There
is a moment described in the biographies of many actors when they get away
with it. Auditioning for a role for
which they don’t totally fit the bill they take a chance, either falling flat
on their faces – literally, sometimes – or succeeding with possibly career-changing
consequences.
Can
you ride a horse? Of course I can.
Deep-sea dive? I’m a
natural.
Swing
from a helicopter above the English Channel? I was fifteen the first time I
tried that.
Invariably
in the accounts we read the blag convinces, the actor secures the part and,
with maybe a hiccup or two, a star is born.
In
real life it isn’t quite like that. No,
not quite, but maybe sometimes close. In
the seventies, in my twenties and desperately needing to supplement my teaching
income, I applied for a bar job in a Birmingham nightclub. ‘We only employ girls,’ one of the
middle-aged Spanish brothers who owned the club told me. Curiously he spoke only out of the right side
of his mouth. ‘Pretty-ones,’ his brother
added, from the left side of his. As a
six-foot twenty-five-year-old bloke there was no way I was going to blag my way
through that one. I had to admit defeat.
But
wait. It seemed I had something that was of interest to them. The very thing, it turned out, that so
definitely disqualified me from the position for which I was applying. ‘You seem a big, strong lad,’ left-mouth
brother said. ‘You look as if you can
handle yourself.’ I suppose that phrase
is open to interpretation, but I was pretty sure I knew what they were
suggesting. In the seventies, of course,
before security checks and training courses, being able to handle yourself
was pretty much the only qualification required for door-work.
This
was my swinging from a helicopter, of course I can ride a horse, walk a
tightrope moment, and I knew what was required.
I nodded. ‘Did a bit of boxing at
school,’ I lied. And, referencing the
Bruce Lee craze of the time, ‘little bit of Kung Fu. No expert though.’ And it was enough.
I
certainly looked the part. The black
suit. The dickie-bow. The stance – legs just a little further apart
than is comfortable – was easy. The
swagger – almost naturally acquired. But
I knew that sooner or later there would come a moment when I was going to have
to get on that horse, put on that diving suit.
And I tried to put it off for as long as possible. The way I did this was to talk to people: be
reasonable; be nice. Prevention is
better than cure as my old mum used to say.
Look, I’m really sorry about this, but it’s obvious that you’ve had a
few. Another time we’ll be glad to
welcome you. But tonight … There’s a
taxi rank over there. I’d have a word with a drunk’s mates, persuade them
to see him home, get girls to help me to talk their blokes out of a potential
punch-up. I developed quite a technique,
as much chat as a vacuum-cleaner salesman as one of my colleagues
observed – well it was the seventies!
But
of course luck always runs out eventually.
And when the place did take off one night, I fell off the horse, dropped
from the helicopter. Even the diving
bell couldn’t save me.
I
thought the job was finished. But the
twins came round to see me when I came out of hospital. I was sussed, yes: not a fighter. But I was a talker and that, they decided,
was what they wanted. When undesirables
– for whatever reason – were trying to gain entry, it was my job to talk to
them – be nice – get them to change their mind, go somewhere else. Go home.
If that failed, a specially choreographed little manoeuvre took place:
sadly admitting that all attempts at reasonable persuasion had failed, I moved
back towards the ticket kiosk so that my heavier colleagues could move in to – in
the words of the brothers – do the business.
And
so for three years I was part of the Birmingham nightclub scene, working the
door, patrolling the dance floors, pretending to be hard – but the friendly
one. Memories from those times came
back to me when I started writing crime stories ten years ago. All the dodges that can be part of that world. And the more sinister aspects. The shock I felt when someone told me that a
gun was kept in the safe – the brothers keep one in their draw too –
deeply shocking in the seventies, and probably not true, but all grist to the
mill of a writer.
And
I certainly drew upon those days when developing the characters of Craig Carrow
and Shuko for my novel, The Norway Room. Both work in Birmingham’s club land. Carrow, an e-ex cop, is part of the security
team of The Norway Room, the city’s premier nightclub. Shuko, a fixer for the Triad gang the Ninth
Dragon, that is active in the city. Both men who really can handle themselves.
It
is interesting the things from one’s past that you draw upon when writing
fiction. After my nightclub and then
teaching days, I trained in Chinese medicine and had for a number of years an
acupuncture practice in Birmingham. In
training one learns a lot about the structures of Chinese society, the
importance of hierarchy, the mythologies.
And I was able to use some of the sensibility of these things in
creating the Ninth Dragon.
Shuko, the
fixer, looks to the histories of the Chinese Emperors for guidance when
planning the Dragon’s strategy in a turf war over the Norway Room. He uses the brutal outcomes of some of the
traditional stories as a warning to opponents.
So
in writing The Norway Room, almost inadvertently it now seems, elements
of my past working lives were excavated as I constructed the narrative. Night Clubs.
Chinese medicine. And the years
spent teaching? Well, there is Ashley;
the thirteen-year-old lad at the centre of the novel, attempting to survive on
his own in the city while his father serves a prison sentence.
The Shots review of The Norway Room can be read here.
The Shots review of The Norway Room can be read here.
The Norway Room is out now (£11.99, Tindal Street Press)
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