HAVING FEARED BRIDGES WERE BURNED

with the nearby drama school, I was recently heartened to receive a call from the new secretary, politely inquiring whether I was available at short notice to assist in rehearsals. It emerged one was to temporarily take on the role of “intimacy coordinator” — these days apparently deemed essential by students — after the last incumbent was forced to resign in disgrace (they'd discovered she’d “liked” two JK Rowling tweets in 2017). On arrival, I duly set about the task by explaining to those present that I knew all about the difficulty of love scenes, having been unflatteringly compared to Timothy Dalton by a leading lady in 1979. I then playfully suggested that “mental obstacles” surrounding onstage intimacy might be overcome if they followed the excellent example of countless generations of drama students — namely jumping into the sack with one another beforehand. Judging by the emotion on those young faces as they started frantically typing into their phones, I could sense some sort of very real breakthrough being made … only to be interrupted by an irate member of staff bursting through the door, shrieking that my being there was a “secretarial error”.