This 'n' That

Well, for a start-off I can't think of a title for this post. I usually attempt to find something alliterative. Well, if you don't know what it means (and shame on you.) it's words with the same initial letter that sound similar. 

The Police have packed up and left the 'crime scene' in Osprey Close. Although they left the peculiar blue box, shades of Doctor Who's 'Tardis' time machine. It's obvious what it is. A portable toilet. They had to make sure the Boys In Blue had somewhere to go, didn't they? Every possible 'convenience' at hand. We'll know sooner or later the outcome of this incident, although someone has been charged and was before the Magistrate's Court last week. I forget the person's name but it's bound to be in the local media.

The grass at the rear of the house has been growing steadily over the past couple of weeks. It's had plenty of sun and more recently rain, which might explain why it's got so long. I have been putting off mowing it, and this morning I got the mower out and attempted around half. The rest can be done tomorrow. It's mild weather-wise and I was hot when I finished. 

We have a good crop of blackberries on the brambles that overhang the fence at the end of the garden and there are quite a few along the Redway. I will get out tomorrow and pick some. 

I have been watching the film of "The Lady In The Van." This is a film based on Alan Bennet's stage play of the same name and starring the brilliant actress Maggie Smith. She who was the Dowager Duchess in "Downton Abbey." A very different character to the character she portrays in "The Lady In The Van." I have been an admirer of hers since I was around 16. I think I must have first seen her in the film "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie." I studied "Othello" by William Shakespeare as part of my 'A' Level English course and saw her opposite Laurence Olivier in the film of "Othello" when she played Desdemona. And then in a very amusing film with another actor, I always liked, Peter Ustinov, called "Hot Millions." He plays her boss in an office and she is the cleaning lady who comes in to clean his office and they set up a scam to trick money out of the company when she bangs down her mop bucket near the company computer. She couldn't have been much more than in her late twenties or early thirties when she made that. As for Peter Ustinov. What a talented man he was. Not only a great actor but also a playwright of some renown. He wrote "Romanov and Juliet" and I saw him in  a wonderful play called "Beethoven's Tenth" where he plays Ludwig Van Beethoven, who is made to appear as (possibly) a ghost by a music critic played by Robin  Bailey. (best known probably for playing Uncle Mort in the Peter Tinniswood sit-com called "I Didn't Know You Cared.") I might be right in thinking that Beethoven is given a hearing aid and is able to hear recordings of his symphonies for the first time. Ustinov stole the show, and it was extremely clever and funny.

I saw Maggie Smith in the Noel Coward play "Private Lives" when she played Amanda to her then-husband Robert Stephens, who played Eliot (originally played by Noel Coward himself and Gertrude Lawrence in the 1930's original production.)  This production was at the Phoenix Theatre in London, and, I believe, was directed by Sir John Gielgud. When I was an A.S.M. in Colchester in the early 1970's we did our own production of this play and I have been a Coward fan ever since. His plays never seem to be out of fashion, unlike a lot of other playwrights of that period. Just as amusing as when they were written and in some cases more relevant today than when  they were first produced. Such plays of his, as "Hay Fever" and "Blithe Spirit" are constantly being revived.

As for Alan Bennet, I have also enjoyed his work. He did a lot of plays for the BBC and a number with Dame Thora Hurd. He wrote a series of monologues for the likes of Thora Hird, Maggie Smith, and Patricia Routledge and called "Talking Heads." The first play of his I remember was a black-and-white television film about a gang of Edwardian cyclists. Very little plot and, being set in that idyllic realm immediately before the First World War, had a very poignant ending. A definite 'must see' if you get a chance. He's since done most of his writing work for the National Theatre, such as 'The History Boys' which was made into a film in the early 2000's.

Watching "Downton Abbey"

We are currently watching "Downton Abbey." We are watching the 'box set' of this highly popular and successful I.T.V. series through Sky +. We had watched an early episode when it was first broadcast but gave up because it had so many commericials in it. I realise that I.T.V. is funded by the sale of advertising, but they really have too many breaks within an hour's programme. It actually runs for around 45 minutes so there's a least 15 minutes-worth of commercials. You can record programmes and then fast-forward through the commercials, but there are so many adverts for sofas and car insurance you can take, believe me.

It's an enjoyable show, if a little slow. Nothing much really happens. It is actually little more than a soap. The sinking of the Titanic as well as the First World War comes into the story, along with some other historical points in early Twentieth-Century history, along with such things as the Spanish Flu epidemic which kills off some of the central characters along the way. The 'downstairs' characters are far more interesting than the 'upstairs' characters. They seem to have far more interesting storylines. The Hugh Bonneville character, the Earl of Grantham, is somewhat one-dimensional. He is rather passive and as such a bit boring. He never seems to have much to do. He's dominated by the women around him. He has all daughters (hence the longwinded storyline regarding the succession to the title.) His mother-in-law, his wife as well as his mother, as well as his daughters, all know exactly how to wrap him around their little fingers in order to get what they want. He doesn't seem to have a great deal of control of his family, his household or the estate. He can't be much good at financial matters, hence the storyline about how his investments have gone pear-shaped and the threat to the future of Downton Abbey. How on earth would anyone be advised to invest all their fortune in just one company, and an American one at that? Just doesn't ring true somehow. And a member of the aristocracy? Please. I know it's only fiction, but it's a bit far-fetched. Also, why is it none of his household staff are unable to iron his nightshirts? Whenever we see him in bed, or preparing to go to bed, and he's dressed in a nightshirt, it looks so creased and obviously un-ironed, or even poorly ironed. I realise that in the early 20th Century there weren't the kitchen gadgets we take for granted today in our homes, for example, electric steam irons. But are we to honestly believe that the male head of the household will put up with so poorly ironed clothing? How many staff are there in the kitchen? Why is it that the Head Butler, Carson, makes such a fuss of the slightest thing, even insisting that His Lordship's newspapers are ironed, but not his nightshirt? This is a real slip-up. Having worked as a supporting artiste on various television shows over the years I know that the wardrobe department is generally very particular about the standard of their costume-care, so to have the central character's nightshirt looking so shabby is really poor. Also, the storyline concerning the mis-laying of His Lordship's shirts. Not realistic in the slightest.

We love the Dame Maggie Smith character, the Dowager Countess of Grantham. She seems to get all the best lines. She manages to out-act virtually everyone else on-screen when she has a scene, along with up-staging everyone. A sheer joy. Love her to bits. I remember seeing her on stage with her late husband, Robert Stevens, when they were acting together on stage in Noel Coward's delightful play "Private Lives." It must have been in the 1970's. She was also in the film version of "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie." Also, another film I enjoyed called "Hot Millions" with another favourite actor of mine, Peter Ustinov.

What also makes watching "Downton Abbey" so enjoyable is the fact that we know so many of the locations they used to film it. Some scenes were shot at places we've been as members of the National Trust, such as Waddesdon Manor, West Wycombe Park and Basildon Park, which we visited only a a couple of months ago