>>>>>Killing Time<<<<<

Perfect Pitch at Hull Truck last night. Budding actor Scott came along for the ride. I find it to be one of the more satisfying Godber plays - which is just as well as this it the fourth time I've seen it (in seven years! Cripes). Seemed a touch flatter than the previous productions and there was a section that usually gets huge laughs that just seemed to leave the audience puzzled. I consumed one free drink and a couple of onion bhaji-style snacks. Sat next to a gent who thought it a good idea to splay his legs wide, thus encroaching on the already small amount of leg room. By the interval I was suffering severe discomfort. The quartet to our left were in their seats before we arrived, didn't budge at the interval and, as the house lights came up at the end, wanted to wait until the auditorium had cleared before they moved. I think they saw us as a total inconvenience, keen as we were to hobnob and laud it up as we critics do on a press night. Not too many hacks rode into town last night, which is always a blessing. I kept thinking that this might be my farewell as a critic but am not sure yet whether, for financial reasons, I can kiss it goodbye. But even as I was filing my copy, which, after a shade of 'umming' and 'aaahing', left the PC and headed Stagewards at 12.30am, I was thinking 'right, that's that'. I think that, from the point of view of where my writing is taking me, I'll defintely have to hang up my critic's notepad when the play opens, if not before - I'd hate to make more enemies than necessary.
After some McBreakfast this merry morn' we took nascent performer Scott to his yoof theatre class this morning. He was uncharacteristically nervous (first class for a few months, change of venue and classmates to blame), so we calmed him by mercillesly taking the mick, which is surely what SuperNanny would advise. "To shake before acting lessons is unacceptable!" we shouted in his ears before dragging him from the car in a fashion that can only be described as a complete exaggeration of the truth. We then headed into the dirty surrounds of Hull city centre to cock our working class snoop at Toulouse Lautrec and the Art of the French Poster, which is on exhibit in the Ferens. Good stuff it is too, even on a second visit. Last time I was there I got talking to this woman who excitedly told me, "I didn't realise Lautrec did posters too!".
Guitar noise: Graham Coxon - Spectacular