Diary of a Gossip: What has Elton John got to do with Propeller?

Tony Bell will be keeping a blog during Richard III and Comedy of Errors, sharing personal insights into his experiences with the tour. Entries will be posted on the home page, as well as collected in links under the 'Tour Diary' tab.*

“What has Elton John got to do with Propeller?”
Week Three, Girona


I’ve still got it. My mojo that is. My voice is another matter, but we won’t go
into that now. Let’s accentuate the positive. I know the last blog was a little off
piste, a little ‘bnt’ (‘bitter and twisted,’ not the sandwich, that’s ‘blt’), but it came
from another time, a darker one, before the Richard rebirth. That’s all gone, that
melancholia. It may come back, of course, after three hundred performances of the
same “venomous queen” (Surrey Advertiser), but for now it’s all chocolate and roses,
or anchovies and figs.




That’s what we had for breakfast at the Hotel Ultonia, in Girona, in Espana - a lot of
a’s in Spanish don’t you find? I haven’t had a fig before, at least not one that wasn’t
in a roll, though weirdly I had anchovies last night, before jet lag let me sleep (can
you have jet lag after a two hour flight?) The first lot of anchovies I brought with
me in a tupperware. They were seven pounds fifty from the Dulwich deli and at that
price I didn’t want them rotting in the fridge. The second lot came at breakfast with
chorizo, stinky cheese, and the aforementioned figs. Chris Myles reckons figs are
fantastic roasted in the oven with brandy and brown sugar, though I don’t remember
these on the menu at the Buckingham’s Christmas do last year. I do remember Chris’
wife’s alcohol free mince pies, however. Now I know where the brandy went.

We’ve got a day off today, and after two Spanish shows, there’s another week
off. Life’s not boring though, far from it. Richmond, and Edward, haven’t arrived
yet, since they’re both played by Robert Hands. Was it an identity crisis, which
made Robert arrive four hours early at Stansted, then shop for five? Or just that
Rob is a “Material Girl”? Either way, we’re not worried, it’s not the first time
we’ve travelled a little light. Last time, I walked into the toilet at the departure
gate, passport poking seductively from pocket, and unzipped next to a man with a
moustache, who relieved me of more than the contents of my bladder. My wallet must
have gone down the same black hole as my passport, because while Propeller walked
onto the plane I walked to East Dulwich, despite my ‘damsel in distress’ impro to the
men in uniform.

Next morning, with ink still drying on my new passport, I jumped on the back of
a motorbike, and screamed all the way down the M25 to Heathrow. I roared into
Business Class, grabbed a bottle of complimentary Dom Perignon, jumped into a
Cortina, made a “No Country for Old Men” dash across Spanish desert (it’s not
actually set in Spain is it, it’s just got a smoky Spaniard in the lead?), arriving just in
time to knock Catalonia dead with a wonderfully windswept Tranio. That’s the way
I remember it, anyhow. In truth, the company was more interested in rehearsing the
understudy for Tam Williams, who had dashed in the other direction for the birth of
his second child. There’s never a dull moment when Propeller comes to Spain.

Actually, there’s never a dull moment, wherever we go. Touring is when the company
really bonds. We’re living in each other’s pockets you see, just like a real family.
Take last night when we arrived at the hotel, hot, sweaty, and very rock and roll:

Interior. Hotel Ultonia. 10pm

Ratcliffe: How’s your room Dave?
Catesby: Bloody awful. Some Spanish throwback’s playing Elton John at full
volume. And some other inconsiderate, ‘scuse my Spanish, bastardo, is running a
bath, sounds like Niagara bloody Falls
Margaret: Er Dave, that’s me, I’m afraid. I always take a bath when I’ve been
travelling, you see, helps me relax, soaks out the tension
Catesby: Well, I’m glad you’re relaxed, Tone, that’s pukka, sweet as, but can you
please tense up again and explain those crimes to music? I really need to know this,
mate, am I sharing walls with an Elton John freak?
Margaret: Er, yes, actually, but only the early stuff, before fame ruined his talent
Catesby: It was “Candle in the Wind,” mate
Margaret: “Don’t let the Sun go down” actually, and it was George Michael not
Elton, although Elton does duet on the chorus
Catesby: That’s it, I’m changing rooms, I’ve got my girlfriend coming over, no
offence, mate…

In truth, Dave speaks nothing like Ray Winstone, he’s a softly spoken boy from
Lincoln, oh, and his girlfriend is already here, but the rest is exactly as it happened.
Honest.

Seriously, though, what could be better? A day off in sunny Spain, while London
snows to a standstill. A day exploring the history of one of Catalonia’s oldest towns.
There’s the Cathedral, dating from, oh, ages ago, and the castle from medieval times
(did they have that in Spain?), and the gloriously evocative city walls, that you can
walk on the top of, and feel the stone under your feet from, from, look I can’t help
it if I’m stuck in my room like Stig of the Danube (wrong country, sorry.) It’s not
my fault, I’ve got a sodding blog to write. I’ll be out there culture-vulturing soon, I
promise.

Alright, I’ll come clean. There are those in Propeller who do that sort of thing, and
those that don’t. Traditionally, I’m one of those that don’t. I prefer to play Elton John,
he’s universal I find, crosses all cultural boundaries. I haven’t got the measure of who
is in the culture camp this time. Chris Myles for sure, he of the figs. Chris and Jonny
McGuinness used to be the educational option on our first world tour, circa 1998. I
spent a fascinating day in Mexico looking round old houses for signs of Communist
habitation. I believe Trotsky may have been shot in one, certainly the artists Frida
Kahlo and Diego Rivera lived in several, in a famously open marriage, which meant
that he slept around and she didn’t, from what I can google. But I digress.

Let me set out for you the alternative, non-educational, options on offer to those
travelling with Propeller back in the day. If you wanted sport you went with
Ratcliffe, alias Duguld Bruce Lockhart, to one of the expatriate country clubs, and
got thrashed at Squash, or swam with other more buff actors like Dougie himself, or
the humpback, before he got the hump. If you wanted to eat you went with Emilio
Doorgasingh, sadly no longer with us (he’s not dead, he’s in Los Angeles, so right the
first time, actually). Emilio wouldn’t take you to Michelin starred restaurants, only
Michelin priced ones. Whether it was Italy, Greece, or Asia, you spent a lot, drank
a lot, then shopped a lot, drunk, in Prada, or Versace, or Zara, for sweaters, or tight
trousers. He gave me a whole new wardrobe in Mexico, which sadly all shrank. Even
the stuff I didn’t wash.

Okay, I know you’re dying to ask, what options did I choose? Well, I kind of floated,
and I also did my own ‘off the cuff’ options. In Mexico I was arrested for drinking
in the street. This involved armed police wrestling with my stripy yoga pants (from
Sri Lanka, I think) which seemed to have an inordinately long elastic, because they
stretched for at least twenty feet while I shouted “I am English, get off my trousers!”
In Bangladesh, I spent a day attached to a saline drip after food poisoning, and was
rather gently assaulted by the house boy, who rested his hand rather high up my
thigh while the doctor went for supplies. After a moment of indecision I said sotto
voce “not today thank you, I’m a bit under the weather,” whereupon he withdrew
contact, and padded barefoot back to his room. In the Philippines, I spent an evening
locked in a nightclub toilet with three exuberant transsexuals, but that’s another story.

The phone just rang in my room, conveniently. It’s Chris, he’s asking, do I want
to come with him to see the Cathedral? Actually, I think I will, it’s never too late
to educate oneself is it? And with Chris things tend to be safer. He’s Councilor for
Hackney, and a father of two for Pete’s sake, he’s a responsible adult. There’ll be
no danger of any dodgy ‘off the cuff’ stuff there. Which is a good thing isn’t it?
I’m older now, more mature. It’s about time I found different ways to keep myself
amused. Isn’t it?


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