(Pause)

Harold Pinter, playwright, screenwriter, political activist, occasional dickhead, and adjective.

Famed

for the



pauses





in his stage work

originally meant to help actors act his plays in a more natural manner than tended to be fashionable in the 1960s

but which became more stylised and

mannerist

over the years

to the point that when he once gave a reading of one of his monologues, everyone complained because he was reading it too fast.

We’re back to our normal Monday - Wednesday - Friday schedule starting tomorrow. See you there…

Millie Week 6; Thu 11 - Sat 13 Oct 1990

click to enlarge

Three things to note about the second strip. The boy with the blonde hair is apparently called Tim, and I flag him up in the script as someone who will feature later. We never see him again.

Similarly, the boy on top of the pyramid in the second frame is Sammi's little brother. I think we see him in the background in strips set at Sammi's family newsagent's, but once again he never becomes a main character.

Finally, from the original script, here are my drawing instructions for the third frame...

3. I'll leave this up to Roger's imagination, but I think two people formed the sides of the toast while the others were beans last time I was subjected to this.

Millie Week 6; Mon 8 - Wed 10 Oct 1990

Click to enlarge

This is interesting - the first strip you see here on the syndication sheet is not the one that got published - and I've only just noticed. The Mirror changed it to one that had exactly the same script and the same punchline, but took place in a busy street on the way to school. It ends with Richard spouting his Shakespeare to some puzzled passers-by. And it's a definite improvement on the original. I'll scan it and plonk it in this post later.

The character of Miss Twee was partly based on the wonderful Diana Edwardes, the driving force behind the West Kent Youth Theatre, and one of Those People Who Change Your Life For The Better; though Diana was neither twee nor as theatrical as this. I'm not convinced she would have had much time for drama workshops either. Neither did I, I always found them to be a nice way to waste an afternoon but I could never take them seriously. Acting is a mixture of let's pretend, empathy, diction and knowing where you are on a stage in relation to other people. Pretending to be an acorn doesn't come in to it.

Added, Saturday afternoon: Here's that revised Monday strip...