Sir Derek Jacobi's saliva

Totally off the topic I intended to talk about (which I might post later, so no clues here just yet), I have to mention my strangely cultural Tuesday...

At lunch I took a couple of hours out to unwind my beleaguered brain and watch Prick Up Your Ears again. I used to have a copy of it on video as a teenager recorded off the tellybox, except my mum had started recording it late in, so the version I remember watching (repeatedly) started in Vanessa Regrave's publisher's office. There was no opening gambit with the bodies being found in my 'cut'. I was a bit disappointed to learn it was even there, to be honest - although I always knew how it was going to end, it seems to detract from the horror when you get to see the murder scene before it unfolds, even if it does explain how the diaries got to be hidden. I don't know, maybe I'm just speaking as a creature of habit, but when I make my boyfriend watch it I'll probably start it from the scene I knew as the start. Just out of interest, you understand.

And if I'm honest, the real reason I watched it so often is, frankly, Gary Oldman. I'll follow him to the ends of the video rental bargain bin. Watching it back now, it's like a showreel for his talents, squandered these days. He convincingly plays from innocent teenager, to burgeoning thesp, to budding writer, to swaggering, wonderful, witty, selfish, blindly-self-assured Orton himself. It's actually pretty bloody brilliant. Poor Alfred Molina is stuck playing ever-the-same Halliwell, and though doing it brilliantly, there's a bit too much of his future performance of Tony Hancock in there. Which keeps making me laugh. Unfortunately. And Julie Walters' scene with the teeth is fantastic. In fact, all the cast is brilliant (watch carefully, there's an awful lot of future luminaries in there), but Oldman is just great.

Moving on, last night I went with the other half to see Twelfth Night in town. Somehow, he managed to get front row seats. This sounds amazing in theory, except whereas my boyfriend is a smidge under 6ft, I'm 5'2". I wasn't totally certain I'd be able to see over the stage edge - even less so when I saw they'd layered driftwood-style boards to stick over the stage as the flooring, meaning there was extra stuff to see over. My poor man suddenly felt very bad about these fabulous tickets, but, as I pointed out, unless the actors lay down in the middle of the stage, I'm see them fine. Um. I'll get back to that.

I realised within seconds of the play starting that this was the second time I'd seen Victoria Hamilton. Which is odd, as I tend to find her quite an annoying scren prescence, but great on stage (the other show being Day in the Death of Joe Egg, which was great). She was extremely good, their Orsino less so (my personal definitive version being Chiwetel Ejiofor's TV version - track it down, he's amazing); they had cast Sir Andrew brilliantly, with Guy Henry playing him (for want of a better description) as Gussie Fink-Nottle. But, of course, most of the audience were there to see Sir Derek Jacobi, and he didn't disappoint. Teetering on the edge of cartoony, but somehow keeping pathos there at all times, even at his most boastful and mad, Sir Derek (I just love the incongruousness of that title and that name) was excellent. I was chuffed to bits.

Having said all this, to stage the scene where the fool taunts Malvolio in his cell, they had chosen to use the trapdoor hinged up centrestage, so that his hands would grip the bars holding it up and it would appear he was hoisting himself up to show his face through them. Great staging idea. Lousy row to see it in. Especially when you're 5'2". I could see the corner of the hindged door, annoying immensely the woman behind me when I craned to see what on earth was going on.

Which brings us full circle. I mentioned I would watch anything with Gary Oldman in. Well, that icludes Friends. In that, he played himself giving Joey acting lessons by explaining you had to enunciate by spitting your 'p's. Last night, Sir Derek demonstrated this master-thespian skill by practically gobbing all over me and the others in the first row whenever he spoke.

Edit: I've just read this back and, judging by my grammar and unfinished points, I suspect I'm heading for a migraine. I will go back and edit this properly later. For now, sorry.