A Review By Keith Smith

Timothy West has led a charmed life as an actor: Rarely out of work, moving effortlessly between TV and stage, film and recordings, he is perhaps most famous for his television portrayals of Edward VII and as patriarch Bradley Hardacre in the hit TV series Brass. With his wife, Prunella Scales, and now his son, Samuel, the West family have provided many memorable moments in theatre, film and television. Timothy West’s early years as a young actor read like a map of a now vanished landscape: box-office at Frinton, assistant stage manager at Newquay, weekly rep at Hull, a two-year contract at Salisbury…and meanwhile coping with a small child and a manic depressive first wife.

Soon the parts get meatier, and the venues better known: the West End, the Royal Shakespeare Company, performing Dickens and Dostoyevsky on television, and a stint running the Old Vic, which includes coping with Peter O’Toole and his disastrous ideas for Macbeth…

Not my usual sort of book, so I thought it would be enjoyable to read something out of my normal tracks. In fact I gave up after a short while, as Timothy West seems to be a bit of a bore. If sewing fish into a landlady’s settee because her digs weren’t good is the sort of thing that amuses you this might be the book for you. Alas, not for me……Can’t recommend, except for out and out thespians.