It has all been a little more ‘quiet on the Western Front’ after last week’s excitement. No dogs, no men in uniform and Paul Barber kept his trousers on!

Ah well you can’t have it all.

We still managed to have a lot of fun with some great people passing through the doors of A1. Each brought their own special ingredient to make life at The Towers the mixed and spicy hotpot of convivial merriment that we all know and love.

Up and coming, Irish actor, Andrew Scott, joined the party last week, and he is definitely a rising star in the making. You could say it is the luck of the Irish but that would be an absolute slight on the raw talent that this young man possesses.

He made his film debut aged seventeen as the lead in acclaimed Irish film Korea.

After filming a small part in Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan , he worked with legendary film and theatre director Karel Reisz on the classic American play Long Days Journey into Night, for which he won Actor of the Year at the Independent/Spirit of Life Awards as well as an Irish Times Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He was just twenty- one years old!

He then filmed Nora with Ewan McGregor, Henry James’s The American, alongside Diana Rigg and Matthew Modine and cast in major roles in the BAFTA winning drama Longitude opposite Michael Gambon, and multi-award winning series Band Of Brothers for HBO. Blimey O'Reilly.

For his role in Buena Vista’s Dead Bodies, Andrew beat the likes of Colin Farrell to win Best Actor at the Irish Film Awards. OOOOO - Take that Farrell.

He received his first Olivier award for his role in A Girl in a Car with a Man at The Royal Court, and the Theatre Goers Choice award for his heartbreaking performance in the National Theatre’s Aristocrats. Good lord lad, I hope you have extensive shelving to show off all those golden trophies?

His theatre credits include Sea Wall, a one man show written especially for him by Olivier-award winning playwright Simon Stephens, and The Vertical Hour, his critically acclaimed Broadway debut opposite Julianne Moore, written by David Hare and directed by Sam Mendes, for which he was nominated for a Drama League Award.

He recently starred in Chasing Cotards, as well as Paul McCartney in BBC film, Lennon Naked. His most recent credit is as Jim (James Moriarty) in the BBC mini-series Sherlock.

Scott will also be playing Leo in a Design For Living at The Old Vic this autumn which was cast by none other than our own Nick Chambers’ other half, Amy. Small world, impressive resume and unquestionably one to watch – to be sure, to be sure!

Paul Barber, everyone’s favourite scouser, came bounding up the stairs and entertained all with his usual cheeky banter this week.

In a career spanning more than 30 years, it seems he has a lucky affinity with anything related to the equine species. He is best known for playing Denzil in Only Fools and Horses and Horse in The Full Monty. Hee-haw!

Barber has worked extensively in British TV, such as in Minder as Willie Reynolds in the episode Don't tell them Willie Boy was Here, Only Fools and Horses (1981–2003), Boys from the Blackstuff, Malcolm in The Front Line, Casualty and Cracker. He made a guest appearance in the first episode of The Green Green Grass - a spin-off from Only Fools And Horses.

Notable early, film roles were in the big-screen version of Porridge and The Long Good Friday. In 2001 he played alongside Full Monty co-star Robert Carlyle and Samuel L Jackson in the Liverpool-based crime movie The 51st State.

However, Barber's most famous role was playing one of the stripping steelworkers in the popular 1997 film The Full Monty set in Sheffield. Sorry but I couldn’t resist the piccie...Get em off boys!

In house news this week – Eleanor Howell has landed herself a new role in An Inspector Calls. The show will be a six week run over in Wales so we wish her all the best of leeks and luck with that.

Nick Chambers and Tom Clarke Hill both had auditions this week. Being in the business that we are in, there isn’t much call for day to day suit wearing, so when the boys get smartened up it is always a bit of a shock....but a pleasant surprise. Here is Nick practicing his business man hand shake for our camera. Eat your heart out Daniel Craig.

Tom had a few of us going over lines with him before his big moment and I think you will agree that he looks more than dapper in his smart offering. Jane MacFarlane was assisting with the line read and is pictured here with the suited and booted. Good luck fella’s.

SOHO NEWS:

T.K.Maxx opens on Charing Cross Road – Bargain Hunters - Now is our Time.

The chain store has opened for business on a quirky corner among the collectors’ book emporia and guitar shops.

TK offloads the gear designers and department stores have been unable to sell at full price. In doing so you can pick up a tasty little garment at an astonishingly low cost. Scarily it does give the public a glimpse of just how much the High Street marks up designer goods.

The Primarni’s and Matalans of this world have proved it’s possible to make and distribute clobber for a few pounds apiece, (if you can ignore the plight of the poor souls making it), but TK Maxx teaches us that big fashion houses of Britain, America and Italy clearly don’t spend too much more knocking the stuff up themselves. We are just the silly mugs for buying it.

Some argue that once an item of clothing has been on the hanger for a while, fully celebrity endorsed and then a new fashion line comes in, that items value deteriorates. But unlike a piece of food that would have to be thrown out, a pair of jeans (however old or ‘last season’), can still be worn.

Whatever your view, TK Maxx is the chain store killing the chain store and take it from our own Joan Walker who is a self confessed, bona fide TK Maxx Extremist (she just can’t help herself) who says ‘Sarah...it's bloody brilliant’.

That is all for this week folks, join us next week for more thrills and spills from your favourite studio – Not Arf!