29 August 2014

As promised last week - here is the next installment of my short story 

'The Village Concert' 

(Curtain up: First half)

All eyes were now trained on the stage; but something was making the curtains stick; they were being frantically yanked open by hand. Finally they parted, revealing the empty stage. The footlights were on and spotlights picked out the ancient floral garden tapestry that passed for backdrop scenery. It hung there: faded yellow and green colours predominated. Italianate flower-beds and ancient funeral-like urns, bedecked with laurel, completed the whole. The entire scenario was larded with trees and birds. Brian’s heart sank once more when he saw it. 

The old curtain was a nightmare; but he had no time to reflect on what even a little money could have done to brighten things up. The show had begun.

‘Right girls,’ Brian enthused from the wings. ‘Are you ready?’ He whispered to the lead chorus girl, ‘Keep them tight, Jean. Now! You’re on!’

He signalled to the band-leader, Tom Cairns, to finish with the William Tell overture; and as the band all knew what they had to do, after a moment or two they struck-up the chorus’ signature tune.

Accompanied by a great cheer from the audience, the chorus girls high-stepped out from the wings to the centre of the stage, linked together, arms tucked around waists. Feet thundered on the old boards; they sang and shrieked, “Keep your sunnyside up, up, keep your sunnyside up...”

For the first few minutes, whistles, wolf-calls and yells accompanied every kick. Gradually, however, the young bloods settled down as they began to appreciate the long shapely limbs on display. Without missing a step, keeping a straight line, the show-girls began singing the next song of their short eight minute routine: “Keep Young and Beautiful...” 

The troupe now began a simple manoeuvre. They changed from moving sideways in a cross-over leg action, while linked to each other by hand, to a high-stepping, rotation, holding each other by the inside of the arms. All hinged on Jean, at the centre of the move. Despite her desperate urgings during the words of the song, the line was apt to go awry. But other than Phil Sharpe and Stan Atkins, the two talent scouts, it is doubtful if anyone noticed.

The audience was enthralled by the youth, vibrancy and happy radiance of the girls. Most of them were new to the stage. Raw energy, nervousness and excitement filled them. And it was contagious—if the reaction of the emotionally starved audience was anything to go by. They didn’t care whether some legs were a little fat, some skinnier than others; or if the occasional belly or bum sagged a little. This was real. The noise was deafening, as the girls high-kicked their way off at the end of the act. 

Brian, waiting in the wings, was ecstatic.

‘Well done, well done, girls!’ he bellowed. Grabbing Jean as she passed him he said:

‘Don’t let the girls change outfits, lovie; keep everyone ready. I might need them at a moment’s notice. You never know how things will go. The Stonecross people have really taken a shine to you all.’ Jean nodded breathlessly and hurried away, elated.

*

Brian turned to the compere. ‘Right, Larry, you’re on. You’ve got ten minutes, remember. Do your stuff. Keep it snappy. Go get em!’

Larry stepped out of the wings, one hand stretched out to the audience, the other gesticulating to the point of departure of the last chorus girl.

‘Ladies and gentlemen. Ladies and gentlemen, what about that then, eh! Wasn’t that really something! A big, big hand for The Toppers. The crowd clapped and cheered furiously. 

The compere had turned his cap back to front for comic effect. He was a tall, thin man and wore a yellow clown’s outfit, plus a red waistcoat. It was too big for him. The trousers had wide flares. He wore a red carnation, large shoes and white gloves. 

The outfit summed up Larry Jones perfectly—pure farce. Earlier in life he had been astute as a jester; then he became a Pierrot, putting on a turn at Beach Pavillions around the country. Now, he couldn’t stop being a fool, a real one, requiring no act. He had been on the booze for years and could never remember his lines or the acts he was meant to introduce. As he grew older, he relied upon reading instructions pasted on the inside of his hat, or on his gloves, pieces of paper; in fact anything that was close to his face, because his eyes were failing too.

Larry’s act always started the same way. There was nothing original about it; and tonight was no different. He assumed a North Country accent.

‘Hello? Hello? Hello everybody? Are you a'right, t’night?’ He cupped his ear as always, listening for a response. Hearing none, he tried again and again until he got what he wanted.

‘Is there anyone there? 

Eventually, the audience shouted a loud: ‘Yes!’

He began his one liners: ‘Did you hear the one about...’

A late-comer crept along the passage-way in front of the stage, head-down, moving as quickly as she could towards her seat.

‘Your late missus—now I don’t want you to let it happen again or I’ll fall all over you. Eh, what d’you think of that then, eh, heh, heh!! Now then, where was I...?’

What the audience didn’t know—at first, was that this was standard practice for Larry. He really had no act to speak of and depended upon such interruptions and distractions. Others were asked if they were going to the lavatory when they stood up, and if so, to get a move on.

The audience started to get restless, and before very long he was blaming the equipment.

‘This mike is bloody useless, but being a great trouper, I’ll persevere. Did you hear the one about...?’

In the auditorium, the two professionals, Stan and Phil, cringed, sinking lower in their seats as the compere continued his routine. For seven out of his ten minutes on stage, Larry poured out a thin vein of humour. After so many years on the boards, he no longer required audience reaction to feed off. He delivered his monologue automatically: a mixture of dry, mocking and sarcastic throw-away lines, topped with verbal abuse and highlighted by a variety of risqué stories.

Now and again his staccato delivery raised a titter or two; but the overall effect was a build-up of tension between him and the audience, which usually ended in his exasperation and their dislike. Tonight was no exception. What saved him—which the stage-manager, Brian Clarke, relied upon—was the absolute necessity to get on and introduce the acts. Even then he could be painful.

His introduction, invariably prefixed to every act, whoever and whatever it might be, was: ‘But now, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, at very great expense, checked for quality before being allowed to appear here, tonight...’

This time, however, he surprised himself —and everyone else—by making a simple and effective delivery: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, will you please give a warm welcome to the world renowned jugglers, the Trapp family.’

*

Larry walked off quickly, just as the Trapps arrived on stage—leaping, bounding, tumbling, throwing Indian clubs up in the air and carrying their equipment: springboard, rings, cups, plates and long slim poles.

The orchestra, meanwhile, struck up a medley of oompah tunes by way of accompaniment. 

The two impresarios sat up in their seats, they were interested. This was something their projected show lacked. They were to be severely disappointed, however. The Trapp Family turned out to be funny beyond belief, but their humour was completely unintentional.

On stage, their act had begun very badly indeed. It all kicked off when the member of the family, supposed to be sent high into the air from one end of the springboard, didn’t quite make it. The power was supplied by the leap of another of the family, from the shoulders of the biggest and strongest member of the troupe, onto to the other end of the board. Unfortunately, he didn’t quite make a proper connection. The unfortunate tumbler made lift-off alright, but not enough power had been generated to give the height needed to execute his somersault in mid-air. The springboard had only been half-struck.

Other Trapps made a dash to break his fall. Both the man spinning plates on poles, working his way up to ten rotating discs, and another one throwing Indian clubs in the air,

collided in doing so. From on high, their brother landed on them; plates began to fall off poles, Indian clubs were scattered all over the stage. The crowd roared with laughter.

To the accompaniment of the band’s ‘oompah pah’, the chaotic bungling continued, with the person performing backward flips cannoning into the one doing cartwheels. Both rolled into their brother who was trying to execute a Russian Cossack dance. The audience again laughed uproariously. The Trapps proceeded to get angrier and angrier, with themselves and with the audience. Brother pushed brother on the stage. 

On the other side of the footlights, words of advice deluged them from their tormentors in the audience:

‘Look out mister, you’ve dropped something! Hey, fly-weights don’t fight welter-weights! Haw, Jimmy! Needin’ a hand?’

On stage, The Trapp rage grew, until it became impossible for them to perform at all. Materials and props were strewn all over the place. 

In the wings, Brian was at his wits’ end.

‘Willie! Geordie!’ he shouted at the stagehands, ‘For God’s sake, close the curtain, quick. I think they’re going to start fighting with each other.’

Brian was none too soon with his instructions. The curtain had just closed, blanketing out the great good humour of those in the front of the house, when The Trapp family set about one another. 

The crowd’s reaction had heightened their fury, which in turn had affected timing and balance, leading to the catalogue of errors. Of course, this had fed the audience with even greater glee. Now the Trapps were at each other’s throats. They couldn’t get at the enemy on the other side of the curtain, still baying at them, so they started on each other. It took Brian, the stagehands, Larry Evans, and members of the other acts to separate them, retrieve their equipment and bundle them back to the dressing room.

*

In the wings, Brian looked at his watch. He addressed his compere.

‘Good, we haven’t lost much time, really. Go on, Larry, get out there.’ He started to grin. ‘That was really quite funny, you know. Use it to good effect with our patrons. Tell them that’s show business. Get the boy soprano on, pronto. Right?’

Larry nodded eagerly.

‘Okay Willie, curtains away.’

John Scott, boy soprano, was twelve years of age, approaching thirteen. His voice hadn’t yet broken, but he was inclined to hit the wrong note at times. He was also prone to singing slightly off key. Nevertheless, he could get away with it because of the sentimentality he aroused. His extreme youth also set him on the right path for evoking sympathy; as did the tear-jerking Scottish songs he sang: “Down in the Glen”, “Bonnie Mary of Argyll”, “Annie Laurie”, “Bonnie Strathyre” and so on.

He dressed in the kilt; and at the microphone, stood perfectly still, a small pathetic looking figure in the middle of a great big stage. His head was always angled upwards, towards a microphone cunningly placed just a little too high for comfort, but with the effect of making him appear even more frail. The boy soprano also provided a great excuse for the band in the orchestra pit to go to town for all they were worth. They poured out a kitsch-loaded backing for him.

The mums and older patrons loved him. Lorna blurted into the ear of her friend Bella Reid, ‘Aw the wee soul.’

This echoed the sentiments of a great number of the audience. Here and there, though, were heard the sarcastic rasps of the older kids and high school pupils. Sporadic yells broke out:

‘When are you going to grow up, shortie? What’s under yer kilt, son?’

When he had finished, Stan and Phil looked at each other questioningly. They gauged the audience’s reaction, and measured the appreciative applause against the ribald comments.

‘What do you think, Stan? Do we want him?’

Stan grimaced and pursed his lips. ‘Hard to say, Phil. He didn’t go down too badly though. Let’s sleep on this one.’

*

While John Scott was singing, the ventriloquist, Ike Wells, sidled up to the manager, still at his post in the wings.

‘Is it true then, Brian, what they’re saying?’

‘And what are they saying, Ike?’ Brian didn’t care much for the speaker as a man, although he had a good class act.

‘That this is it. We’re finished. No money; that this is the last night.’

‘Who told you that?’

‘Oh, one of the stagehands. Geordie I think. But the word has spread like wildfire. Everybody knows.’

Brian’s face fell and a frown crossed his brow. He knew immediately that Larry had talked.

‘I’m going to speak to the cast after the show, Ike. You can wait ‘til then.’  

He waved the man away and beckoned to Larry, who had appeared from the direction of the dressing rooms.

‘Larry, that boy was on stage exactly eight minutes. We’ve still got three or four to kill, so I’m going to send the girls on again to liven things up.’

‘Good thinking, boss. I’ll go and get them. It shouldn’t take long before the house is rocking.’

Tom Cairns approached in answer to Brian’s beckoning finger.

‘Tom, play, “You’re the Cream in my Coffee,” for the girls. Make it a three minute spot. Okay? Tom gave him the thumbs up.

As requested by Brian, the chorus girls had remained ready and primed for any re-call. They took to the stage singing, to great applause. Their performance went without a hitch.

*

In the hall, Brian’s re-shuffle has not gone un-noticed by his two fellow stage managers, Phil and Stan.

‘That was good was that, in my opinion, like. What do you think, Stan?’

‘Aye, your right there, Phil. Our boy made up his time very craftily there.’

‘And the act’s good too. The girls are right cheery like. Good lookers as well. And their leader does a good job coaxing the younger ones along. Don’t you think so, Stan?’

 ‘Aye,’ said Stan, tersely. 

The locals had gone gaga over the ladies, who were almost forced to do an encore there and then. Only Brian’s severe shake of the head and beckoning arm stopped them and the band, from going on. Still high-kicking, they finished their act exiting stage right, where, in the wings, their boss waited for them, smiling.

As always, he was on hand to spread praise and encouragement.

‘Well done once again, girls! That was just right. But never give them all they want, eh!’

He was really pleased with their performance and effort.

*

‘Are you ready, Sam?’ The next artiste stood in the wings beside Brian.

This act was problematic; a bit of a gamble all round. Brian had not seen Sam Entwhistle’s presentation. There was never an opportunity for rehearsals at the best of times. Usually Brian would sample five minutes of an artiste’s performance at least. But he was going blind on this one, just to please 'Dear old Julian', who has let him down so badly.

Sam was in his mid-forties; a Lincolnshire man of few words, as Brian had discovered. He billed himself as a song and dance act. In the business, this could mean anything. 

In front of the microphone, Larry Evans dutifully did his bit by way of introduction; and as he did so, the backstage people watched, round-eyed, as the mediocre-looking, narrow-shouldered little chap, slipped into a pair of big boots that he had to hand, tied green ribbons at his knees and picking up a hamper that no one had been allowed to touch, ambled out on to the boards.

Brian Clarke stood transfixed, as the figure walked forward to the edge of the stage and handed some music to Margaret Roach, the piano player. He then turned on his heel and made his way to the hamper—he still hadn’t said a word. The audience was so mystified there was dead silence. Out of the basket he produced a short yellow tunic, like a little girls skirt, which was slipped on. Next, appeared a battered old hat, a pair of spoons, and a pole, with lots of coloured streamers hanging from one end.

In the wings, Brian started to wail. ‘It can’t be. Oh, no!’

Larry exploded as well, ‘A Morris Dancer! A Maypole!’ incredulity was written all over his face.

One or two titters began to emerge from the audience. Stan and Phil shot arched glances at each other.

At a signal from the artiste, Margaret Roach commenced playing “The Lincolnshire Poacher”. On drums, Tom Cairns managed to find a rhythm or beat to it.

Sam Entwhistle now began his ‘act’. He accompanied the piano by playing his spoons, leaping up and down in time to the music, slapping the spoons against his knees, elbows, head and backside, criss-crossing the stage as he did so. 

The audience still couldn’t believe what it was seeing and hearing.

Alex lowered his head sideways to speak to Dod.

‘He looks aboot as auld as us, Dod.’

‘Maybe, Alex, but we’re no sae daft looking as him.’

Bella turned to her pal, Lorna, looking indignant.

‘D’you think he’s taking the mickey oot o’ us?’ 

Here and there a ‘boo’ rang out from the audience; and some choice pieces of advice were offered:

‘Get on with it ya freak! This is no real! D’you get paid for this!’

Chairs started to squeal, feet to tap; more and more voices from the audience were being heard in the wings—and what they were saying was not pleasant.

Brian Clarke was beside himself; almost jumping up and down with frustration.

‘I don’t believe this,’ he muttered. But it was to get worse.

Sam had put the spoons back into the hamper. He now picked up the Maypole, complete with streamers. A harmonica appeared like magic from a little pocket in the front of his tunic. Before he started, he said a few words.

‘Most of you probably won’t know, but this very old English form of dance actually began here, in Scotland, before making its way southwards—and this happened so long ago, it has been lost in the mists of time. Thank you.’ 

At his signal, Margaret now started to play again, and Sam commenced to skip figures of eight across the stage, while holding the pole aloft. He accompanied the melody being played by blowing and sucking on the tiny mouth-organ. It was straight from Shakespeare. Now and then he would sing a snatch of the verse: “Where the bee sucks there suck I, in a cowslip bell I lie...”

After a few minutes of this, it didn’t matter to the audience, what he was playing or saying. Some people were hysterical with laughter, others sat, eyes popping, mouths agape. A steady background noise of hissing and booing began to reach a crescendo. Objects began to be thrown. Cries rang in the air:

‘Away ye go, ya fool! What a buffoon!’

Brian shouted to stagehands, Willie and Geordie, ‘Get him off, for goodness sake, or we’re done for.’

And as Sam completed a figure of eight around the perimeter of the stage, a shepherd’s crook sneaked out from the wings, caught him around the neck, and he was hauled off. 

This was done in the midst of a veritable hurricane of noise and verbal abuse, which became tinted with cheers as he disappeared out of sight and the curtain came down.

*

Sam was a total disaster; an embarrassment in himself, to the concert party and to the evening's entertainment. Most people in the audience were convinced they had been deliberately insulted; that Sam was intent on flaunting English culture in front of them. 

Although it was true, they didn’t believe his bit about the Scottish origins of Morris Dancing. Brian feared there would be a riot. But slowly the noise died down, and here and there great gales of laughter were heard as the unintentional comedy of the situation struck the audience. 

Sitting in his accustomed spot, Brian mused over what had just happened, a smile beginning to appear around his lips.

‘Larry, old son, Sam has maybe fallen flat on his face, but just listen to the customers; unless I’ve got it wrong, it looks like he’s coming up smelling of roses after all.’ 

He assumed an imperious figure, and put what he thought was a tougher tone into his command.

‘Right, Larry, get on-stage and announce the interval.’

Larry did as he was bid; and on stage added the usual plea:

‘And please, ladies and gentlemen, be back in your seats in fifteen minutes. I thank you.’

The lights in the hall began to glow, and the compere disappeared into the wings, to the accompaniment of scattered applause.

Brian looked at his watch. ‘Forty-five minutes exactly. Well I’m blowed. Spot on.’ Then he too disappeared backstage for a welcome cup of tea.

***

Nest week - 'Intermission' followed by 'The Second Half' performance