A Confession...

I write this post AGAIN on Friday 8^th Aug. This evening I am supposed to be in Portsmouth doing a gig, but I am in Tokyo instead. Another curve ball in my highly unusual life which I will explain one day, but not now. I am doing the rewrite on Nikki’s laptop because my Mac Book Air has crashed again (the first time was a Pro and I lost everything). Rather unhelpfully, Nikki asked me if I have saved my files to the Cloud and I sighed because I have no idea. I just click ‘save’. My files are like my stuff at home. All my stuff is in my house; I am just not sure where everything is.

My Mac Book – or my ‘machine’ as I call it will be dropped in at the Apple store today along with my passcode should they manage to get it going again and need access. This is the modern-day acid test for a man without a secret life or anything to hide. Like the husband who lets his wife borrow his phone. A boring life perhaps, and so-be-it, it works for me.

With technology on the rampage, soon having a job at all might be an achievement, let alone a job for life, unless parenting is included as ‘work’ that is. Parenting is the most enduring job of all, and perhaps the most important, and yet it comes with no manual or training. Other critical jobs are difficult to achieve with years of training before being let loose to practice - like for instance, becoming a doctor or an astronaut. Not so parenting. Just follow some urges and instincts and a baby will follow but be careful because then the work begins.

And it never ends.

When my four boys arrived in rapid succession, I had no idea what lay ahead and that my parenting skills would be so much on show and therefore could be judged.

To date, and despite my best efforts, parenting is the sole area of my life where I have received only good notices. If anything, it’s all been too fawning, and so I feel a need to set the record straight that I am not such a perfect dad.

I have an unerring knack of being wrong, as longtime readers of my non-fiction will know and why I have come to be largely ignored by my family.

Paddy is the lone survivor, still at home with us and so he bears the brunt of my hot air which he defends against by having a default setting of doubt whenever I am speaking. And he doesn’t spare my feelings by trying to hide this. Quite the opposite, he has a look that calls ‘bullshit’ and when I am finished, out comes his phone and he announces that he’s fact checking everything.

In Eclipsed, I chronicle my most glaring errors…

When I explained to Tom that he stood almost no chance of being cast as Billy in Billy Elliott the Musical.

And once he’d finished his stint in the show (as Billy) I explained why he had almost no chance of playing Lucas, in The Impossible with Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor.

And to be consistent I thought the same about his prospects of being Peter Parker, but I had the good sense to keep my mouth shut.

Not that I didn’t believe in his ability – just that such things happen to other kids and not to ordinary people like us.

Flat wrong.

What the hell does Dad know?

And I have two further glaring errors to add to this unfortunate list...

Some years ago, Tom was working in the US with a hectic schedule, being pulled from pillar to post and we were worried about him. He was busy with reshoots on a movie, I can’t recall which, but it was in Atlanta and at the same time he was required to be in LA to appear in a lame TV show that he had somehow signed on for.

It sounded like an awful show, and even worse, it required considerable rehearsal time. A sort of karaoke meets celebrity X factor. It sounded abhorrent; no wonder it was causing him considerable stress, and this was before I knew anything about him wearing fish net tights and miming to Rhianna.

I told Tom to walk away from such a ridiculous show and if his ‘people’ or anyone else has a problem with this decision, then tell them to call me and I’ll give them what for.

Obviously, Tom ignored my advice.

If ‘views’ are the modern metric of success, then his appearance on Lip Sync Battle was an overwhelming success.

Speaking of which, the numbers and notices for Brand New Day are in and it’s a hit.

And yes…

I also advised Tom not to reprise his role for this latest film.

Because the final film of his trilogy with all three Spider-Men being reunited was never going to be topped. Furthermore, get out at the top, I advised and reclaim some of your life in the process as the attention focusses on the next lucky dude.

I know that this is an odd suggestion because whenever I told a close friend they always baulked and thought I was nuts.

Even more bizarrely then, during my trip to LA, I sat with Amy Pascal and decided to tell her also.

For the non-film nerds, Amy is a Hollywood Titan. One of its most successful producers with Ghostbusters, Molly’s Game, Little Women, Hitch, Project Hail Mary, the Spider-Man franchise…

Oh, and she is about to produce James Bond.

Of all the actors around the world who dream of being cast in anything at all let alone a franchise like Spider-Man and this chump of a dad is advising his son to hang up his tights.

No doubt, millions of fans across the world are pleased that Tom yet again ignored his silly old man.

And finally, Amy Pascal is also producing the forthcoming Fred Astaire biopic shooting next year and starring you know who.

She might be worried therefore that this film has my full blessing and on this we all hope that finally I am right

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