Helen Osborne

Saturday

Helen Osborne

A bland and baleful stoic

From our UK edition

‘Woke up this morning feeling fine. Notices for Lorca’s comedy, Jack’s the Lad, terrific (even from that goof on the Times). Rehearsals for the new Arnold Wesker a real gas. Long lunch with Aimé Planchon (hot French bombshell); short siesta; drinks party at NT for all of us with CBEs … rest of evening a bit of a blur.’ April Fool. National Service, Richard Eyre’s diary of his ten years (1987-97) at the helm of the bunker on the South Bank, reads like Penal Servitude. What a chronicle of woes, crises and wariness, of ‘panic, insecurity and inadequacy’. The mystery is why Eyre, in his father’s phrase, chose to ‘nail his balls to the wall’.

Saturday

Helen Osborne

Heroes, villains and bugbears

From our UK edition

Unlike most journalistic cobble jobs, this collection of Nigel Farndale's interviews from the Sunday Telegraph has a real sparkle: intelligent, irreverent and often unexpectedly kindly. It makes you laugh and, occasionally, it makes you gasp. Over the past five years he has quietly garnered a reputation as one of the best inquisitors, up there with Lynn Barber if not yet so fearsome. After absorbing all that holy writ from rampant egos, most interviewers end up feeling like a piece of old blotting-paper and pull out of the game. Farndale is still resilient. Flirtation, Seduction, Betrayal - for him the weekly confrontation is an encapsulated love affair. He does his homework on his heroes and villains, and then is prepared to be surprised.