Sharon Penman Takes On Will Shakespeare

I've made a fascinating discovery about Later Bloomers. Many are driven, not just by passion, but by an obscure obsession that defines their path.

With Peter Paul Roget, it was creating elaborate lists. With Mary Somerville, it was the exotic shape of algebraic symbols.

And with Sharon Kay Penman (b. 1945), it was vindicating England's most reviled monarch -- Richard III.

A THING DEVISED BY THE ENEMY

With a name like hers, you'd wonder why Penman considered doing anything other than writing. She'd loved it from a young age but, like many of us, had difficulty deciding on both a college and a major. After a few false starts at different schools, she transferred to the University of Texas at Austin and graduated at age 24 with a major in history.

In her academic wanderings, she became fascinated with King Richard III, the House of York's last king, portrayed by Shakespeare as a nasty hunchback who murdered his young nephews and drowned his brother in a butt of malmsey (Madeira).

Penman was astonished to learn that Shakespeare took extreme poetic license with Richard III (sort of like Hollywood)...

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Liz Smith: All This and Johnny Depp Too

I've never considered a facelift because I earn my living by looking old. ~Liz Smith

There's a Liz Smith who calls herself "the 2000-year-old gossip columnist." She's often a skilled and entertaining writer.

We won't be talking about her. We will, however, be talking about Hollywood.

I've written elsewhere about the foibles of living in Hollywood.

On the one hand, my 50-something self still looks pretty darn good. Or so says my British Hubby (BH), who's eight years younger.

On the other, everyone in this town over age 35 is invisible, so it doesn't matter (except to BH, who's the only one who really counts).

In my official status as a scribe of the Great Unseen, I'd like to pay homage to the other Liz Smith. (Like Buster Merryfield, BH introduced me to this UK treasure. I owe him so much. What was my life before Dr. Who? Black Adder? Red Dwarf? 10/14/10 addendum: As of last weekend -- Mr. Bean!)

Our Liz Smith is a British character actress born Betty Gleadle in 1921. She's one of those faces you've probably seen but never noticed.

ABANDONMENT MULTIPLIED

Smith's mother died in childbirth when she was two. Her baby sister died a few months later. When she was seven, her father walked out on her, promising he'd write. The letter never came.

In her own words, "My father was a bit of a sod really... he just went off with loads of women and then married one who said he had to cut off completely from his prior life and that meant me." Her beloved maternal grandmother, who raised her, died when Smith was 20.

During World War II, Smith served in the Women's Royal Navy. Right after discharge, she married sailor Jack Thomas, whom she met while serving in India. Thomas walked out on her when their children were two and six -- with a good friend.

After my divorce was a terribly bitter time. For about 18 months I walked the streets openly crying, I didn't care. I used to go to jumble sales and spend three old pennies on a whole pile of old china; cups, saucers, plates, anything, and then go home and throw them at the wall. When I look back I think that was healthy.

Smith worked odd jobs, mostly in shops and offices, to support her children. She felt the stigma of single motherhood in the '50s: "As a woman with two kids and the husband gone, nobody wants to know you. Neighbours would cross to the other side of the street in case they had to say good morning."

But when did she know she wanted to be an actor?

As a girl, her grandmother sent her to after-school elocution class so she could make friends. The class often toured village halls, putting on shows. She says, "The warmth and lights and laughter was magic, just magic."

FLOGGING TOYS ONE CHRISTMAS

When her children got older, Smith took acting classes at night and worked summers at Butlins, a family resort chain that also provided entertainment. She could spend all day with her kids, Sarah and Robert, and appear in the evening shows. Her big break came in 1971:

The moment that my life transformed was when I was standing in Hamleys one Christmas, flogging toys, and I got a message from this young director named Mike Leigh. I was nearly 50 at the time, but he wanted a middle-aged woman to do improvisations. I went to an audition and I got the job of the mother in this improvised film – Bleak Moments, his first film – and it changed my life.

Since then, she's worked non-stop and has become the UK's favorite fictional granny. Some shows you may have seen her in (and not even realized):

• The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover
• The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles
• The Vicar of Dibley (BBC Series)
• A Christmas Carol (with Patrick Stewart)
• Roman Polanski's Oliver Twist
• City of Ember (with Tim Robbins and Bill Murray)
• Charlie and the Chocolate Family (with Johnny Depp -- now do you recognize her? Sleepy Grandma Georgina)

FINALLY A ROCKSTAR

In 2007, Smith published a short story collection entitled Jottings: Flights of Fancy, appeared in a music video by Little Man Tate, and won the "Best Television Comedy Actress" at the British Comedy Awards for her role as the tippling Nana in The Royle Family.

(The Royle Family, a BBC show that ran from 1998 to 2000 with subsequent yearly specials, centered on a telly-obsessed Manchester family. Although it never made it to the States, you can pick up the first few series on Netflix.)

In July 2009, she received an MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire) for services to Drama.

Smith has never forgotten where she came from or what matters. In 2002, she said, "I have four grandchildren, aged from 12 to 27, and next year I'll have had 30 years without working in a shop. Not everyone has a nice slice of life like that."

She retired from acting recently, at age 87, after having a stroke. She's still having trouble walking and reading, but plans to write more short stories.

I can't even imagine what kept her going -- abandoned by her father and her husband, spurned by her neighbors for the awful crime of not having a husband, having to work in toy store during Christmas (that's really paying your dues). I adore her even more because she's no Pollyanna. She admits to very natural feelings of envy for her child co-stars because she didn't have their opportunities.

Yet she kept the spark in her soul alive, the warmth and lights and laughter that was magic, and at 50 carved out a whole new career that lasted almost four decades.

I’m very proud because I had rejection for so many years, and it seemed as though I’d never get anywhere, but I was determined to keep on trying. And I’m thrilled I did get somewhere in the end.

WHAT LATER BLOOMERS CAN LEARN FROM LIZ SMITH

• Like her contemporary, P.D. James, Liz Smith shows you can take care of your people and pursue your dream. They needed to persevere over the long haul to do both, but they kept going.
• Excavate that magic memory. Let it lead you on a new adventure or help keep you going.

SOURCES

It happened to me: actress Liz Smith. Legion Magazine.
Liz Smith: I'm a little off-centred. The Independent: 19 June 2002
Her Royle Highness. The Daily Mail: 28 September 2007
This much I know. The Guardian: 21 October 2007
Liz Smith cruises into her retirement. The Telegraph: 09 July 2009
Liz Smith's Wikipedia entry
Liz Smith's IMDB entry

Movies, Misfortune And The Making Of Roget's Thesaurus

At 14, he went to university and by age 19 he'd earned his medical degree. (You might call him a Georgian-era Doogie Howser.) He went on to teach physiology at the University of London, helped found Manchester Medical School, invented a new type of slide rule, designed a pocket chess board, and arguably invented the first movie camera.

But perhaps his greatest accomplishment was a list.

Maybe you've heard of it?

Roget’s Thesaurus.

I can’t write in my house, I take a hotel room and ask them to take everything off the walls so there’s me, the Bible, Roget’s Thesaurus and some good, dry sherry and I’m at work by 6:30. ~Maya Angelou

The man is not wholly evil – he has a Thesaurus in his cabin. (Captain Hook as described by J. M. Barrie in Peter Pan)

Strictly speaking, Peter Mark Roget (1779-1869) doesn't qualify as a late bloomer.

He was a precocious scholar who began his career while in his teens and went on to pursue a challenging medical and scientific career.

At age 55, Roget wrote a paper entitled “Explanation of an optical deception in the appearance of the spokes of a wheel when seen through vertical apertures.” In it, he described an odd phenomena -- that if a person observes a moving wheel through a series of vertical slits (such as a picket fence), the spokes of the wheel seem to curve. Roget devised a shutter-and-aperture device to study this observation -- a movie camera prototype.

But it was when Roget retired from medicine in 1840 to pursue his true passion -- the classification of words through their synonyms and antonyms -- that he achieved his ultimate accomplishment. Roget published his Thesaurus in 1853, at age 74.

Roget's Thesaurus is so comprehensive and useful, that during the 1960s, '70s and even the '80s, two reference volumes could be found on every student bookshelf in America: Webster's Dictionary and Roget's Thesaurus.

His list was his life's work.

His list -- Roget's Thesaurus -- has helped millions of people across more than a hundred years.

And it may have saved his life.

A MAN BESET BY HEARTBREAK

Although obviously accomplished, Roget experienced overwhelming heartbreak in his life. His father died of tuberculosis when he was four. His mother suffered from paranoia, often accusing the servants of plotting against her. Both Roget’s sister and daughter experienced mental breakdowns. His wife, 16 years his junior, died of cancer at age 38. His favorite uncle and surrogate father slit his own throat, while Roget fought to take the knife from him.

To cope with this litany of tragedy, Roget developed an abhorrence of dirt and disorder and an obsession with lists and counting. He showed the hallmarks of what we today call obsessive-compulsive disorder, not to mention depression. No wonder.

And so, in his biography of Roget (The Man Who Made Lists), Joshua Kendall concludes that the Thesaurus did much more for Roget than for its millions of users across the centuries. The ultimate book of lists became his salvation and "it enabled Roget to live a vibrant life in the face of overwhelming loss, anxiety, and despair."

Twenty-eight editions of the Thesaurus were published during Roget’s lifetime. He died at age 90.

Obsession served him well.

And Roget's "later blooming" has served all of us well, too.

WHAT LATER BLOOMERS CAN LEARN FROM PETER ROGET

• Never discount your passion because it seems too strange or too simple.
  Roget's lists have benefitted millions.
• We each have a personal battle that defines us. Later blooming involves unearthing a creative, individual strategy that increasingly leads us beyond coping into the sublime. Check out Josh Hanagarne, The World’s Strongest Librarian. He will gleefully destroy every stereotype you've harbored about Tourette's Syndrome while bending a grade 5 bolt Ironmind yellow nail. Plus, he loves books.

SOURCES
The Man Who Made Lists: Love, Death, Madness, and the Creation of Roget's Thesaurus by Joshua Kendall
New York Times book review of Joshua Kendall’s The Man Who Made Lists by Thomas Mallon
"The Myth of Persistence of Vision Revisited," Journal of Film and Video, Vol. 45, No. 1 (Spring 1993): 3-12
Download Roget’s Thesaurus for free on the Project Gutenberg Web site

Acknowledgement:  Many thanks to Kelly Diels for providing editing assistance.

How Bram Stoker Handled A Soul-Sucking Boss

What do Dracula and The Devil Wears Prada have in common?

Recently I attended the opening of a gourmet chocolate kitchen. As I sampled the delicious goods, someone asked, “Are you in The Industry too?”

The amazing chocolatier, you see, has a day job. He’s a sound engineer. He’s done films you’ve heard of.

In Los Angeles, you can’t go to a gathering without being asked, “Are you in The Industry?” Meaning, of course, the entertainment industry, which permeates the city like a layer of smog.

Or fog, if you lived in 19th century London like Bram Stoker (1847-1912).

Stoker knew The Industry well. For over twenty years, he was the personal assistant (PA) to Henry Irving, a leading actor of his time and the first to be knighted.

A BRILLIANT PUBLIC SERVANT

Stoker knocked around in his 20s, attending graduate school, writing theatrical reviews, publishing a few short stories and working as a civil servant. At age 29, he wrote a textbook called The Duties of Clerks of Petty Sessions in Ireland, which became a classic in the field.

UNTIL HE MET DRACULA

The same year, however, Stoker penned a flattering review of Henry Irving’s performance of Hamlet.

Irving invited Stoker to his hotel room to talk about himself. He recited a poem for Stoker, The Dream of Eugene Aram, about a schoolteacher who batters an old man to death for a bit of gold. The performance mesmerized Stoker:

So great was the magnetism of his genius, so profound was the sense of his dominancy that I sat spellbound. Outwardly I was as of stone...The whole thing was new, re-created by a force of passion which was like a new power.

Irving and Stoker became close friends, or perhaps, master and acolyte. According to biographer Barbara Belford, the hypnotic, self-centered Irving is the man who was Dracula.

In 1878, Irving acquired the Lyceum Theatre in London. He asked Stoker to become his PA and theatre manager, a position Stoker held until 1899, when Irving sold his interest -- without telling Stoker.

What could have caused such a rift?

THE CHILLING MASTERPIECE

Two years earlier, Stoker had published Dracula, at age 50. Stoker wrote a few minor novels in his 40s, but none of them rivaled Dracula. According to Belford,

The novel's genesis was a process, which involved Stoker's education and interests, his fears and fantasies, as well as those of his Victorian colleagues. He dumped the signposts of his life into a supernatural cauldron and called it Dracula.

When Stoker asked his employer of almost 20 years what he thought of Dracula, Irving replied, “Dreadful!” He refused to star in a theatrical adaptation.

Barbara Belford speculates that Irving felt it beneath his dignity to act in a play written by an employee.

Stoker and Irving's relationship, however, appears more complicated than that. Did Irving just see an unflattering portrait of himself in the novel? Or was it something else? Certain members of The Irving Society believe that Stoker might have been privy to a very dark secret about Irving. (See "The Ripper and The Lyceum" in First Knight, their Society journal.)

After Irving sold the Lyceum, Stoker stayed on as his personal assistant for a few more years, but the two eventually drifted apart.

Henry Irving died in 1905, probably never realizing he'd turned down the role of the century.

Finally free, Bram Stoker wrote prolifically until he died in 1912 at age 65. He produced several more novels and a biography of Irving. Stoker’s widow Florence published a short story collection, Dracula's Guest and Other Weird Stories, after his death.

In 1922, the unauthorized movie Nosferatu became the first adaptation of Stoker’s novel. Florence Stoker sued the filmmakers for copyright infringement and won.

Although ruled derivative, Nosferatu originated the idea that sunlight could kill a vampire, a concept Dracula doesn’t explore.

WHAT LATER BLOOMERS CAN LEARN FROM BRAM STOKER

• You can spend 10 months as a PA and write The Devil Wears Prada, but it takes 20 years under the thumb of an soul-sucking egotist to produce something the caliber of Dracula.
• Start doing now what you dream of doing later.

SOURCES
The Irving Society
Belford, Barbara. Bram Stoker and the Man Who Was Dracula.

Buster Merryfield Had A Pension For Acting

I can thank my British hubby (BH) for widening my vocabulary. The Brits have degrees of expressing disdain that we Americans can’t touch.

Over here, for instance, an idiot is pretty much an idiot.

Over there, an idiot can be a git, a twat, a tosser, an eejit, a knob-end, a wanker, a plonker or a half-dozen more words I’ve forgotten.

(Really, I’m not making an analogy to Eskimos and their words for snow here. )

BH tells me that a sitcom called Only Fools and Horses made plonker (my personal favorite) a household word in the UK and that its beloved star, Buster Merryfield, didn't act professionally until he was 58.
Since I live in Hollywood, the entertainment (aka youth) industry capital, I had to check.

Harry “Buster” Merryfield, Jr. (1920-1999) came from a typical pre-WWII working-class English background. His mother was a part-time waitress and his father a packer.

Merryfield's grandfather gave him the nickname Buster when he was born, since he weighed nine pounds, and the name suited him when he became a child boxing star in the 1930s.

Merryfield took a fascinating road into professional acting . . .

FIRST STOP: JUNGLE WARFARE INSTRUCTOR

Merryfield was drafted in 1939 at age 19 and served with the Royal Artillery.

In 1942, he was given the chance to train as an officer, and took it. He became a physical training and jungle warfare instructor, serving in India and South Africa.

In 1944, Merryfield returned to England, where he led a squadron shooting down flying bombs known as V1 doodle bugs.

SECOND STOP: BANK MANAGER / AMATEUR THEATRICAL PRODUCER

Just before being drafted, Merryfield had entered a management training program with National Westminster Bank. After the war, he returned to his desk job and rose through the ranks. (He'd gotten married in 1942 and had a baby on the way.)

But he loved amateur theatre, and had been in charge of providing entertainment for the troops. He continued acting in local productions.

While in his 40s, Merryfield produced John Osborne’s The Entertainer, Ruth Dixon’s The World-My Canvas and Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge for the Woking Drama Festival.

The productions won best play prizes in 1966, 1968 and 1969, respectively. Merryfield himself took best actor honors in two of those plays.

(The festival, held in Surrey, is one of England’s largest drama competitions.)

THIRD STOP: FAMOUS CHARACTER ACTOR

At age 58, Merryfield retired from NatWest Bank to pursue acting professionally. He convinced a London repertory company to take him on, performed in several plays at the Connaught Theatre, and won a few small television parts.

His big break came in 1985, at age 65, when a BBC producer saw him perform mime. He was asked to audition for the British sitcom Only Fools and Horses.

Merryfield became Uncle Albert, the crusty seafaring relation of two thick, but likeable, second-hand traders.

The series ended in 1996 when one of the nephews discovers that an old watch they've owned for years is an antique worth millions.

You know, I’ve figured it out. I always said I wanted to do 40 years in a bank. A few years in the war. About 20 years as an actor. Five years to write a book and then another 10 years as a painter. By the time that’s all done I will be about 102.

Merryfield didn’t quite get his time as a painter.

He passed away in 1999 at age 79 from a brain tumor. Merryfield was survived by Iris, his wife of 57 years, his daughter Karen and two grandchildren.

Buster Merryfield's humor, his zest for life and his devotion to his family still inspire Later Bloomers through his autobiography, During the War and Other Encounters, and his work on Only Fools and Horses. I've included a video clip for you below.

WHAT LATER BLOOMERS CAN LEARN FROM BUSTER MERRYFIELD

• “I’m in the enviable position of being an actor with a pension.”
• Start doing now what you dream of doing later.

MERRYFIELD AS UNCLE ALBERT


SOURCES

• Buster Merryfields's Obituary in The IndependentBuster
• Merryfield in Wikipedia
• Photo credits: BBC