What blows my mind is that Sue Kirby, a close friend in George where I now live, knows Peter. Dave, her husband, met Peter in his primary school days, they went to St Andrew’s, were discharged from the army together and then Pete went to Rhodes and Dave went to Cape Town University. They remained close friends throughout.

Much to my delight, Peter spent the night at Sue’s before going to Knysna to perform his one man show. Sue kindly invited me to lunch. It was incredible seeing my friend of forty years again.
“He’s grown so much older,” was my initial thought.
‘And so have you’, a voice inside me laughed.
Peter still has a wry sense of humour which I discovered with delight. He recounted the last time he had seen me before my stage fall.
“We were at Anne Curteis’s place in the country. For some reason, my young two year old daughter was infatuated with you and spent much of the time sitting on your lap on the lawn.”
He showed me a photograph of this little bundle of mischief who had played on my lap all those years ago. This beautiful woman in her thirties laughed into the camera.

Over lunch I asked him about his production.
“Janice Honeyman said to me: ‘You are a wonderful writer. Write about something that moves you and I will direct your production.’
How could I fail to begin writing immediately?”
Janice Honeyman is an actress, writer and director extrodinaire!!!
I remembered Janice directing me in: Isn’t It Romantic. Janice directs like a dream. I could well understand the relish with which he began to write. He wrote about something that has alway fascinated him, the First World War.
And that was how At All Costs came into being.

The following evening, Sue and I drove to Knysna to see Peter’s production.
We took our seats and I waited eagerly for the performance to begin. The lights brightened and Peter strode through the audience to front of house. Facing us, he began to speak.
The play takes place in the 1970’s. Peter addressed us as a character, David Wells, who is a survivor of the Battle of Delville Wood in 1916. The Battle of Delville Wood was the first major engagement entered into by South Africans on the Western Front during the First World War. For six days and five nights a soldier was killed every minute, with one South African soldier dying every three minutes. David Wells had returned to the wood fifty years later in an attempt to lay his ghosts to rest.
“It has taken me fifty years to face my fears.” 

Peter is a brilliant writer and this is clearly evident in his descriptive use of words in his play. He paints scenes so horrifying in their bleak, guttural truth.
He is also breathtaking as an actor. I don’t think I have seen Peter act before. What I saw that night was heart wrenching. David Wells reached out and took me with him down through the corridors of time so that I too felt the gunfire, smelled the stench of war, the loss, the inhumanity of man. I saw it all there reflected on the face and in the voice of David Wells. At one point, I had to close my eyes because it hurt to be a witness to such pain, anguish and suffering. I had tears running down my face at David’s final words.
“We held the Wood.
At all costs.”

In the First World War, there were 17 million deaths and 25 million casualties. I am enraged at leaders who declare war. Are they sitting in icy cold muddy trenches attempting to shoot someone in an opposite trench? Of course not! They sit comfortably in their offices and order young men to carry out their war for them. And what an unendurable time those young men had to endure between 1914-1918. When the Great War ended in 1918, they swore that was the war to end all wars. Twenty years later, the Second World War began! While Peter and Janice were rehearsing their production, Russia attacked Ukraine. Ukraine was forced to defend herself. 

I wonder what would happen if more women were Presidents or Prime Ministers? I think maybe there would be far fewer wars. Women are more empathetic than men and they are also more far seeing. They consider the consequences of their actions.

Watching Peter Terry playing David Wells was actually a cry out to the world to stop wars.  Wars have gone on from time immemorial.
And I fear they will continue to do so!

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them. – Laurence Binyon

The post Terry & the Terrible Havoc!! appeared first on 'ear 'ear! by Gaynor Young.

Funny Girl.

I dipped with glee!
What an adventure I was about to have.
I was off to Cape Town to see Funny Girl!

At George Airport, the Cape Town flight was called and I joined the rest of the passengers to hand in my ticket. I felt this tap on my shoulder and turned to see a stunning woman standing before me.
“Gaynor, it is you! I couldn’t believe it when I saw you.”
I looked more closely at this woman and then she fell into place. I seemed to hear a voice from 28 years ago singing: ‘Life is sweet, tender and complete, when you find the bluebird of happiness……..The girl who’d played Cinderella in John Moss’s Christmas pantomime we’d put on at The Playhouse in Durban all those years ago – Julie Hartley!

“What seat are you in? I am 6C,” I asked
“16C. Miles apart.”
“Let’s wait and see. Maybe something can be arranged.”
The plane was half full and I had a spare seat next to me. We both hurled questions and answers at each other trying to catch up on twenty-eight years in a mere forty minutes.
Julie lived up the West Coast with the love of her life – her horses!
“The next time you are in Cape Town, please may I drive down and fetch you. I stay in an enchanting place. You will love my horses and dogs!”
I will definitely do that. I will go for a few days and take Perdita, my dachshund with me. Perhaps she will like the horses, I thought doubtfully, thinking of my  ‘I only love Gaynor’ dog.

The day of the show dawned!
I sat in a warm and cosy coffee shop. I was meeting my theatre friend of many years, Jenny Steyn. She came in and scanned the room. A wide smile lit her face as she came towards me. I love Jen. She is a person who speaks from the heart. When I had my fall and was hospitalised for seven weeks, Jen didn’t come and visit me. We were on the cusp of getting to know each other. So she didn’t feel that she could claim to know me and take up valuable hospital time. Now it’s a different case completely. Jenny has this natural joy that seems to emanate deep within her. When I worked as an actress, Jenny and I were often up for the same part. I considered us both containing an equal talent. How wrong I was. Recently I saw Jen perform in The Inconvenience of Wings. What a stark display of artistry and passion. Recently she played Nora in The Dolls House. She told me that the play had concluded with Nora walking through the audience and exiting the theatre. I love that! Her talent and grace seems to be fathomless.

On our way to the theatre, my sister, Liz said to me: “Tell me who is in Funny Girl that you know?”
“There’s Kate Normington who I approached about getting us complementary tickets to the show. Then Di Wilson.”
“Oh, I know Di. She’s been around to our house visiting you.”
“That’s right. And then there’s Michelle Maxwell. I did a show in Cape Town, I forget it’s name, but Mums and Dad came to see it. Mums said to me that in that show, for the first time ever, she didn’t recognise me as her daughter. She believed so totally in the character.”

What a beautiful theatre The Fugard is. It’s intimacy instantly transports you to a special place. We were shown to our seats in the third row! Glory be, not only comps but seated in a prime spot. We grinned at each other and settled back comfortably to enjoy the spectacle about to evolve before us. The musical tells the fascinating and bitter-sweet story of Fanny Brice whose vocal talents and comedic ability see her rise from a Brooklyn music hall singer to Broadway star. Intertwined is her tempestuous relationship with gambler Nick Arnstein. It was sumptuously designed and the dancing and singing were outstanding. But it was Ashleigh Harvey playing Fanny that stole the show.
“……Cause I’m the greatest star, I am by far, but no one knows it. Wait, they’re gonna hear voice, a silver flute…..”
I sat up and stared. This woman was incredible! She and the rest of the cast beckoned me into their world for the next two hours. I couldn’t help myself but as Ashleigh Harvey came forward to take her curtain call, I rose to my feet applauding.

After the show, I was meeting up with my old friends. I was nervous. I hadn’t seen Kate for about 13 years and Michelle even more. I had seen Di but that was years ago. I saw Di first. She gave me a warm hug and explained that she couldn’t stay. She had to get all the way home to Hout Bay. Then I saw Kate and my nerves vanished. She put her arms around me and we held each other for a long time. Michelle has this all embracing smile. When she had finished hugging me she said: “I have a present for you. I must see you before you go.”
Then I saw Ashleigh Harvey. Kate said: “Gaye, Ashleigh actually organised the tickets for you.”
“But…I don’t even know her,” I said to Kate.
“Ah, but I know you,” Ashleigh laughed coming straight up to me and giving me a hug. Pulling away but still holding me, she said: “I read and loved your book!”
I saw with astonishment that she was wearing a moon boot. I pointed at it questioningly.
“I fractured my foot in a dance class before I came down to Cape Town to start rehearsals. I have been in a moon boot all day for ten weeks but I take it off for my performances at night. I have had carbon plinths made for my show shoes so that my foot doesn’t move at all. Another few more days and then – goodbye boot!”
While Liz chatted to Kate, I re-found Michelle surrounded by friends at the bar.
“It is so good seeing you again. It’s been too long. I knew you were coming tonight and I….I wanted you to have this.”
She handed me a beautiful red and white dotted present bag. I put my hand in and drew out a mounted photograph of a much younger Michelle and Gaynor. The card said:

Dearest Gaynor
I found this photograph of us in Crossing the Line where I played your older sister. I had it copied as I think it’s sooo beautiful!
It was at the Baxter December 1989/90 (ish) and was directed by Mavis Taylor, (Colleen Craig, the author!)
Much love to you and blessings that we could see you tonight…….
Mich XX

I stared at the photograph in total delight. Mich’s timing was wrong. It had been in July, 1989. Here were the characters I had been telling Liz about in Crossing the Line. That was what the play was called! I had this image of me in khaki trousers and a t-shirt walking on stage. Then a blank. Since my fall, I have never been able to remember one instance of performing. Here was a ‘sense’ of the character I played and her relationship to her sister. I’m sure my name was Paula! I must check up with Michelle.

I give so much thanks for the love of a friend giving me back a touch of my past.

Kate and I arranged to meet for tea, a couple of days later. We hadn’t seen one another for about thirteen years, maybe more. The last show I had seen Kate perform in was as Eliza in My Fair Lady. Now I had just watched her play the lead’s mother. Time….!!!

And she had changed. We both had. While still possessing that sharp, humorous wit, she seemed to have grown gentler with age. We spoke of Funny Girl naturally and about the wonderful cast surrounding her. I mentioned laughing at a remark she made on Facebook about Michelle Maxwell getting on the piano and the two of them playing around with various numbers. She said: “Yes, but Gaynor do you remember Ian von Memerty, you and I found an empty rehearsal…”
“…room during Camelot rehearsals,” I finished. “Yes, that is one of the things that I remember clearly, Kate. We had a ball! Ian could do whatever number we came up with. We did numbers from Grease, My Fair Lady, Easter Parade, Sound of Music…”
“I sat on the piano stool as if I was playing the piano and singing and Ian crouched in between my legs with just his hand appearing on the keyboard. It was both magical and hysterical!”
I was so thrilled that that moment had been memorable for us both. It had broken through the mist surrounding my memory of Camelot and has remained sparkling like a much treasured gem all these years.
“And do you remember we found that wheelchair and we pushed each other harum scarum up and down those lovely, long corridors at The State Theatre?”
The wheelchair came skidding round a corner and into my memory.
“Oh yes,” I cried watching those two wild women acting like mad six year olds. That was a new memory that was magically conjured up for me that tea time. I will guard it jealously in my memory box.

Kate has been married for the last year. I am due up in Johannesburg in August. It will be wonderful to meet Kate’s husband during that time. I have also promised to see Ashleigh Harvey for lunch.

Finally, I met Shirley Johnston for dinner that night. She edited my book and is a very precious friend. She always finds time to see me when I’m in Cape Town. It somehow felt right finishing off my Cape Town visit having dinner with her. She had worked for five years with Ashleigh Harvey in Death of a Colonialist. I had heard Shirley speak of Ashleigh but hadn’t clicked that she was the star of the show that I’d just seen.
“That’s your Ashleigh? But…but Shirls, did you know she could sing like that?”
“I actually saw her in a cabaret. I remember tears just falling down my cheeks she was so moving.”

This is what those delectable four days in Cape Town gave me. A superlative show! But more than that. It gave me: Julie Hartley, Jenny Steyn, Diane Wilson, Ashleigh Harvey, Michelle Maxwell, Kate Normington and Shirley Johnston. My theatre friends, old and new. And, except for Shirley, I have lost touch with them. I go up to Johannesburg and down to Cape Town and I don’t contact them. I tend to think: Oh, they won’t want to be bothered by me!
This is garbage! Those four days proved that to me. Friends are special. Theatre friends are exceptionally unique. I am no longer able to act. But that is not important. I believe that once you have entered into that ‘theatre fraternity’ you are there for life.

Oh, how I love my ‘Funny Girls’!!!

The post My Funny Girls! appeared first on 'ear 'ear! by Gaynor Young.

Dear Gaynor

I am a friend of the director, Janice Honeyman and Denise Goldin.
I am a professional actress, born in Cape Town but now living in California.

The way I came to know of you is this:
I was in Cape Town staying with Janice. I am working on a play about a tragedy that has also brought me to know Denise. I was talking to Janice about the trials of having been an understudy – specifically for Angels in America, Parts I and 2. I told her that I had not been rehearsed on the stage and had to go on for two three hour length parts of that play. In one instance, I was a few seconds late in coming down a revolving platform and got stuck. Who knows what would have happened, if not for an alert stage hand who reached in to pull me out?

Janice got quite upset and told me about what had happened to you, about your horrendous fall offstage. A few days later, at the Naledi Theatre Award ceremony in Johannesburg, I was blown away when you came on the stage. I realised you were the actress Janice had told me about. I immediately bought your book on Kindle and read it all the way from Johannesburg to London, to San Francisco.

I am so profoundly impacted, so deeply touched by your story but also by your light and power which I was fortunate to actually experience from the stage that night. I asked Denise for your email.

I would very much like to be in touch with you. Because of my own tragedy – an avoidable accident that killed my gorgeous 21 year old daughter, Annais in July 2013. I was introduced to Denise Goldin online. I met her at the Theatre awards for the first time. Stayed with her. Did the first reading of my play at her house and then boarded the plane back to California…and of course devoured your book.

I have many things I would like to ask you about. There are many similarities although both cases are different in their specifics. But still, there are elements that screamed out at me.

So, if you would be open, I would love to be in touch.

Very warm regards
Penny Kreitzer

I immediately read about Annais on: www.JusticeforAnnais.com and was horrified.
Several dozen members of staff were happily eating breakfast under a large oak tree in Camp Taiwonga, California in 2013. Disaster struck. A thirty foot branch cracked and hurtled downwards, killing Annais and severely injuring several others.

It would appear that six months previously, Camp Taiwonga had been warned about the instability of that oak tree. Nothing was done! The oak tree with it’s overloaded precarious boughs remained untouched. Why had that tree not been looked after and pruned? For goodness sakes, it was a disaster waiting to happen. The entire catastrophe could have been avoided.

Instead a dark haired young woman with dancing eyes is now dead.

Three years later, Penny has written a play about her daughter. That disaster and the resulting anger gave birth to Penny’s writing talents.
“I do know that without that anger, I would never have begun to write the play. It was anger that drove me to the computer and that rage punched word after word onto my keyboard. And yet, suddenly in the midst of that raw anguish, beautiful tender pieces of poetry began to emerge. I have no idea where some of the characters in my play appeared from. They are funny, poignant, honest and compelling. And gradually the story took over. I found I was able to handle it with a gentler spirit. I believe the discovery, tears, anger, shock, awareness and love will affect the audience in different ways. I am hoping that the story will speak for itself.”

Anger is a painful, powerful and complex emotion. Not dealing with it effectively, increases its potential to be destructive. After my fall, how I longed to lash out with my fists or my tongue and deliver ‘felling’ blows. The problem was: my fists and tongue would no longer ‘work’ as they used to!!! I was given a computer and the light began to dawn. My darkness eased as, like Penny, I discovered how through writing I could expel my anger.

With the computer in front of me, I was able to ‘write’. My creativity was given free reign. My anger was the gelignite. Explosively, I wrote about the ‘me’ I had been forced to become due to my fall. The frustration of my deafness, my memory loss, my fury about my spasticity and no longer being able to use my right hand for writing. It all exploded forth onto the computer screen. Those pieces were fuelled by my rage at the way my life had changed so drastically. I had lost control of so many areas of my life. Yet I was lord of that keyboard. That was where I could shout and weep and ‘vent my spleen!’.

Like Penny, I had to turn the pain of my anger and loss into energy for change. It was from those early ‘gnashing of teeth’ that I eventually calmed myself and finally my book My Plunge to Fame was born.

Anger is a useless emotion. The only person it affects is YOU. One has to rise above the anger; to get beyond it. I did this while writing my book. It was a cathartic experience and hopefully the reader can learn something about our wonderful, tragic, amusing, devastating, beautiful and horrific human existence.

Anger has been the fuse for so many works of art – paintings, music, plays, books and poems. Through his monstrous anger at the futility of World War 1, Wilfred Owen created so much powerful poetry. There is a kind of macabre beauty to his poems that contain such a dreadful waste and horror.

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned out backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame, all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.

Gas! GAS! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.-
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams before my helpless sight
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin,
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,-
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

Wilfred Owen

If you are unfortunate enough to endure some horrifying trauma, I hope that the resulting anger is constructively channelled and transformed into something beautiful. Penny discovered that in the midst of the destruction and horror that surrounded her, there was a chink of light.
Creativity beckoned.
And where there is creativity, there is always hope.

The post Scream! appeared first on 'ear 'ear! by Gaynor Young.

The post Childs Play! appeared first on 'ear 'ear! by Gaynor Young.

Joy of all joys, every Christmas we went to the Christmas pantomime! John Moss put on a yearly panto and the delight, laughter, shouts of enthusiastic children that the Playhouse witnessed, makes my heart sing in memory. I remember quite clearly watching Liz Edmiston playing Peter Pan. I decided then and there that when I left school, I wanted to act. The rest of the family didn’t have such a life-altering reaction but we always used to leave the theatre talking nineteen to the dozen, recounting and laughing over bits of of the show we’d just witnessed.
Going to the theatre in childhood transported us into another world where the improbable was made probable. It was a world where there was hope and dreams. It was a place where good triumphed over evil. Going to those pantomimes gave us all a lasting love and appreciation of theatre and the arts which we carried into adulthood.
Recently I met up with a friend of mine, Susan Danford. It is always wonderful seeing Sue. She has an eagerness for life that is infectious. She had just come from running a workshop for school children from deprived environments. The theme of the workshop was War Horse which was then taking South Africa by storm.
In Susan’s workshop, she and the children were exploring how horses move. They all cantered and galloped madly around the room. Utterly exhausting! I still remember, as a child, doing the galloping hand clap onto my chest. I have just tried it and yes, I can still do it. It is strange how things you learn as a child remain with you.
Several days later, Susan and other workshop groups, all boarded a bus and took their children to The Artscape Theatre where they all sat utterly enthralled and transfixed by War Horse. It was a heady moment for them. Going in a bus! Going to the theatre! And then seeing a play of the calibre of War Horse!
ASSITEJ SA was responsible for ensuring that over 5000 children got to see the international production of War Horse through the generous sponsorship of Rand Merchant Bank. Lesley Beake, director of the Children’s Book Network based in Red Hill, recounts: “None of our Red Hill children had ever been near a theatre. Many of them will never go again. When the boys came to the workshop, they slouched in full of attitude. When they left the theatre their eyes were shining… For us, as a reading organisation, the most heart-warming of all was the way they seized their books and immediately started reading them.”
Hopefully that experience will remain with them for a long time.
Susan suggested that I should contact Yvette Hardie, the World President of Assitej. She thought maybe in the future I might do some school workshops about my deafness and cochlear implants under the umbrella of Assitej. Or perhaps something connected to ‘my’ opera I mused.
Yvette Hardie carries a serenely organised air about her. She is the first African President of ASSITEJ International and has successfully championed the bid to bring the ASSITEJ World Congress and Performing Arts Festival to Africa for the first time in 50 years. The 19th ASSITEJ World Congress and Festival will be held in Cape Town in May 2017! The theme will be inclusivity!
On meeting, I asked her to explain exactly what Assitej is.
“Well, the acronym ASSITEJ stands for: Association International du Theatre pour l’ Enfance et la Jeunesse.” She laughed. “Yes, French, the organisation was actually founded in France. It’s aim is to promote high quality arts and theatre for children.”
On March 20th,  The World Day of Theatre for Children and Young People is celebrated annually by ASSITEJ members in nearly 100 countries. This year it is using this day to highlight it’s initiative “Take a child to the theatre today”. It’s hope is that by the end of March more than 20,000 children will have had the opportunity to experience theatre for the first time.
I consider theatre vital to children. When I was performing in children’s theatre at university, I played an evil witch. This witch played havoc with a small pig. The pig escapes and the witch is duly vanquished. After the show, I was standing chatting to my friends when a young five year old boy accosted me. “You are a nasty person! I have a pig. If you had treated my Henry like you did just now, I would have got Dad’s sjambok and…and…you wouldn’t have been happy!”
Laugh! While not advocating the use of his father’s whip, I rejoiced because that little child had comprehended the injustice that was shown in our production.
This campaign of “Take a Child to the Theatre Today” is so important because theatre presents its young audiences with their hopes, dreams, and fears. It develops and deepens experience, intelligence, emotion, and imagination. It inspires ethical choices; it increases awareness of relationships; it encourages self-esteem, confidence, and the free expression of opinions. All of this through merely watching and experiencing theatre.
Could you support Assitej’s campaign? Which child might you take to experience theatre for the first time? Believe you me, they would love it. And what’s more so would you!

The post “All the World’s a Stage……..” appeared first on 'ear 'ear! by Gaynor Young.

Before my accident Elzabe Zietsman and I put on a cabaret in which we sang and performed short sketches. In one, I told the audience a true story about me and Tobin Shostakovich. Great name, huh? Tobin Shostakovich! But he was known as Toby or Tobe. If I had had my way, he would definitely have remained Tobin. Admit that has a far more romantic nuance to it!

I was ten years old and Tobin Shostakovich was twelve. He was our neighbour and what a neighbour! Toby was already starting to broaden out in all the right places.  He was tanned this golden brown and his voice was starting to break. That was something I, at the advanced age of 10, found tremendously attractive.

We were sitting round the side of our house, well out of the way of any prying adult eyes. Tobe turned to me and said in a very nonchalant manner: “Hey…do you want to smooch?”

The Gobstopper that I was sucking was just about swallowed whole. “Smooch?” I squeaked.

“Yeah, you know…..do ya..er…want to smooch?” he repeated.

I did know! I had seen people smooching in movies and it looked…it actually looked…cool! The womens lips always looked full and succulent. Certainly not stained by Gobstoppers! I took mine out and threw it into a nearby bush.  “Okay, let’s…let’s smooch!” I finished a little breathlessly. After all this was a totally new experience for me. I had never been smooched before! We were sitting opposite each other and Toby attempted to put his arms around me.

“Move a little closer to me,” he said. I did so and licked my lips attempting to get them full and succulent. “No, come closer still!”

Why didn’t he move? I thought as I edged closer. I shut my eyes, anticipating his “smooch.”

“A bit closer,” he croaked. My excitement must have been intense for as I eagerly moved forward so I let out this enormous…FART! Toby moved pretty quickly then. He jumped to his feet and took several steps backwards. “Ahhh, sheesh…!” was his response.

And that was the last time anyone attempted to “smooch”  me until I was sixteen!

As you can imagine, the audience simply rocked with laughter at my “smooching” tale.

Time moves on and in July 2010, my sister, Liz, was renovating her flat. She had decided to put in beautiful sash windows in the lounge. She had looked in The Yellow Pages and found the number of someone who would give her a quote. She was measuring things when the car pulled up. I went outside to greet the “window” man. A good looking guy got out the car.

“Hi, I’m Gaynor Young, Liz’s sister,” I said my arm outstretched to shake his.

A big grin spread across his features. “Gaynor Young,”   he said  beginning to laugh as he grasped my hand. “ I am…Tobin Shostakovich!”

My comprehension was slow. “Tobin….no, oh…no!” I cried also beginning to shake with laughter. Liz was standing just behind me and had cracked up as well.

“My secretary came to see your performance in 1987 and I never lived that story down in the office! Then you had your accident and I wanted to write to you but I wasn’t sure you’d remember Tobin Shostakovich”

“I have forgotten a lot since my accident but fortunately my experience with Tobin Shostakovich has remained crystal clear.”

“Do you know that three years after “our incident” I met the girl who I would ultimately marry. Who knows what we would have been to each other if it wasn’t for that…for that one hellishly loud fart!” he said cracking up once more.

He gave me his card and said that some time I must come have dinner with his wife and…Tobin Shostakovich!

Big smile.

Closure to my tale!

Disclaimer: To protect privacy some names in this story have been changed

The post First Kiss! appeared first on 'ear 'ear! by Gaynor Young.

Janet Suzman, (now Dame Janet Suzman!) the international actress and director directed us in Othello. I played Bianca, the whore. At the time I was still a virgin. A virgin playing a whore! Tell me if that’s not good acting, huh? Othello was an incredible experience with John Kani playing Othello and Richard Haines, Iago. Janet captured the entire production on film. I saw it on VHS and then forgot about it.  But later Jan had it made into a DVD and…WOW! What an amazing DVD. With subtitles! She saw to it that I was sent one.

Darling Girl

I’ve asked Linda Louw at The Baxter to send you a DVD of our Othello. I hope it won’t be in any way upsetting for you to watch Gaynor Mark 1?? You were so lovely in the play. But don’t be – all your friends that love you, know that you are so much bigger and better a human being now than you ever could have been had you stayed Mark 1. If you don’t know it, then that is simply another mark of your natural modesty. If you want more copies for your friends, tell Linda and she can post you a few more. Just tell her I say it’s fine.

Hope all is well with you and here’s a BIG HUG

Love, Jan

……And it isn’t upsetting for me watching the nimble, beautiful, well spoken Gaynor Mark 1. It is like watching someone else and I am awed that she had anything to do with me!

The post “I am no strumpet………..” appeared first on 'ear 'ear! by Gaynor Young.