No hanging around...

There was a lot of noise emanating from the green room during Monday morning. We’d got used to loud banging (as the actress said to the bishop) in the early stages of the project but of late it’s been much quieter. The cause of the cacophony was the demolition of the green room bar, and a sturdy construction it was too! It now lies in a heap on the floor, awaiting the arrival of a skip to cart it away.

As we suspected, the delivery time for a platform lift is 4-6 weeks, so this won’t be installed at the same time as the rest of the green room work. All the arrangements will be made in advance, however, so that the disabled lift can be fitted quickly and easily in mid- to late-August.

Yesterday, with only two weeks to go until the auditorium reopens, things suddenly seemed to move up a gear. There were more people on site than at any time since the project began, including five contractors, four plumbers, three electricians and two painters – not to mention the arrival of several rolls of underlay and carpet, some of which already appears to have taken up residence in the dressing rooms.

Lyn Morgan dropped by again yesterday and revealed what was, to me at any rate, another new fact. I knew that in the early-1950s, a fire destroyed part of one of the balconies and part of the stage area after the opening performance of a play on a Saturday night. What I didn’t know was that the balconies themselves were then used as dressing ‘rooms’, as this was before the formation of the Theatre & Arts Club and the acquisition of the rest of the complex. Although the theatre remained shut for some considerable time for restoration – far longer, in fact, than the current refurbishment is taking – the play that was being staged at the time of the fire simply moved to Pate’s Grammar School for the rest of the run, without, we believe, missing a single scheduled performance!