Tuesday 9 September 2014

Birthmonth Day Nine: Chicago


DAY NINE.  AGE NINE.
Seen here, as a Christmas cracker.

Kind of like the geologist thing, I probably wanted to be a palaeontologist when I grew up (although I don’t think I went as far as knowing the word for it).


Did you know it turns out they don’t even teach you about dinosaurs in history class?  For some reason it comes under science and I already said I found science boring.  Of course all this was back when I thought dinosaurs were cool and played with the ice cream tub of luminous and multi-coloured misshapen rubber dinosaur toys we had, before Jurassic Park came along and decided to make dinosaurs the scariest thing in the world.



Being part of that drama crowd I keep mentioning, it happened eventually during college that we banded together and went to see some shows off our own steam.  I had been taken to see shows by parents, school and Brownies, and I had gone to see shows that people I knew were in, but this was the first time I had gone with friends to see a professional show and it felt really cool. 
Yes, that’s what I considered cool.  Going to the theatre with the drama crowd.

The idea was to turn up just before the show started and buy the cheap leftover seats.

The first time, we saw Chicago (The Mayflower/1st March 2002) and it was brilliant.  For a long time after this I counted Chicago as one of The Top-Five-Favourite Shows.  However, having now worked in a theatre, I’ve seen it a few times since and it’s actually really annoying. 

Of course back then I had a special rule which was
This was because a live experience is unique and I was afraid that if I saw another version that The Memory would be replaced with the latter one and the original would be lost forever.  And I was kind of right.  Because I don’t remember what was so great about that first time I saw Chicago any more.

The other show we went to see was Grease (The Mayflower/16th May 2002) because we were doing Grease ourselves as the whole school production (another stinking musical).  This show was… unremarkable.  It wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t remotely interesting.  And back then I had another rule.  Back when The Father took me to see Les Misérables and everyone stood up to applaud at the end and I didn’t because I was feeling really sad and resentful and The Father got annoyed with me, I decided then

At least, not just because other people were.  I wasn’t going to stand up just because the inconsiderate people in front of me were now blocking The View.  I would only give a standing ovation if I saw something so mind-altering brilliant that I couldn’t help but jump to The Feet cheering.  So I was not giving Grease a standing ovation.  So I couldn’t see the damn finale through the backs of the people in front of me.

What I remember better than either of these shows is that one of these times we stopped in the Toys-R-Us outside the theatre first and I had a go on one of those £1 machines that releases a random little capsule when you turn the wheel.  It was a Thunderbirds machine and I had a 5-1 chance of getting the only Thunderbird I had any interest in (Thunderbird 5, obviously) and I TOTALLY BEAT THE SYSTEM AND GOT THE ONE I WANTED FIRST TIME.  I still have it (somewhere), although the pointy bit at the bottom has fallen off, which actually allows it to sit better on a shelf.



Which is your favourite Thunderbird?

2 comments:

  1. Just before John cries himself to sleep at night, he prays for a fan like you.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah... and I'm sure I don't just like him because he's the most similar to Captain Blue.

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