Back To Shore

Another proxy post to keep the few photos I shared from my vacation in Brighton in May 2024

Hello from lovely, albeit today a bit drizzly, Brighton. Time for a bit of an update.

Back in my cute little studio apartment for a nap / rest yesterday afternoon I was scrolling through the Brighton Pier website to figure out if I wanted to take my camera and tripod down there in the evening even in the drizzle. Under “What’s On?” I found an interesting event happening at Horatio’s Bar on the pier: “A talk with actress Imelda Staunton”, which I knew from some of her iconic roles like Prof. Umbridge in Harry Potter. I dithered a bit, because did I really want to go out again? Turns out, yes and man, am I glad that I did.

The talk with Imelda on her own was super interesting and she was very down-to-earth and fun to listen to. Early on she mentioned that she met her husband when she was working with him on a theatre production – so a fellow actor, though I had no idea whom. Silly me! She also mentioned that he was in the room. Later on the chat turned to Downton Abbey, where Imelda starred in the first two movies. Suddenly the host said, “Let’s just bring on your husband as well, shall we?” and that obviously was planned from the start, but like I said, I had no idea! Hello, Mr. Carson! (aka Jim Carter, aka Imelda’s husband for 41 years!)

OMFG! Seriously, how did I not know this? Easily answered, because even though I liked Downton Abbey well enough, I wasn’t a fan as such and I’m not really up-to-date with the who’s who of showbiz people in general. But what can I say? Jim Carter also was so much fun to listen to. A born storyteller, very funny, very quick-witted. He coined the term I used for the title of this post and once he realized how much laughter it caused, he used it quite a bit. It also was very lovely to see how much they cared for one another, but also how in sync they were sometimes, which is no wonder after four decades of marriage. And how they still managed to make each other laugh, which is so important. Imelda said at some point “I heard him tell that story so many times over the years and it still cracks me up.” Which I thought was so sweet.

My personal tiny highlight: At one point the chat turned to awards in general and the Olivier Awards: “They are coming up soon? Next week or so?” the host said. I of course had to intervene and shout “on Sunday” from my seat in the 2nd row. “Sunday! Are you going?” the host asked of Imelda and Jim. “No”, was their reply. Imelda then looked in my direction and asked “Are YOU going?” Hahahaha. I wish! Because Operation Mincemeat is nominated a couple of times and they are the only reason I know about it.

All in all, I had such a great time and I’m so glad that I a) found out about it in enough time to go and b) actually went.

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The other lovely activity happened in the late morning: I visited the “One Week In Brighton” exhibition at the Brighton Museum, which was all about how ABBA had won the Eurovision song contest in Brighton in 1974 which catapulted them into the stratosphere of pop royalty. Or something like that.

While I was walking through the exhibition and learned all the tiny interesting / nerdy facts about that event, I thought how strange it was, that there had been a time when ABBA hadn’t been the household name they were and still are. I was born in 1975 and I never knew a world without ABBA. Which is true for a lot of other things that have happened before I was born, but this somehow just illustrated it once again.

Thanks to a lovely gig-buddy I had the chance to be at an exclusive, small and thus super cool Frank Turner gig earlier this week. It feels like it’s been too long since I’ve seen him play some songs on a stage in front of me. Almost five months ;-)! I know, I know, I’m a spoilt fangirl of a touring maniac who actually provides me with ample opportunities to see him play on a pretty regular basis. Did I just book four more of his gigs in October / November? Maybe… ? Kidding. Of course I did!

Back to that surprise gig; for the first part of this post anyway. Frank played for about an hour to about 100 people. Half of them won the ticket by telling the radio station why they should be at the gig, e.g. how big / special a fan they were. The other half (like me) were ‘plus ones’. I could have argued my case for being a big fan as well of course, but I hadn’t even entered the lottery, because I thought I couldn’t make the date work. Thus I was especially happy that I was able to tag along . Frank played five of the new songs – the four already released plus “Never Mind The Back Problems” and besides that it was a “Greatest Hits” set, which is always fun. The gig came with a “Meet & Greet” if you want to call it that. Frank was available for autographs, photos and a quick chat afterwards and of course we went to that as well and even though it’s always only just a short moment, it’s always nice to have that with him…