George Pensotti 1937 - 2010

To Moscow...To Moscow... was written by George Pensotti. Sadly George died on the 22nd of August this year after a period of ill health.

George (pictured below on the right, with Gregory Cox), had an impressive career as an actor, both on stage and on television where he made appearances in episodes of No Hiding Place, The Wednesday Play, Grange Hill, Holby Blue, Doctors and culminated in his playing an array of judges.


In addition to being an actor and writer, George was also a much loved director and teacher. Having taught some of the founder members of the New Factory Of The Eccentric Actor, George kept track of their work and after seeing General Strike 1926, he decided to write a play with them in mind. It was very clear to all concerned that To Moscow...To Moscow... was a labour of love for George (pictured below on the set of Privates On Parade).


I only really met George once, but we got on very well. It was at the first read-through of his script for To Moscow...To Moscow... and my abiding memory was that for the brief time we spoke, despite being in a busy rehearsal room with about thirty other actors, his attention was so focussed that whoever he spoke to felt like the most important person in the room.

Sadly he was in hospital during the performances and never got to see his work staged. He sent cards each night, the first was something along the lines of 'Break a leg', but the second stayed with me as it read "I'm sure you were all wonderful and awful last night". Naturally enough, the end of the play concerned Anton Chekhov's last days and the parallels were not lost on the cast.

Last Thursday, a memorial service was held for George at the Actor's Church in Covent Garden and fittingly it was a full house. Initially I felt slightly fraudulent being among people who knew him so much better than I, but one of the sentiments mentioned during the service was the line from Alan Bennett's The History Boys "Pass it on, boys, pass it on". This was mostly in reference to George's teaching, and although George never taught me directly, I have definitely benefited through the work I've done with the New Factory.

These (much better) obituaries were written for The Guardian and The Stage, by his wife, Diana Quay.

Microfiction Monday #58 & #12

It's Microfiction Monday again:


And here's my attempt:

He had been hunted for sport. Even in death he was mocked by sport. Whoever won, he still lost.

- - - - -

And here's the twelfth picture:


And my response:

Putting the wolf encounter behind her, she decided not to don the hood anymore. She still wore red though, some things were sacred.

The Tables Turned Again

Last week The New Factory Of The Eccentric Actor were asked to perform another rehearsed reading of William Morris' play The Table's Turned in Ladbroke Grove as part of an event called 'Notting Hill Roots' for an organisation called History Talk.

The event was followed by a Q & A, during which I was thankfully asked to provide neither Q's nor A's.

Once again I played Lord Tennyson (above) with the aid of a wonderful hat. And with some the cast from last time being busy I also played the wonderfully named Constable Strongintheoath. Which presumably Terry Pratchett references in his Discworld novels with the name of one of the Dwarves working in the Ankh-Morpork City Watch, Constable Stronginthearm (possibly pictured below).

Twist And Shout

Channel4.com's latest little innovation is words spoken by people off the telly which you can re-order. It's the internet equivalent of those sets of magnetic words on the fridge that really only come into their own when you have a party and everyone ends up in the kitchen. You can make an interesting and cogent sentence, which is philosophically so mind-blowing that it threatens to turn the world upside down, or you can do something like this:



My thanks to Jimmy Carr, Heston Blumenthal, Davina McCall, Phil from Location Location Location, the T4 girl that isn't Miquita Olivia, Derren Brown, Gordon Ramsay, Kevin McCloud & Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall.

Microfiction Monday #57 & #11

It's Microfiction Monday again, here's the picture:


And my attempt:

They call him The Man With No Shame.
But even he thought twice about wearing the same outfit as someone else to the party.

- - - - -

The eleventh picture:


And my response:

Congratulations and welcome to puberty. This will restrict your intake of air and enforce unrealistic expectations of a feminine shape.

We Love Live

The stars have aligned, the fates have smiled upon us and amazingly Pulp have reformed. I couldn't be happier. The Different Class line up of Nick Banks, Jarvis Cocker, Candida Doyle, Steve Mackey, Russell Senior and Mark Webber are back together again. Pulp will be playing some concerts in 2011 and I couldn’t be happier. Now if only I could afford tickets.

By way of celebration, here's a performance of 'This Is Hardcore' from 2000's Reading Festival. I'm stood at the front somewhere...

Top Ten Films They Should Have Made...

Over at Ellie Garratt's blog inspired by the fact that Clint Eastwood was approached to play both James Bond and Superman, she's running a blogfest about the:

I think I've slightly missed the point because for the most part I haven't recast existing movies, but instead I've included some sequels, remakes and adaptations that I'd like to see.

Here's my top ten movies they should have made:

Star Wars Episode II: Attack Of The Clones
Sticking with Jake Lloyd as Anakin Skywalker instead of Hayden Christensen.








Serenity II
They just should. It would be shiny.





Dr Who And The Chase Of The Daleks
Peter Cushing (and probably Roberta Tovey) star in the third Dalek film, the 1967 adaptation of Terry Nation’s television scripts from two years earlier as the time travellers are pursued through history from the Marie Celeste to Mechanus via Morton Dill...



The Restaurant At The End Of The Universe
The Hammer & Tongs Hitchhiker's was not the failure it was deemed to be by hardcore fans and a sequel could have been wonderful.




Wacky Races: The Movie
I'm amazed that a live action Wacky Races with CGI cars and hi-jinx hasn't happened already.



The Secret Of Monkey Island
When I saw Pirates Of The Caribbean I knew there would never be a Monkey Island movie which is unfortunate since it was awful. When such a mediocre film had two such successful sequels and a third on the way, I began to wonder...

Strontium Dog
As 2000 AD's stony-faced figurehead Judge Dredd gets a second cinematic outing, but I'd be very interested in seeing Johnny Alpha on the silver screen. Would geek-du-jour Simon Pegg be interested in playing him again?




Porno
Danny Boyle and Ewan McGregor need to get over whatever they fell out about and get on with making this.






Somegreybloke
The YouTubings of Somegreybloke have left me wondering what a big screen version would be like?




Star Wars Episode III: Revenge Of The Sith
With Jake Lloyd as Anakin Skywalker instead of Hayden Christensen again. I really don't like Hayden Christensen.