I was also treated to my first pork strap, or jockstrap, whatever you want to call it. It’s quite a strange experience, really, putting it on for the first time. Let me explain it for you: a man’s dance support strap isn’t like a man’s sport support strap. Sports straps have two pieces of elastic on the outside of each butt cheek, which give lift and support both sides.
When you train as a dancer, working your gluteus maximus (that’s your ass, to anyone from Essex), you don’t need the side support. It’s straight up your back crack like a cheese wire. I can’t remember if my balls had dropped or not by age 12, but it looked like I had a vagina. It really did its job, the Cotton Lycra jock strap, and held you in.
So, everything was in place, including my balls. All I had to do was get it right on the day. And that day was getting nearer. I had to wait two months after the letter arrived for my audition and those two months felt like two years. As you know, when you’re that young, time never seems to pass. Unlike now – by the time this book comes out, which should be pretty soon, you might have forgotten about me. No, I don’t think you will have forgotten me. How could you forget me?!
I HAD not slept for most of the night before the audition and it was the first time that had happened. Not even at Christmas had this occurred to me. I know I keep saying I can remember things clearly, but I am very alert: I was fearful, worried, anxious because I knew it was make or break and could really change my life; and I was making, I was not about to be broken.
I met Doreen at 7.30 am at Braintree Station (Dadina could not come because she was doing a professional dance job); we were on the commuter run and I had never seen so many men in suits. It was a bit of a fight for a seat really, but we did manage. I needed the rest; I might have been young, but I hadn’t slept all night. My anxiety started to kick in shortly into the journey and I was beginning to feel nauseous. I think it had something to do with the cigarette smoke in the carriage, but I managed to get through the journey of one hour and 10 minutes, then a tube trip. I felt ill again on the tube, being pushed and squashed between all those grownups. It was not what I needed before facing the biggest day of my life.
We finally reached Clapham North and my nerves almost got the better of me. I had read the name Clapham North on the audition letter so many times: ‘On leaving Clapham North, bear to the right, and there you will see Landor Road’. I can’t remember the number but I can clearly remember the sounds and smells of showbusiness. I could hear a piano being played in one studio, pop music coming from another, while some students sang in the stairwells. It was like the fabric of the building was alive.
It was not a glamorous building by any means; thinking back, it was actually quite run down. But at that time, to me it seemed like the brightest, shiniest, most welcoming door I had ever opened in my life. I had to get through the audition and I had to be accepted into the school – it was where I belonged.
My dreams of being a dancer like those I used to watch on the big variety shows on Saturday nights were closer to becoming reality. I used to sit in front of the TV and think to myself, ‘I want to be one of those boys.’ I was inspired by watching them dance; in Braintree I seemed to be the only boy attending dance classes. There were a couple of male dancers in particular that I used to see on all the variety shows, such as Royal Variety Performance and The Marti Caine Show.
One of them was Eurasian, with long, jet-black hair that swished as he danced. The other was blond, with blue eyes; I say he was blond, but really, he had highlights. If there was a female artist on the show, he seemed to be the one who always danced with or close to them.
Years later, when I was taking classes at Pineapple, a friend introduced me to him. I literally gasped when I met him. His name was Greg and I thought to myself, ‘If he only knew how much I used to fancy him!’
After reporting to reception we were sent to a room with the other auditionees and that was when reality finally kicked in. I was not the only one hoping to get in and places were limited. It was not a comprehensive school and they could only accommodate so many students per year. One advantage in being a boy was that there were never as many of you fighting for a place. On my audition day there was one other boy and out of about 20 kids, I was one of the last to audition.
If it was just about dancing, it would have been easy for me. I could check out the competition auditioning in the studio next to the room we were waiting in and, worse for me, we could hear them singing – and the other boy was not singing ‘Happy Birthday’, nor was he singing out of tune. He was singing like an angel sent from heaven. That’s when I had one of my very first gay moments, calling him a bitch. In my mind, of course, not out loud.
I questioned myself for a moment, wondering why I was calling him a bitch, but it was only a moment. But then I remembered: I was different, or special, as I like to call it in my own mind. Then it was my turn.
‘Louie Spence, please.’
My heart was pumping so fast and I was shaking that much – when I went into the studio the first thing I saw was the panel that was going to judge me. They sat behind a long table and looked very stern. Each one had a notepad and a glass of water in front of them. There were two women and two men.
The first lady looked like a headmistress and was in fact the principal of the school. She seemed to be in her fifties. She was very well-groomed and wore a two-piece tweed suit. It was blue with yellow flecks and the jacket had three big gold buttons. Her hair was in a chignon and she wore oval tortoiseshell glasses.
Next to her was a younger man in his forties, with thick brown, greying hair that had a sharp side parting. His beard was unkempt and he wore a dowdy dark blazer that you would find on most history or geography teachers.
Next was a middle-aged lady with crazy dark-brown hair, with a soft frizzy perm. Throughout the audition she twisted her hair through her fingers, tousling and teasing it. She wore thick mascara, which gave her three large lashes on each eye. Her lipstick was bright red and could have stopped traffic. She wore an off-the-shoulder top, which she shifted off one shoulder to the other throughout the audition and I found this very off-putting.
To her left was the pianist. He wore stone-washed jeans and a leather biker jacket, which I thought was an odd choice. I found out later he did not have a motorbike and looking back, I can see it was a gay fashion and that he was a leather queen.
They asked my name and I had a vibrato in my voice. Unfortunately it did not help my rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’. The panel was very to the point and told me my vocal performance needed a lot of work. In my mind again, I was thinking, ‘Tell me something I don’t know.’
Next was the piece from Shakespeare, which received pretty much the same response. At this point I could feel my dream slipping away from me – I knew this was it. I had to make it work. When I knew I had to dance everything became a blur and the panel seemed to speak in slow motion. I lost myself in the dance and when I finished, I could not remember starting, what was in the middle or getting to the end. What I could see was the panel applauding my performance and nodding in a way that reassured me that they understood who I was and what I was about.
I just had to hope that it would be enough because my singing and acting were definitely not up to scratch. I left the audition happy but very apprehensive, knowing that I would have to wait up to six weeks for their decision. I could not think about anything else for those two months and if you don’t know what I mean, think back to your first love: when you couldn’t sleep, you couldn’t think, you couldn’t eat. Dance was my first love and I didn’t want it to end: I was going to be faithful and loving for ever and ever, and it is true. Still to this day, even if I have nothing else in my life, no-one can take my love of dance away from me because