There's no doubt about it, Richard Wilson, that classically trained star of stage, screen and Tesco Mobile Flat-Rate Tariff voiceovers is one of the nicest individuals that I have ever met and I say that for manifold reasons.And I say 'manifold' because I love using that word.
Richard becomes the first individual from my list of 500 to have come to my aid twice, the previous time was when he tried to help me win a bet against a friend by shaking my hand in 2005 – it’s a long story (which is available for £9.89 on Amazon)
Having recently finished filming the latest series of Merlin, Richard’s agent Deborah, who turned out to be equally delightful, contacted me to tell me that I would be welcome to catch up with him at their offices in Soho where he would sign my flags.
And so yesterday morning following a healthy bran-based breakfast, which is irrelevant to this story, I found myself walking around Soho’s relatively empty streets at 10.45am. I say empty, there were a few burly, tattooed men who were rolling metal barrels towards pub basements, a couple of media types who had presumably overslept and 47-odd builders who were obviously required to dig up a two meter stretch of Berwick Street.
As I was a few minutes early and a little nervous, I toyed with the idea of knocking back a cheeky glass of whiskey in a local pub but then thought better of it, largely because the pub hadn’t yet opened and I didn’t fancy being arrested under section 9(1)(a) of the Theft
Act 1968.And so I made my way to the front door of the agency that represents Richard ie Conway van Gelder – which sounds like the name of an equine surgeon from Ghent but isn't - an unassuming doorway on an unassuming street, where pressing the buzzer had little effect....Three times.
And so just as the capillary in my eyelid was starting to flicker with stress I glanced up the road to see a man in a smart Crombie overcoat, shades and a scarf walking towards me and that this man was Richard.
I momentarily feared that he would suspect me of hovering outside the building on purpose in an attempt to pounce and catch him off guard, so after I had mouthed ‘Richard’ to him and he had responded by stating “aah you must be the man with the flags” in a familiar Scottish brogue, I quickly allayed those fears by apologising for being early and informing him that no one had responded to the buzzer.
He then pressed it himself, again no answer, which was followed by a slightly awkard little conversation between the two of us while we waited for someone to realize that we were there. If memory serves topics included Conway Van Gelder’s office move, Harry Potter films and sleet.
Fortunately, Richard is far more alert than I am since after a minute or so of us loitering around Broadwick Street like a warmly dressed Russian tourist and his son, he spotted the sign that I had missed and which read “During office hours please use the buzzer in the front hallway”.
As a result, I soon found myself in the slightly surreal position of being crammed into one of those gated lifts - a lift where even the shortest Mbuti Pygmy would have been grumbling about a lack of space - whilst standing cheek by jowl to a man whom I had last seen playing an Arthurian magician in a BBC medieval fantasy drama.
We entered the Conway offices on the second floor and Richard immediately displayed his down to earth and playful streak, informing the lady on reception, who clearly recognized him that he was seeking agent representation.
“Have you acted before?” she asked.
“A little bit, I’m classically trained though. I went to RADA.”
“Have you been in anything I might have seen?”
“No” he replied “but I’m very good.”
At that stage I decided to enter the charade
“He is actually very good. I’ve seen some of his work. I can vouch for him,” I interjected but our game was cut short when his agent Deborah appeared and offered to represent him for a nominal commission before offering me a cup of tea which was declined.
The flag signing ceremony was then carried out with the minimum of fuss, I ask Richard for his views about America and the American people and he was broadly supportive, stating that he hadn’t been there as often as he would have liked, always enjoyed trips to New York and wished he could go more often. His view on the so-called ‘special relationship’ between the US and the UK– the subject matter for my book – was that there was an should be an intrinsic bond between the two countries stemming from a share of common language and ideals.
As he signed the flag, he noticed Jeffrey Archer’s message on it and opted for a more conciliatory epigram before moving on to the second ‘Jack’ the one to be auctioned off for charity and simply marked it with his signature as directed.
I thank Richard Wilson whole-heartedly for once again being kind enough to receive me and my slightly odd request and hope that a snowball that has been nudged towards the edge of a cliff will soon start to gather further momentum.
