What a week it has been, Trump saying he is the chosen one, Johnston smoozing Germany and France, more and more on the royal family and especially sad is the loss of Sean Coyle to our local airways. Much has been said and written of how he lost his closest friend to cancer and when Gerry Anderson was ill and unable to continue broadcasting and then when he died, Sean kept the dream alive. Now he has been ejected from his seat in the BBC, on the fifth anniversary of Gerry’s death. Will the public outcry reinstall him? Probably not. Things move on and in big corporations there is no way of stopping or doing a U turn, faite a compli. I hope he takes comfort from the love and respect in which he is held by his public.
Rejection is hard to take and we’ve all experienced it in some way or other. You might get over it but seldom do you forget.
Boris Johnson really gets worse, I heard his protestations being described as ‘proformances’ and certainly when you hear him in the House of Commons or being interviewed, he rivals the most flamboyant Shakespearian actor! And did he really put his feet up on Macron’s coffee table or was he caught on camera uncrossing his legs? Even if the French president told him it would make a good footstool he should have desisted. It looked disrespectful and silly. And is he serious that there will be no cars on the roads after 2050. How on earth could people in outlying towns and villages get around, can you imagine bendy buses ploughing their way round the beautiful little country roads of Tyrone or up and down the hills of Down.
I’m concerned for the Queen, she must be livid about the behaviour of her family. Her middle son seems to have gone haywire, will he end up like Princess Margaret’s set living a lascivious life on some island away from the prying eyes of the press? And then there is Prince Harry who is slipping down the popularity scale – who’d have thought it.
What with the Edinburgh Festival and all the comedians there, here’s a Facebook offering.
A friend muses, “Apparently it’s no longer politically correct to direct a joke at any racial or ethnic minority so…….
An Englishman, a Scotsman, an Irishman, a Welshman, a Latvian, a Turk, an Australian, a New Zealender, an Indonesian, an American, a German, a Peruvian, an Egyptian, a Japanese, a Mexican, a Spaniard, a Russian, a Pole, a Lithuanian, a Tibetan, a Swede, a Finn, an Israeli, a Romanian, a Bulgarian, a Serb, a Swiss, a Greek, a Singaporean, a Kazahk, an Italian, a Norwegian, a Dane, a Ugandan, a Nigerian, a Frenchman, a Colombian, an Argentinian and a South African went to a night club.
The bouncer said: “Sorry, I can’t let you in without a Thai.”
Below is my thought for today.
RICHARD ON THE WORLD STAGE
I was recently writing about theatre being a great educator, certainly is when enjoying it from the auditorium but more so from behind the footlights and Richard Orr would agree. He’s a well known actor, on stage since he was a teenager and rarely out of work for the last 30 years. His CV is the envy of many, he has worked with the best yet five years ago he decided it was time for a change.
“I had a good run and throughly enjoyed my time in theatre and travelling to play on stages in the United States, throughout the UK and Ireland even filming a movie in Luxemburg, but I needed a challenge.”
Most of his work locally was at the Lyric Theatre and his fellow actors included Adrian Dunbar, Dan Gordon, Conleth Hill, Ciaran Hinds, Stella McCusker, Frances Tomelty, Liam Neeson and Sir Ian McKellen, the best in the business. He toured twice in America, on Broadway with ‘Brendan at the Chelsea’ with Adrien Dunbar and he spent 5 months in Washington DC playing Pavel in Brian Friel’s ‘Fathers and Sons’.
With a pedigree like this why leave the stage?
“After 30 years and a changing theatre scene I just wanted something new. So, in my late 40s I bought a restaurant and opened Clemsons on the Woodstock Road and, although it got to number two in TripAdvisor, eventually I sold up because there was something else that had become very fascinating to me – Tour Guides NI.”
Despite having seven ‘O’ levels, studying drama in Manchester and a life time of experience, to qualify for the intensive course at the University of Ulster he needed the one thing he didn’t have, maths. So at 52 years of age he went beck to school, got his qualification and started the Blue Badge journey. His plus factor is that he has a natural passion for Northern Ireland, the skills of presentation, a love of words and a fine sense of humour.
“I aim to be a good tour guide because I’m proud of this country and I want people to understand it and come to love it too. I want to entertain, inform, keep the people safe and well looked after and send them away as fascinated with this part of the world as I am.”
He’s still waiting for his official badge awarded ceremony next month but already he has been honing his skills taking visitors on walks around Paris, London and now Belfast. He has set up his own platform Best Fast Tours and after his recent LGBT tour during the Gay Pride week in Belfast the compliments flowed – ‘exciting’, ‘informative’, ‘fun’.
“And people love to hear personal theatrical stories especially during The Troubles and here I can talk about my own experiences, about the audiences who kept coming to the theatre despite the civil unrest, nothing stopped a production except a power cut or snow! Once in the Arts Theatre panto Cinderella we got an unexpected phone call that there was an incendiary device primed to go off at 3.30 so we shortened the show and got everyone out of the building by 3 o’clock – thankfully it was a hoax!”
He talks of the language of the guide.
“I once referred to there being an awful lot of people at one venue and someone asked me what was wrong with them, why were they awful! On another occasion I said I wanted to do something terribly badly – think about it!” Laughter is never far away from Richard.
Thankfully theatre hasn’t lost Richard Orr completely, although not acting he is making a name for himself as a director, most recently with the hit show Ruby starring Libby Smyth as Ruby Murray. You might not realise it but you often hear his voice on commercials between television programmes, he has made an ad for the Dead Rabbit restaurant in New York and publicised anti-litter campaigns and domestic abuse awareness. He still coaches young actors but he says he’s out of the mix when it comes to performing and he has few regrets.
“I’ve proved you can take years of experience and put them to good use reinventing yourself and taking on a new role on a new stage in life and I’m loving it!”
Details of Richard’s Tours at e-mail: Bestfasttours@yahoo.co
P.S. If you have a comment please use Facebook, I’m fed up getting ads about Ugg Boots so have switched of the blog. comment facility. Although might appreciate an Ugg Boot or two come the cold weather! Have a good week.