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Day two of Relativity record and I attempted to get in by public transport, taking the bus to Hitchin, then walking to the train station, train to Kings Cross and tube to North Acton. It took two and a quarter hours and I was five minutes late and exhausted. But it’s hard to be sure that driving in will be any quicker at this time of day.
But I did see a man with a top hat on the tube, which made up for everything. I think he was probably a time traveller or a ghost.
We were (amongst other things) recording the wedding episode today, which seems to be the funniest one of the series. My old running pal Tony Gardner was in to play my character’s new father-in-law,Clive, an obnoxious prick who seemingly knows nothing about his daughter (when Tony had DMed me asking where Clive was from, I said it didn’t matter as long as he was a cunt).
Whilst this is the stand out episode, I am pleased with them all. We read episode 4 through and it might be a touch short (all the others are a little bit long) so there might be a bit more writing for me before the week is out.
As we only had Alison for one more day we had to get all her parts done, which meant we’ve done all the tricky group scenes for the funeral and the wedding, so we’re well ahead of the game. It’s such an enjoyable job and unlike a lot of what I do, very sociable too. Nobody in the cast is a twat as far as I can see (which means of course, that I am the twat) and everyone understands their character and the script well, so I don’t feel I have to be hovering around in scenes I’m not in, to check that they’re getting the jokes right.
Of course writing these four episodes has been an emotional drain on my year, though all that is forgotten now they’re (mainly) done. I hesitate to say it has been worth the pain in return for this relaxed four days of fun. But it probably is.
And I made much heavier weather of the writing than I needed to. But then that’s just what I do!
We were able to do a few scenes that were pegged in for Friday this afternoon and I wasn’t in them, so I got to go home and see if I could be in time to bathe the kids. And a slightly smoother journey back meant that I got to. I put Phoebe to bed and she chose a flap book about the human body, where you could see inside brains, lungs and intestines by lifting the flaps. Phoebe’s favourite flap revealed a poo about to come out of a bum hole. It was my favourite too. But she seems to be gaining a basic understanding of all the things inside her and how her body works
I was back home in time to see House of Games tonight. I thought my kids might get a kick out of seeing me on the telly, but my daughter just wanted me to switch back to some rubbish cartoon she was watching on Netflix, so I used my phone. It was another very tight game and it looked like it might be JB’s day, but somehow I once again snatched victory from defeat, winning by one point, by buzzing in before I’d really properly worked out the answer to go for “Russell Brandroid†which gave me the win by one point. Not that it would have made any difference to the final score, but I regretted walking into the Animal Farm trap that had been set on the literature round. I should have realised that if the book I was searching for involved animals and was set on a farm then the production would not have used those clues (from JB) and surmised, as I almost did, that it was actually 1984 we were looking for. And a mispronounce of Little Mix as Little Minx lost me another point, but I was allowed the point on the David Bowie question (though they are also songs as well as albums) so I was possibly lucky to get my second victory
Do stay tuned to see how I get on in the last two shows. It’s an enormously fun show, even when you’re not winning it (but it’s better when you are winning).
Another RHLSTP hits the shelves today. And this one has my wife in it. It's me talking to the Drunk Women Solving Crime.
Both video and audio also available on iTunes.
