Felpham-based Kevin Short heads to the Edinburgh Fringe this August with Samuel Beckett’s 1958 one-act play Krapp's Last Tape (Lime Studio at Greenside @ George Street).
00:00Good afternoon. My name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers. Good to speak
00:06to Kevin Short, as always. Kevin, you're doing something remarkable this summer. You are heading
00:11to Edinburgh with Craps Lost Tape. Now, this is a bit of a lifelong ambition, isn't it? You saw
00:18this play many, many years ago with much younger stars playing it. You decided to wait until you
00:25were pretty much the right age. I did. Yeah, I saw Albert Finney at the Royal Court, and he was
00:31quite young when he did it. And I saw Ian McDermid as well, played in his 20s. They were marvellous.
00:39They inspired me. They inspired me to do a lot of Beckett. A lot of my work's been Beckett
00:44influenced. But I thought, no, I'm a character actor, but I've never been somebody to play a
00:49really aged person. So I'll wait. So I've waited and waited and waited. Until you are an aged
00:55person. Yes, I am. But still young at heart. And I thought, this year is the time to do
01:05it. And I've been growing my hair for two years. If you can see, there's a ponytail, if
01:12you can see it on camera. And because Beckett is very strict about his description of Beckett,
01:20that he has long, bestraggled hair. He has a white face. He has a purple nose. He has
01:25pointed white shoes. Extraordinary images he creates. It's almost a clown-like image to
01:34begin with, because he was very keen on silent comedy. Beckett loved Buster Keaton and Laurel
01:41and Hardy and the like. As you were saying, you want to be directed effectively by Beckett
01:48himself, by covering exactly the stage instructions. But the play, what makes you want to do this?
01:54Why is it such a striking piece?
01:56Because it's actually...
01:58And it's a one-man piece, obviously.
02:00The one-man piece. And I've come to the age of the character. In fact, I'm slightly older.
02:05He's 69 in the play. And I'm coming up to 75. Although I do look at 65, really. But yeah,
02:1269. And he reflects on his life. He's recorded every birthday for the last 30-odd years. He's
02:20recorded his feelings and his ups and downs. And now in his 69th year, he listens to his
02:27former self 30 years before, who was quite full of energy and hope and fire.
02:34And we see 30-odd years later that he's lost that. He's drained away. His artistic soul has
02:43drained away. He only survives on eating bananas for food and drinking alcohol for drink. And he's
02:54a very depressed human being. But through all that, there's tremendous humour. Beckett's always
03:02found a way of actually touching the funny bone out of a crisis in all his plays. He always sees a
03:08funny side somewhere that you've got to laugh at tragedy. Otherwise, life really isn't worth living.
03:13And even crap in this play does see the humour in himself of 30 years ago. And the humour in himself now, you know, the sad person he is, he does find humour in himself. So it's not all doom and gloom. That's for the audience.
03:31Well, it sounds a fabulous piece. Good luck taking it to Edinburgh. Good to speak to you. Thank you.
03:35And to you, Phil. Nice to see you again. Oh, by the way, before you go, I wear this T-shirt all every day now, which says, you can't probably read it. It says, eat, sleep, eat, be Beckett, repeat.
