There are many people that, since my university days, I have lost contact with, and I often wonder what many of them are up to. One of them that particularly comes to mind any time I get in the mood to think about such things is a chap called Russell, who seemed to vanish off the face of the Earth long before we all finished university, and I think that was a shame.
Russell was a member of the university theatre group. I forget exactly which production he was involved with — it was possibly the chaotic production of Twelfth Night I was left directing (with zero experience) after my co-director decided to fuck off on a skiing holiday for two weeks during the main bulk of our rehearsals ahead of the production coming together. It doesn't really matter.
Russell was — and I'm aware writing it like this makes it sound like an obituary, but I honestly have no idea what happened to him — one of those people who could make people laugh completely effortlessly. Everything that came out of his mouth was hilarious. And it wasn't in an overblown "I'm going to spout one-liners" or "I'm going to quote Blackadder endlessly" way — he was just a naturally funny person. He would have a quip for every occasion, a comment for everything, and he was always a shining beacon of fun in any room he was present in.
My enduring memory of Russell is at an aftershow party for the production in question. We had all been drinking a fair bit ever since the curtain had come down on the final performance of the show's run, and we'd bundled around someone's house, as was tradition. This person had one of those weird chairs that was like a big circular bamboo frame with some cushions splayed over it. Russell immediately made a beeline for it, assuming it was the most comfortable chair in the room — but it was not.
"Oh," he said. "Oh."
"What's wrong?" we asked.
"I appear to have sat in a very disappointing chair," he said. We laughed. He did not get up. From thereon, the chair in question was known as the Chair of Eternal Disappointment, and Russell's initial opinion of it was backed up by anyone who managed to sneak into it while he went to go and refill his drink. He usually found it unoccupied on his return, as I can confirm, it was an exceedingly disappointing chair.
I never saw Russell again after that particular production, and I don't think any of the rest of Theatre Group did, either. We often commented on that one particularly memorable night, and the Chair of Eternal Disappointment remained a running joke among any of us.
I wonder what Russell is up to now. I wonder if his own chairs are to his satisfaction. And I sincerely hope that wherever he is and whatever he's doing, he's still making people laugh and smile by virtue of his very presence.
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