Met up with a cousin a couple of weeks ago and, surprisingly, he was not aware that I gave talks. We had a discussion and I directed him to take a look at this site. He asked my fee but told me his chairman wouldn’t pay that much! I said I donate it to charity but that didn’t seem as if it would satisfy the chairman. Much to my surprise he ‘phoned me last week to say that he’d like to book me and offered a few dates. He wanted to clarify the title of my talk and wanted the word Ballet inserted somehow. Now, from experience, I know that that is a word that can discourage, so I said well it needn’t be about ballet it could be any stage production. Well, he said, in that case I should bear in mind that 2 of the group’s members were high flying theatre and event managers.
Am I fazed, no not really; I’ll work that into my talk somehow. It might be interesting for them to know what amazing productions can be achieved in provincial theatres with a comparatively low budget.
I was hoping to find a suitable, gratuitously embarrassing photograph of him to slot into my presentation somehow but sadly can’t find one.
Only downside is they want a shorter talk than normal. Last time I did that I was told that I missed talking about tutus out. Something had to go!