My life in the theatre

It's my son's sixteenth birthday on Saturday so tonight, at his request, we're going to see Yes, Prime Minister at the Gielgud Theatre in London.

I've always enjoyed going to the theatre whether it be in London, Edinburgh, Buxton or Bath and 14 years ago I achieved a very small ambition when I produced a one-off show at a leading West End theatre.

In my pre-Forest days I edited a monthly magazine for an organisation that shall remain nameless. I also organised special events for members that included lectures, debates and, from time to time, concerts.

In 1996 members celebrated the organisation's 50th anniversary with a "gathering" of members from all over the world. My contribution to the golden jubilee was to produce a variety show directed by and starring members of the organisation.

I was reasonably confident that we could pull it off because I had already produced similar (albeit smaller) events at the BBC Concert Hall, the Royal Academy of Music, the Royal College of Music, and the Library Theatre in Manchester. And this time we had a captive audience - several hundred Americans with nothing else to do in London on a Sunday night.

The secret, I had discovered, of a successful show or concert was to delegate the most important job (that of director or musical director) to an experienced professional. (I tried once to direct a show and it was a disaster. Never again.)

Anyway, the Criterion in Piccadilly was one of a number of theatres I considered for this one-off show. Most London theatres are available for private hire but you have to work around whatever show is on at the time - and that includes the set which is more often than not completely inappropriate.

If you time it right you can go in between shows (while the theatre is "dark") and that gives you so much more flexibility in terms of staging.

As I wandered from theatre to theatre I realised that the people who were particularly keen to work with us were the staff working in theatres hosting a long-running play or musical. I got the impression that they were so bored they would have embraced anyone who could relieve the monotony of staging the same show night after night, week after week, month after month, year after year ....

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I eventually struck a deal with Wyndham's Theatre in Charing Cross Road and asked Roger Ordish, producer of Jim'll Fix It and many other BBC shows including Top Of The Pops, to direct the show.

We selected the best acts from our previous shows and added Gretchen Christopher who had enjoyed a number one single in America some years earlier. (Actually,_ many_ years earlier - 1960, I think.)

Roger Ordish did a brilliant job and the show was a great success. The theatre was full too ...