Jeremy Davis
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Jeremy Davis
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Jeremy has the unique distinction of being the only person actually interested in theatre to walk away
from a MUGSS freshers' stall. Despite meeting a few notable old soaks in the
autumn of '94 he managed to join the "First Night Theatre Group" (Though he
maintains that this was purely due to his lazyness and the distance he needed to
travel to rehearsals) He spent their production being patronised by their
production team and listening to their LD's Beavis and Butthead impressions.
No such mistake in '95. He took his experience of crewing SE London childrens' theatre and joined MUGSS. Life was simpler here, since the parents of the children in MUGSS didn't shout at him so much. Jeremy took a small part in Ruddigore, building some of the set and pointing a sportlight. Unfortunatly for his sanity, he managed to be a bit too noticeable and suffered for it - someone talked him into standing as UMIST chair.
Somehow he got elected, and it was the beginning of the end for his non-MUGSS life.
Iolanthe saw him copping flak on the committee as well as being asstistant production manager and returning to his favourite spotlight. He also spent far too much of his spare time giving the society website a new look. No wonder that his flatmates hardly saw him that year. Unfortunately, getting his photo in the programme went to his head and a terrible transformation occured. He became - Da Da Dah - an actor (!) and joined the chorus, leading a large dissertion from the crew.
Despite all this, his most heinous crime of the year, was to be responsible for the crew's running
joke "The Pig Gag". (Just don't ask, it's safer) He will probably also be
remembered for being 'Yoda' from Star Wars, and the terrible cabaret act
associated with it.
And so to Mikado, his finest hour. Somehow, we know not how, he was noticed by the director and thrust
from the back of the chorus to...... the front of the chorus. (Well, it's a
start) He got to dance amusingly as one of the "Men in Black" style royal guards
in act 2. Even more amusing was his being hypnotised & punched by Nanki-Poo.
In a brief moment of madness the society saw fit to give him an award for the
coarseness of his acting in this scene.
Jeremy was forced to leave Manchester and MUGSS at the end of the Mikado, to become sensible and work as a civil servant. However, due to being in just the wrong place (near the Jo Taylor) at just the wrong time (five minutes after she got the job of directing The Sorcerer) he managed to become the Animatronics Consultant for the show. Animatronics, I hear you ask? Jo wanted a sheep in the cast, and she wanted it to act - obvious really.
So Jeremy spent many evenings sawing, soldering, gluing and swearing, (much to the confusion of his new housemates in Bristol) to produce the basics of Neville the sheep. When this was combined with the Artistic input of Leda Channer, and the technical fiddlings of the crew a true star was born - and it was a star who had a good excuse for wooden acting. For more info and for photos see the Neville Website.
Somehow, despite having given up working on the society website after The Mikado, he was persuaded to go back to working on the site with Ben Robb towards the end of Pinafore / Trial in 99/00. With Ben now working for a web integration company in London this was bound to lead to an overspecified site - and the techies were not to be disappointed.... Dangerous phrases like "XML Content Management", "SQL Database" and "LINUX Mail Relay" were bandied about, and between them Ben & Jeremy (Who deny any link to the Ice Cream makers of a similar name) have produced a site of awesome usefullness. (honest) Neither Ben or Jeremy are prepared to comment on whether this work has anything to do with the fact that Jeremy left Bristol and the Civil Service just before the site was launched, and is now working with Ben at cScape. MUGSS "Old Boy" network? Surely not?
You can find their wonderful creation at www.mugss.org, and try out some of their clever features - such as a searchable archive of over 1000 photos of life in MUGSS and clever gizmos for joining the society's mailing lists. Don't delay - have a look today!
Jeremy aims to continue gatecrashing any MUGSS related activities he can until he's at least as old as Dave Bolton.
It has recently been brought to his attention that Jeremy's efforts with the MUGSS website back in Mikado 97/98 were not wasted. In a recent interview in the Sunday Times, ex-MUGGS member and Doctor Who star Sophie Aldred cited finding a recording of herself singing Mabel in the 1981 production of Pirates as "The strangest thing she had found on the web". Guess who put that on the MUGSS website?
If anyone really cares, then he can be contacted at DJDavis@iee.org when he's home or at webmaster@mugss.org when he's at work.
30th August 2001