The cup was chipped and handleless, but the malt tasted good. When he reckoned that Charles was sitting comfortably, Michael began. ‘No, I shouldn’t have taken this job. Amateurs have no concept of theatre. Look at it. This evening I should have been working, improvising, creating something, and what happens? Half my cast are rehearsing for some bloody revue, half of them are doing some dreary Shakespeare crap, half of them aren’t interested…’
‘And half of them get stabbed…’
‘Yes.’ He nodded vigorously. ‘Though he wasn’t a lot more use to me when he was alive.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Never came to bloody rehearsals. Didn’t participate in the concentration exercises or movement classes, any of the workshop stuff. I mean, how can you build an ensemble with people like that? He hadn’t any acting talent anyway.’
‘Then why did you cast him in your show?’
‘I didn’t cast him. Look, I’m offered this job-’
‘You mean you’re nothing to do with the university?’
‘Good God, no.’ Michael was severely affronted. ‘I’m a professional director. They booked me to get some professional feel into their production. And then like bloody amateurs they don’t give me enough time to get it together properly. Everyone off for other rehearsals. Do you know how long it takes to build up an ensemble?’
‘About four years?’
‘Well, four weeks anyway. And four weeks’ work. Not four weeks doing bourgeois revues and middle-class Shakespeare.’
‘No, of course not. You were saying how Willy Mariello came to be in the show…’
‘Yes. O.K., I take the job. I go to Derby to hold auditions. And already I’m told that Willy is doing the music and, since Rizzio’s a guitarist and he has a couple of songs, O.K., he’s playing Rizzio too.’
‘Who told you this?’
‘Sam Wasserman, the guy who wrote this crappy play.’
‘Is it crappy?’
‘Yes, but it doesn’t matter.’
‘Why not?’
‘My style of direction doesn’t need a good play. In fact the play can get in the way. It’s only a starting point from which the totality emerges-the iron filing dropped into the acid which produces the perfect crystal.’ He added the last image with great satisfaction, albeit dubious chemistry. Then he looked at Charles with pitying contempt. ‘I suppose you still think a play has got to have words.’
Charles smiled apologetically. There was no point in alienating such a ready source of information. ‘Yes, I am a bit of an old fuddy-duddy on that score. I expect Sam Wasserman probably thinks words are quite important too.’
‘Maybe.’
‘He sounds an interesting bloke. I’d like to meet him.’
Michael gave a snort of laughter that could have meant anything. ‘You should get a chance quite soon. He’s coming up to Edinburgh.’
‘For the opening in the Third Week?’
‘No, before that, I hope. We’ve been sending telegrams all over Europe for him. He’s going to come up and take over the part of Rizzio.’
‘Oh really.’ That was very interesting. ‘He plays guitar too?’
‘Yes. He was going to do the music for the show himself until Willy was brought in.’
‘Ah.’ That was also interesting. ‘So everything’s back to where it started?’
‘I suppose so. More drink?’
‘Thank you.’ Charles held out his cup and the malt was sloshed in like school soup. Trying desperately to sound casual, he asked, ‘What did you think of Willy Mariello?’
‘Useless, unco-operative bastard. Ruining my production. From my point of view, his death was the best thing that could have happened.’
It was an uncompromising statement of hatred. So much so that Charles felt inclined to discount it. A murderer would be more guarded
… Unless it was an elaborate double bluff… Oh dear. The further he got into the business of detection, the further certainty seemed to recede. Still, keep on probing. Try to find out some more hard facts. Again he imposed a relaxed tone on his voice. ‘Were you rehearsing last weekend?’
‘Of course. I rehearse whenever I can get my cast together. I am trying to create something, you know.’
‘Of course. So Willy was rehearsing all weekend?’
‘No. That’s a good example of what I mean. He rehearses on Saturday with his usual bad grace. Sunday-no sign of him. Monday he is not there and I am so furious I break the rehearsal and I go up to his house to drag him back-by force if necessary.’
‘Was he there?’
‘Oh yes, he’s there. Calmly decorating. Plaster dust everywhere, paint brushes, so on and so on.
‘Did you get him to rehearsal?’
‘Yes, till mid-afternoon. Then he slipped off again when we had a break.’
‘Hmm. Perhaps he wanted to get back to his decorating.’
‘Yes. Or to the girl.’
‘Girl?’
‘Yes. When I finally got him out on the Monday morning, he called out “Goodbye” to someone upstairs.’
CHAPTER SIX
In they go-in jackets, and cloaks,
Plumes, and bonnets, turbans and toques,
As if to a Congress of Nations:
Greeks and Malays, with daggers and dirks,
Spaniards, Jews, Chinese, and Turks Some like original foreign works,
But mostly like bad translations.
By Sunday 18th AugustEdinburgh was beginning to feel the Festival. Over-night the city was full of tourists-tweedy music-lovers on leisurely promenades, earnest Americans decked with rucksacks and guide-books, French and Japanese drawn by the twin attractions of culture and Marks and Spencer pullovers. The residents who had not escaped on holiday wore expressions of resignation, hardened to the idea of their streets clogged with ambling foreigners, their early nights troubled by returning revue audiences and the distant massed pipes and drums of the Military Tattoo.
Because that Sunday was the day when it all started officially. In the words of the Festival brochure, ‘The twenty-eighth Edinburgh Festival will be opened with a Service of Praise and Thanksgiving in St Giles’ Cathedral on Sunday 18th August at 3 p.m. Later, starting from the Castle Esplanade at 9.45 p.m., relays of torch-bearing runners will light a bonfire on Arthur’s Seat.’
And in the little halls of Edinburgh on that Sunday morning would-be cultural torch-bearers blew earnestly at the smoulderings of what was in many cases incombustible material. Experimental and university groups realised that their rehearsal time was running out and put on a spurt to justify the extravagant claims of their publicity. There were dress rehearsals for at least a dozen ‘funniest revues on the Fringe’, some twenty ‘revolutionary new plays’, and three or four ‘new artistic concepts which would flatten the accepted barriers of culture’. If all these ambitions were realised, British theatre would never be the same again.
In the Masonic Hall in Lauriston Street Charles Paris was trying to realise more humble ambitions and finding it hard work. The lighting technician he had been allocated was a fat and contemptuous youth, whose blue denim had faded and dirtied to the colour of sludge. He was known as Plug, and Charles found it difficult to call anyone ‘Plug’.
It had been made clear that, considering the exacting demands of creative amateur theatre, there was not going to be much time or effort left for him, a mere professional. ‘Um… Plug?’ he said exploratively, ‘I wonder about the chances of moving the back-projector round. If it stays there, I’m going to be masking the slides.’
‘That’d mean moving the screen too,’ Plug grunted accusingly.
‘Yes, it will.’
‘Can’t be done. Haven’t got the extension leads.’
‘Can’t you get them?’
‘Shouldn’t think so.’
Charles bit back his anger. It was difficult dealing with amateurs. In a professional context, no problem; he could have bawled the guy out, justified because a service that was being paid for was not being provided. But the amateur relies on goodwill and there did not seem to be much of it in evidence.