Mal weather on Mull
Monday morning and the weather’s not great here on Mull. Did my show on Saturday night in the soon to be finished Mull theatre (school chairs covered in paint, walls still bare board with ceiling beams still showing like ribs).
For a while now I’ve had a rule that I don’t do shows anywhere where there are either Bunsen burners (ie. Uni lecture theaters) or plastic chairs (school halls), well unless I’m talking to kids. The reason is that neither tend to be conducive to a good night, either because the venue is designed for a guy in a cardigan talking about particles physics (a twelve foot long, five foot thick work bench with sinks built in isn’t great stage furniture), or because the seating; folding wooden lecture theatre seats, or plastic chairs, tend to have even the most attentive audience shuffling within about twenty minutes.
And so, when I got to the Mull theatre - spoiled these days by fancy venues and big turn outs - and saw a half finished room, lined with about fifty schools chairs my heart sank, especially considering the big journey and expense in doing the gig (six hour drive, expensive ferry ride, two nights accommodation). When I asked George , the friendly and helpful tech guy from the theatre what would happen if more than fifty people came, he just said “we only have fifty seats”.
But you know what, sometimes you forget why you do this (especially when you’re tired after being on the road, sleeping in your car etc). It’s not about making money, or getting bums on comfortable seats, it’s about having the privilege of going to new places, and people coming to listen to what you have to say, Bunsen burners or not.
And so, when 8.00 o’clock came around people came, lots of people, in fact more people than we had chairs, maybe more people than had been to this tiny local theatre before, and I felt humbled that they came out on a nasty night.
And what about the chairs? Well luckily although we were thirty chairs short, a lot of people had braved the Mull theaters seating before and so brought their own.
— September 29, 2008 12:09 PM
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