Weekly News: Spacey, Altman, Schell

I’m deep into my tour, playing to good houses but suffering from the performer’s perennial terror — what if I turn up to a gig . . . and no one else does?

Could I still go out on the boards, on a mission to inspire just the techies and stage hands with positive mantras?

When my stage fright is at its worst, I remember a tale told to me by Les Dennis, the comedian and Celebrity Big Brother star.
At the height of his personal problems, when he had just separated from his wife Amanda Holden under the glare of the redtop Press, he found himself playing to a house of about three dozen in Aylesbury.
“It would have been rude to ignore them,” he told me. “So I got out my mobile, called the local pizza parlour and had them bike round a stack of margaritas. With extra onion.”

The extra onion was a stroke of genius. Now before I go into a theatre, I always check my phone is fully charged and there’s a page torn from the “P” section of the Yellow Pages in my back pocket.

THE Old Vic was packed on Saturday night, though it wasn’t me the crowd were straining to see. It was the opening night of Resurrection Blues, with Maximilian Schell, Matthew Modin, Neve Campbell and James Fox.
Hanna, Shipi and I were there at the personal invitation of the director, Kevin Spacey, who sent a text message to my phone:
“U hv got 2 come 2 the 1st nite of my new play. Rite up yr street.”

Kevin is the Renaissance Man of theatre. An Oscar-winning actor who doesn’t have a single sub-standard movie to his name, he landed the megastar’s ultimate dream job when he was appointed Artistic Director at the Old Vic.Every Hollywood hunk and babe wants to act in the West End: Kevin runs a chunk of it. As well as directing Resurrection Blues this year, he’s doing Shakespeare with Trevor Nunn, in Richard II. And he’s Lex Luther in the upcoming Superman Returns. Kevin was greeting everyone in the foyer, and I’m fascinated by his ability to be world-famous and yet a man of mystery. I’ve worked at a mysterious persona for decades, but Kevin’s is so effortless.
“It’s a professional necessity,” he told me with a shrug. “I’m not trying to create any mystique by keeping my private life private — it’s just that the less you know about me, the easier it is to convince you that I am that character on screen. It allows the audience to come into the theatre and believe.”

Robert Altman, whose career as a director spans six decades, had flown over from Los Angeles especially for the performance — and was flying back for the Oscars the following evening, where he was due to pick up a Lifetime Achievement award. The master of movies from McCabe And Mrs Miller to Gosford Park deserves nothing less.

MY companion nudged me as we tucked into an aftershow meal. “That’s Robert Smith,” he muttered.
“Who?” I asked. “Where?” I followed his gaze and saw a magnificently eye-shadowed man with a coal-black bird’s-nest of hair.
“Is he famous? Smith is a stupid name for a celebrity — who’s going to remember that? And anyway, there are so many other celebrity Smiths: I know Mel Smith, Delia Smith, Will Smith, Patti Smith, WH Smith . . . . but not Robert.”
“He’s a pop star,” I was told. “You must have heard of The Cure. He’s the lead singer, the driving force. You’d know loads of their songs. Massive in the Eighties.”

Now I would have been inclined to leave poor Mr Smith alone, but the editor of The Weekly News is a hard taskmaster, always demanding more photos of me with the famous and infamous.So I strolled over to the unsuspecting singer and (forgive me, reader) told him that I had followed his work for a long time. “I’m a great admirer,” I said. “Could we take a picture together?”
He gaped for a second, and then shrugged. “OK,” he said, “but first let me bend a spoon for you.”
It was my turn to gape. “Let me bend a spoon” is supposed to be my line. But with a expert flick of the wrist, he beckoned a waitress, caught up a piece of silverware, draped it in a napkin and dropped it in her hand. When she pulled off the serviette, the spoon was bent double.

As we posed for Shipi’s camera, he admitted the trick was sleight of hand. “I wish I could do it your way,” he said. “And if this picture is going in the paper, please make sure you spell my name right.”
Smith, I thought. How many ways are there to get it wrong? I supposed it could be misspelt with a “Y”. And yes, that would be irritating:
I hate it when people spell my name with a ‘Y’.
“It’s Lowes,” he said. “L-O-W-E-S. Martin Lowes.” He saw the puzzlement on my face. “You know I am a software designer, of course? From Belgium?”
Forgive me a second time, reader. I said, “Of course I know.”