Matthew Kelly and son hit town, not each other
Matthew Kelly has a unique, some might say odd, relationship with his own son, Matthew Rickson. The two of them played together in Beckett’’s Endgame in Liverpool last year then sealed their onstage partnership as ugly sisters in pantomime.
Now Matthew senior has opened, most impressively, as George in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at the Trafalgar Studios, and Matthew junior was on hand — in the very front row — as his Dad expatiated bitchily on the son he never really had in the play.
It was as if an actor playing King Lear were to deliver the sterility curse to Goneril in an intimate studio theatre with his own real-life daughter sitting right behind him.
I have to say Matthew junior — who bears an uncanny resemblance to his Dad, being tall and gawky, though slightly better looking — suffered the ordeal with a very good grace and joined in giving Matthew senior and his co-star Tracey Childs as Martha a fully deserved and resounding ovation at the end.
And if Dad had fluffed a line or even — heaven forfend — keeled over, you felt that Matthew junior was handily placed on the end of the front row to whip off the horn-rimmed specs and moth-eaten cardigan and carry on in the role himself.
He was cosily nestled there with Rula Lenska, Christopher Timothy and the director of Rula’s new play down at the Mill at Sonning, David Taylor. I’d coincidentally spent lunchtime with Rula, who’s a Polish countess, telling me about her plans to try and wrest back some of the Warsaw lands and stately houses the Communists confiscated from her family after the last War.
I also mused to myself that she and Christopher Timothy might make a very good George and Martha themselves in a few years time. And I have to say Rula would also make a much better fist of the European countess in A Little Night Music than Maureen Lipman — excellent though she is, in a Lady Bracknell-ish way — is currently doing at the Garrick. She’s the genuine article, after all.
She has already played Desiree Armfeldt in Night Music, at Plymouth, when Glynis Johns was slated to play the countess. Glynis, who had great success as both Desiree and the countess in her day, was by that time pretty far gone, poor love, so never figured beyond a couple of rehearsals.
Hey-ho the travelling life. It was a glorious day down by the river in Sonning. I arrived early for my appointment so followed the bend in the river round towards the lock. You stand still. The water laps at the bankside, the birds soar and settle in the green flat fields, a distant canal boat chugs comfortingly towards you. There’s no landscape more beautiful on a summer’s day in the heart of England.
Coming back to the squash and clamour of the Trafalgar Studios is a bit of a downer. I thought I’d go mad and treat myself to an interval ice-cream but as they wanted to charge me £3 I said they could keep it, or words to that effect.
More barbarism from the Trafalgar host company Ambassador Theatre Group: milk for coffe and tea (served in cardboard; no proper cups offered) is now dispensed in squidgy plastic tubes, like mayonnaise in cheap cafes, impossible to open without squirting other disgruntled customers at the bar.
I apologised to Rula for not having changed my clothes since lunchtime. She of course had, and looked as unostentatiously stunning as she always does. Jenny Seagrove was just as lively a feature of the first night crowd, though more under-dressed.
She’s saving herself, Jenny, for this weekend’s big FA Cup semi-final at Wembley Stadium when her partner Bill Kenwright’s team, Everton, take on the slightly faltering but brilliantly mercurial Manchester United side.
Jenny is convinced this year that Everton’s name is on the FA Cup, and there’s no triumph that would mean more to Kenwright, that’s for certain. Meanwhile, Jenny said how pleased she was that my team, Tottenham Hotspur, had made such a good recovery in the Premiership.
I’m still kicking myself for not betting three months ago on Spurs finishing way above Hull City in the league, when they were dicing with a relegation place and Hull were achieving a series of unlikely victories.I could have cleaned up. I could have been a contender.
Instead I lost out, as I did at the Grand National. Again, I backed the ride of theatre owner Stephen Waley-Cohen’s nephew and took a punt, too, on Madeleine Lloyd Webber’s horse. The first nag fell early on, the second limped home after fading badly.
What a mug I am. Cheering news from Stratford-upon-Avon, though, where former hostess of the Dirty Duck, Pam Harris, recovering well after severe illness, backed the eventual 100-1 winner. But there’s bad news, too: she only put on a pound!