about Harold Pinter...he passed away christmas 2008, just a few days before I saw my first Pinter play performed. A few days after his death I attended a talk by Michael Billington, he has been the theater critic for the UK newspaper The Guardian for many years. He was talking about the hot plays in town, what to see and what would be impossible to get tickets for (a tease and a challenge all rolled in one) but due to events ended up talking quite a lot about Pinter. a few anecdotes that I will not share here, but I will say that Michael spoke so fondly and with such passionate (professional) admiration that I instantly felt I should see his work and read up about him... I did buy a few books on Pinter, and am fortunate to have seen some of his work performed since, but real life distracted me and most of the books sit on the 'to read' pile at home. Now that I am typing this out I can only say that that pile of books has gotten way out of hand, I really should make time to simply read!
So the (Billington)talk I attended was in London, I was on this fabulous(!) theater trip, really one of the best trips of my life, theater related or not. A few days later, the last play of the trip was the Pinter play... No Man's Land, at the Duke of York, I think it was the very last performance of the run. It had a fabulous all star cast: Michael Gambon, David Bradley, David Walliams and Nick Dunning. Going in fairly blind on the makings of Pinter (I had in preparation of the trip read the play but found it impossible to make sense of) I was stunned. it was riveting, mesmerizing, still incomprehensible at times but in a way seeing it on stage instead of on paper it all made sense to me... of course when talking to others in my group after the play it turned out they had made sense of it too, just with a completely different take on meaning... I think for me that will always be the essence of Pinter.
Afterwards two of us waited outside at stage door to catch a glimpse of the great Gambon, he was gracious as ever in shaking off his fans quickly :)
note: Gambon is a seasoned stage actor, he worked with Pinter on and off for 30 years. He performed in Pinters plays and was also directed by him. Pinter came to see this production on opening night, just a few months before he died. On my Michael Gambon page I have included his farewell to Pinter, from the No Man's Land stage. I feel very lucky to have seen this production, and also that Gambon was part of the cast in my first Pinter experience.
That day January 3rd 2009, this evening holds very special memories to me, those of you that might read this and were there that evening, you may know and remember, those of you that were not present, sorry I'll not elaborate much, suffice it to say that 'No Man's Land', at this time, with this cast, and in the enlightening company I was in... unforgettable very dear memories!
