The nocturnal diddleys

This usually happens to me when I'm doing a show. Occasionally I'm obliged to do a show I hate, like The Sound of Music. Rodgers and Hammerstein lovingly crafted a raft of songs which are syrupy, trite, and complete and utter earworms - once they enter your head they will not leave. There is nothing worse than going to bed with that ghastly 'Goodnight, farewell, auf wiedershen, goodbye' tune stuck in your head, and waking up in the morning with it still there, having taken over your dreams for the past eight hours!

I think Cabaret was the worst. That's a brilliant show with wonderful music, but there's a non-stop Germanic jazz-oompah rhythm to a lot of the songs that takes over the mind completely. Bom tikka bom bom, bom tikka bom bom, bom tikka bom bom, bom tikka bom bom (repeat for a month or until severely medicated).

I'm actually in a show at the moment. Oliver is playing at the White Rock Theatre in Hastings right now - it started on Wednesday and the last night is tomorrow. I'm mainly in the chorus for this one, though I do have a short character part in act two as Doctor Grimwig, the pompous doctor who gives Oliver a checkover while he staying at the Brownlow's house. Yes, once again the tunes are all earworms, but they're good ones.You can't beat a bit of Lionel Bart.