Covering All Your Needs

I’m old. I mean, I’m not quite ready-for-Denville Hall, old. But wore-it-first-time-around old. Basically an old hoofer who is 403 and been performing since I trained just after WW2 so I’m a true mardy old pro!

I’m going to leap in with something I have felt ever since I started to work in this industry: why being a swing/cover is never enough. Wait, I phrased that incorrectly: why being a swing/cover IS enough. I feel so lucky and privileged to have been and continue to be a swing and understudy within musical theatre. I’ve always felt appreciated, supported and a valued in almost every company.

“CHANGING MY TRACKS CONTINUOUSLY ALLOWS ME TO INTERACT WITH ALL COMPANY MEMBERS BOTH ON AND OFF STAGE AND NO ONE DAY IS EVER USUALLY THE SAME.”

 

It’s thrilling, exciting and terrifying all at once, like watching a horror film or me doing warm up! Whether I am on for a role or kicking my knees up (usually kicking my tits while trying) in a fantastic ensemble number, the joy is there and both have equal place in heart. The swing team I’m working with currently are genuinely some the most versatile and highly skilled performers I know.

So why is there a collective voice in the musical theatre world that tells me I need to do more? Play principle roles. I have lost count of the times I have had conversations with actors and been told “yeah I’m not covering anymore”, “I won’t swing again”, “I want to be taken seriously.”

But I can’t help but feel that this attitude undermines what I think of my job. To constantly hear fellow actors talk of the need to stop covering to enable them to be thought of as a principle makes me feel sad. And less than. This is probably a hang up on my part. It’s hard to listen to this dialogue that hasn’t changed for years. In fact, I struggle to think where the conversation comes from. When and where was this thinking enabled? If I feel genuinely valued in my role as a swing/cover then why am I allowing this unwritten rule to continue to perpetuate?

“I SPEAK FOR MANY OF US WHO, AS KIDS, LOOKED TO THE WEST END AS THE HOLY GRAIL.”

 

Maybe this rhetoric is driven by the actor’s process. Our craft. Our job. I understand that desire, that passion, that drive. It is a joy to be given a lead in a show, immerse yourself in the character, developing each show, deepening the knowledge of that person and the journey they take. I speak for many of us who, as kids, looked to the West End as the holy grail and to be here 8 shows a week is still magical, remembering that little northern lad coming to see Starlight Express and dreaming big. So I do get it and understand our dreams change as we grow but I would have given my left tit just to stand on the Apollo stage and it’s a useful leveller to remember that.

Or is it ego that drives us? That’s a hard question to ask of ourselves. Is it the desire to be seen, validated and ultimately have our ego massaged? Is it financial?! I mean, who wouldn’t like a few extra noughts at the end of your weekly wage?!

Or is it not our (the actor’s) choice? Another conversation that you hear muffled in quick changes or packed dressing rooms is about the casting directors or producers looking at you as a principle: to stop understudying so they understand that you can be taken seriously as an actor. Yawn!

All of this reflects on my job: that I should want more, be “more than”. And maybe I’m writing this to tell myself that I am enough. That I love my place within this community. I’m making a career for myself as an old showgirl that will (hopefully) still be here when Miss Rona buggers off. And, if you come to see a show I’m lucky enough to be a part of, I might be performing that night as a principle, or giving it gorge in tap shoes and singing a tricky harmony line… or I’m in my dressing room just on the off chance someone slips on a bobby pin. 

AND IT’S ALL OK. MORE THAN THAT. IT’S ENOUGH AND IT’S BRILLIANT.