Chris Drayton

In an attempt to evade being accosted by some imbecile wielding a foam mace on the Live Action Role-play Society stall, Chris sought solace in the stand opposite. Unfortunately this turned out to be Mugss. Having been led astray by the lure of high powered lights and gaffa tape at secondary school and when told they were a bit short of Techies he thought he'd give it a try. At the first rehearsal, he avoided the Male Chorus trying to convince him he really wanted to prance around on stage and was pointed in the direction of the OP bar. There he met Jeremy, Ben, Matt and Irish Dave who happened to share the same contorted sense of humour and the five of them proceeded to spend the following Thursday evenings consuming copious amounts of beer.

For Iolanthe, he, Dave and Ben must have offended someone as they were banished to the lighting box but, as a bonus, got to blind the principals at will. Mugss had failed to entirely envelop Chris' life up until then but that changed when he ended up on the Committee. He got elected as Secretary and was ensnared for good, so much so he started doing crap Caberet; a curious rendition of 'Y-O-D-A' following on from the re-release of Star Wars, with the Usual Suspects of Jeremy, Ben and Matt. In years to come Ball goers would be subjected to Python re-writes, but only as an excuse to molest the Social Sec with baguettes, and the surreal homage to Michael Green: 'Coarse Bingo' at Kirkby Lonsdale.

Having heard of the legend of the Mugss Boating Holiday and knowing the pointy end of a boat from the other end, Chris signed up for a heady week of cruising of the River Avon on the good ship 'Stratford' under the austere command of Capt. Penny. Consuming medicinal rum and lard in all its many glorious forms, scaring the hell out of the locals and not forgetting being sacrificed to the Sprout Goddess of Evesham! He enjoyed it so much that Chris signed up for the following year's Boat Trip (well we caught a ferry) and continued where he'd left off, consuming lavish quantities of fine wine and food and basking in the French climate.

After an inauspicious Wine Evening debut, Chris then spent Mikado year running round pointing people in the right direction and doing icicle impressions on weekend mornings trying to hammer together bits of Nigel's vision, because anyone who knew anything had seen sense and either graduated or defected to the chorus. When Show week eventually came round Chris managed to avoid any flak by finding the novel hiding place of within the set, with a parcan, (a light), for company. Along with the new influx of crew there were now 4 Chrises and pre-empting confusion nick-names were sought. In an eccentric combination of the crew's love of acronyms, a comment made by Jo Taylor and a 'Flanders and Swann' song about cannibals Chris chose 'Cattac' (Chief Assistant to the Assistant Chief) which appears to have stuck.

Back from his acting debut as a Rude Mechanical, or bloke #3 in sack cloth, in the French holiday production of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' and following in the tradition of Lighting crew in their Final year, Chris joining the Male Chorus in Sorcerer. By being in the right place at the wrong time Chris got given the job of being 'Seth Sheepshank' shepherd and guardian of Neville, the animatronic sheep, who like all the best Props before him stole the show and upstaged the principals, with a little help from Denzil.

Another summer, another holiday, this time in Alston, Cumbria, and this time Emma Farrell convinced the assembled horde to produce a short film with Chris being cast as bandito 'Trevor Mex-Arse' who will be remembered for the infamous greeting of 'Holá'.

Until recently Chris lurked at the House of Hoof and was amassing the core of a costume collection - the weekly parties and gatherings were too numerous to list, although photos of most are available from all good extortionists. Chris is currently being headhunted by Spanish TV, although all offers should be sent to chris@hazel45.demon.co.uk He is now back in the North West learning about the inner workings of the x-ray machine, although it is widely believed that this is just a ploy to learn how to get x-ray vision.