proper set!
‘OK, I think we’re getting a bit ahead of ourselves here,’ said Hannah, always the practical one. ‘We’d need way more than four people to do a pantomime. You’re probably talking about more like twenty! I’d love to try it some day, but I think we should start off a bit smaller. This is only our second show – we shouldn’t make things too hard for ourselves.’
Hannah’s sensible approach brought me back to earth. She was right of course – we didn’t want to take on too much. And anyway, this way I’d get to focus on the bit I really loved – bringing a character to life.
‘When you two are quite finished,’ Hannah said, sounding almost like a teacher as she frowned at Laura and Ruby, who were still arguing, ‘let’s take it in turns to read a bit of the story and maybe it will give us some ideas. Cinderella has been done so many times I think we need to do something a bit different or people will just find it too unoriginal. I’ll read the first bit then.’
I passed the book to Hannah and sat back to listen to her reading. There was a time when, just like Maisie, I almost knew the story off by heart, and I found it all coming back to me as Hannah read. The ugly stepmother who makes Cinderella work so hard, the horrible stepsisters who are so mean to her, the fairy godmother who comes along and saves the day, the handsome prince who falls in love with the mysterious girl at the ball and finds her glass slipper. It was such a great story, I could never get tired of it.
We passed it around the table to read. As I listened to the others reading I tried to think of ways we could change the story to make it more modern. I was la
st to read, so I got the nice bit where Cinderella tries on the shoe and the prince realises he’s found his true love. Even though I’m old enough now to realise that not many people decide they’re going to marry someone after dancing with them for five minutes, I still love that bit. I’m a sucker for a happy ending.
‘So what do you think we could do to make the story modern?’ Hannah said, all business-like again. ‘I really like the idea of doing a disco instead of the ball, but what about the rest?’
‘Would we still have the magic part in it?’ Ruby wondered. ‘You know, when the fairy godmother turns the pumpkin into the carriage and Cinderella’s rags into a ballgown.’
‘That must be pretty tricky to do on stage,’ Laura said.
I thought back to when I’d seen a pantomime version of Cinderella. They’d cleverly managed the magic bits with lighting and a mist that rose up at just the right time. Mum explained that the stagehands were able to quickly wheel the huge carriage (which was just a cut-out, not a real carriage) onto the stage, hiding the pumpkin. I was mystified by Cinderella’s quick costume change though until Mum told me there were actually two actresses involved – the actress playing Cinderella had a double who appeared on stage just for a moment wearing the rags, not long enough for the audience to realise she wasn’t the real one, and then the mist allowed them to swap places, with the real actress having changed into a beautiful ballgown.
I explained all this to my friends. Hannah was thrilled to hear all the detail – as our director, she always likes to know the ins and outs of what goes on backstage.
‘I don’t really see how we could manage that ourselves though,’ she said reluctantly. ‘We don’t even have lighting, let alone a mist machine!’
We all thought for a minute, then Laura had a brilliant idea. ‘How about …’ she said slowly, ‘instead of a fairy godmother who works magic, we have a cool aunt who gives Cinderella a makeover. She can do her hair and make-up, and buy her a new dress for the disco.’
Starring Meg Page 4
