My own pre-Christmas rush….

Take yesterday. I wrote yesterday’s blog entry first (the daily morning ritual!), then set off to Holland Park to interview Janie Dee, currently starring in Shadowlands which transfers from Wyndham’s to deservedly continue its run at the Novello from tomorrow, at home, for the weekly profile page I have been doing, alongside my review round-up, in the Sunday Express (and will now have to write up this morning as soon as I’ve done this!). This was my second big face-to-face interview with her (though I’d previously to both of them also done a phoner with her): in 2003, she was touring in Peter Hall’s double-bill of Design for Living and Betrayal ahead of bringing the latter to the West End, and I went to Richmond Theatre to meet her. It was one of the last days of the summer, and I remember she grabbed a rug and took us off to Richmond Green to do the interview sitting on the ground there.

I do a lot of interviews in my line of work, and invariably we’re both there under polite duress: the interviewee to promote something, the interviewer to collect material. But Janie, in person as onstage, can’t help but give something else of herself: if in acting she exposes something of her very soul, in person she exudes the source of it in a restless, questioning intelligence and a direct honesty that’s completely disarming. And she’s also, to boot, a great story! She has gone from end-of-pier dancer to serious West End actress, appearing in Ayckbourn and Pinter and working with directors from Sir Alan himself and Peter Hall to Richard Eyre, that marks her out as a serious original.

From there, I went to tour the National Theatre Studio, newly returned last month to their permanent base next door to the Old Vic after a £6million, 15-month refurbishment under the stewardship of theatrical architect wizards Haworth Tompkins, who also did such sterling work on the Young Vic just along the street and of course also the Royal Court. One of their signatures is to retain both the original feel of the place (and even retain remnants of its original features, which here at the Studio includes a multi-coloured wall that used to be part of a scenery painting rack) but also expand on its resources, in this case doubling the studio’s development capabilities. New offices have been created that allow the National to give a physical home for invited associate artists to base themselves at. These currently include two people I know: playwright Matt Charman (whose The Five Wives of Maurice Pinder was seen in the Cottesloe earlier this year, but whom I knew in an earlier life when both he and I worked for Whatsonstage) and director Elizabeth Freestone (whom I first met when she was producing radio programmes for Radio 4 and got me involved in one she was doing on the history and importance of the National Youth Theatre).

Wandering around the studio yesterday, I see Katie Mitchell holding a workshop with young directors, while a physical theatre workshop is happening in another room. But there is also, for the first time, a public part to the studio, too, since the National Theater’s archive is newly based here, and members of the public can, by appointment, come to view material from the extensive digital archive that is being created, which includes the taping of all new productions at the National, as well as filming the platform performances that take place around them. I discover I am already part of this archive myself: I hosted a platform session on A Matter of Life and Death with director Emma Rice and co-adaptor Tom Morris, and it’s now there available to view alongside the show itself.

The National Studio now adds yet another dimension to this thriving stretch of Southwark: a couple of weeks ago I also went on a tour of another theatrical resource, Jerwood Space, following its own expansion with a brand-new studio built onto the roof. Jerwood Space has already long been one of London theatre’s premiere rehearsal spaces for hire; I have interviewed several actors here in the last few years. This new capacity will only consolidate its sought-after position; but the great thing about Jerwood is that it allows the “top end” hirers like West End plays and musicals to cross-subsidise far cheaper rentals to fringe and other companies in the smaller spaces or down-time between the other users. And Jerwood is also open to all, not just actors, to visit thanks to its welcoming café and exhibition areas.

But back to yesterday: I then crossed the road to Waterloo station and took the overground train to Richmond (far quicker than the laborious trip on the District Line that in fact rendered my friend late) for the matinee of this year’s panto there, Cinderella. This is commercial panto at its most sparkly: yes, shows like the indigenously created Hackney Empire spectacle (this year, Dick Whittington and His Cat) may have more local heart and art, but this panto, dusted down off the shelf of new production giants First Family Entertainment, is anchored by a speciality act of such goodwill (if yesterday, poor voice since he was clearly labouring under a severely taxed throat) from Paul Zerdin as a ventriloquist Buttons that I was won over far more fully than the Old Vic version managed to do. And this is panto that also offers a crash course in modern musical theatre hits: it opens with “You Can’t Stop the Beat” from Hairspray and ends with a song from High School Musical, with “Bosom Buddies” from Mame (naturally for the Ugly Sisters, played here by John Barr and Ian Good in full flight drag horror), and Sunset Boulevard’s ‘The Perfect Year’ for the Prince and Cinderella, inbetweeen. All of that and Simon Lipkin, fresh from Avenue Q, as Dandini – what more could you want?

Then last night I should have been going to Marianne Dreams, the final major opening of the year and the Almeida’s first play for younger audiences, but then I read David Rooney’s Variety review for Kiki and Herb’s second Carnegie Hall show last week and decided I had to go see them make their first London appearance for a year at the rather less salubrious Shepherd’s Bush Empire last night instead. Unfortunately I received a double blow from the experience: first of all the dangers of reading a review that quotes so much of the material that the surprise of the new journey of discovery they are taking you on is ruined, but also that of a building so inherently not fit for the purpose of holding live theatrical performance that it spoilt whatever was left to ruin. I have only ever encountered the Empire before as I competed with its crowds on my way into the Bush next door, which is where I longed to be last night instead (and should have been, given the reviews for its current production, tHe dYsFUnCKshOnalZ!, that I have missed and ends on Saturday).

From the messily inefficient box office ticket collection points (only one window was manned at 7pm when I arrived, and was dealing endlessly with one customer for about ten minutes), to the unreserved seating (or downstairs, standing) policy that has the doors open a full hour before the performance and therefore requires you to find a place and then defend it, this was not obviously not going to be an easy experience. But I didn’t realise, either, that I’d managed to buy myself a ticket that gained me access only to Level 2 – what traditional thatres would call the upper circle – which put me at a distance from the stage I have long been spoilt to be able to avoid.

Still, at least I wasn’t standing downstairs; but I also felt like I was sitting in a draughty wind funnel in the front row. I was even colder than I had been at Southwark Playhouse last weekend, as I reported here, and when Kiki and Herb finally appeared, the sound was terrible. By the interval, it was time to flee; but even then, the horrors did not end. A bolshy security man was barring the exit; only 20 people were allowed outside at a time, he said, as he was fending off would-be smokers. It was only when I protested that I actually wanted to leave for good that he finally let me pass. I’ll stick to theatres in future.