ElizabethMalcolmFull12.04.24
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The date is the 12th of April 2024 and I'm going to sit down and speak with Elizabeth Malcolm today. The time is 1107 and we're going to begin the interview now. Please, can you state your full name and date of birth? My full name is Elizabeth Julia Malcolm, and my date of birth is the 21st of April 1949. Can you tell me a little bit about where you were born and raised? I was born in a nursing home as many Children were middle class in Edinburgh in 1949 in the new town of Edinburgh. In the nursing home, my mother had to have a very big operation during and after my birth. So I came home with a nurse on was there for a month before my mother came back home. But I've lived in Edinburgh all my life. Apart from a short spell in Canada after I graduated from university is a librarian on. My whole life has been in Edinburgh, so being to the Edinburgh Festival since I was five years of age, so that was the start of my going to things in theatres and festivals in it. Can you tell me a little bit? About what? Subjects Interested you in your school days in my school days. I suppose it was really history, which I really was interested. And that was sparked off by a really wonderful history teacher is still alive. Mary Hope she's 94 and I'm still in touch with her on. She was one of these people. That was really a Miss Jean Brodie character. A single lady, rather glamorous, slightly mysterious. We always wondered why she hadn't got married and didn't seem to have a boyfriend, but were then discovered she'd had a little bit of a history. But she was an inspirational teacher in the senior school. No junior school. The junior teacher was a Miss Joan cared, who was very well known, who used to take us annually on a trip down the high Street. And we went down every close in the High Street. On it was discussed in class Afterwards, there was a wonderful book that was in the public library that we read about that the closest of of Edinburgh High Street. There are mile on. That really was the start of it. It was very definitely a couple of school teachers who started it off for a lot of people like me who followed it through is interested in it on. Then, later on, I married my husband, who had known for a very long time. He was an architect on Dwork for private practise, but then was with historic Scotland. So that was again, back to history, lots of it. Speaking of history, what are the biggest changes you've seen in Alhambra? Well, I suppose no one would have to say it's the inflow, huge and flocks of tourists in Edinburgh, but the whole facade of the city, like many other towns after the Second World War. There was a lot of very poor housing, you know, sitting in this room and looking at the back of houses that her 18th century, which looks very cute nowadays. But I remember them as the most appalling slums in Edinburgh, and there was a huge slum clearance in the town which of course, shifted people out to suburbs where there was no facilities at all, which caused all the problems that they suffer from nowadays. But on the other hand, there wasthe e forming of the Edinburgh Newtown Conservation Committee, who took todo having a handbook about the design of Georgian buildings and led to a very serious on well funded project of restoration of the Edinburgh Newtown, which was a terrific thing. And in the new town is now a rather sort of posh area with expensive houses. But again, when I was a child, I remember them as absolute slums, you know, places like an street that you're selling for 5 million pounds, nobody would could raise a mortgage on it and they were all rented out. These big houses in rooms, you know, for rented property. So there's that. That's been the big change in Edinburgh. No, I don't think we want to go down the route of what we think's happening to Edinburgh. I think a lot of it is very sad. But Edmund has been unlucky that the council has always been in a model about things. There's never been a proper clear thinking about it. But every town suffers from the same thing. I mean, London London is in the same boat. But certainly, you know, the fact that we've lost cinemas and theatres and you know, there's theatre that we're sitting in just now. Festival theatre, you know, became empty ruin and a bingo hole and all the rest of it until eventually. Eventually, you know, the removing forces to get things changed. So that so that the Kings Theatre can find itself in the same boat. to build off of that. What role do you think theatres play in Edinburgh is tourism? as tourism. Well, I suppose you know the bigger shows that your arm like, you know, this Hamilton that's here in the stuff that goes to the playhouse, the big receiving houses. Obviously it must attract people. just recently, I was looking at her tell prices for relatives of mine, and it nearly fell off my chair. The cost of accommodation and endless, utterly stupendous. The room they were looking at in June was 400 pounds a night. Unbelievable. But obviously there are people who come so therefore, you know, the theatres should attract stuff. But really, you know, we can't live on tourism. Edinburgh's got to think about the city and the people that live here and that that's what in other city is about, not about tourists. It's about a place that is beautiful, that we want to live in as citizens on Diz, also attractive for tourists but not for tourists only. So let's all the theatres can keep going because it's a very sad day that you find that because they're in these old buildings. This is then a problem. You know, the inadequate buildings for today's world make it very difficult. You know, touring cos obviously won't come if the place is an up standard. That's certainly something that's been a big focus of the King's redevelopment project. Yes, going back to feel her. Could you tell me about your earliest memory of going to my earliest memory? I think probably my earliest memory at the King's would have been to see Margaret Lockwood, who was a very famous and very beautiful actress on stage and screen and film. She played Peter Pan on that tour in London. I think Manchester and all over Britain. She's very famous on. She was attached by wires, and it's the first time any of us kids had ever seen a show where somebody flew across the stage and it was completely imperceptible how it happened. But it was just magical. I do remember that Peter Pan and it was a Children's book I had was beautifully illustrated, actually by Mabel Lucy at toward Any Famous Children's Illustrated It was just a magic show, and I think that was probably the first thing I saw in the King's. I would have been about six or seven, I think. who brought you to the theatre for you? My parents, my parents. My father was very interested in taking me to theatre and live shows. Obviously, it was in the days before television. I mean, television didn't really come to Scotland until the sixties. you know, the English always talk about how television started with the queen's coronation 1953. But long after that, television came to to Scotland. So all entertainment Woz live. You know, you either went to the pantomime or theatre shows designed for kids, which obviously something like Peter Pan Woz s O that that's, you know, that was the start of it. After that, it was then musical things that came to the whole. you know, similar. I mean, there were orchestras that came to the theatre. It wasn't just the theatre, you know, in in the theatre s Oh, it was a very interesting time, I think, and that there were in the 19 fifties quite a lot of touring companies that came from London on from abroad. I distinctly remember my father taking me on a Saturday afternoon to the Lyceum Theatre where they had the Comedie Francaise, because he said you'd be starting French at school soon. And I wanted to hear how the language sounds when spoken by the natives. And that again was another amazing experience. We couldn't get a seat. It was sold out, so he stood at the back of the stalls. on. Of course. The maitre d comes onto the stage and French Theatre with a stick on the stick, has struck three times. 123 on. Then the show begins. I just thought it was magic. Was just amazing, really was. I'd never seen that before, but my father was always very keen that we go to anything of any sort of quality at the theatre or at you know, the can you recount or tell me a little bit more about what it was like getting ready to go to an event like Oh, well, those were the days when even the Scotsman newspaper had an advertisement on the front page. It was always in the front page for generous. The wonderful department store is no more in Princess Street. On DIT was how to get dressed for the opera or how to get dressed to the theatre. And there was a little tab about what was all that the king's heir on at the Lyceum are on it. The whole on it was displaying ladies dresses. Obviously, men were just expected to wear their suits, suits and ties. But you definitely dressed up for theatre. You didn't go in jeans or the equivalent it was. It was a deal of getting your best jury on the new best frog on going with Mommy and Daddy, which in those days we didn't have a car. We lived in Marchment. So it was a very quick walk down White House road to a Kings Theatre, eh? So we would just walk and less. Obviously it was a bad night and then I suppose my father might have splashed out on a taxi. But, you know, the whole business of going out to theatre concerts was was quite addressing a fair, definitely not the waiters today. Can you describe what your experience was like as soon as you walked through the doors of the kings to get to your seats And what you remember seeing you? Well, I definitely remember. I thought how incredibly beautiful the place looked. I still look at them every time I passed. The Kings Theatre is the most beautiful big brass door handles that have very beautiful enamel Norman, which is starting to chip. on that. The whole look of the place was very deluxe. Which, of course, was the idea behind theatre and cinema. You know, when they when they were built, it was meant to be a palace of some sort. On you went in and on the left hand side. The right hand side was the booking office on the box office where you probably picked up your ticket. I don't remember buying a ticket. My father buying it didn't having in her hand when we arrived. So you went picking up your ticket on the right hand side on the left hand side. There was also a little cubicle, which was selling ice cream on boxes of chocolate. So you got your fries, chocolate or your cabarets box of Cadbury's milk trade or even a box of malt teasers on. Then you walked up once he presented your ticket and they knew where you were sitting. If you're going up to the balcony, you went up the stairs on then round turned around past the very beautiful tiny little bar, which, of course is a child you were going nowhere near. Then you just went into your seat and as one dozen theatre that the whole atmosphere is one of suspension of disbelief. You walking through these doors and to this very plush you know, red velvet seats and you sit down and people are coming and you recognise people on the curtain is closed, the big red velvet curtains close. And then that would go up. Nearer the time the show was about to go up, there would be a safety curtain to stop fire spreading through the theatre, which obviously in the days of gaslight and candles, was a serious problem on that was covered in advertisements for famous shops. That was really funny. You would see something from generous and something from seeing J. Brown's the Furniture Shop S O. You were looking at all this and that all these ads were put up in beautiful calligraphy with a little gold frame around it, sort of Luca's. If it was, ah, swanky picture. And then, of course, the lights would dim on the beautiful little pointed light. Such a in the in the Kings Theatre lights would dim and that safety curtain would go up on. Then the whole show would begin, you know, the police was in darkness and then the stage lights went on and it was just magic. It's what theatre is all about. Can you tell me what some of your earliest memories are walking into the stalls and seeing the boxes? Well, they just looked amazing. And you always wondered who who are the people that sit in the box is that there were there were people who did sitting and I know now it is, I think, because the sight lines are so poor that the very seldom anybody in the boxes But certainly if you were sitting in the balcony then of course, you were terribly aware of these blinking carry out its you know what is amazing, their bosoms hanging out. You know, you would always sort of look up What? Mustn't look, you know, it's a lady with no clothes on, slightly embarrassing. It was never something you discussed with anybody with your friends or your parents, but it was just one of those things. You wonder what they're there for because I didn't know they were. They were Carrie attics. I hadn't got us far in my Greek history to know what that was all about. But certainly that was always quite amusing. But you know, these lovely plush seats and they used to have little clip. containers at the back of the chair in front of you that held little red plastic binoculars, and you could put six months in this on, flick it up and then take the binoculars. And then if you were too far away from the stage, you could you could walk if you didn't have your own posh binoculars. It's the sort of thing I felt a lot of gentlemen did when the glamorous stars came and they wanted to get closer. Look at their legs or whatever I know. Certainly that was my father's reason for putting the six minutes in and getting the little binoculars. Can you tell me about some of the big names that you recall seeing? Well, I certainly is. I said, Remember Margaret Lockwood, who was very glamorous lady playing Peter Pan? But there was all the people from the Fight Car State show, which was slightly more adult. That wasn't obviously Children show it was a variety programme. that had all the Scottish stars. Jennie Logan. Kenneth McKellar is a wonderful singer, actually sang as a non operas star. Originally, hey came from Aberdeen. There was another show called The Wish for Janey, which also had McKellar, and a lot of shows came through from Glasgow from the Alhambra Theatre in Glasgow. Tessie O'Shea, who was actually Welsh. I think although obviously she had an Irish name, she was a very famous. singer really more the sort of comedy singer Anita Harris union A clean Stanley Baxter, of course, that the pantomime with Ricky Fulton on that pantomime did a year in Glasgow and then a year in Edinburgh went back and forth on Stanley, of course, was famous for his fabulous costumes and his fabulous legs. Ricky Fulton did a show called Francie and Josi, which was also a little cover. The show about 22 lads, although obviously there were men in their forties by that time. But that was funny. The gang shows Scouts gang show on the Good old days with Leonard Sax on That was a replication of an Edwardian Variety Theatre show aunt. He introduced lots of big stars as well. I understand your husband worked in the arts and has some family connections as well. Could you tell me a little bit about how you for Well, I met my husband. This one usually did. At the brownies, guides and scouts and clubs at some Katherine's Church and Grange Road, eh? So we knew each other, and when we were about five on, then we kind of got together when we were later. Teenagers at a youth club in eventually became an architect and worked with private practise in Edinburgh, including Robert Matthews on Michael Reardon Partners. And they need you could complete change away from modern current architecture to work for historic Scotland. On he was principal architect for historic Scotland. On the last job he did was the complete refurbishment of Stirling Castle, which included a restaurant on variety of other bits of the building, the Great Hall. But his aunt his is great and rather his mother's sister, Woz Anon, opera singer Helen Ogilvie was her name, and she sang for the Carl Rosa Opera Company, which was a very well known small opera company, and those those opera was not staged by big people in London. These small companies toured right around Britain, so that was your only chance of hearing on opera other than being fortunate enough to have about eight via shellac records. They were in those theseventy eight records on playing the one after the other. You know your only chance of seeing something Woz to come to the king's to hear the Carl Rosa on Helena. Will they sound lots of parts? She actually premiered the role of Elizabeth in Wagner's opera Tannhauser in the 19 thirties. You know the opera was written in the 18 eighties. Esso. It'd never had an earring in Edinburgh alive earing until Karl Rosa brought it on. They had a selection of maybe even a many as a dozen operas that they brought in the year all over Britain. On that, you know, lots of people in Edinburgh of my vintage and older. Remember Helen Ogilvy is a one of the big stars. She was prima donna of the company on Kenneth McKellar actually sang with the Carl Rosa the year before, he gave up serious classical singing and became a music hall star. What was your first experience? Sing Opera. My first experience seen opera was a film actually in the cameo cinema in To Cross, which showed things like films of operated weren't an enormous amount, but I distinctly remember it must have been, I think, about eight or nine, maybe nine. on. My father had decided it was time to go and see this. And I think my mother probably had said that she was a fancied herself, was a bit of a singer. She would like to hear it a swell. I can't remember who the stars of the opera were, but it was very these Aida on that was on in the in the similar on the half time they had a break where you could get up and buy lollipops, and I think that we're selling ice cream in those days. But I suddenly suddenly started to say, I'm terribly itchy and my mother said, Right, What's all this about? Andre took me next door to what was a Crawford's restaurant. She took me down to the bathroom and lifted up my blouse. And there I was, covered in chickenpox, so I was taken street home. I never saw the second half of Ida. That was the end of it. But that was my first time I ever saw Operate. And it was a film. I think it was much later that I saw live Opera was probably more like 15 or 16, and it would have been things that the festival in. which performances have made the biggest impact on you. in Edinburgh. Well, I certainly think that that production I saw the Comedie Francaise. I think really there's just too many to mention all the things that I've ever seen at the festival, which I see I've attended in only one or two performances when I was very small to, you know, spending a serious amount of money and all this to go to lots of performances. there have have just been amazing things I missed out seeing. Maria Callas because she wasn't well the night that she cancelled here. But so many other wonderful people. Victoria Della, sons of these. Joan Sutherland along the really huge names that Edmund was able to attract in the barely days of you know, the grand golden days of the festival. so lots and lots of wonderful things, you know, in all sorts of theatres. I do remember seeing in the Kings Theatre. Andres Segovia, the guitarist playing And you could hardly hear him because it was in the days before people were being miked on D didn't wish to be night. He wanted just to sit on the stage in play. were your first experiences seeing performances and pantos without mikes. No. I think that things were probably might up then. But not not body makes, you know mean people were learning Well, did learn in those days how to declaim on the stage and that that was always the thing you noticed that I play. You sat down. You were You're hearing people talk around about on. Then suddenly somebody would talk from the stage in this rather loud voice produced by the dyer From on you suddenly go. Oh, gosh, This is loud on then your eyes, you're you're suddenly got used to it. It's a very funny thing when you go to live Theatre, there isn't Mike Top the way it is Now. You know, if you go to something like the Shakespeare stuff in London at the Globe Theatre, it's not might you know, actors have to throw their voice using your die from a different sound but that all adds to the magical in the surprise of it. You know, you get the shock at the beginning of something coming up in front of your eyes on then your ears, you know? Can you tell me how you think amateur theatre at the King's has transformed over the years? Well, I think is I can't remember that. I've seen ah, particularly large amount of amateur theatre. Normally, that sort of thing was up at the Churchill Theatre. That's certainly where I've seen my current husband's amateur theatrical people put on productions. The gang show, obviously from the scouts, was an amateur on amateur show, but I can't remember really seeing anything else. Speaking of the gang show, What are your thoughts on the gang Shit? Well, of course, you know, the whole thing is completely politically correct in every shape, way or form. But, you know, for the boys that were in it, they really enjoyed it. So my present has been Derek Wilson. Eyes still in touch with all his chums from scouts. They have a meet up once a month on one or two of them are still alive and people's theatre and all that kind of stuff. They absolutely hooked on it. But I asked there it yesterday before I came here. Did you ever go to the Kings? And he said, No, no. A friend Gordon Braidwood on his wife, Mandy, who was a dancer They met at the gang show. they they carried on, you know, going to allow these things. And they went because they were obviously more committed. And one presumably wants to say slightly more talented that my husband probably was on the stage, so, you know. I don't know what the scouts do. Know whether they have a gang. So it was, you know, in the days when they were all boys together and that was what it was all about. Those days are long gone, I think for the possibly for the better. but they have great fun doing it. I mean, it was a huge thing if you're in the scouts and you had a brother who wasn't always in the gang, so Wow, Right, Well, we got to go along and see how they sang all these silly songs, you know, were riding along on the crest of a wave can still sing it. and over hand movements that went with it. Did you bring your your husband to the kings to see shows throughout the years or bring other family members? Well, I think probably when I was small, it was just me. I was an only child, so, you know, it was just me and Mommy and Daddy. But as I grew a bit older, obviously I went with school friends. The school that I was then a school in Edinburgh. It's a small private school, just very near, but since college the teachers there took us out. Tiu shows todo to cinema. so that there were occasions when you know it's a French play. Our staff of the festival definitely. I remember seeing Leyla cab driver in the cherry Orchard, which was totally in Russian. You know, people like myself went not knowing a word of Russian, but, you know, it's to see this wonderful actress in a production from a Moskal Theatre company. So it's all these kind of lucky events that we were able to have an editor because we had, you know, good theatre, good theatres to go to on obviously wonderful promoters. so we were lucky on that count. Where did you see the king's sitting in the ecosystem with other theatres in Edinburgh? Well, because it's a very small little jewel box of the theatre. It's actual physical. Luke is incredibly important to retain. on. Obviously, you know there are different size of shows. I mean, you've got Hamilton here. It's a massive show of loads of people are obviously very sophisticated technology required to put on a show like that. It's not just, you know, a five piece orchestra in the pit playing and somebody walks across the stage. It's a completely different ball game now. People wouldn't expect that kind of thing, so the king's has to sit. as you know, to find its niche as a sort of specialty theatre, I think obviously more intimate things the way that one I would expect, Ah, small concert hall to take the part of chamber music. This is what I think the king's has to focus on. But obviously in today's world, they still have to have the technology on the comfort. People don't expect to sit on a beat up old seats on poor sight lines. You know they want to have a nice bar that's accessible on that's, you know, the commercial side of the theatre. That has to be thought about now in order to meet the thing commercially viable. Obviously everybody can buy tickets online, so their purchase of tickets is easy and you've got social media and you're locked into that. Then you've got a publicity side But the actual theatre itself obviously needs a serious brush up on if anybody seen around the back, you know, stage door and what the actors have to put up with them, you know, different ballgame. But they're completely dedicated Fox. But you know, even so nowadays, one expects things to be, Ah, little nicer. So, I mean, apart from stuff like parking, which obviously you can't do when you go to the centre of town, you know, it's really what's inside the theatre on how beautiful it looks on how well maintained it ISS, which is the other side of that argument. And you know when you've got a city that some finding it hard to keep going with the buckets. Never mind thinking about the Kings Theatre. Very difficult, very difficult indeed. The arts are in a very sorry state at the moment, so let's just hope it can only get better. What got you interested in sharing your storeys about the king's with this project? Just because of my my history thing, I'm you know, I think there's one gets older. You start thinking about these things you see aside up saying, you know, thinking's needs a massive massive refurbishment and far more money needed even. Oh my God, is this the place going to be lost? No, no. Got to do something about this on day. Think that's the catalyst for a lot of Edinburgh people that it's been part of our lives intimately, you know, for our whole lives on. You just can't imagine it closing. It would be absolutely tragic or something happening to it, burning down with a fire or whatever. so I think that that part of part of it is interesting. The fact that I, you know, I come from a professional background of being a library and worked at Radio Fourth, was the chief librarian at the Scotsman use maker. I am. You know, I I see the value of keeping these things, you know, in the Scotsman newspaper left the huge big offices which weren't actually the original offices in the bridges. The whole of the library archive, which was millions of newspaper cuttings, were consigned to a rubbish tip. was absolutely tragic. They have absolutely nothing left from the nine up to the 19 seventies when I was the chief librarian, it all went in the bucket because they said we can get the newspaper. accessed online by typing and you know headings into Google. We don't need all this stuff on away. All went terribly sad when they moved down from North Bridge, done to Holly. Rude. That was when it all went on. That was my deputy librarian, Meira Stevenson, who then became the library and when I left over saw that happening was tragic and the photographic archive as well. Old ditched don't need this stuff. Modern technology. But if the photographs were published in the paper, we can get them well. I challenge anybody to go and look on their Web site on, Put in a subject and you can't find it. It's just nonsense. The only way he can access it is microfilm in the public library, and that's a hassle to get through that stuff. so that I had a huge big file for the Kings Theatre and all the people that played in it that I see him and the whole everything like that all gone without a trace. so there we are. very sad. when I was experimenting to see if I could indeed find something from the Scotsman archive. So cold archive. I typed my name in on day. I was looking for a photograph of me with other friends singing in the Edinburgh Cool coral unions, the Messiah on New Year's Day in the 1919 68 I think itwas on it took me forever to find. I found that picture, but any other little snippets of information that I was interested in drew a complete blank. not there. What kinds of things would you like to see out of People's archive from the Kings Theatre? you mean, if I was granted access to see it? Well, obviously, all the things that you're doing now in the way of gathering some audio about it all. I would hope that there are photographs, playbills, all the usual things that one would get from the theatre on, perhaps even memories. There are other websites around where people do appreciate that. You know, it's essential to do it. I think I mentioned to you that Edinburgh Photo Archive, where people throw up a photograph and say, Does anybody remember this on its sparks off a lot of people writing in, which is really the only way that you can tap into a live memory of that sort of thing. Now you have to get people before the crook because once my generation's got you've lost that are you know it's gone. Can you tell me a little bit about Audrey? Audrey? Well, Audrey Young Audrey Beatrice Young as she liked to call herself. Her father owned a very big collection of bakery storeys in Edinburgh. They had a big bakery not far from here in the Pleasants Young brothers on. They were two brothers who had who was Scottish but had married English girls. Well, Audrey was born in Edinburgh. She would have been, I suppose, in her nineties. Now. I worked for her when a neighbour of mine asked me, Could I help this lady who was after my first husband died and I was a little lonely. Very impoverished widow on, I said Right. Okay. On I rang her doorbell on this rather grand, very stout lady. Beautifully. Quite sure. Dwight here opened the dungeon. Oh, darling, I'm so pleased to see you. Are you going to help me? So I said, Well, Audrey, love to see you. You know, we need to get on. Oh, we'll get on fine. Well, I sat down. I couldn't get busy working because Audrey was telling me all these memories of being studying in Edinburgh. elocution and really acting skills at a school called the Turner Roberts and I forgot the ladies first name. But this was such surname, Turner Robertson School of elocution and Drama Skills. And I think they were in George Street. Was one of these private schools that people sent their kids to if they didn't think they were speaking nicely, eh? So you got sent there, you know, to improve your what we call received pronunciation in English the way that actresses used to be Talk, you know, 100 years ago, well, Audrey went there on she played in several productions at the Gateway Theatre, which was an old theatre down Leath walk. but she When she died, we became very good friends and the end of ah ah, working day when I was then going up to look after my God daughter, who lived just three or four doors up the road, Orderly would all say, Now, when you're finished, darling, I think you need a good supper. I'm going to book a restaurant will go out. So we used to go out. And, of course, she discussed on talked about everybody on. Always in this very loud theatrical voice on would carry money in her handbag, which is really what you would call a little Victorian Rhetta Kyul on. She would tip the waitress 10 pounds for moving their chair because she was rather start. But when I when she died, she left me quite a bit of money on. That's for a car. You need to have some money to buy yourself a new car on. I thought Audrey has to be remembered in this first refurbishment of the Kings Theatre, so I bought her a brass plaque with her name on. I think it says Audrey maybe, says Audrey Beatrice Young Audrey, be young, I think I said a wonderful actress on a lovely friend was something like that that I put on the inscription, but I made sure that it was in the dress circle. I couldn't see Audrey in the stalls or the upper Circle s Oh, she's memorised their she actually has. Ah, quite a well known family. There's several people who were writers and legal profession folk. Who would remember Audrey. She was a real character, one of the's Edinburgh characters. What do you hope the kings will be like when it reopens? I would just like it too. Wonderful. I mean, obviously when I was five years old, it could have been scruffy and wonderful. Just looked wonderful, but I would love to see it. You know, looking beautiful again are not sort of down at heel on, You know, the shows that come absolutely nothing wrong with what's there. But you know how one actually get the sort of acts that want to come. And that kind of afford to be in Edinburgh, You know, goodness knows that obviously depends on the new management that they hire on also the support of the Edinburgh Festival. Something has to go in from there. obviously places like the Church Show Theatre is probably, you know, hoping to keep going with them or amateur side of things. But you would want Ah, grand opening of the Kings Theatre was something really special. That would be wonderful, really would be. I don't know if anybody's put their minds to it. I'm sure there are lots of suggestions, but you know, even something modern I don't mind them in Hamilton is not such a show. I would go to see, but, you know, for Cheddar they can fit in there with whatever technology they have. There are lots of small things I certainly remember in the past. There used to be quite a trickle of pre West End shows that came to the theatre to the king's. I remember seeing things that was only on for a week, just a za try out for the West End. Well, you know nothing wrong with that. Be wonderful to see West End shows, even if it is just for a week for whatever price. That, of course, is another matter. The pricing. Is there a particular show that would just be a dream to get in Edinburgh. For you. For me? Yeah, sure. I don't know. I suppose it's to see live opera again. You know, the festival they can concern to now is some concert performances. It would be wonderful to see something like that, but you know, a lot of the smaller plays. you know, the classic place. It would be wonderful. Anything, Anything, really. I mean, that's the point. You you don't want to go and see something you've seen before. Unless it's a particular caste that you're interested in seeing, You know, we have to see new theatre on. You know, there are plenty people writing. I know. That's usually heading, you know, to the icy. And but still there are. There are other things. Certainly. You know, pre West end stuff would be terrific to see back in Edinburgh. That would be really good on. Obviously, you know, the pantomime in on all the rest of it. Obviously, you're not going to have a live orchestra the way you used to. My cousin was actually in the little orchestra here for a very short while. And then I think he think he ended up actually, that I see him or you might be the last scene first. He certainly played here He was a pianist in a violinist, and he laterally was my piano teacher on my my first piano teacher died with that came from my father's side, who were very, very musical family and our music shop. Rosen Blond brothers in the North Bridge Arcade, which was in that building from when it was built in 1906, right through till 1967 when my grandfather died on my father, who was an accountant, decided not to keep the business on. And it was a time when records were just sort of starting not to make a lot of money. People weren't playing instruments they used of competitions in the meadows for bashing up pianos with access at bright pianos. It was quite extraordinary. So remember my father saying, You know, the music sheet music side of things and instruments and violent strings and what have you is not a profitable part of the business will just close on. My grandfather died. That's what happened on. We got phone calls for years afterwards because of our name in the telephone book from people saying, huh? Where am I going to get all these wonderful gut strings? from our cello and my values are terribly sorry. I don't know. so it was. It was a huge loss. It was a very big shop, very, very well known. And that was from my grandfather, who was a Lithuanian Jewish refugee. Another 1902. It's a conscript in the Russian army from the war that the Russians had of the Japanese 1902 The conscripts came in to lift you in. It'll the Baltic states. And they conscripted all the Jewish young men and carted him off. That was the start of the second big wave of Jewish immigrants into Edinburgh into this very area. my grandfather's families on my grandmother's family and she'd been here since about 1840 were all round about this South Clark Street area. Huge number of people. And of course, they were all very musical. You know, they could play violence and what have you, So you find them in these theatre orchestras. It's an interesting time long gone. you were taught piano. Do you still play? No, I don't. I sold my little baby grand piano to put central heating and my first flat, so that went. But I did learn for a long time from the age of five, which is when you know you're usually meant to start. But I've got two very good friends who are very capable pianists. One, Nicholas Ashton, who used to be head of keyboard in a Napier University on now, teaches at the Conservatory in Glasgow, but he's put on two or three concerts at Queens. Also, I'm still in touch of musicians. it seems your love of music and theatre is continued. Absolutely, absolutely. Well, I want to thank you so much for sitting down with me today. A tous point. We're going to stop the recording. The time is 1152. We will now conclude the interview for the Kings Theatre Heritage Project. |
