An eventful life

The very first job I did as an event organiser /entertainment manager was at a Kwiksave conference which was held out of season in a holiday camp in North Wales. This was exactly as glamorous as it sounds. It was so in the middle of nowhere that the winter train timetable meant that you had to ring a bell to let the driver know  that you wanted to get off as the train wouldn’t normally stop there. Had I know what lay in store I may not have been quite so enthusiastic in my bell ringing.

When I got there it became apparant that I was to share a room  with someone else from the production team who was running the event. This someone else had thoughtfully placed a Bible on my bed. Luckily I managed to avert the inevitable upset that would have ensued  and was given a chalet on my own ( think Heidi meets garden shed) For some reason I seemed to have arrived a day early,  so set about exploring the delights of the holiday camp. This took less than ten minutes of very slow walking because everything was closed. In the end I went and sat in the bar, the sort of bar where bars go to die, with a faint smell  of damp dogs, dettol  and tired saggy chairs.

Gradually people started wandering into the bar and much to my excitement the barman announced that the music quiz was about to start..not enough people to actually make up more than about two teams so he suggested we play as individuals. An hour or so later and I was the triumphant winner. Of a Haven holidays tea set. I never did get round to picking it up.

So my job on the night was to look after a couple of magicians , some dancers and Roger de Courcey. There may be some readers too young or indeed too classy never to have had the pleasure,  and indeed until that point I had remained blissfully unaware of his contribution to showbusiness, but he was  a rather tired puffed up comedian,  who performed with a stuffed bear called Nookie. He was, as he kept reminding me,  rather famous in his prime,  but sadly ( and apologies to any members of his family in the unlikely event that they might be reading this )  to put it politely he was “well past his sell by date”. Quite who decided he was to be the star  turn was a mystery to me, and it was one of those  bad decisions that you only realise just how bad it is when its far too late to do anything about it. He had been briefed that on no account must he tell any rude jokes, a fact that he complained about while I sat watching him re arrange his hairpiece in the dressing room in a ‘Don’t they know who I am ?” kind of a way ( well, no to be brutally honest)

Meanwhile dinner was underway and things started to get a little out of hand with the delegates who were very excited to be on an away day, enjoying their free alcohol and were beginning to get a bit frisky. There was a glorious moment when one of the slightly elderly waitresses was gamely trying to make a discreet entrance with what can only be described as a bucket full of gravy. One table of likely lads started wolf whistling her and as she turned to give them a piece of her mind she tripped, throwing the entire contents over the dance floor.

By the time it was Rogers cue to go on, the atmosphere was beginning to get more than a little volatile, to the point that guests were hurling left over bread rolls at each others amid a lot of loud cheering and shouting. ” I am the ultimate professional” he muttered adjusting his bow tie and smoothing down his purple velvet jacket,  before marching on stage, Nookie bear in hand. The next ten minutes were I have to say, probably the worst I have ever seen ( and believe me, I have seen some). After the first couple of jokes ( I use this term loosely) the jeering started, then the booing and hissing,  and then the excruciating icing on the cake when  I was sent on stage to whisper in his ear ” I think some of your rude ones would work “. All I can say is that they didn’t. They were even more truly awful. By now it was as if the entire cast of Gladiator had arrived by coach and had  joined the audience in voicing their disapproval, and fearing a full on riot, we bundled Roger and Nookie off stage and back into the safety of his changing room. All he had to say while stuffing Nookie bear into a plastic bag and before storming off was ” What would Bob Monkhouse have to say about this”.

The rest of the evening was the kind of car crash scenario you would expect in one of those reality programmes about nightlife in Ibiza,  with people vomiting and fighting until the organisers finally saw sense shut the bar. Then everyone went outside  and vomited and fought all over the roses. I barricaded myself in my chalet and the next morning was up and at the station at crack of dawn,  almost throwing myself on the railway tracks, frantic with worry that the train might not stop for me and take me home.