Wardour Street

What's the name of that gaff? Wardour...

Not Wardour Street.

The name of the club is like...

The address... 96 Wardour Street.

No, 50 something or 10 something.

Someone in the comments will be able to tell us.

So they're just not going to go to the shops anymore.

They want that black cab or their chauffeur to drop them.

You conceal your religion from me in a monstrous way.

You treat it like writing in the Saturday Review for Pollock, or dining in Wardour Street off the fascinating dish that is served with tomatoes and makes men mad.

I know it is useless asking you so, don't tell me.

i felt an outcast in chapel yesterday not really but a little in exile i met a dear farmer in a cornfield and he gave me a seat on his bunk in church so i was quite comfortable he now visits me twice a day and as he has no children and is rich i have made him promise to adopt three two boys and a girl i told him that if he wanted them he would find them he said he was afraid that they would turn out badly i told him every one did that he really has promised to adopt three orphans he is now filled with enthusiasm at the idea he is to go to the cure and talk to him he told me that his own father had fallen down in a fit one day as they were talking together and that he had caught him in his arms and put him to bed where he died and that he himself had often thought how dreadful it was that if he had a fit there was no one to catch him in his arms it is quite clear that he must adopt orphans is it not i feel that berneval is to be my home i really do notre dame de la yes will be sweet to me if i go on my knees to her and she will advise me it is extraordinary being brought here by a white horse that was a native of the place and knew the road and wanted to see its parents now of advanced years it is also extraordinary that i knew berneval existed and was arranged for me monsieur bonnet wants to build me a chalet one thousand meters of ground i don't know how much that is but i suppose about a hundred miles and a chalet with a studio a balcony a salle manger a huge kitchen and three bedrooms a view of the sea and trees all for twelve thousand francs four hundred and eighty pounds if i can write a play i am going to have it begun fancy one's own lovely house and grounds in france for four hundred and eighty pounds no rent of any kind pray consider this and approve if you think well of course not till i have done my play an old gentleman lives here in the hotel he dines alone in his room and then sits in the sun he came here for two days and has stayed two years his sole sorrow is that there is no theatre m bonnet is a little heartless about this and says that as the old gentleman goes to bed at eight o'clock a theatre would be of no use to him the old gentleman says he only goes to bed at eight o'clock because there is no theatre they argued the point yesterday for an hour i sided with the old gentleman but logic sides with m bonnet i believe I had a sweet letter from the Sphinx.

no letter from you to-day i suspect that domesticity is dominating also no waterbury do send me one the duane is perfectly easy a nickel watch is what i long for silver is bimetallic i never know the time and my poem goes all wrong consequently though it aims at eternity also the pictures don't arrive i feel some other influence is dulling youth full of promises wyndham is to arrive he says to-day so you must begin to be queen anne style at once s m friday july twenty third just had a wire from wyndham to say he comes over to-day to see me but must leave to-night again please send my pictures at once i cannot leave them in london ask chapman if the pastel would not be safer without the glass the glass is the only danger and i can get one at dieppe but i am wretched without my things i want to have my chalet like le home please do this s m saturday july twenty fourth dear robbie i saw wyndham yesterday he came for three hours and now i feel i can do the play pretty well as he leaves me carte blanche to pull it about as i like You are quite right about Congreve.

Fortunately, he is among the books you gave me.

But I like Wardour Street English very much.

The cast Wyndham proposes is splendid, and if you work hard, I shall have a great success.

There were a couple different ones.

We played at the one which was on Wardour Street.

Dingwalls up in

Camden Town.

Rick lived in Woking.

He used to ring me up and say, oh, John, do you fancy going up to the Shaz for now? The Shaz is a little drinking bar in Wardour Street.

And he drove all the way from Woking to Norwood, Crystal Palace, if you like, in his little Singer Gazelle.

And we drove into town, went to the Shaz, the Shaz, whatever you call it, the marquee, the ship in Wardour Street pub.

Then he'd drive and drive me home and he'd go back to Woking.

And Rick was lovely.

Max Beerbohm once said in his delicious defense of cosmetics.

Come, the larks will soon be singing in the clear sky above Wardour Street.

I am tired of tirades.

How sweet the chilly air is.

And when I later developed a passion for the child film star Mandy Miller, my mum would take me up to London to where a lot of the film...

They weren't exactly studios, but in Wardour Street, various places...

Film companies.

And they had those...

We're a very motley crew.

When I, when I was starting out, because most of the screening rooms then, they were Wardour Street, Dean Street, Soho Square.

I mean, you, I know you'll remember this, but there was a time when Soho was the center of the film industry.

Oh, absolutely.

Warners were there.

Everyone was there.

And there was a, there was a group of us that like horror fans, me and Nigel Floyd and Ann Billson and Kim Newman, and we used to refer to ourself as the Dogs of Wardour Street.

[laughs]