Literary Tour

I had a really fun acting gig, playing characters from various literary settings for an American tour group visiting parts of England associated with books and writers. Characters I played included Doctor Watson, Calico Jack, Branwell Brontë and an 18th century smuggler.

It was a fun and challenging mix of improv and invisible theatre. Probably the trickiest but also most enjoyable day was playing Alfie, a Yorkshire farmer and Home Guard member visiting 2024 from a 1940 James Herriot type world. For this event we were in character for several hours, including sitting at dinner which is really quite hard when the people sat with you want to chat to you as an actor and make you break character…

“so how far do you live from London?”

“I live on a farm just down the road from here…”

“NO! The real you!”

Also in attendance were the director and two of the cast from Channel 5’s All Creatures Great and Small, so as well as the tour guests I was also sharing a table with the actors who play Herriot and Tristan, who I don’t think had been briefed about us being there in character which must have been quite confusing for them!

The tour combined my interests in improv, literature and history and I got to visit some really fantastic places in Yorkshire, Cornwall, London and Bristol. I had a fantastic time with the other actors and felt like we were doing good work to make a once in a lifetime tour a wonderful experience for the guests.

Photos by Sarah Becker