Tuesday 5th August 2008

Wooden scenery for the show.

Hot and sticky. Sunny all day. The hire boats were jostling for places again. I made a sign to hang on the rope between us and the hulk, which went< 2.20M> Max! to try and keep the hire boats from insisting on cramming between us and the hulk. We went shopping at Carrefour Agen Sud. Back for lunchtime. I stowed the stuff while Mike went outside to change the coax connectors on the satellite cable as he’d bought some new ones. The old ones weren’t as corroded and rusty as he thought they would be, but he changed them anyway. Later we found our folding Captain's seats out of the engine room and sat out on the back of the boat to watch the performance. It was still light when sat out; the bank of seats looked pretty full and the lights were lighting up the front of the quay where a juggler was performing (we could see the Indian clubs but not him!) and a girl was singing. 

More of the scenery during daylight.

When it dropped dark at ten the show started; smoke poured across the canal and a green laser played through the fog; the recorded commentary started (and a brief hello in English) then a ferryman illuminated with ultra violet light paddled across from the grassy bank to the towpath side by the bridge and his three passengers took lamps and got off on the bank; blue lights back of the trees lit up and sent the foreground into darkness. As the passengers alighted the blue lights went off and the foreground lights all along the towpath came on in orange revealing a sepia coloured still life tableau of life in a French village of one hundred years ago and for a brief moment the scores of people in period costume were stock still. Then the spotlights came on and Snap! everyone went about their business: a priest lead a funeral procession with a monk hauling a cart and coffin to the cemetery far left of the scene (opposite us), the harvesters were running a thresher, two old cars went through the village honking for kids and dogs to get out of the way followed by a horse and carriage. 

Scenery for "Au Fil de l'Eau" annual pageant at
Valence d'Agen

A cameo scene took place in the schoolroom far right where the teacher taught the children about the rivers of the region and a projection screen mid “stage” showed illustrations to aid his lesson for the audience, then a bullock hauled a barge full of wine barrels from right to left (unfortunately for some reason the barge wasn’t lit up) then a steam barge started from the right. The sky due south had been lit up by lightening flashes ever since we first sat out and it had started to rain just as the lights came up, but suddenly the wind picked up blowing with hurricane force from the south hurling the scenery about and the projection screen flew out horizontal! Opposite us the area around the ancient threshing machine had loads of straw which the wind was now hurling at us with great force along with leaves and dirt! We could see all along the stage the wind was tearing through the scenery and blowing dirt and debris all over the audience in the stalls. We retreated inside. The show was called off and the audience left. Mike said he saw the cars leaving the car park at the back of the “stage” driving over things going crunch on the towpath which he thought were tree branches until the occupants of one car stopped to pick up the scenery panels of the churchyard wall! That was a huge disappointment. It was 10.30 p.m. so there had been another hour and a half of the show we didn't see!