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We welcomed our latest cast member to"I Killed Rasputin" today with the arrival of the actor who will be playing Gugus IV. This was a hard role to cast as Gugus is a dog, a cross between a slack-jawed terrier and a bull-dog (who needs to slobber and who in an earlier version of the script needed to piss on demand) and taking an actual dog to Edinburgh would cost even more than a human being. So Gugus is being played by a puppet and having seen him in action I wish I had cast the whole thing this way. He has a wet nose, blinking eyes, cocking ears (I mean they can be cocked, that is not an expletive) and the ability to drool and in the brief bits of the rehearsal I saw today he is a scene-stealing genius. And he's lifelike enough that I am hoping to convince my wife that he is a real dog and have him as a very cheap pet who neither eats nor shits. So I will have something to show for all this in the end, whatever happens in Edinburgh.
Things seemed to be ticking along nicely, so I left the cast and Gugus to get on with it. Whilst I was gone one of the cast mildly concussed himself whilst trying to teach the others how to stage fight safely. Which is quite an achievement. I think he's going to be OK, though he has to take a day off to recuperate, but he can always be replaced by a puppet.
My work there is done, but there is much more to achieve before I can properly relax. And I also only have ten days to get a six pack. Today I was able to wear a T-shirt that I haven't dared put on for about six years as it was rather figure hugging. I just about got away with it. And even though I haven't done much swimming recently I did 40 lengths in just over 30 minutes and had lots of energy left, more or less equalling the time I was doing about a decade ago. I am getting younger and I will never die. You see if I am wrong.
