Tabula Rasa lj

I am currently arguing about computer programming with Oracle, which is always good fun (read, frustrating and painful), and am about to head off for my second lot of major dental work on an ex-tooth.

So here's a cartoon, as found on seancollinsblog:



And a final Rocky Horror anecdote. The play was on at the Star City casino, so it was the first time I've ever seen guards checking patrons on the way out of a performance. There were signs saying that casino patrons could not disguise their appearance, which makes me think this may not have been the right play for this particular venue.

Two more points about Rocky Horror, while I think of them:

I noticed last night that Rocky, the character, disappears somewhat in the final act. In the movie they get away with it when he grabs Frank and scales the tower, but on stage it seemed lop-sided. Oh well.

This is also an excuse to mention Summer of Secrets again. Not many people know that the director of the RHPS made a movie a year later in Australia, that is something of a thematic follow-up (not to be confused with Shock Treatment). Here is Kyla's review of the movie, for those who like tracking down such things.

I like the Rocky Horror Show. The energy and chaos and liberation, of course, but also the alienation, the dissolution, the death. My favourite character has always been Columbia I think, which no doubt says something about me, without the handy portability of a meme.

Our friend B is in town, and has never seen it on stage, so we went off to the new production last night. It was indeed full of energy and detail (more so than the Jason Donovan version, back in the late 90s), and a great night out. The relentless pace and tendency to shout the dialogue left some of the sense behind -- but after all the dissolution and death we got the chance to do the Time Warp again, and by God we did.

Apparently there was some technical hitch, in that the role of Janet lost not only the listed actress, but both understudies. I can't remember her name, but the woman who stepped in did it perfectly (I'm sure finding someone who knows the lines is not a big problem. The relatively intricate choreography more so). Meanwhile, Rocky was like a big goofy Shane Warne on steroids, which seems scarily appropriate.

Afterwards (in a story ripped from the headlines, as they say), we were witness to a street brawl at our local train station. Some guy was being kicked in the head. I guess it was ANZAC day; don't dream it, be it. Yah.

As found by seancollinsblog, Cronenberg's The Fly is going to be an opera, directed by the man himself.

As a bit of a change, we went down to Melbourne this year to do the Christmas thing with my brother and his ever-burgeoning family. The day itself was very nice, and mostly spent playing Heroscape, which we gave to the nephews. It was declared the best game ever, and it did indeed work pretty well to these more jaded eyes, after a somewhat fiddly set-up (we safely escaped before anyone tried to put it away again).

They are also into train games (we played Ticket to Ride on Saturday), so we got them Transeuropa as well, thanks to a propitious sale at MilSims. No word on that as yet. There was also much spinning of nephews at high speed, and thwacking with cushions, which I'm sure was just as exciting.

Apart from that, we visited some friends, including artbroken, went off to the theatre, watched Ed Wood (is charming), received a Forgotten English desk calendar (looks good) and sat around reading stuff, so it was a good trip all up.

At Patrick's we played Vampire: Dark Influences, a more or less simpler version of Prince of the City, and I got walloped at Goth: The Game of Horror Trivia. Oops.

As for the theatre, we saw the mighty Spamalot. Despite all the love it gets, I wasn't quite as convinced -- there's quite a bit of it that relies on nostalgia rather than actual laughs. Recreating Monty Python sketches just isn't as funny as the original, especially when taken out of context (the fish-slapping dance and Always Look on the Bright Side of Life in particular). But I can't complain too much -- the extra songs and jokes did bind it all together, and we enjoyed it a lot.

I've just come back from the Lord of the Rings musical. It's a trip -- well made and neatly compacted into three hours. A lot of it is surprisingly accurate, with only the journey of Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli after the parting of the ways being severely mangled.

Perhaps there was too much to get through for all the emotions to resonate, but not through want of trying (only the ents put me in mind of Monty Python...), and with plenty of spectacle on the way.

The actual songs weren't really catchy, nor always easy to understand (I'm guessing some were in Elvish), but were mostly pleasant. The journey through Mordor accompanied by Galadrial singing was surprisingly effective. Many of the effects were pretty good too, on a suitable scale. The portrayal of Smeagol's back story was the most strikingly beautiful moment (oddly enough), and likewise Michael Therriault's conflicted Gollum was probably the single performance that stood out above the ordinary.

Also, I loved the rotating and undulating stage a whole lot.

Just got back from jack_ryder's play Gone Bush, on at Newtown Theatre in town. It's about five women on a corporate retreat up to the Blue Mountains, with much chaos, sex, a panther, a dodgy journalist and possibly murder close behind.

It was great fun, and all the cast did well -- but special mention goes to Lauren Hamilton Neill who stole the show with her geek gone feral.

I've already bemoaned the fact I haven't caught up with Shaun Tan's The Arrival — and that was before the first stirrings of Aurealis controversy. Now I discover there was a stage play, which sounds excellent (review here).

Well, no theatre for us today, searing or not. It seems my throat is not up to the task, and the nice people at the Sydney Theatre let us exchange for a later date (entirely unexpectedly).

In theory we're off to The Lost Echo tomorrow... four hours of searing new Australian theatre (and that's just the first half).

(Though it is starting to look like it depends upon whether the on-line booking system actually works.)

In the meanwhile, The Boys is doing great in New York apparently, which is good to see.

We went off to see Batavia last night, an opera by Richard Mills and Peter Goldsworthy about mutiny and shipwreck afflicting the crew of the Batavia in 1629. Over 120 people will killed by the followers of Jeronimus Cornelisz, a charismatic man trying to set up a new colony of free love (at least, free for him).

In a way it is the archetypical Australian horror story: a confused set of Europeans get caught in a savage landscape and turn on each other, which much sex, violence and madness ensuing. It's a powerful story, conveyed with much gusto and some controversy: it wasn't really officially Rated R, but did carry warnings for strong violence and sexual assault, and there was a bit of a slanging match in the Herald about its vileness). It must be said the actual violence occupied a short (but memorable) portion, with a lot of set-up and the subsequent trial — there seemed to be some debate afterwards if that created an anti-climax. I wouldn't say that, but certainly I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who wasn't up for a lot of opera singing. (I'm not exactly a buff myself, and this was my first English-language opera, which was slightly odd. The surtitles were certainly necessary.)

Australia seems to have a great tradition of horror on stage, and I keep getting tempted to dedicate a portion of the TR website to it, since I suspect most of them come and go with little fanfare. However, I suspect I don't really have the depth of resources to do such a thing.

Next up in our occasional theatre schedule is probably Sweeney Todd, which is highly recommended to all (whether you can cope with opera or not).

just to neatly tie up my previous entry, apparently Danny Murphy -- half of the Platinum Grit team -- has played Hitch in Hitchcock Blonde, the play I saw in Melbourne last year (but not that production).

Wow.

OK, I'll stop now.

forgot to mention the plays.

On friday we went to see Snark: The Way of the Bravest as part of the Sydney Festival. It is a one-man puppet show about the hunt for that most elusive creature. There's not much Lewis Carroll therein, but they use the poem as a skeleton around which to build a chaotic and funny series of absurdities. Greed, murder, sea-sickness, equine carnage and psychedelia combine in carefully choreographed mayhem -- it's all good stuff.

It is also the first play I've seen in ages where a significant percentage of the audience seemed younger than me.

Apart from Boojum! and a previous stage production of Alice, I guess what it reminded me most of was Svankmajer's animation, with ordinary objects coming alive in strange and disturbing ways.

(The Alice in Wonderland play was great -- though since it's been twenty years, my memories are somewhat faded. I seem to recall it was constructed on a 3D stage, with the actors climbing up and down a series of gantries to represent the different levels of reality. I don't suppose anyone would know how to track down details of that. It would have played in Canberra in the 1980s.)

Two weeks ago we saw a rather different production, Stephen Sewell's The United States of Nothing. Sewell is a renowned playwright and also the writer of Lost Things and The Boys. You certainly can't accuse him of complacency -- this was a brave and topical play, following the fortunes of a family trapped in a superdome during a hurricane. However, despite covering interesting ground, including lots of nifty moments and an ambitious finale, I don't think the characters quite came alive, leaving it somewhat strident and directionless.

I also forgot to mention comics, though that basically comes down to the fact that latter issues of Platinum Grit are still very good, and I fully expect Tango 6: Love and Sex to be great.

Kyla went off to the NSW Writing Centre forum on the new Sedition laws last night. Apparently it was very good, and a report may follow. Somewhat off subject, she met Martin Wesley-Smith there, who happens to be co-creator of Boojum!, which I was raving about recently. Frabjous.

Sydney-siders who are into Lewis Carroll may be interested in Snark: The Way of the Bravest, which is playing at Parramatta in January, as part of the Sydney Festival. I know nothing about it, but it looks fun.

This is also an excuse (somewhat unfairly to Snark, perhaps) to plug Boojum! again, Martin and Peter Wesley-Smith's musical adaptation of the poem. It's not playing anywhere that I'm aware of, but you can get it on CD and it's greatly recommended. Not exactly easy listening, perhaps, it's intricate, dense and exuberant.

Hitchcock Blonde

I saw this play in Melbourne last week, a study of obsession, death and beauty told in three time zones. Within we cross between a modern-day reconstruction of a lost Hitchcock movie, Hitch himself during the filming of Psycho, plus parts of the found movie, supposedly dating from 1919.

It was good, though I'm not sure I would call it very good. On reflection I don't think it lived up to the power of its own set-pieces. There was certainly dramatic and interesting themes, and the direction was polished, but I thought the interaction between the two sets of characters never quite broke through the artificiality of the set-up.

Mind you, it has been gained good reviews from all over, I believe (here's one), so I wouldn't let that turn you off if the subject matter interests you.

Of course, it interests me too, and there is another factor at play as well. I remain somewhat ambivalent about characterising Hitchcock (or any artist) with the prominent themes of his own work. And yes, this is despite (or because of) my own story about Alfred Hitchcock, obsession and zombies (called Relish, as appearing in Southern Blood), which used Donald Spoto's The Dark Side of Genius as prominent research material, among other things. Maybe that's a convenient excuse to turn a blind eye to bad behaviour in interesting people, or maybe I'm just I'm just having my cake and eating it too (but hey, I didn't write a story about obsession with youthful blondes, stocked full of naked youthful blondes...)

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Or maybe I'm just grumpy, since I wasn't overly impressed by this either. It had its moments, but apart from looking fabulous (albeit somewhat artificial at times), it didn't have the creepiness or personality I remember from the Gene Wilder version. Undoubtedly I saw that at a more impressionable age. Sometimes I have to remind myself that Tim Burton has made good movies, since most of the ones I immediately think of are flawed at best (Batman and Sleepy Hollow), inexplicable at worst (Mars Attacks and Planet of the Apes). But between The Nightmare Before Christmas and Ed Wood I can see the potential being reached.

The Muppets

Inspired by arfies, I bought Kyla season one of the Muppets (well, that and The Cure: Trinity). The first episode hits the ground running — starting with nothing less than Mah Na Mah Na, and getting stranger. Good stuff. We also snuck ahead to watch the Vincent Price ep, though I think that didn't work quite as well, for one reason or another. (Has he ever played a vampire, BTW? I'm not counting The Monster Club here.)

The Party

I suspect photos will suffice for this:

( the evil unleashed )

I'm sure I've done more stuff than that over the last week, but that will do for one update.

Well, I got to Melbourne without problem (indeed, an hour and a half ahead of schedule), the conference is pretty interesting, and my main duties for it are done. I've been to see the nephews, and now am trying to work out the best way to book to see Hitchcock Blonde tomorrow evening (credit card details in a public terminal... no).

It's all going well.

Well that was a day that could not have been called productive. I'm no good at weekends. I'm not much good at evenings at the moment, either.

But I did get to hear the radio play at least, via a wonderful medium called... radio. Whodathunkit. The play was 'Sit on my Facets' by Iain Triffitt and Brett Danalake, and involved a daring rescue of one Angus Castrati from the Liberal Party. On the way our valiant heroes must brave the ideological swamp, the pit of rabid stockbrokers, and death by hat, at last finding the secret heart of the Liberals (implosion imminent).

Kyla did manage to get to the performance, and had a delightful time, with anecdotes of giant plungers, celery sticks and people wrapped in plastic.

We went off to a Comedy Festival double last night, seeing Cirque du Chaser and Andrew McClelland's Somewhat Accurate History of Pirates at the Seymour Theatre.

The first was a series of sketches lambasting various obvious targets (John Howard, Princess Mary, Kim Beasley) but also Billy Connolly, Ani DiFranco and Doctor Who fans (ho ho). We didn't get the chicken in a mattress mentioned in the Herald review, which may or may not be a good thing. Some of the sketches seemed a bit one note, but it was all entertaining.

Andrew McClelland was quite a contrast (though similarly centred on a Powerpoint presentation), providing a mock lecture on the history of pirates and much else between the formation of the galaxy and Tatu. It was energetic and fun, and provided some education along the way (also pirate tongue, karaoke, and the chance to storm various Spanish fortresses with party poppers). Did we mention the riff on the Beastie Boys, "You Gotta Fight for your Right to Plunder"?

Short and Sweet is a short-play festival that's happening most of January and February in Sydney. jack_ryder had two plays in competition, and we saw one last night, along with 10 others. It was called 'Relics', and picked up third prize in the judge's awards (public opinion is to be collated and announced tomorrow).

The selection certainly showed a wide range of subject matter and approach. First and second prize went to what were basically two monologues, which I thought was a little bit of a cheat -- though they were both very good. There was also some examples of compact storytelling, and more than a few 'absurdist comedies'.

'Relics' fell into the storytelling set, and although it was a little more conventional in structure than most, managed to contain the best realised plot of the night. Along with Iain's, the best were probably the monologues (of which 'Naked Ambition', in which a woman reminisces on cricket and streaking, had more of a point), 'Die Feral, Die!' (about regentrification and ODing, from TripleJ poet Tug Dumbly) and 'Domestic' (a stunning combination of 'kitchen sink drama' and good fight choreography) .

The only one I really didn't like was 'Truck Stop Moon' (precisely what this was about seemed to change from minute to minute), though a few failed to live up to their potential, most notably 'Diary of a Mathematician' (alas).

All in all, very much worth a visit, and recommended for those in Sydney. That current set of plays has now finished, but there is more to come, culminating with finals on Feb 25th, I believe.

(It was also an interesting comparison with our earlier excursion, wherein eleven amateur standup comedians duked it out. It's a cut-throat business, this entertainment thing.)