‘Thank you kindly, sir,’ John responded as he took them, then turned to me and whispered, ‘That’s Richard, he’s the same every time. Brings all these sweets for us. I can never eat them, but he insists we take them home for all the volunteers at the sanctuary, and of course Pollyanne gets her own bag.’ Then in a slightly serious tone, he added, ‘As you can see, everyone is so eager to spoil her, I actually have to monitor what she gets, to make sure she doesn’t get overfed.’
Among the small crowd of well-wishers, a lady now appeared who, from her appearance, did not seem to be part of the stage crew.
‘Evening, John, all OK?’ she said, before turning to greet Pollyanne.
John looked up and, as he recognized her, a warm smile spread across his face. ‘Hi, Kay, I’m fine, just fine, let me introduce you to Jon, he’s our vet at the sanctuary, I thought I’d bring him to show him our star at work!’ He turned to me. ‘Kay is Pollyanne’s agent, the one that got us into all this nearly twenty years ago, can you believe it?’
‘Pleasure to meet you,’ I said, shaking her hand.
‘How lovely you could come this evening. You must go and meet Louis, the gentle giant, he’s the other star of the show.’
‘Yes, Louis is beautiful,’ John agreed. ‘In fact, Kay, would you mind staying with Pollyanne for a minute so I can show Jon around?’
‘Of course, no problem,’ Kay said, and immediately turned her attention to fussing over Pollyanne who was now more interested in her hay net.
‘Come on, Jon, it’s only six thirty, so there’s plenty of time to show you around before I need to get ready.’
First he led me towards the front of the immaculately prepared stage, where a small team of stagehands were attending to last-minute jobs. The vast crimson red stage curtain was down and there was as yet little noise coming from the other side of it. Any punters who had already arrived were clearly occupying the bars and restaurants rather than their seats. I noticed the yellow tape on the floor that Emily had mentioned. Despite it being set about a metre back from the stage entrance, the vantage point still afforded a view of over half of the stage. Six chairs were lined up in two rows of three, in the corner, behind the line.
‘You’re more than welcome to watch the performance from here,’ John told me. ‘These are for special guests of the performers.’
Then he led me back past Pollyanne’s pen to the back right of the stage, which opened out into a much larger area. A large, majestic, jet-black shire stallion stood in the middle of his roped-off area as his owner brushed and groomed him.
‘Good evening, Samantha, are you well?’ John said, greeting her and introducing us.
‘This is Pollyanne’s mate, Louis,’ she told me. ‘The two of them have been in every performance of Carmen since it started, haven’t they, John?’
‘Indeed, they both love it.’
‘What a beautiful animal,’ I said, stroking him.
‘Thank you, he’s such a star, even if I do say so. Never put a foot wrong in nine years.’
‘Louis plays a horse belonging to Carmen’s lover, the bull-fighter Escamillo,’ John explained. ‘He has to carry Escamillo around the stage while he sings “Toreador”. It’s pretty impressive to watch.’
I wondered how many opera singers imagine their career will involve performing on horseback. We left Louis, and John led me further back. It was only now that I began to fully appreciate just how large the stage was, but just when I thought we had reached the back of it, we came to a huge doorway. Walking through it, I realized we were on another enormous stage, and beyond that a third stage piled high with an array of sets: a throne room, a balcony, vast paintings, spectacular painted vistas.
‘It’s incredible, John,’ I said in disbelief. ‘I would have never known the back stage area was so vast.’
‘Yes, this area is even bigger than the front of stage, apparently, and these stages are on a huge turntable system so parts of the floor or whole stages can be interchanged between scenes or performances. They can store multiple different sets at the same time, which means they can have several different performances running together. It had a huge overhaul in the late nineties, and that’s when they added a lot of this. Well, I guess I’d best be getting ready, and Pollyanne will be eager for a brush,’ he added, bringing me back to the whole purpose of why we were there. We retraced our steps, and found Kay sitting on a chair outside the pen, busy on her phone, while Pollyanne was still happily tucking into her hay.
‘Thanks, Kay,’ John said, gathering together his outfit from the rail. ‘I’d better go and get changed now.’
‘Do you want me to give Pollyanne a brush while you’re getting changed?’ I enquired.
‘If you want to, that would be a great help, thanks.’ He disappeared off to find a changing room among the rabbit warren of corridors, rooms and offices underneath the stage.
I climbed into Pollyanne’s pen and took to brushing her. She responded immediately, leaving her hay net and turning to face the stage, ears pricked.
Kay laughed, ‘She knows exactly what’s going on, don’t you think?’
‘She certainly does – quite the performer, isn’t she?’ I replied.
‘I have to say I deal with all sorts of animals in my line of work and Pollyanne is one of my favourites, she’s such a character. I’m sure John told you about the night when Radio Three were here recording Pagliacci with Plácido Domingo, and Pollyanne let out an almighty bray during a duet. John was mortified, but everyone else thought it was hilarious.’
‘He did tell me, but I didn’t realize it was when the BBC were recording the performance.’
‘Oh yeah. After that people started queuing up outside the stage doors to get hoof prints of Pollyanne in their programmes, it was unbelievable. John took it all in his stride, as you’d expect.’
‘How funny,’ I mused. ‘Quite the celebrity.’
‘Who is?’ John said, suddenly reappearing, now dressed as a simple Spanish peasant farmer in old boots, chaps, flannel trousers, white shirt and grey jacket.
‘Pollyanne,’ Kay responded. ‘I was just telling Jon about how people used to queue up for her autograph.’
‘Oh yes,’ John chortled. ‘Took me quite by surprise the first time, but we soon got pretty good at it. Her hoof oil worked brilliantly as ink.’
‘You couldn’t make it up,’ I chuckled.
‘Well, what do you think?’ John asked. ‘Do I pass as a Spanish peasant?’
‘You certainly look quite the part. So, what is your role?’ I said, realizing for the first time that I didn’t actually know the story.
‘Well in Act One it’s a street scene and we appear on stage, with Pollyanne wearing a pair of pannier baskets filled with old-fashioned wine flagons, and I saunter around the stage offering them to villagers. Then in Act Three we walk onto the remnant of a battlefield. This time the pannier baskets are full of ammunition, and I sell them, along with Pollyanne, to some gypsies who walk off with her.’
‘I can’t wait to see it,’ I said.
‘Come on then, Pollyanne, time to put your outfit on.’
The wings were all starting to fill with the performers, many of whom were keen to greet Pollyanne, while the bustle of the audience taking their seats was now clearly audible on the other side of the curtain. The stage caller wandered around, announcing, ‘Ten minutes.’
I felt an eager anticipation, but the routine of just another day in the office was evident among the cast, who were nonchalantly playing on their phones or chatting away. Pollyanne was now wearing her panniers over a very cleverly designed harness that had a subtle sack at the back to catch any droppings, should an accident happen on stage – although in nine years it never had. John donned his simple wide-brimmed hat and put his pipe in his mouth.