Londoners seem to be in search of a film. Wherever you go in the streets, there are performers creating theatre, waiting for their script and director. Now they were all a bit more noticeable to us than usual yesterday, as we'd just come out of the Gielgud theatre on Shaftesbury Avenue where we'd had our minds teased open, played with and not properly tidied away by, well, a mind-altering production of 6 Characters In Search of An Author.
In brief, a play about the blurred boundary between reality and unreality when it comes to writing, performing, filming and everyday 'real' lives. Why do we view characters in a play or a film as less real than us, when they can exist forever, whereas we only exist for a moment in time? Who's to say that we're not all just characters in a film? Also, what's more real and closer to the truth; a documentary or a drama about the same story with actors playing the parts the real people play in the documentary? As when a camera is put in front of a person telling their story, they begin to act. Unlike an actor, who's trying not to act, but portray that person convincingly.
And who's really watching who? It's not just the actors who're being watched, but the people behind the cameras, the big production studios, the audience, and 'real' people's lives.
As we stepped out of the theatre we saw all the Londoners looking for their film, play or story. A young woman looking lost with tears in her eyes, a man holding a sign for an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet and two young guys having a heated debate in the shadows of a backstreet. And then I realised that London's film was already rolling. At that moment, an old bloke with a face not dissimilar to Charles Manson the serial killer's, complete with long, straggly hair, piercing man-on-a-mission eyes, and no joke, Texas Chainsaw Massacre t-shirt underneath his leather jacket. I couldn't believe that he was one of the normal characters in London's film. He was too contrived and out of place. He belonged in a dodgy action thriller playing the obvious baddie who no-one suspects, except the audience.
So we watched him some more to see where he fitted into it all. He then stopped dead in the street, as if he could sense us watching him, turned and looked up towards the top windows of the building across the street. He put his hand inside his jacket, and we thought, oh my god, he's about to pull out a gun. He then began to pace back and forth, his hand still inside his jacket, his piercing eyes penetrating the windows of the building. We quickly decided not to stick around for the ending of this particular film, and fled the scene.
We headed towards Covent Garden to meet some friends at a restaurant. They were sat outside, enjoying the last and first day of London's summer. We'd only been sat there for about 15 minutes, narrating the scenes of our day so far, including our unwitting cameo in a dodgy action thriller, when, and this is completely true, a group of people came over to the little alley we were sat in opposite the Royal Opera House, and began to set up a camera. We all watched in disbelief as they filmed a woman who began to cry as she tore pages from a book, then stuffed them into her bra before throwing the novel down hard on the ground. About 9 times. When the camera stopped rolling, she went from crying her eyes out to bursting into fits of laughter. It made me wonder what'd happen if the cameras for London's film stopped.
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