Actor John Altman – best known as ‘Nasty Nick’ Cotton from Eastenders- this week visited Laleham Gap Post 16 students in Ramsgate to discuss his career with the aim of helping youngsters plot their future careers.
Post 16 teacher Paul Ursell said: “It was lovely and successful. The discussion was so interesting for the students. John was helpful; they learnt a lot. Certainly, as far as Laleham Gap are concerned he wasn’t Nasty Nick at all, he was really Nice Nick.”
John gave a presentation of his long and varied career. He started with a clip of him singing Wild One with the band Joan of Arc. Music, alongside acting, has been a lifelong passion. He showed pictures of his grandparents who had been on stage in the early 1900s. Students then learned how this passion for acting started at a school drama club and through his love of cinema.
Significantly, he described his route in, which was through getting a job backstage in theatre and then networking. It took a lot of perseverance. When he got the Eastenders role for instance he described himself as “skint” and living in a basement flat and totally desperate for the part.
John answered all the students’ questions. From ‘has he made friends through work’ to ‘whether he still watches Eastenders’ and ‘has he found any aspect difficult’ to ‘does he prefer films to being in a soap.’ John told them the lot.
At the end John said: “I really enjoyed speaking to the students. They were amazing. They asked such thoughtful questions – some of them really made me think.
“You could tell they got a sense of how much is involved in building a career, including hard work and perseverance. But also how rewarding work can be too. I am really happy to think I may have helped a few of them as they plot their own paths to their careers.”
In the lesson immediately after John left, Mr Ursell encouraged the students to prove they could apply their learning as they wrote about how what obstacles the actor had faced and how he had overcome them.
They then looked at what obstacles they might face and how they would plan to succeed.
Mr Ursell said: “It is great to see my students setting their sights high, putting in the work to get there and planning to beat any challenges they find on the way.”
He was great as George Harrison in 1979’s ‘Birth of The Beatles’ movie.
Well done all involved. Learning from real life experiences is the best way.