Free The Birdcage by John Bowen Page B

Halliday to find her a mate. Better still, if he could do so without hurting Mrs. Halliday’s feelings, he would give her away. “Silly little bird! It’s not worth it,” he said affectionately to Lucy, and opened the refrigerator for eggs.

3
Separate Establishments
    R ichard Findlater said that the Avenue Theatre had been torn down and rebuilt in 1905. Then it had been damaged, and again rebuilt, and had taken a new name, The Playhouse . It was no longer a theatre, but a studio for the B.B.C. So much for the Avenue Theatre.
    If they were to find a script of The
Forgotten Men
, some time (and therefore money) would have to be spent in looking for it. Norah Palmer told Clarissa to type copies of Shaw’s review, and she sent three of these copies to the Head of Drama, with an inter-office memo in which she suggested that the play might fit agreeably into
The Fore-Runners
. If they could find it, she said, that would be an interesting story for the Publicity Department to exploit. Obviously it was taking a chance to spend money on a play which nobody had yet read, but she reminded the Head of Drama that Granada had done Houghton in their
Manchester School
series with success, and Houghton was of the same period. There was an excellent chance, she felt, that the play would hold an audience, and as a package, the play and the search for it might do something for the company’s prestige.
    The Head of Drama detached the bottom copy of Shaw’s review, wrote “Could be interesting” on Norah’s memo, and passed it to the Programme Controller. The Programme Controller detached the second copy, wrote “I agree” onNorah’s memo, and sent the memo and the top copy of the review to Mr. P., the Chairman of the company. That was because it was well known within the company that everything had to go to Mr. P. in the end. He had ordered the company’s head designer to copy Harry Truman’s “The buck stops here,” on to a deckled card, and kept it on his desk. The company was Mr. P’s. kingdom, and nothing could be done in it unless he said,
Le roy le veult
. On working days, he arrived at the office at eight-thirty in the morning, and he left at seven-thirty in the evening, after which, it was said, he and Mrs. P. watched the television until broadcasting ended, and went to bed. Norah Palmer’s memo and the review by Shaw took six minutes of Mr. P’s. attention. He wrote, “Yes” in thick blue pencil on the memo, and sent it back down the chain of command.
    When it reached the Head of Drama, it stopped. The Head of Drama gave Norah Palmer a buzz. “Just got the green light on your
Forgotten Men
,” he said.
    A week had passed. Fred was dead and eaten, and Norah Palmer had begun to think that she might, without too much loss of face, telephone Peter Ash some evening. She had forgotten
The Forgotten Men
. “The play Shaw liked,” said the Head of Drama.
    “Oh … I’d better do something about it, then.”
    “Sooner the better. It’s just the sort of thing His Nibs will keep asking about.”
    Where did one start? Her Assistant? Norah Palmer had an Assistant as well as a Secretary. The Secretary looked after Norah Palmer, and the Assistant looked after plays.
    You may think that it was Norah Palmer who looked after plays, and so (ultimately) it was, but there were so many plays, and company policy was that every play had to have a reading. However unpromising it might appear, even if it were only thirteen pages of long-hand, written inpencil on lined paper, the play must be read, a report made on it, and the report-card filed. Fifty unsolicited plays a week, together with the real plays commissioned on synopses through agents, and the proof or advance copies of novels which might (somebody had thought) be adapted into plays—one couldn’t expect Norah Palmer to lose herself in dealing with such a
mélange
. So her Assistant sorted the plays and novels, and sent them out to readers, and read the readers’ reports,