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MICK MITCHELL'S MURDEROUS MANIACS
'Listen, McTavish ... No, you listen to me, mate,' I was
saying to my agent, over the dog, 'Mick Mitchell has not, does not,
and will not in the future just lob his Old Bill out for the
British public. Banish that thought from your hot, stinging brain.’
‘Now Michael, don’t be so melodramatic,' replied McTavish, in his
Morningside accent. ‘Quite apart from anything else, I wonder if
you're established enough to refer to yourself in the third person.’
‘And whose fault’s that, you kilted bell-end?’ I didn’t
say, instead procuring a Britney from the Golden Gate Bridge.
So matters between myself and McTavish had deteriorated
lately. But no bleeding wonder. I, Mick Mitchell, who'd done
Chekhov, who'd played Ariel, who'd graduated with honours from his
class at RADA, and subsequently put in a series of, dare I say it,
brilliant performances as a pimp on The Bill, a West Ham nutter in
a Hollyoaks special, and a wife-beating, crack-dealing, teenage
fiddler of a father (not a violinist) in Channel 4's recent
ratings smash, Alcopop (can you see what they'd done there?) was
now in danger of being type-cast. Of being stuck in the same moody
shellsuit and bleeding Arsenal top combo until I found myself,
literally, driving a cab. When all I wanted to do was play the Dane
So I'd taken the call from McTavish's office with a
hangover, basically.
'Michael,' he'd said, 'I understand your frustration. You
are a serious artiste. Rome, however, wasn't built in a day.'
'How exactly is me giving another brass a shoeing on Holby
City gonna help with the construction of the Vatican, mate?' I'd
said. 'But all right. Go on. Surprise me.'
'Yes. Now, are you familiar with Danny Dyer, the actor?
Star of Human Traffic and The Football Factory?'
'Are you mugging me off? All I get offered's parts that
muppet's turned down.'
'I believe I have explained to you, Michael, about the
pecking order in these matters. The chain of command, as it were.'
'Yeah,' I'd said, reciting the mantra, 'there's Caine,
Hoskins and Winstone, the premier league. Then Daniels, Dyer, and
the rest, the first division. And then there's Millwall. Crystal
Palace ... Leyton sodding Orient … '
'The new breed, Michael. The coming young things. Although
there's rather a glut of you laddies at the moment. Tell me, have
you seen any of Alfie Allen's work?'
'Do not talk to me, McTavish, about the brother of Lilly,
and the son of Keith ’
‘Indeed not. Anyway, here's the situ. Young Dyer has recently been
getting some very decent ratings - ratings, let me tell you, that
no one expected - for his series on Bravo. Danny Dyer's Deadliest
Men.'
'Yeah, I've seen it.'
'Really? That's marvelous. I'm afraid I haven't, myself.'
'Too busy having dinner at The Ivy, eh mate?'
'Not to be a bore, Michael dear ... Now, no more
interruptions.'
So the situ was this: In series one of his show, Dyer had
knocked about with a load of ex-hard cases, top boys from the
football, armed robbers and so on. All now supposedly reformed and
all now trying to get somebody else to write their screenplay for
them, or their autobiography. Because why spunk a few years in
front of your laptop, pulling your plonker, when you can get some
mug to do the lifting instead? It's this sort of thing that makes
the true artist weep.
Anyway, in series two of all this the stakes had been
raised, as Dyer spent a few nights round the hard men’s houses,
meeting their partners, seeing how they lived. Invariably, he'd
start off 'shitting himself', but they'd always end up bonding
down at the local, over some pints while the wife made dinner.
So what the powers that be at Dave TV (it's low on the
menu if you've got Sky or cable, but it is there) were interested
in doing was making a pilot for a similar show, in which somebody
(i.e. muggins here) would go the extra mile, by not just staying
overnight at the ex-villain's gaff, but also, and here was the
facer, by trying to get off with the geezer's Doris.
Which brings us back, pretty much, to where we came in.
'Look McTavish, next time you fancy a bleeding giraffe, why don't
you ring up the son and the brother?'
'Young Alfie,' said McTavish 'is otherwise engaged.’
‘Yeah, I bet he is ... That’s supposed to make me feel
better about what, exactly?’
McTavish, at this point, had quoted a figure.
'I, er, see ... Straight up? Just for a pilot?'
'Indeed. And there would, of course, be more to follow,
subject to a satisfactory performance.'
'Right.' I said. 'Right.'
And so it was that three weeks later, I found myself
outside a mock-Tudor gaff in darkest Basildon, feeling quite tense.
'Okay Mick,' said Seb, the director 'Ready to roll, yes?'
'I feel like dropping the kids off, mate, as it goes.'
'Really?' said Seb, not inspiring much confidence in his
understanding of the milieu we were about to enter, 'I didn't know
you had children.'
‘If this comes on top, mate,’ I said ‘there’s a pretty
good chance I never will.'
So it was ten in the morning, and I was making my way
through a four-pack of Stella, the old Wife Beater, ironically
enough. I'd been told I shouldn't shave, so I hadn't, and I'd been
kitted out by wardrobe with a Burberry duffel coat and a black
Kangol hat. So I basically looked like Paddington Bear. But that
was only germane, I supposed, as Clifton Styles, the subject, came
rolling out of the front of his house, already fixing me with a
cold, hard stare.
The problems implicit in bonding with Styles, never mind
his good lady, were clear from the outset. He was from round my
area (I’m a Basildon boy myself, hence the move into acting, as
soon as I could) but I'd never heard of this bloke. So in the motor
on the way over, I'd considered his charge sheet. Assault,
aggravated assault, possession of firearms, the list went on. It
all seemed to centre round a Tuesday morning back in the Nineties,
when Styles, instead of watching Sky Sports, or indulging in a spot
of listless self-abuse, had set off down the road to his local
Barclays, to raise a few points about his monthly statement. Well,
fair enough, you might think, except it's probably not if you've
smoked enough rock to waste a Crufts class of pit bulls, and you've
forgotten to leave your Uzi at home. Going to the bank being a bit
frustrating at the best of times. To be fair to the bloke, he'd
always claimed to regret this, but then you would do really, if, in
a morning of madness, you'd pretty much scuppered your alleged
crime empire. And so here he was now, the man of the hour, in
shades, a lot of gold and a loose Prada tracksuit, maybe five six,
five seven, surprisingly slight. Always beware of the short bloke
though, and that's especially true if he's done ten years in
Pentonville.
'Clifton mate,' I said, offering a hand 'How you doing,
bruv?'
'I ain't' said Styles, slapping it away, 'your brother.
You cunt.'
The morning sun flashed off his rings, his SUV, and his
wife's blonde extensions. His wife, that was, who was standing in
the doorway like a fairytale princess, as if trapped in a tower by
a magic spell ... Or, if you'd rather, an eye-popping breast job.
What were they, double E? Double F? Whatever, it could not have
been easy to get round Basildon with those on display. Maybe I
could do this, after all?
'My apologies, Mr Styles.' I said. 'Thank you for inviting
me ... sorry us,' I went on, making a point of introducing the film
crew, 'into your lovely home.'
'Yeah,' Styles said 'it's fucking gorgeous innit? See
anything you like?'
'The, erm, garden?'
'Yeah. Are you looking at my wife?'
'No, Mr Styles.' I said, inwardly wishing a plague on
McTavish, this being a question there's no right answer to, it's
almost a zen thing.
'So you're saying she’s a dog then? You fucking mug?'
'No, Mr Styles.' I said, as, with a laugh like a broken
khazi, he slung an arm round my neck.
'You look like you've done a shit in your knickers, mate.
I'm only having a giggle.'
‘Yeah, you got me there …'
'Yeah, I did, didn’t I?' he said, eyeing my crotch as if
checking I'd wet myself, best-case scenario 'Fucking poof. Right,
let's crack on.'
The next problem with the shoot looked to be this: that
while Dyer's deadly men had presumably known about, and maybe even
had a butcher's at a few of his movies, Styles, as we toured his
plot of prime Essex real estate, seemed to have not an earthly who
Mick Mitchell was. It became clear, basically, as he explained, at
length, about his plans for the extension, that he thought we were
there from Grand Designs, or one of the other property porn shows
Oops. But did this suit my nefarious purposes? Well, it
did in a way, seeing as Debs, the long-suffering, while she
obviously wasn’t going to have much of a say in the slice of
Marbella Styles was trying to create here, was still along on the
tour. Which gave me the chance to put in some spadework, a quip
here and there, the odd cheeky grin, before, after one too many
questions about E's in the Nineties (that's extortion, Ecstasy and
Essex, et cetera), the penny finally dropped.
A tricky few minutes had then ensued. Obviously, I
couldn't tell him what we were really doing there - it was at this
point it hit me that whatever it was, it probably wasn't all that
ethical - but I think I just about managed to smooth things over.
At least, it appeared to be sufficient to the hour for everyone to
accept that these days, Clifton Styles was a legitimate
businessman. That Clifton Styles had always been a legitimate
businessman, and that anyone who thought otherwise could meet him
in the alleyway down the back of his local.
Which, in a roundabout way, brought me on to my next
suggestion, that we go for some lagers. I'd always been planning
this, a trip to the pub (under the circumstances, how could I not?)
and so it was that about six hours later, as we came stumbling out
of the Dave TV people carrier, Styles collapsing in the drive like
a wounded animal, everything seemed to be going pretty swimmingly.
'Oh God,' Debs said 'plastered again and it's not even
seven ... how d'you let him get like this?'
'Don't look at me, Mrs Styles,' I said, holding my hands
up, 'I wanted to stick with the beers as it goes. But he's a hard
man to argue with ...'
'Don't I know it ... All right, let's get him inside ...
Yeah, you lot and all,' Debs barked at the film crew. 'And you can
turn that bloody thing off too. You even think about showing this,
and you'll be hearing from his brief ... His brief if you're
lucky ...'
'Of course' said Seb, looking pretty much traumatised, as
anyone would, after the five solid hours of bloodcurdling
anecdotes we'd just endured. The chances were they were unfit for
telly, but courage, Mick, I was thinking. The show must go on.
Styles ensconced in the spare bedroom then, ('Let him
sleep it off the filthy, drunken pig') Debs insisted we stay for a
spot of dinner.
'It's the least I can do', she said, as we sat down in the
dining room, 'And I don't see many people, now the kids have grown
up,' she went on, before adding, shyly, 'you wouldn't think it now,
but I used to be an actress myself.'
‘Oh nonsense, Mrs Styles,’ I said, having wondered about
this earlier - it wasn't just her face that seemed strangely
familiar - ‘You're a very attractive lady.’
‘Cheeky!’ said Debs, with a peal of laughter, Seb and the
others just looking on, horrified. But maybe the greatest
compliment you can pay anyone who’s trod the boards, (and Hoskins
and Winstone would agree, I'm sure), is that you’ve watched one of
their performances all the way through, more than once. As, I
explained to Mrs Styles, had been the young Mick's experience with
Stunnas 18.
'You remember that?' Debs said.
'Oh yeah. Vividly.'
‘Now you, Mr Mitchell,’ she said, as, distractingly, she
poured out more drinks, ‘can call me Debs.’
'And you,’ I said, thinking bingo, you rogue, 'can call me
Mick.'
So the wine duly flowed, and the gin and the Malibu, Debs
dishing the dirt about blokes in the biz, Michael Winner, Chris
Evans and the late Benny Hill, until, having asked Debs earlier to
let us restart the camera, I rallied the dregs of the old Mitchell
charm, and suggested a quick, cheeky peck on the lips, like an
autograph, I said, for old times' sake. Lest you think I'm too much
of a monster, I should say, in my defence, that I'd been very much
trained to see the play as the thing. And that, by then, I was
totally trousered, so much so that I didn't feel anything as, with
a roar of, what, indignation, the entire Styles gaff went a bad
shade of black.
So what can I say, lying here in the hospital? Well, that
I've had better weeks on the afternoon racing, but that the
footage, actually, isn't too shabby. It'll never be shown, of
course; the only reason Styles isn't going to repaint the courts
with Dave TV's innards is the kicking he gave yours truly,
apparently. But the pilot, I think, has a certain energy. Like
early Scorsese meets Celebrity Wife Swap, something like that. Am I
any closer to my RSC dream? Probably not. This year it looks like
it's panto again, if maybe not in Essex. Still, trying to look on
the bright side, I suppose I've now been stuck off the geezer
register, seeing as on the CV they don't let you look at, the one
that McTavish, at least, reserves for producers, it must read
something like; 'All right. Biddable. But cannot fight his way out
a wet paper bag.'
So there you go, really.
I mean, talk about suffering for your bleeding art ... |
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