Blog: The First Readthrough

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On Sunday we had a little GATHERING at CHEZ NOUS, when The Hewitts came round to help us eat a pile of CRUDITES, drink a load of BOOZE, and also have the first readthrough of next year's show, "Hey Hey 16K".

I must admit I was rather worried about how it was going to go. The only person who's SEEN the script or even HEARD the songs is Steve, as not even The Hits In My Back Catalogue has heard it. Mr Hewitt had said it was all OK, but what if it wasn't? What if THE WIVES said "No, this is rubbish, you need to start again"? What if, when saying it all out loud in front of other people for the first time, I realised it was BORING? And on top of all that, is IS A Bit Different to all the other shows - what if everyone RECOILED?

With all this in mind we sat round the kitchen table, scripts to hand, and DONE it. It seemed to go OK - the Ada Lovelace RAP SECTION (oh yes) seemed to take quite a while, and I got confused in a few places where songs I've done a MILLION times suddenly START with a different BIT but otherwise it was fine, especially the section called "Dad Jokes" which Steve and i LARFED our way through, though if the audience at home was anything to go by I think that that may be dividing future audiences along gender lines.

Once it was all done and everyone had ABLUTED I asked for reactions. Everyone said they liked it! There were some queries about the NATURE of the show (e.g. we probably need to signpost it more right at the start that it ISN'T going to be a history of home computers or an hour long version of the main song) and some surprise that it actually IS different from the other shows (not least because you can understand what's going on for most of it!), but the general reaction was GOOD. As you'll (hopefully) see if you (hopefully) come to a performance, it's a LOT more PERSONAL this time and a LOT less about superheroes/robots/dinosaurs, although it DOES have the usual amount of - possibly even more - TITTING ABOUT. And time travel, obvs.

It's also much shorter than previous shows. This version was 40 minutes long which, when you add in LARFS and deduct NERVES is probably how long it'll be in performance, though there IS a Tap Dance Section (honest) which might take a while, and I'm hoping to do a MEDLEY at the end too, so it should all work out at the right length. Anwyay, it's much nicer to run SHORT than LONG on things like this, as you can mess around a bit more and people can get off to their next show/the bar sooner too.

So it was all a bit of a RELIEF, though it has led to another slight worry. We spent MONTHS working on the script for Total Hero Team, moving things around, cutting scenes, changing characters, so I'd taken that onboard as part of the PROCESS. With this in mind I'd timetabled all of next WEEK to do the second draft - if it's going to be this straightforward, I'm going to have to find something else to do!

posted 7/10/2014 by MJ Hibbett

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Comments:

Unrelated to this post, but: http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-29517710 Have you ever considered it?
posted 7/10/2014 by

I did try once, but it must have been about 20 years ago! Art Brut are going to have a go though, I suggest everybody stand resolutely behind them!
posted 7/10/2014 by MJ Hibbett

They would be fantastic. If you hear anything about supporting them, do make it public!
posted 8/10/2014 by

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