The end of the pier, p.1
The End of the Pier, page 1
The end of The Pier
James C. Lee
Copyright © 2016 James C. Lee
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Matador
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Front Cover Artwork: © Velvet crab drawn (pen and watercolour) by Racheal Bamford
“The Heat Is On” Words and Music by Harold Faltermeyer & Keith Forsey ©1984, Reproduced by permission of Sony/ATV music Publishing Limited, London W1F 9LD
“I’m So Excited” Words and Music by Trevor Lawrence, Ruth Pointer,
Anita Pointer & June Pointer © 1982, Reproduced by permission of EMI Music Publishing Limited London W1F 9LD
ISBN 978 1785895 449
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd
To my Mum and Dad with love
With thanks to Graeme
Acknowledgements
In addition to my Double Act Mum and Dad, and my Script Editor Graeme Garvey, to whom The End of the Pier is dedicated, I wish to express my deep gratitude to the rest of my Cast and Crew: my Production Team at Matador, who deserve their stellar reputation; my Set Designer, artist Racheal Bamford who drew the beautiful, slightly menacing velvet crab for my cover; my Ventriloquist, Louise Williams, who expertly proof read my manuscript and corrected my every gottle o’geer to bottle o’beer; my Stage Manager, real life stage manager Kevin McFarlane, who gave invaluable technical advice and feedback; my fellow Follow Spot Operator, Victoria Lister (nee Walker), with whom I shared a childhood watching The ‘Weeds, and whose endorsement means so much; my Merchandise Vendor, Sara Elliott, of Just Books (Yorkshire’s leading discount bookseller!), whose generous praise gave me a boost when I needed it; my Speciality Act (with comedy), Richard Plummer, who was the first to hear of my plan to write a novel and not only didn’t mock my pretentions but positively indulged them; my Musical Director, Simon Berry, who over ten years did mock (affectionately) my slow progress, but in doing so stiffened my resolve; my Costume Designer, Andy Marshall, who shares my love of Lycra and who’s enthusiasm for this novel fuelled my own; my merry crew of Stagehands Chas, Liz, Jonathan and Mark, who with their sincere interest in my novel - between quiz questions! – fed my belief; and finally my deepest gratitude is reserved for my Comedian, Singer, Choreographer and Star Of My Show, my wife Nicky, without whose tolerance (and regular absences!) The End of the Pier could not have been written.
Praise for The End of the Pier
The End of the Pier is a striking, compelling debut and a sharply observed evocation of a dying world. The writing is superb, the characters unforgettable and the ending incredibly moving. One of the best debuts I’ve read. Highly recommended.
Stav Sherez, Author of “A Dark Redemption”
A Tour de Force of observational writing. Convincing characters within compelling prose, laying bare the often seedy side of the variety/entertainment scene. It really got under my skin and I thought the ending was inspired. I found myself rooting for Martin (and Mandy). Loved it!
Sara Elliott, Just Books
The End of the Pier lifts the curtain on the dark reality of summer season shows. The characters are recognisable but stripped of cheap sentiment. A great read.
Tony Peers, veteran comedian, actor and producer
A brutally truthful insight into the veracity of variety, and a great read, beautifully written. So many stunning lines... Laugh out loud stuff! This would make a great independent film!
Sam Kane, Actor
It took me back to our Variety days in the eighties and all that was politically incorrect, captured in an intriguing story. People I knew are so recognisable in the characters, from the stagehand, Martin, who could have been me in the sixties, to Gerry Neon, who could have been many a bill topper from shows of the past. A great read from start to finish.
Ian Tough, The Krankies
Fantastic! Gripping. Nostalgic. Brought back memories. I was there!
Kevin McFarlane, Technical Stage Manager, Lyceum Theatre, Crewe
This is a truly compulsive read that takes you into the minds of the characters. James’ observations about the ‘back of house’ activities demonstrates a unique knowledge and understanding of the world of Light Entertainment in the seventies and eighties. For those of us who were there it is frighteningly accurate!
Alan Cutler, Peel Entertainment
Contents
Acknowledgements
Praise for The End of the Pier
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
Finale
About the Author
Notes
1
“Is there anyone in from the Galapagos?”
Martin Collier was forever re-hearing things. Daily his mental Walkman would play him a variety show of echoes. A typical bill might comprise a punchline, a catchphrase, a Scotsman’s laugh or, as he could hear now, a juggler’s greeting to a half-filled auditorium. On the whole he welcomed each encore as evidence of his perceptive, hi-fi mind; but, if sleepless in bed at two in the morning with the spools still whirring, he wished then that the tape would stop.
Not this afternoon though, and not this audio-clip. In fact the Galapagos opener, which had replayed in his thoughts all week, was for him a source of amusement and satisfaction, and for good reason. Hearing it, a smile caused his young eyes to crease.
It was just after four on Friday afternoon and Martin was walking to work. He dipped briefly into Pagoda Park, in the area where the road bridge soared over the glen, before entering Colville Road Cemetery. It was cool and damp beneath the summer canopy and sunlight dappled the gravestones. Again the voice in his head enquired…
“Is there anyone in from the Galapagos?”
He thought of Alfonso Delos Santos, the juggler from the theatre where he worked. He could see him now, resplendent in his mariachi costume and fake moustache, and the lines he delivered between Martin’s ears were as good as audible. Just feet from rotting corpses and suited skeletons, he heard gags. The patter came with Alphonso’s distinctive pseudo-Latino accent, and the occasional flat stamp of a Cuban heel even augmented the performance. The juggler repeated his greeting for the nth time that week…
“Is there anyone in from the Galapagos?”
Some days Martin would wake up and an insignificant phrase, from a television advert for example, would loop over and over ad nauseam: “Yakety Yak, oh my back!” “Yakety Yak, oh my back!”*. However, the Galapagos line that for seven days had possessed his waking thoughts was far from insignificant.
Last Friday, he had been standing backstage on the prompt side, waiting for his cue, when Alfonso came up to him. The “Speciality Act with Comedy” was just about to go on, when he had asked Martin the name of the islands with the giant tortoises; “Y’know, where that monkey bloke with the big beard went?” he had added in clarification, adjusting the chinstrap of his sombrero. It was an unusual question for a spesh act to ask a stagehand, even if he did have a reputation for scholarship. Quizzically, and with some hesitation, he gave the answer.
From the wings, he had then watched as the older man used this knowledge in his act. At the end of a brief introductory routine, in which three clubs the size of bowling pins dueled with gravity and the band played La Cucaracha, Alfonso threw the last club high into the air, barely missing the God spot. He spun twice, caught the club, stamped a heavy heeled boot and exclaimed a triumphant “Hey!” Once the eager applause had faded, he greeted the holiday crowd with the unconventional opening line…
“Is there anyone in from the Galapagos?”
Backstage the crew, always primed for irreverence, had sniggered, but quiet-natured Martin had surprised himself by laughing out loud. Even now, here in the graveyard, he still saw great humour in this
As anticipated there had been not a single holidaymaker in the audience hailing from the Galapagos, an uninhabited archipelago of volcanic islands 600 miles off the coast of Ecuador and a world away from Grumby. What a way to start your act, Martin had thought. Never mind the usual north-of-the-border version, with the “Is there anyone in from Scotland?” feed, and the “Who paid for your ticket?” tag; forget working the room with audience participation to get them on side, or pandering to their need for a joke that they knew. Alfonso had opened with subtle humour that required intelligence. It had been a lot to ask of the family audience, but it had been piss funny. Indeed…
“Very funny in Ecuador.”
…the voice in his head joked further.
Being Friday night, first house, the theatre had been half empty. In this, his second season backstage Martin knew that Friday was changeover day, when one week’s herd of holidaymakers went home and the next hundred busloads arrived, most not yet ready to venture into the world of variety. He knew that whenever business was slow, performers might vary their acts – a new line here, an “in” joke there – often more for their own amusement than the audience’s. It had never crossed his mind that the Galapagos gag was born of a desire for artistic evolution. Even so, from that moment on Alfonso Delos Santos, Speciality Act with Comedy and third from top of the bill, had earned the admiration of at least one stagehand.
Furthermore, from then on the same stagehand had gloried privately in the gag’s existence and had beamed whenever it echoed in his head. He beamed because in supplying a little knowledge to a pretend Mexican, for Alfonso Delos Santos was in fact Alan Sandham from Birmingham, Martin had tasted a kind of fame. It was a deluded belief, he knew, for such a meagre contribution, but all week he had actually felt famous.
On the Saturday following the Galapagos Friday, Alfonso had winked at the stagehand, doffing his sombrero in mock reverence and greeting him in his off-stage Brummie drawl; “O’royt, myte.” Even this week knowing smirks had been exchanged in passing, the lad was fairly sure. Either way, each night brought him two shows closer to their next “first house Friday” collaboration; at least that was what he hoped. Now, Friday afternoon, walking to work, he had only the short hour it would take him to reach Grumby’s Victoria Pier Theatre to come up with – to script – fresh material. Passing a particularly grand headstone, he heard another…indeed, he mouthed:
“Is there anyone in from the Galapagos?”
At the boundary with Queensway, he exited the cemetery and walked into the glare and blare of sunshine and traffic. As he waited for a gap, curbside litter traced swirls and vortices in the wake of each vehicle. The act of crossing this busy road roused him from his daydream and he cantered the last half lane of carriageway. Leaping onto the pavement, he resolved to finalise his suggestion for tonight’s location and, with an air of decisiveness, he spoke, he impersonated audibly…
“Is there anyone in from the Galapagos?”
***
After Queensway, Colville Road became more commercialised, many of the houses having been converted into shops. Martin now marched with purpose, searching his mind for Latino sounding locations and his next shot at the Big Time. Mentally he toyed with Acapulco; “Is there anyone in from Acapulco?” he rehearsed. But it seemed to him to lack something; it sounded exotic, but the right name would also need to confuse the audience, at least a little. The problem with Acapulco was that it was too well known, a tourist destination with cliff divers to marvel at; someone may actually have been there. Such a question, he feared, might provoke a response, shouted by a globetrotter in Row J and that would spoil the gag. The humour, the beauty, the essence of the line lay in the moment of silence that followed it. Silence and puzzlement; that was what he was looking for, not holiday recollections.
Nonetheless place names filed through his mind like items to remember in The Generation Game. He weighed up The Alamo, but judged it unsuitable as it lay in Texas, although Mexicans were involved. Aconcagua was no good, it being a mountain, and likewise Atacama was a desert. He searched the B’s and considered Brazil; but countries were too general, too likely. Bolivia, even? Perhaps the letter C might yield returns… He pondered Chihuahua, but worried that some dog-ignorant punters might not know it as a geographical place at all; the phrase “Is there anyone in from Chihuahua?” would certainly cause confusion, but of a canine strain; he struck it from his mind.
He ditched the alphabetical approach and seized instead upon Ipanema, as in “The Girl from Ipanema”. Everyone knew the song and surely the girl of the title wouldn’t be in attendance herself; that would be too ironic. He imagined her sat at the back, next to the Boys from Brazil. He snorted at the absurdity. So Ipanema was a possibility.
His mind was now racing; in quick succession up popped Rio de Janeiro, Montevideo and Buenos Aires, but he had little time to reflect on their suitability before Las Malvinas came from nowhere. Thank Christ a subconscious alarm bell sounded, for Britain had only recently gone to war to protect the sovereignty – and the name – of the “Falkland Islands”. He didn’t want a scarred veteran of the Sir Galahad confronting him at the stage door. So no, not Las Malvinas, he censored himself. What about Tijuana, he went on, or Tierra del Fuego? Where the hell was that?
***
Martin was fast approaching Lorraine’s Hairstylist’s, which lay on the opposite side of Colville Road to him, but he tried not to acknowledge his location. He was engrossed with his geography of the Americas, which helped, but the fact of his whereabouts kept tapping him on his shoulder. Eventually reality stole him from his script writing.
He just knew that inside Lorraine’s his eponymous mother would be combing and snipping quite incidentally while talking the hind legs off some poor regular; an ex-usherette regaling a nobody with tales of glamorous circles formerly inhabited and of stellar shoulders once rubbed against. He knew also that later she’d be hitting the town with a thirst on: how many white wine and lemonades in bars and clubs would she accept tonight? He dreaded to think.
There were times when he had considered taking a different route to work, the slight detour of Sutcliffe Street via Walker Row, the better to avoid his piss-head mother, he thought. But he enjoyed the bustle of Colville Road, The Parade, the architecture… Oh, who was he kidding? The truth was that like a moth to a flame he felt compelled to pass his mother’s premises, to spy on her daily, to confirm and then re-confirm that she was still as embarrassing as ever. Not that he could tell much from across the road, that is, but still he would watch her. The irony was that even if he were to bypass Lorraine’s it would be an evasion rendered futile by the larger fact of his still living at home.
Happily for him though, their paths rarely crossed inside the family semi, and so pretty much the only opportunity for mother-son eye-contact was during these Peeping Tom moments; she would glance over and by chance catch her son looking at her, as he was now; she would then beckon him, eagerly, but he would point at his watch and gesture an apology; or else he’d pretend not to see her at all. This state of affairs suited Martin, this estrangement, this surveillance.
It suited him that their working hours and her bedridden Sunday hangovers kept them apart. It suited him that her scrawled reminders to hang out the washing, or afternoon ‘phone calls to request that it be brought in (“It looks like it’s going to rain, sweetie…”), were practically the only communication they had. These things suited Martin just fine.
Walking slowly, watching her, he could see her holding a mirror behind a freshly permed head of hair. She was presenting its image to the customer with all the drama of a matador holding a cape before the bull; performing as always. She might have been exclaiming “Ta-dah!”, or preparing to take a bow to soak up the applause that she seemed to crave, and all the while she beamed with the most dazzling of smiles, a smile that Martin could feel in his guts. He prayed that she didn’t look over and see him…and then felt sad that his prayer was answered.
