"I think I'm putting lard on the cat's boils that night. He's an arse..." was the response to my text asking a friend if he was going to be watching TV on Thursday night. What I was really asking was whether he'd be watching Alan Davies' Teenage Revolution. AD was at Bancrofts, where The Boy goes following in my footsteps, and has built a career slagging off the place. I don't know why the school lets him back, but they do, so we have to endure his nonsense time and time again. Last night, he spoke in a contemptuous way about it being 'posh'. Well compared to many schools it is, but then if you're brought up in a prosperous middle-class area, living in a house that is worth (today's prices) in the region of £800,000 by a successful chartered accountant father (and mum who wasn't mentioned) you're really quite posh yourself aren't you? His key act of rebellion seemed to be riding his bicycle on his neighbours drive and putting posters on his bedroom wall. Wow. Over the last decade or two Bancroft's has been one of, if not the, the top mixed schools in the country, and manages to churn out people who generally avoid the elitism of many Public Schools. I'm so glad that Lucy Mangan in The Guardian described it as "an extremely tedious hour"
One performance I will miss though is The Boy in Twelfth Night as he has decided not to audition for the Senior Play this year. His reasons are complex and it's a great sadness after he stunned everyone with his genius performance in the Middle School play earlier this year...but he says his evenings are full, so I'm not going to insist...as if I could anyway!
And back on the professional stage Deathwatch with Simon Russell Beale (by reputation our greatest living stage actor) is getting rave reviews, which I don't understand as the play itself is cheesy nonsense and the man's performance is not all that it could be. Just shows that you can't trust the critics...not that I did anyway.
I feel I need to lie down...