ACTRESS
Soho is full of actors. Being brought up in the Theatre, it is part of what makes it feel like home to me but for anybody visiting the area, I would imagine it can be thrilling to spot your favourite star of stage or screen. My first memory of Soho is actually the view from the stage door of the Queens Theatre on Winnett Street. My older brother was acting in Alan Bennett’s ’40 Years On’ in 1984, both Paul Eddington and Stephen Fry were in the company and as a nine year old, it was very intoxicating for me to be around such dynamic characters. I did not know it then, but obviously my memory is of looking at St Anne’s church.
I associate Soho with this good memory and it was also the day I was given my first bike (my brother had bought me a BMX which was waiting for me in his dressing room).
During the mid 90’s, I lived above the Phoenix Theatre and became very close to the cast of Blood Brothers who would regularly meet for drinks downstairs in the Phoenix Artist Bar (or Shuttleworth’s as it was then known). Quite often I would have been doing a gig at The Astoria or The Mean Fiddler (then known as the LA2) and have my after-show parties at the Phoenix. I was not aware of it at the time, but the friends I was making in the theatre became a really strong support network and that became a blessing when my band was dropped from Sony. Even later in 1999 when I was appointed as ‘Master of Music’ at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre, the team spirit of the company of actors was truly magical. Real showbiz people are wonderful like that (this does not include bandwagon presenters or celebrities from Reality TV shows!) I’m talking about the sort of people who have honed their craft, the sort of people that you will find throughout Soho in member’s clubs after the curtain’s gone down. People who smile through the greasepaint even when it’s their last night because the director’s hired a younger model for the part, or people who get standing ovations every night but still don’t forget the thousands of rejections they had before their luck changed. People like that are survivors (me included) and the energy we all have in common is what courses through the veins of this extraordinary area.
When people say that Soho has that ‘certain something’, I like to think that the energy of true artists is a part of it.
Actress, the song, is of course about a real person, but I prefer to dedicate it to every young girl that dreams of becoming a great woman. This, of course, could be every female on Wardour Street on a Monday morning but you know what I mean.
Actress
Actress, actress.. why did you pull the show?
When you know how much I would have liked to go
With a seaside stare and your New Forest air
My only care is when
I'll be under your arrest again
So, temptress, temptress... play another part
For I've seen this role played too few times apart
I'm no also-ran or flash-pan-fan
I never cared to fake it
And if you keep on breaking hearts like this
You'll make it
It's hard to know where I should go from here
Run me through the script, a walk on would be fine
Thoughts of you to me are just as typical as
Props inside a pantomime
Actress, actress...
One more encore
Don't leave just yet to the sea not yet
The coast will always scan
One day you'll find your perfect leading man
Until then I'll do the best I can
Lyrics printed with the kind permission of the publishers © V2 MUSIC 1999
© TIM ARNOLD 2006
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