Theatre Royal, Brighton

As a postscript to our visit to Brighton, and when I was delving into my box of old programmes to find those from the World Cup of 1966, I found three from Theatre Royal, Brighton from 1966 and 1968. The latter, shown above, is for two plays starring a young Ian McKellen and James Bolam.

The first programme from 1966 is a production of Staircase with Paul Scofield and Patrick Magee. The other is Bernard Shaw's You Never Can Tell. This was one of Ralph Richardson's most memorable performances and subsequently played for a long time in the West End. Many London plays previewed in Brighton.

I have always loved the theatre. Dad had always been involved in amateur dramatics, even from a young age, and Mum loved to watch plays on tv. When I was young, we had two great aunts who lived together in Esher. They must have been sisters of Gran who was our father's mother. Every Christmas in the mid to late 1950's, when we lived in London, they took us to see a show. Sometimes these were plays such as Toad of Toad Hall.

I remember going with the school to see Paul Scofield as King Lear in London in 1963 as this was our Shakespeare for English A Level. The same year I played Major Petkoff in Bernard Shaw's Arms and the Man,which was the school play for that year.

So now I have been going to see a play half a dozen times a year, more over recent years. So tonight it is Chekov's The Seagull. I do like to go different theatres to look at the building, so tonight is especially exciting as the RSC have opened the new Courtyard Theatre while the main house is being refurbished. I will be going early to have good nose around.