I'm honour of #richardbriers day, I wanted to share (again!) the lovely encounter I had with this most generous and caring of gentlemen. A thread. @lucyjbriers

Back when I worked in theatre and was an aspiring director full of self-confidence and certainty that I was going to the world by storm, I decided to direct a production of King Lear. Up til then, my professional directorial experience had been a small tour of Anorak of Fire.

Like many, i was trying to seek Arts Council funding, & both to try and improve my ability to direct and to improve the chances of the funding, I wrote to various well known actors asking for advice.

I had some lovely responses - including a v. generous donation from a well known shakesperian actor & a rebuttal from an equally well known stage and screen legend. Bless him....I also missed a phone call from the one and only @SirPatStew because I was buying a new bathroom....

Anyway: the loveliest response was from Richard who rang me, left a voicemail, inviting me to his home in London for 'a spot of lunch and a bit of a natter.'

I immediately rang him back &, ever humble, he said 'I don't know what advice I can offer but it'd be lovely to meet you and have a chat.' A few weeks later I found myself on a train to London, both nervous & excited anout meeting the legend.

I had assumed I'd be there for anout an hour but my word: the hospitality of him and dear Annie was wonderful. They greeted me with such warmth and kindness of spirit that my nerves instantly disappeared.

And we chatted - & about Shakespeare, about Lear and about life. It was a genuine chat, as if I'd known Richard for years. His amiable and gentle presence put a nervous & arrogant young director at ease.

What I thought would be a one hour visit ended up being closer to 5 or 6 during which he and Annie made me lunch and continued to make me so welcome. I learnt so much from Richard that day, not only about Lear, but anout the industry & about what it means to be human.

I left with the promise to stay in touch and he said he would come and see the show. Sadly pneumonia prevented that, but I had the most Richard voicemail possible that morning which said ‘sorry I won’t be able to make it, I have a touch of pneumonia.’

I sent him the DVD of the final production & he so graciously watched it, phoning me with his gracious and generous feedback.

That afternoon in the Briers house remains one of my happiest and most unexpected of memories. He was a real gent and both him and Annie are and were people of such integrity, humility and compassion. The world is poorer without him in it.

For what it’s worth, I never did get the Arts Council funding, but I got something far better out of that production.

I should have said, the memory that most makes me smile of that day was Annie excitedly offering me delicious olives which I excitedly took. It was at that moment that I discovered a lifelong dislike of olives. But I couldn’t refuse: it was olives offers in the Briers house!