Laurence Olivier and Me

[callmemadam]

Or, in which I show my age.

Even my dislike of Sue MacGregor didn’t stop me listening to The Reunion on Radio 4 yesterday morning. I’ve written before about my admiration for Laurence Olivier. In this programme some very famous actors reminisced about the early days of The National Theatre. It was fascinating for me because when they mentioned the ‘iconic’ production of The Royal Hunt of the Sun or the landmark Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, I could think, ‘I was there!’ As a schoolgirl I was theatre mad and I saw just about every production at the National Theatre when it was still at The Old Vic.



This shows you La MacGregor with Michael Gambon, Derek Jacobi, Maggie Smith, Joan Plowright and Bill Gaskill. Names to conjure with and I’ve left out their titles! I can’t put it directly on my page (as I did the other day with Mma Ramotswe) because the iPlayer links offered don’t seem to include the code I would need. It took me long enough just to find this (see yesterday’s RANT about the awfulness of the BBC radio web site). What made these great actors feel so nostalgic was that they saw the original company as an actors’ company, led by an actor who understood them. (The early programmes used to print at the back ‘The National Theatre Company’, with ‘Laurence Olivier’ listed alphabetically along with the lowliest walker-on; 'Mike' Gambon, for instance.)



By the end of the discussion there were tears but I can assure you there was nothing luvvie-ish about the conversation. Go here to Listen Again.

Comments

[rosathome.livejournal.com]

Lovely.

I am too young to have been to the National at the Old Vic but I did have one very lovely moment at the National Theatre a couple of summers ago when I went to see Henry VI Part 1 with Matthew MacFadyen as Prince Hal. I'd gone on my own and during the interval I got talking to the elderly gentleman sitting next to me who told me all about the time he'd come up to London on a school trip to see Laurence Olivier in Henry VI shortly after the end of WWII. Sixty years on, he clearly remembered it vividly. Though he was kind enough to compare the the modern performance favourably with the older one.

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

What a great story! Even I'm too young for that :-)

[geraniumcat.livejournal.com]

Oh gosh, me too, though I was too far north to be able to get to the National, I just read about it every month in Plays and Players, and dreamt of the day when I might tread the same boards as my heroes - never happened, of course, I got married instead, and anyway, I was a rotten actress.

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

We all had our dreams! Did you love The Swish of the Curtain as a child? I did, although my favourite in the series is Golden Pavements.

I was lucky to be on the spot. I saw Helen Mirren hit the world as Cleopatra in the National Youth Theatre production and a few years ago saw her in the same role at the NT.

[geraniumcat.livejournal.com]

I like to mourn the loss of my brilliant career.

I found a copy of Swish of the Curtain recently - amazing to read it again, and I took it to my mother because she remembered it too. My favourite was Maddy Alone.

Helen Mirren in NYT must have been quite something, I envy you. And oh dear, isn't Rickman gorgeous.

[geraniumcat.livejournal.com]

And I so badly wanted to see that Royal Hunt of the Sun, and as for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern - I felt life was passing me by.

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

And I knew nothing about them until I saw them! I did put 'mood privileged' on the post and now I feel even more so. Of course you don't realise it at the time, like seeing Jimi Hendrix (I didn't.)
Oh, Alan Rickman; that voice. I have to tell the world though that his Anthony was a great disappointment.