I Carried a Watermelon by Katy Brand

Author:Katy Brand
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2019-09-12T17:00:00+00:00

I am on a train to Aylesbury. It is affectionately referred to as the Chiltern Turbo, and I have not been on one of these for around 20 years. It starts at Marylebone station and goes through my old home town of Amersham.

When we first moved there, this train did not exist, and commuters had to make do with the rather grotty old boneshakers that bother the Metropolitan Line (now rather more pleasant, it has to be said). Those greenbelt City workers who lived in the smarter Buckinghamshire towns and villages did not wish to be trammelled by such an uncomfortable service, though, and so a separate line was built that had nice hydraulic doors that hushed closed, little tables for your … I don’t really know what for as take-away coffee was not a thing back then, but anyway, a nice touch. Somewhere to put your crisps. And, best of all, toilets.

The arrival of the Chiltern Turbo was extremely exciting – it went slow from Aylesbury to Amersham, through the posh stops, and then, luckily for me, fast from Amersham to Marylebone, meaning you could be in actual London – real, dirty, exciting London – in about half an hour, without ever having to encounter the existential despair that is Finchley Road station. Some of them stopped at Harrow-on-the-Hill, but if you closed your eyes, you’d never notice. This was amazing.

I am on my way to a performance of the live touring show of Dirty Dancing, at the Aylesbury Waterside Theatre. I have never seen this show before, and I have booked it now, in all honesty, as research for this very book. I knew of its existence, but in the same way I have also been aware of the existence of very life-like sex dolls, I have never felt compelled to seek it out. I prefer the real thing. But now, in the interests of professionalism (no, don’t laugh), I am on my way to see it for the first time. I am quite excited, but also apprehensive.

I have tended to avoid ‘the re-makes’ of Dirty Dancing because I cannot believe I won’t be disappointed. I have a hunch that the chemistry of the original casting will never be bettered, not in Aylesbury, not in London, not anywhere. The perfection of the moment, the bringing together of first-time director Emile Ardolino, a young choreographer Kenny Ortega and a relatively inexperienced writer in Eleanor Bergstein, with a cast hoping to establish themselves, and all that energy in one place makes a kind of alchemy – they were the pioneers, they were taking a chance that gold is in them there hills, and it was. And therefore probably not also to be found in a touring cash-in show. I think it somewhat smacks of cutting open the goose that laid the golden egg to get more, only to find no further eggs, and a dead goose on your hands. These things do not happen twice, and they are impossible to recreate.

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