I Am What I Am, John Barrowman [smart ebook reader .txt] 📗

With love, John 2009

CHAPTER ONE

‘PROMENADE’

★

‘Outside of a dog, a book is a man’s best friend. Inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read.’

Groucho Marx

Six of my favourite things in my house in Wales

1 A caricature depicting the Torchwood cast embracing Captain Jack and Captain John in an exuberant tangle of arms and legs (say no more).

2 The original sheet music for Cole Porter’s ‘I Get a Kick Out of You’ (a gift from my Reno Sweeney, Sally Ann Triplett).

3 Model planes, ships and cars, and a telescope to view the stars (these are a few of Scott’s favourite things, too).

4 Two goldfish that my niece, Clare, and I rescued from a friend’s house and named after two of our ‘pet’ names for each other (Shaka and Nina).

5 My gran, Murn’s, two ‘Wally Dugs’.

6 A bust of Caesar and a statue of Buddha in the bathroom, plus an oversized, welded-steel statue of a male diver in a backward pike that dominates the interior courtyard.

Welcome, readers – to my home in Sully, Wales, and to my life in the spotlight. Watch out for my dogs tangling themselves at your feet: Harris, a boisterous black cocker spaniel; Charlie, a gorgeous red-haired Dogs Trust rescue spaniel; and the family’s thug, Captain Jack, a rescued Jack Russell terrier from Cardiff Dogs Home. Try to avoid their frenzied doggy madness as you step into my front foyer, and consider yourselves very lucky – because, since there’s so many of you, I haven’t gently urged you into the foyer, switched off the lights, closed the outer door … and left you alone to discover that a full-size black Dalek looms in the corner.1

The Dalek is one of a kind, made especially for me by the Doctor Who tech guys; I requested that the Torchwood logo be tattooed beneath his menacing eye stalk. My Torchwood Dalek is one of two treasured pieces of memorabilia displayed in pride of place at the front of my home because of their importance to my success in the entertainment business.

The second piece is far less scary, but equally significant. Hanging on my interior front door – where a welcome wreath might normally be – is the SS American life preserver from Trevor Nunn’s revival of Anything Goes, in which I played Billy Crocker. Anything Goes, as you may know, was the Cole Porter musical in which I made my West End debut with Elaine Paige in 1989.

Anyone can make a grand entrance promenading along this hallway towards the main part of the house; even the dogs love to skid up and down on the blond oak-wood floor. To your left is a guest bathroom that I call my ‘superhero room’. It’s decorated with comic-book art: a poster-sized ‘Spidey Saves the Day’ comic cover, and on the wall opposite this is a poster from one of the first Superman movies. The film’s tag line is ‘Irresistible Force’ – which is an appropriate mantra for a toilet, don’t you think?

Most of the art and the photographs in this hallway – and elsewhere in the house – punctuate special moments in my life or Scott’s. For example, next to the bathroom door, you’ll notice the framed drawings and costume swatches for one of my Dancing on Ice costumes. The best art, though, is through the far windows in front of you.

The view of the sea and the distant English coast is stunning, isn’t it? After a hectic week of meetings or rehearsals or recordings or whatever, I come down this hallway, see that expanse of water – the Bristol Channel, and beyond to the Celtic Sea – and the surrounding craggy cliffs, and my entire body kicks into relax mode.2 One of the first things Scott and I do when we arrive home together is drop our bags at the bedroom door and step outside, where, for a few minutes, we simply stand and stare at the majesty of it all.

While sitting on my deck overlooking this spectacular view, I began exploring ideas for this second book. I re-read many of your comments about my first book, Anything Goes. I’ve received letters and emails from all over the world since AG’s publication, and after seriously mulling them over, a few things really struck me.

One of them was this. No matter what your family experiences, you found connections with the Barrowman clan. Sisters wrote to me about their brothers; brothers wrote to me that they, too, had a bossy big sis.3 Mums shared the book with daughters, and then they passed it along to their sons. Gay sons gave the book to their parents, hoping for some understanding; and parents gave the book to their gay sons, saying they understood. A few of you told me you used the book as a way to mend bridges within your families, and a lot of you revealed that the book reminded you of your own family’s silly antics. You sent me tales about your dogs, your children, your schools and your grans.4 And all of them brought me great joy. Some of you shared stories of alienation and exile from your families, and I’m deeply touched that you found some comfort in the anecdotes from mine. It was a no-brainer, then, that this new book would include a few more Barrowman yarns.

Watch your step as you come down into my main living area, which runs the length of the house; its expansive windows frame the pool and the sea beyond.5 This space is divided into three distinct living areas: two ranged with their own comfy reading chairs and oversized leather couches, while the third space, at the far end of the room, accommodates a massive wooden table that came from Thailand. The table is scarred with the knots, crevices and imprints of the two trees that produced it, as well as the countless cocktail parties, family dinners, lunches and buffets it’s played host to, and the book piles, laundry piles and other