4. AND THE WINNER IS...........

Not me. But I couldn't be happier.

I love awards ceremonies. Watching them that is. I'm a big oscar buff and many was the night in March staying up all night to watch the ceremony live. I'm an avid follower of the Olivier's too and was extremely excited this year as a show I was in last year (High Society) was nominated for best musical. I was so excited, in fact, that I gatecrashed the afters of the ceremony with a few of the lads out of the cast. Deadly night! I love the excitement of them the tension the politics, the drama. I get nervous just watching them on the telly, cheering out loud as I did when Robin Williams won his oscar for Good Will Hunting. Screaming at the tv as Forrest Gump sweeps up at the oscars (Beating Pulp Fiction for christ's sake).

So you can just imagine what I was like attending my first awards ceremony last Friday (26th)....and to make it worse I was a nominee......oh crap.

Last year I spent a wonderful summer at the Open Air Theatre in Regent's park performing Shakespeare for the first time. It was the business. I had two small roles in Two Gentlemen of Verona and a Midsummer Night's Dream. Shakespeare boy. what the hell am I doing performing shakespeare? I used sit at the back of English class in De La Salle College and sleep while we studied a dead ENGLISH playwright. I mean what the feck does this stuff mean? Its archaic. That was before I performed it for the first time. My mind was changed very very quickly. Without wanting to sound wanky the beauty of shakespeare is in the performing or the watching not in double english last thing on a Friday. The poetry the drama the comedy is all there and your challenge as the performer is to make it clear understandable and interesting to an audience. Ok, three pound acting lesson over. But its deadly, believe me. And I had a ball doing it. Now please remember these were small roles. Small. Not Big. SMALL. I wasn't playing bloody hamlet or anything, I was just happy to have to say a few lines of this weird old shite, and I thought that it was all over and forgotten about until a few weeks ago I get a call from the office at the Open Air to say that I have been nominated for the Ian Charleson award.

Come again?

Yes I did hear right. Oh Jesus! The Ian Charleson award is for the best performance by an actor/actress under 30 in a play written before 1904 (the year of Chekov's death dontchaknow) or in Layman's terms best young classical actor. There's 14 nominees from productions all over England and I'm one of them.

What me?

Yes you. Aw man. So off I have to trot, adorned in a suit and accompanied by the director of Two Gentlemen of Verona, to an awards lunch at the Royal National Theatre which will have Michael Gambon as guest of honour. lovely.

The day arrives and I'm bricking it. big time. I've got the sweats and the suit is NOT helping. Why have I got the sweats? Well let's see....Isn't that Charles Dance over there....oh and there's richard griffiths,,,,,,ah yes there's Sir Peter Hall......jesus who's next? Its a bit of a who's who of older english actors and the other nominees seem to know lots of them. I, on the other hand, know no one. I mean who the hell am I? all the nominees are under 30 alright but some of them are seasoned classical actors. I'm an aul messer from Waterford boy. All I'm worried about at this stage is not looking like a pleb. Be cool, calm and professional. Then someone accidently bumps into me. The voice that says sorry is very familiar......I mean like every day on sky one kind of familiar.....I mean professor x kind of familiar. Sorry about that says Patrick Stewart. How bad.

The meal goes well. I'm put at a table with a few actors I know of and a couple of directors (which will do me no harm at all). Its grand. I don't spill my food down me (borrowed) tie. Then the prize giving gets going. And suddenly I realise what's happening. I'M AT AN AWARDS CEREMONY!!!!!!!!!

So me heart is jumping now. Big time. Not because I think I'm going to win. I'm not. I played two SMALL roles at the Open Air for feck's sake. i can't even have a drink because I have a show that night. nuts.

The large Irish oak of a man that is sir Michael Gambon goes up to the mike. He's funny. That should calm me down. It doesn't. the judges get up to give citations about all the nominees and then you have to go up and collect a framed certificate of commendation. Grand. I was warned about that. at the end then they give out 3rd 2nd and 1st prizes. Alphabetically I'm first on the list of nominees so I'll be called called first and it'll all be over with. Grand cause I can't take much more of this anxiety.

First citation is given.

Its not me.

What's going on here? After 8 citations I am now feeling like crap because I start thinking that they have forgotten me. I knew I wasn't meant to be there. But then a little thought slips into my mind. I tell it to piss off but it won't..........maybe I've been placed.........that's it so. I've officially got the shits and my heart is now half way down my shirt, there's only 5 names left on the list, jesus I might have been plac....

"It is always nice to be able to recognise a performance in a small role."

And with those sweet words my misery was ended. Nice words were said about me including that I played Thisbe in a Midsummer night's Dream like a "Defrocked nun". It wasn't in my mind at the time but I'll agree with you kind sir that nominated me. I got up to warm applause (Who the hell's this guy I'm sure they all said) shook hands with sir Michael he handed me my framed cert we posed for a picture;

"Don't forget your champagne" Quoth Sir Michael.

"That's why I'm here boy" Quoth I. You can't bring me anywhere.

So I didn't win (the excellent lisa Dillon did and well deserved too) but I don't care. I got to go to an awards ceremony and not as a bystander but as a nominee. How bad, not too shabby for an auld blaa. People have already started to take me more seriously as an actor because of it and I had a deadly day met really cool people and I walked past the theatre where I spent nine months as a front of house assistant at a time no one would give me a job. I used to walk past it and my heart would sink to think I have to do that crap job again. this time I had an award commendation a bottle of champagne and my head held high as I made my way to another theatre where I was in a west end play.

So although I didn't win I'm still a winner. A cliché but true. So i don't mind that I didn't win.

Then I found out that the winner gets a cheque for £5,000.

Shite!

Bitter? Me?

Maybe...........