Postscript . . .
By CYRIL RAY
ISLINGTON used to be a par- ticularly Londonish part of
London, but it sometimes seems, these days, as though every corner of the world is Arch Barbecue' hag opened just by the Angel —`Marble Arch' sounding -almost as exotic in our Islingtonian ears as the word 'barbecue' itself: there's many a neighbour of mine that's never ventured that far West—advertising in' enormous letters its 'Yankee Dinner: 6 oz. pure beef Hamburger, one Frankfurter, Baked Jacket Potato and Butter' (virtually the only dish on the menu that doesn't include French Fried— how out-of-date Mr. Wesker is, to be sure: in these Americanised days of ours, it's French Fried with everything). At about the same time, just around the corner in Camden Passage, our quartier got its admirably appropriate little bistro, onioPsoup, mustarded mackerel, carafe wine, coq an yin and all, and very good, too.
And only the other day I saw them moving the kitchen gear into what promises to be more far- flung still, what with its calling itself 'Portofino.' I oughtn't to be a journalist, round these parts: I ought to be a gipsy fiddler.
This Camden Passage I mention is where they're going to build what the enterprising local shopkeeper behind it all intends to advertise as, `the only arcade of antique shops in the United Kingdom'—a sort of blend of the Ponte Vecchio and the Portobello Road. Not bad for a borough that wasn't with it enough a year or so ago even to get in on the espresso-bar boom.
Now, just behind the parish church (which has a notice under the portico in modern Greek, and is just opposite the Kofty Bar, with 'Shish Kebab, Hummus, Lokma' on its fascia board), we have an importation from faraway Hamp- stead—Mr. John Wright and his puppeteers, who have opened 'The Little Angel,' London's first public marionette theatre for more than a hurt: dred years. It is housed in what used to be the Henry Ansell Good Templar Lodge and Tem- perance Hall, and when Mr. Wright sought to THE SPECTATOR JULY 20 1962 buy the bomb-damaged building he had to track down the trustees of the late Mr. Ansell, Who had warned them in every paragraph of hits home-made will against having any truck wth1 solicitors, and was eventually passed on from a . teetotal retired theatre doorkeeper in Shepherd's, Bush to his fellow-trustee, a teetotal retired tram-driver in Balham called Mr. Welfare, and clinched the deal.
There are links with the old Islington, rill happy to say: the sixty tip-up seats in the audt" torium were salvaged from the lire that pot an end to Collins's Music Hall—it adds to the charm, somehow, that they couldn't salvage CO secutive numbers. And there's a note in the programme, after the acknowledgments to the Pilgrim Trust and the names of the distinguished patrons, Dame Flora and Sir Basil among than' to make known to one and all that, 'the sign on the corner is by kind permission of Fishers the fish and chip shop'—a time-honoured tuck- shop that has resisted having to FrenchifY its fries and still keeps its true-blue end up in the same street as the Continental Stores and the Istanbul Emporium. To my mind there ought to be a future for Jr satire in the puppet theatre—for a sort of BO° the Fringe on Strings. But John Wright, the ntaa, in charge, doesn't altogether care for satire and is more for fantasy. 'But just think,' I said, 'whit the marionette-maker could do with those public political faces before ever a string was Pulled or a word put into their wooden mouths.' That was on Saturday last, as ever was, and John , Wright said, 'Yes, but we like our figures to last' But I'd still like to see a marionette conic n., 'i the stage to speak that puppeteer's prologue of C. S. Forester's (one of the best books on the subject is Marionettes at Home, by the man who
created Hornblower): •
Good evening, humans. Here before the plaY, I have a chance to say my little say:
To show you how despite all this to-do We're very little different from you . . •
Like you, we're fond of taking striking Posec;
Like you, we can't sec farther than our noses • We strut our hour upon the stage, nor stop
To think of the approaching curtEaunodurto Spoken before a puppet play b politics that ought to have been good for a laugh, La' Saturday.
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