A mammoth undertaking

By Gillian

Last night, we had a real treat – we went to a live recording of  “I’m Sorry, I Haven’t a Clue” in Cheltenham. Some of our further-flung readers may not appreciate the reference. ISIHAC is a long-running and much-loved comedy on BBC Radio 4. The self-styled “antidote to panel games” has become a minor British institution, and is always recorded in front of a live audience at theatres across the UK. The tickets usually sell out really quickly, so on the day that they were released on sale Christopher camped on both the phone and the website trying to get through to buy some. Finally, after two and a half hours, he managed to purchase a pair of  tickets.

That was two weeks ago, and we agreed up front that if he was too ill to go we would have to cancel and pass the tickets on to a friend. (There was practically a queue of people at work who would have been only to happy to relieve us of the tickets if necessary!) But we very much hoped that he’d be well enough to make it. That was before his back pain really flared up, and what with that and this week’s radiotherapy which has made him sick as well as in pain, it really looked to be touch and go as to whether we could take up our tickets.

On the day, Christopher was determined that he would be well enough to go despite his back pain, but I was feeling dodgy myself, as I was recovering from a migraine. I didn’t feel up to driving to and from the Centaur Theatre at Cheltenham racecourse, especially since we wouldn’t be getting home until nearly midnight, which is way past my bed-time at the moment. Fortunately, Christopher’s ex-boss Mike and his wife Angela are both huge ISIHAC fans, and also had managed to procure some tickets. So they very kindly gave us a lift down to Cheltenham and back which meant we could go after all.

The theatre was huge, reminiscent of an aircraft hanger – it has a capacity of 2250 people, and was full. The warm-up man was the producer, John Naismith, who explained the format of the evening (two shows, recorded back to back with a 20 minute interval in between) and told some truly dreadful jokes to get us going. Then he introduced the panel – regulars Barry Cryer, Graeme Garden and Tim Brooke-Taylor with guest Jeremy Hardy and host Jack Dee, plus of course Colin Sell on the piano.

It was very funny indeed – we both laughed out loud time and again. Jack Dee fluffed some of his lines and had to re-take them, and a few of the jokes just died flat – which was in itself very funny. The funniest bit was Jeremy Hardy trying to sing One Song to the Tune of Another – he really has no musical ability whatsoever but was clearly trying very hard. Christopher was breathless with laughter!

The audience was warm and appreciative and I think everyone had fun. The panellists were clearly enjoying themselves. I always wondered what the state-of-the art plasma laser display screen looked like, and now I know – it was John Naismith holding a large piece of cardboard with the charade titles scrawled on them with marker pen.

The only problem was that the theatre seats were pretty uncomfortable, even though we’d taken a cushion for Christopher. So as the evening wore on his back got more and more painful. We’ve had a really quiet day today and will do again tomorrow to help him recover. But despite the pain, it was well worth making the effort.