myself in for?
We had a drink, then I admitted I was exhausted. ‘I really must get some sleep. So where is my bed, exactly?’
‘Right there,’ he said. And he pointed to a patch of worn carpet in front of the fire.
Unfortunately, even if I did get a bed it wasn’t always Savoy standard. One time I slipped right off the mattress and on to the floor because of the nylon sheets in a guesthouse in Brighton. Now it’s cotton sheets only for me. I’d sleep in linen, if they weren’t so expensive. Whatever tour I’ve been on, the big dream has always been the same: a transfer to the West End. I love travel. But London felt like home. And in 1975 I was about to move right to the heart of things.
Veronica and her husband Gerald owned the Phoenix Theatre on Charing Cross Road. It’s a theatre that’s somehow easy to overlook – though it had just the kind of pedigree I loved. It opened in 1930 with Noel Coward playing alongside Gertrude Lawrence and Laurence Olivier in the premier of Private Lives . Noel and Gertie were back again later that decade with Tonight at 8.30 and apparently they referred to the place as ‘our theatre’. I wanted to make it mine.
I had the chance because what very few people knew was that above the theatre were 25 small studio flats, all available to rent for just £14 a week. I had to have one. I’d moved on from Ifield Road and tried living with a fellow actor and his girlfriend in a flat in Oxford Circus. But it was a tense, tricky little household, and I soon realised that love triangles really aren’t my thing.
I begged Veronica to let me know if any of her rooms ever became available – and I moved in the moment one did. It was just wonderful to be so close to the heart of London – and for an actor it was amazing to live, quite literally, above the shop. I loved my Phoenix rooms – well, room. I had a sofa bed and put throws over the tiny kitchen area to hide the fact that my whole world was in one single space. Overall I was convinced that I had created theatreland’s most glamorous room. It seemed that word had got around.
We had a wonderful old prostitute in the building, living in the flat above me. She was in her fifties and had a gammy leg, but she was a game old bird. Off she went to work every day and she always wanted to see the inside of my flat. ‘They say it’s beautiful. Let me look,’ she’d say.
‘Come in, then, and have a drink,’ I said one night.
She could hardly speak when she looked around. ‘Oh, oh, oh, this is gorgeous. You see, my flat’s all bed.’ She said. Occupational hazard, I suppose.
Opposite I had another wonderful character, the mad woman across the hall who worked on the markets. Her tiny flat was chock-a-block with rubbish. She stacked up anything and everything she could sell – my dad would have loved her. One of my new pals, the actress Georgina Simpson, heiress to the Simpson’s of Piccadilly clothing fortune and the woman who would marry Anthony Andrews, certainly fell under my neighbour’s spell. She was round one evening and didn’t have anything to wear for a party. So we went across the hall, knocked on the door to see if my neighbour had any dresses. Georgina got one for £3 – and she looked a million dollars.
Georgina soon turned into the sister I never had. We met through Jonathan and Vivien in Fulham. They had been invited to a ‘society’ party at some country pile and I was determined to come too. So determined that I offered to do the driving. Even though my dad had offered me plenty of flash, refurbished cars over the years I always stuck with something a lot less glamorous. A white van. I’d needed it when I was propping and had to help move the sets around on various tours. So I still drove it. And it certainly set us apart from the other guests out in the country. We pulled into a vast driveway, past Rolls-Royces, Bentleys and Maseratis. ‘They’ll think we’re the hired help,’ I
We had a drink, then I admitted I was exhausted. ‘I really must get some sleep. So where is my bed, exactly?’
‘Right there,’ he said. And he pointed to a patch of worn carpet in front of the fire.
Unfortunately, even if I did get a bed it wasn’t always Savoy standard. One time I slipped right off the mattress and on to the floor because of the nylon sheets in a guesthouse in Brighton. Now it’s cotton sheets only for me. I’d sleep in linen, if they weren’t so expensive. Whatever tour I’ve been on, the big dream has always been the same: a transfer to the West End. I love travel. But London felt like home. And in 1975 I was about to move right to the heart of things.
Veronica and her husband Gerald owned the Phoenix Theatre on Charing Cross Road. It’s a theatre that’s somehow easy to overlook – though it had just the kind of pedigree I loved. It opened in 1930 with Noel Coward playing alongside Gertrude Lawrence and Laurence Olivier in the premier of Private Lives . Noel and Gertie were back again later that decade with Tonight at 8.30 and apparently they referred to the place as ‘our theatre’. I wanted to make it mine.
I had the chance because what very few people knew was that above the theatre were 25 small studio flats, all available to rent for just £14 a week. I had to have one. I’d moved on from Ifield Road and tried living with a fellow actor and his girlfriend in a flat in Oxford Circus. But it was a tense, tricky little household, and I soon realised that love triangles really aren’t my thing.
I begged Veronica to let me know if any of her rooms ever became available – and I moved in the moment one did. It was just wonderful to be so close to the heart of London – and for an actor it was amazing to live, quite literally, above the shop. I loved my Phoenix rooms – well, room. I had a sofa bed and put throws over the tiny kitchen area to hide the fact that my whole world was in one single space. Overall I was convinced that I had created theatreland’s most glamorous room. It seemed that word had got around.
We had a wonderful old prostitute in the building, living in the flat above me. She was in her fifties and had a gammy leg, but she was a game old bird. Off she went to work every day and she always wanted to see the inside of my flat. ‘They say it’s beautiful. Let me look,’ she’d say.
‘Come in, then, and have a drink,’ I said one night.
She could hardly speak when she looked around. ‘Oh, oh, oh, this is gorgeous. You see, my flat’s all bed.’ She said. Occupational hazard, I suppose.
Opposite I had another wonderful character, the mad woman across the hall who worked on the markets. Her tiny flat was chock-a-block with rubbish. She stacked up anything and everything she could sell – my dad would have loved her. One of my new pals, the actress Georgina Simpson, heiress to the Simpson’s of Piccadilly clothing fortune and the woman who would marry Anthony Andrews, certainly fell under my neighbour’s spell. She was round one evening and didn’t have anything to wear for a party. So we went across the hall, knocked on the door to see if my neighbour had any dresses. Georgina got one for £3 – and she looked a million dollars.
Georgina soon turned into the sister I never had. We met through Jonathan and Vivien in Fulham. They had been invited to a ‘society’ party at some country pile and I was determined to come too. So determined that I offered to do the driving. Even though my dad had offered me plenty of flash, refurbished cars over the years I always stuck with something a lot less glamorous. A white van. I’d needed it when I was propping and had to help move the sets around on various tours. So I still drove it. And it certainly set us apart from the other guests out in the country. We pulled into a vast driveway, past Rolls-Royces, Bentleys and Maseratis. ‘They’ll think we’re the hired help,’ I
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