Sunlight through the trees in summer, endless masquerading. Like a flower as the dawn is breaking, the memory is fading. It took me totally by surprise when Liz asked if she could come to Cats with me. None of my friends before had ever been that interested and it meant a lot to me that she cared - at the time, it was very different to everything else she loved! We were opposites in a lot of ways, but we had the same sense of humour and I think we both also had a streak in us of wanting to have an adventure that no-one else around us was having. The fact she wanted to step into the Cats world was maybe because we were so close and I was so excited about it and it was almost like I was in an adventure on my own and she wanted to be part of it, because pretty much every other adventure either one of us had we shared with the other. I just remember being so touched that she wanted to come and see this show that meant so much to me and I was so excited about that that going to stage door after the show was like keeping on riding a wave, it gave us another adventure to focus on and this one we were actually starting and invested in together. We had such a laugh talking over the show afterwards, and talking over what we got up to at the stage door, joking about the stupid things we'd said and done and talking about our favourite characters and actors, making up stories and singing the songs together. Neither one of us wanted it to be over - we wanted this to be a proper adventure, we wanted to be part of the adventure and life of the tour and to have move in-jokes and memories to laugh about. It was the start of a crazy, amazing couple of years.
The seasoned pros, spying wigs In Nottingham windows!
One of the odd thing about our adventure was that, at school, Liz was always the bold, fearless one, whilst I was the shy, nervous wreck. But at stage door? We always had total role reversal. I would say some of the stupidest things I've ever said in my life - I'd outright tease Dean, I'd tell off Kevin, I'd match John's ability to talk at a million miles an hour and be just as sarcastic as I was with people I'd known my whole life, saying things I'd never normally say to virtual strangers! We never quite understood it, and there were so many times when I'm worried I might have been the only one talking at all! I was in charge of speaking up, asking for photographs and taking the lead with it for the longest time. But Liz was much better at the practical part of things - getting things ready, being there to lend a coat when I'd forgotten mine, able to keep a level head without snapping at anyone when there was a problem with something pre-show and keeping me from losing my mind. She was also always the best at coming up with the silliest stories! Every trip to stage door was an event, a big occasion. An adventure. And a huge part of that was actually the time we spent building up to a show and a stage door rather than the show or stage-dooring itself. We would talk and make plans for shows months in advance and just the excitement of travelling down to a show was something to look forward to in itself. We would listen to the show and crack jokes back and forth and we'd go shopping for new theatre outfits and discuss cast changes and past trips over and over, always laughing over the same silly things and often building things up to an increasing level of ridiculousness in our retellings to the point where we couldn't stop giggling whenever something reminded us of a joke.
Crying on the stage door steps the night of the cast change.
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The Cats Tour Fangirls
So, I can't really talk about my stage door experiences without telling you about myself and my best friend Liz. Because 'The Cats Tour Fangirls' were a thing, ok! We made ourselves a proper stagedooring team, and every trip was a well-planned operation. There were t-shirts, a division of duties was always agreed upon, specialist shopping trips and discussions held on every outfit worn to the show, we even had a sort of 'official document' drawn up between the two of us for when it was acceptable to clap and cheer for our favourite performers during the show! It was funny, it was daft, it was insane, but I had the most amazing fun. One time we entertained ourselves for a whole five-hour drive to Norwich with little else other than a road atlas - as fans of Whose Line Is It Anyway? we were adept at silliness such as 'Questions Only' and we had a habit of making up stories about the tour cast, with one of us saying one part, then the next person saying the next part and so on, sometimes with ridiculous impersonations added into the mix. I doubt I've ever laughed so much as I did with Liz on those theatre trips and the times when we would discuss the tour, it was just the most fun.
The day of our first trip to stage door.
Strangely, the fangirl thing (and the 'hear us before you see us' thing) was all a bit of an accident. That first night we went to the show, we were sat next to this group who cheered everything. They were actually getting on our nerves a little bit by the end! But the cast thought we'd been with that group I think, because we were very enthusiastic ourselves and we showed up at stage door with these massive grins and all this praise for them. But it became our signature - 'cheering and whooping' as Liz's favourite John McManus once put it. My own favourite, Kevin McGuire, just said 'Aw' a lot about us instead! But the person who found us the most amusing was Dean Maynard, who once leant over the bannister of the stage's steps mid-finale and bellowed down to us 'Was that you making all that noise?!' over the music. Naturally, we just cheered and whooped in his face! He thought we were insane and we loved him all the more for that - he became our joint favourite cast-member and maybe in a way we loved him more than we loved our respective favourites combined because he just took on this hero/legend status with us from the first night. And, in turn, we took on something of a legend status amongst the cast.
The early stage door days, outside The Regent Theatre in Stoke-on-Trent.
One of our last ever stage door trips together at the Wolverhampton Grand.
I think that our time at the Nottingham Concert Hall was the pinnacle of it all - it was the venue where the cast first changed and nothing compared to the times we spent at that stage door I don't think, because we simply spent so much time at the Nottingham Concert Hall, inside and outside, and by that point we were practically part of the tour, leading to even more fun memories between ourselves and the cast. Also, for whatever reason, the new cast never quite made it into our hearts the same way as the original cast - our own stubborn fault I suspect, with hindsight. But still, Nottingham was almost perfect. Our seats were so much on the front row that they were practically part of the set, we knew when to cheer, we knew not to even bother trying to eat because we wouldn't be able to as we would be too excited. So much randomness, silliness and stupidity happened at that stage door, running around trying not to be seen pre-show by our favourites so as to surprise them, hidning behind lorries, appearing at all the worst times, giggling uncontrollably, to frighten the life out of poor Alex Durrant. And enduring the cast change goodbyes, crying and hugging alongside the cast as they went their separate ways. We were even part of a little five-person standing ovation the night of the cast change after having to explain to some people sitting next to us why we'd been crying for so much of the show.
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I remember back in Bristol, wandering round on a cold morning-after and feeling so sad and empty and lost that the show was over, and Nottingham had that feeling too, only it was kind of beautiful then because it bonded us with the cast in a way, going through that experience on the final night, crying our eyes out during the show with the cast balling their eyes out too, and at stage door afterwards they were hugging us and telling us not to cry and it was terrible and lovely and painful and magical. And I remember standing on the steps at the end of it, in the rain, Liz and I just hugging each other and...I'll never forget that experience. Never. It was the strangest, loveliest night and it sums up to me all that is great and all that is not-so-great about the theatre and stage-dooring. You've not had a good time if your best memories aren't bittersweet. I think that night taught me that. And it's something that going to the theatre always reminds me of - the need for that contrast in order for me to know that it matters, to feel how special it was. The loss and the sadness is beatitful in its own way, even when it breaks my heart.
We called this photo 'The In Crowd' - Us and our favourites. To the left: Liz and John McManus and to the right: myself and Kevin McGuire.
Stagedooring in Bradford after an early start.
Liz and I aren't close these days. Something which - I can't deny - I think is an awful shame. Sometimes it can feel like a lot of the memories we shared at stage door have been lost and a lot of the in-jokes forgotten. But life got in the way of the stagedooring for a while, and in the way of the friendship to an extent, and that simply the way it goes. I have tried to keep alive the jokes and stories that I can through my writing and now I keep up with the former Cats cast and make more memories of my own; it's a whole new, different and adventure, and for all its differences, it is just as magical and special to me. But I'll still never forget the adventure Liz and I went on together in 2006 and that feeling of being in our very own special club. Yelling "OH MY GOD THAT'S ALEX DURRANT!" out of a hotel window when we spotted a cast member and having Liz tackle me to the ground to shut me up so I didn't freak him out., waiting in the rain for John McManus and watching the growing list of people we'd despatched wander the theatre looking for him, running to hide behind a transport lorry so as not to be spotted pre-show by Kevin McGuire (in the process scaring and confusing Zak Nemorin and Alex Durrant totally), laughing uncontrollably over some stupid stage-door story pre-show in Manchester, rescuing a drawing done for Dean Maynard from the bottom of some random man's shoe, running down the aisles of the Nottingham Concert Hall yelling "THIS THEATRE IS OURS!", and of course crying and crying on those Nottingham stage door steps on the night the cast first changed.
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Walking around Bristol on a cold morning after a show.
When the dawn comes, tonight will be a memory too... And yes, ok: we were teenage girls and we picked favourites and perhaps it took us far too long to realise that we loved the cast as a whole because we were so in awe of our own personal stars - John McManus being a very Liz type of person to be in awe of, Kevin McGuire being a very me type of person to be in awe of, and they were good friends despite them being opposites in so many ways, much like Liz and I were! But we just admired them for who they were and for their talent and we enjoyed talking to them so much. But we loved talking to everyone because they were magical people to us and it made us feel so lucky that we could keep that magic going even when they stepped off the stage. It goes back to this thing of wanting an adventure really; from the beginning, the planning and the trip and all that build-up was equal in importance to us as the show and was just as much fun. I still remember, our second venue on our little Cats tour was the Bradford Alhambra. Liz's grandma came with us, my dad had a broken leg so he was hopping about in the background, we ate ice-cream opposite stage door and we had got ourselves special 'Cats Tour Fangirl T-Shirts' - the first draft of several variations on that theme! - and it was special maybe less because of the stage door (we hardly knew the cast at that point and could hardly tell some of them apart!) and more because of the hilarity and adrenaline which began with us both waking up at about 4.30 that morning and turning on the TV to find BBC2 playing some really surreal, chirpy muzak on their nightscreen, making us laugh almost uncontrollably! And that really sums up my overriding memories of our little 'Fangirls' team. Laughing and being ridiculously random whilst partaking in bizarre little pre-show rituals and making up crazy stories to pass the time. It was a real blast, and a very unique couple of years.
Cats Tour Fangirls: You'll Hear Us Before You See Us!
The Cats Tour Fangirls - as we were so happy to be known - are a huge part of the reason stage door will forever be special to me, because it's a place of irreplaceable memories and a place where I found some wonderful adventures. So, although the friendship may no longer be there, the stage doors where that friendship thrived still are and the Cats Tour Fangirls are still a huge part of my theatre story. I think it was a very special time where things just came together in a perfect way and those memories have made stage doors up and down the country the home of great laughter and great memories. The adventure of it all made the theatre a part of my life in a new way and made me want to carry on finding more adventures in all these places and many more - because honestly? I believe that you can always find magic at a matinee, no matter what, and whilst almost everything else may have changed, that fact remains the same.
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