Went to see Theatre Athena's Mother Goose at the Waterloo Entertainment Centre
and will very possibly go again this weekend with both sets of nephews and nieces. I have never seen a Pantomime before and I loved it. Elise Bauman, who read in my reading of Little Crickets last year, was a very convincing Golden Goose. And including Waterloo's own Silly People was brilliant. I think I will try to work some yo-yo tricks into my next script.
The Guardian's Simon Swift went on a panto marathon, seeing seven pantomimes in one week. I suppose we could catch Aladdin in Toronto ...
Thursday, December 21, 2006
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
The Trial of Ebenezer Scrooge
at Theatre & CompanyDecember 7 - 31.
And it's Pay-What-U-Can on Wednesday, December 13th (i.e. tomorrow) Tickets available at the door, no advance sales.
Saturday, December 02, 2006
LinkedIn Problem
Ok, this is a complaint about LinkedIn. Maybe somebody out there is listening.
The front page on LinkedIn has a section called "Just Joined LinkedIn". It tells me that I have "5 new colleagues from Theatre & Company".
None of these people work at Theatre & Company in Kitchener. They all seem to work at Theatres. My guess is that the LinkedIn software is not handling the ampersand correctly -- perhaps it interprets the phrase "Theatre & Company" as a boolean query.
I have reported this problem twice without any response or action.
Now -- why should LinkedIn care about starving artists? Good question! I can think of a couple of reasons a business contact network should be interested in artists, and why artists should be interested in a business contact network.
1. Artists very often know people with jobs in the real world. They may live with them. They may interact with boards that have members from the real world. So they can act as links between people who might not otherwise know of each other. (There must be an expression for this kind of indirect networking: A-B-A, or B-A-B, instead of A-A-A).
2. Arts organizations need to raise money and market themselves. So they need to network into the corporate world. Here is an idea: theatre companies often give out complimentary tickets as a way to entice people into the theatre. Why not distribute tickets through your LinkedIn network? Hit everybody in Waterloo within three degrees. (Hello, RIM.)
In fact, if the problem above were fixed, I'd pitch the ticket idea to Theatre & Company.
(And off on a tangent a little bit, when I showed Isabella LinkedIn, she called it a "MySpace for Adults". )
The front page on LinkedIn has a section called "Just Joined LinkedIn". It tells me that I have "5 new colleagues from Theatre & Company".
None of these people work at Theatre & Company in Kitchener. They all seem to work at Theatres. My guess is that the LinkedIn software is not handling the ampersand correctly -- perhaps it interprets the phrase "Theatre & Company" as a boolean query.
I have reported this problem twice without any response or action.
Now -- why should LinkedIn care about starving artists? Good question! I can think of a couple of reasons a business contact network should be interested in artists, and why artists should be interested in a business contact network.
1. Artists very often know people with jobs in the real world. They may live with them. They may interact with boards that have members from the real world. So they can act as links between people who might not otherwise know of each other. (There must be an expression for this kind of indirect networking: A-B-A, or B-A-B, instead of A-A-A).
2. Arts organizations need to raise money and market themselves. So they need to network into the corporate world. Here is an idea: theatre companies often give out complimentary tickets as a way to entice people into the theatre. Why not distribute tickets through your LinkedIn network? Hit everybody in Waterloo within three degrees. (Hello, RIM.)
In fact, if the problem above were fixed, I'd pitch the ticket idea to Theatre & Company.
(And off on a tangent a little bit, when I showed Isabella LinkedIn, she called it a "MySpace for Adults". )
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Theatre & Company's new AD
And Theatre & Company's new AD is Daryl Cloran, currently AD of TheatreFront (which sounds like MTSpace with a travel budget. Must be nice.)
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Theatre & Company ...
... will be announcing the name of their new Artistic Director tomorrow morning. A name I managed to figure out a full 24-hours before receiving confirmation from the Theatre, based on a few telling phrases in a previous email which I fed to Google. Which I will not repeat here. Years ago I had a reputation for 'blurting things out' but I have learned the wisdom of the Romanian folk saying: "If one knows, one knows; if two know, a hundred know." (Prove using mathematical induction.)
Falling Awake
From Lost & Found comes this announcement:Falling: A Wake
A new play by Gary Kirkham,
(winner of the Samuel French Canadian Playwrights Award for Queen Milli of Galt)
We have been engaged in play development sessions for several weeks
and now we invite you to be a part of the process.
Please join us for a reading of the play.
DATE: Wednesday, 22 November
TIME: 7:30 pm
PLACE: The Registry Theatre, 122 Frederick Street in downtown Kitchener
RSVP to Kathleen at ksheehy@lostandfoundtheatre.ca
Thursday, November 16, 2006
The New Quarterly
Issue 100 of the New Quarterly is out, with an essay and illustrations by Isabella, The Naked Truth: Reflections on the history, personal and public, of artists' journals and notebooks
Monday, November 13, 2006
Poor Tom
Poor Tom Productions presents "The Kindness of Strangers", two one-act plays: The Visit by Kenneth J. Emberley, and I Can't Imagine Tomorrow by Tennessee Williams, Nov. 16-18, 8:00 PM, at The Registry. With Nicholas Cumming (who was in Yes or No!) and others whom I don't know.
Sunday, November 12, 2006
Blyth etc.
Just heard the news that Gary Kirkham's play Queen Milli of Galt will receive its fourth production, as part of the Blyth Festival's 2007 season. It received its first production at Kitchener's Theatre & Company in 2001. (And, of course, Gary was in my play Yes or No! as Branislav, the Beast of the Balkans.)
Also, Nicholas Cumming (who was Wayne in Yes or No!) and Brian Hogg, who are both members of the Pat the Dog writer's collective are featured in this article from the Kitchener Record.
Also, Nicholas Cumming (who was Wayne in Yes or No!) and Brian Hogg, who are both members of the Pat the Dog writer's collective are featured in this article from the Kitchener Record.
Thursday, November 09, 2006
Dual Citizenship
I find myself substantially in agreement with J. Kelly Nestruck on Dual Citizenship and it is not because he is a critic and I am an emerging playwright. Goodness, no.
I was born in Scotland and came to Canada (on a DC-3) at the age of five weeks. I reached the age of sixteen completely unaware that I was not Canadian but in fact British. It was only when we were about to return to Scotland for a vacation that we discovered the misconception. We hastily applied for my citizenship but there was not enough time to get a passport based on it. So I applied for a British passport. And a formidable thing it was at that time, with its stiff dark blue cover, the crest in gold, and the threatening language inside, commanding in the name of her Majesty any foreigners who might impede my travels to hop it.
I met my wife. We went to Romania. In the bad old days. Both on Canadian passports. She had been required to renounce her Romanian citizenship when her family emigrated (and she was able to emigrate because her mother was German -- we have a photo of her stamped "Etnic"). When we tried to visit the country again (when conditions were very much worse) Isabella was informed the law had changed: since she had left as a minor, the renunciation was invalid. But for a sum of $500 she could renounce it for good, or for just $80 she could elect to keep it. (The Romanian bureaucracy was ingenious at finding ways to extract funds from the most unexpected places.) Keeping her citizenship was hardly a bargain at this time, but she could not bring herself to give it up either, and so we did not go.
In the late eighties I was seized with the idea of working in England (because I could). I got a British passport and Isabella a certificate of Right of Abode. I worked in London for six months and then we lived in France for six months. I opened a bank account in France. "Monsieur Campbell est un European." said the clerk. I glowed with pride. Isabella, who speaks four European language, was the Canadian. In the village they referred to us as "le petit couple Americain".
It was on our return to Canada in the queue at immigration that I thought "Shit! I hope this works!" because I had not brought my Canadian passport. The immigration officer looked at my British passport and said with a note of triumph, "Ah hah! Where's your landed immigrant stamp?" I stammered that I was in fact Canadian but had been a year in the U.K. and had used my British passport while there. He seemed disappointed that I did not have a British accent and let me through.
And there. That's how I regard dual citizenship. As a convenience or a nuisance, as circumstances dictate, with some sentimental value. Indeed, I incline to the view that Canada and the United Kingdom (and Romania etc.) are different jurisdictions merely. And that the nation is a fantasy created by the state to perpetuate itself. Or rather, an exploitation of the natural affection people have for home.
At an audition workship for Yes or No! (notice how I worked that in? smooth, eh?) during a break, an actress, Neda was speaking in Arabic to Majdi, the director. She explained to me:
Neda: We are from the same country.
Majdi: No. You are from Syria. I am from Lebanon. They want to swallow us.
Neda: We speak the same language! We eat the same food!
Majdi: We like the Syrian people. But we don't like the regime.
Neda: Regime, regime! All over the world, who likes regime?
I was born in Scotland and came to Canada (on a DC-3) at the age of five weeks. I reached the age of sixteen completely unaware that I was not Canadian but in fact British. It was only when we were about to return to Scotland for a vacation that we discovered the misconception. We hastily applied for my citizenship but there was not enough time to get a passport based on it. So I applied for a British passport. And a formidable thing it was at that time, with its stiff dark blue cover, the crest in gold, and the threatening language inside, commanding in the name of her Majesty any foreigners who might impede my travels to hop it.
I met my wife. We went to Romania. In the bad old days. Both on Canadian passports. She had been required to renounce her Romanian citizenship when her family emigrated (and she was able to emigrate because her mother was German -- we have a photo of her stamped "Etnic"). When we tried to visit the country again (when conditions were very much worse) Isabella was informed the law had changed: since she had left as a minor, the renunciation was invalid. But for a sum of $500 she could renounce it for good, or for just $80 she could elect to keep it. (The Romanian bureaucracy was ingenious at finding ways to extract funds from the most unexpected places.) Keeping her citizenship was hardly a bargain at this time, but she could not bring herself to give it up either, and so we did not go.
In the late eighties I was seized with the idea of working in England (because I could). I got a British passport and Isabella a certificate of Right of Abode. I worked in London for six months and then we lived in France for six months. I opened a bank account in France. "Monsieur Campbell est un European." said the clerk. I glowed with pride. Isabella, who speaks four European language, was the Canadian. In the village they referred to us as "le petit couple Americain".
It was on our return to Canada in the queue at immigration that I thought "Shit! I hope this works!" because I had not brought my Canadian passport. The immigration officer looked at my British passport and said with a note of triumph, "Ah hah! Where's your landed immigrant stamp?" I stammered that I was in fact Canadian but had been a year in the U.K. and had used my British passport while there. He seemed disappointed that I did not have a British accent and let me through.
And there. That's how I regard dual citizenship. As a convenience or a nuisance, as circumstances dictate, with some sentimental value. Indeed, I incline to the view that Canada and the United Kingdom (and Romania etc.) are different jurisdictions merely. And that the nation is a fantasy created by the state to perpetuate itself. Or rather, an exploitation of the natural affection people have for home.
At an audition workship for Yes or No! (notice how I worked that in? smooth, eh?) during a break, an actress, Neda was speaking in Arabic to Majdi, the director. She explained to me:
Neda: We are from the same country.
Majdi: No. You are from Syria. I am from Lebanon. They want to swallow us.
Neda: We speak the same language! We eat the same food!
Majdi: We like the Syrian people. But we don't like the regime.
Neda: Regime, regime! All over the world, who likes regime?
Monday, November 06, 2006
Tony Nardi: Two Letters
I want to see this.
Update: I created a calendar
Although English Canadians often pride themselves on being the world's third-largest centre of English-language theatre, it's a meaningless distinction, Nardi says. "We have nothing to show for it. We are self-congratulatory about appreciating theatre, but we don't really care for the act of theatre itself. It has no authenticity or rather, we are authentic only in our inauthenticity. Our major festivals celebrate Shaw and Shakespeare. You don't see Quebec mounting festivals for Racine and Molière. I'm not a separatist, but that's a genuine culture. English Canadians live in a country of perceptions, as opposed to seeing what's really there."(From today's Globe.)
Update: I created a calendar
Saturday, November 04, 2006
the good new playwrights
Where are all the good new playwrights? asks Lyn Gardner on the Guardian's new Theatre & Performing Arts blog.
Short answer: Over here!
But the more interesting question posed by the article: Why aren't new play development schemes in the U.K working?
Answer: No idea.
The article suggests the U.S. model of play development is to blame. And I wonder if there is something to this. Because it is basically a therapeutic model. The playwright is the patient, who is helped by various professionals to come to a better understanding of his own work. The dramaturge asks questions but does not prescribe. The point is to get the playwright to stand on his own two feet. And paradoxically this process can create a combination of egotism and dependency in the playwright. The play remains a private fantasy which can never be adequately represented on stage.
(I am just letting my fingers do the walking, folks. No idea how true this is.)
During rehearsals of Yes or No!, an actor said, we are here to serve the text, and Majdi said, no, we are all (including the playwright) here to serve the production. This stance means we are faced with a number of problems which can be solved by the actors, the director, the playwright. I don't have to do it all on my own!
During rehearsals at Majdi's request I gave him a drastically cut down script and he said he would let the actors make a case for keeping lines from the first script. And the high point of the rehearsals for me was seeing a whole sequence Iva and Daniella had improvised based on a paragraph I had cut. And up on the table Iva said some of my lines, and then to Majdi: "I'm keeping that!" and to me: "Doug?" And I made a gesture I hoped would be interpreted as "Who am I to keep my lines from you, dear Iva?"
Short answer: Over here!
But the more interesting question posed by the article: Why aren't new play development schemes in the U.K working?
Answer: No idea.
The article suggests the U.S. model of play development is to blame. And I wonder if there is something to this. Because it is basically a therapeutic model. The playwright is the patient, who is helped by various professionals to come to a better understanding of his own work. The dramaturge asks questions but does not prescribe. The point is to get the playwright to stand on his own two feet. And paradoxically this process can create a combination of egotism and dependency in the playwright. The play remains a private fantasy which can never be adequately represented on stage.
(I am just letting my fingers do the walking, folks. No idea how true this is.)
During rehearsals of Yes or No!, an actor said, we are here to serve the text, and Majdi said, no, we are all (including the playwright) here to serve the production. This stance means we are faced with a number of problems which can be solved by the actors, the director, the playwright. I don't have to do it all on my own!
During rehearsals at Majdi's request I gave him a drastically cut down script and he said he would let the actors make a case for keeping lines from the first script. And the high point of the rehearsals for me was seeing a whole sequence Iva and Daniella had improvised based on a paragraph I had cut. And up on the table Iva said some of my lines, and then to Majdi: "I'm keeping that!" and to me: "Doug?" And I made a gesture I hoped would be interpreted as "Who am I to keep my lines from you, dear Iva?"
Wednesday, November 01, 2006
NU2U Series: Four Ways 'Til Rain
There will be a staged reading of Tony Berto's Four Ways 'Til Rain on November 4th and 5th, 1:00 PM, at the Blair Rehearsal Hall (3rd Floor) of the King Street Theatre Centre in Kitchener.
Admission is free. RSVP the box office at boxoffice@theatreandcompany.org or call 519.571.0928
Admission is free. RSVP the box office at boxoffice@theatreandcompany.org or call 519.571.0928
Sunday, October 29, 2006
One more show ...
... at 2:00 PM and I hope everyone got the memo on DST. And I hope our actors coming in from Toronto drive carefully. Wet flurries or rain showers. Local blowing snow early this afternoon.
Pictured above (L-R): Nicholas Cumming, Sherree Tams (set and costume design), Iva Zendelska, Daniella Forget, Majdi Bou-Matar (director), Gary Kirkham, and Frank Spezzano.
Photo by Dwight Storring.
Not in the picture: Andrew Laikin (the Angry White Man). Lighting: Kari Kokko. Dramaturg: Jasminka Klacar. Assistant Director/Stage Manager/Technical Director: Nicole Lee Quesnel. Original Music: Nick Storring. Sound Board: Richard Quesnel. Front of House: Linda Levesque. Volunteer Manager: Tony Yang.
Thank you.
As for myself, the playwright, I feel a little like I've been to party where I've talked too much and drank too much and was very entertaining until I puked and passed out, and woke up hours later to see the party still going full steam without me.
Pictured above (L-R): Nicholas Cumming, Sherree Tams (set and costume design), Iva Zendelska, Daniella Forget, Majdi Bou-Matar (director), Gary Kirkham, and Frank Spezzano.Photo by Dwight Storring.
Not in the picture: Andrew Laikin (the Angry White Man). Lighting: Kari Kokko. Dramaturg: Jasminka Klacar. Assistant Director/Stage Manager/Technical Director: Nicole Lee Quesnel. Original Music: Nick Storring. Sound Board: Richard Quesnel. Front of House: Linda Levesque. Volunteer Manager: Tony Yang.
Thank you.
As for myself, the playwright, I feel a little like I've been to party where I've talked too much and drank too much and was very entertaining until I puked and passed out, and woke up hours later to see the party still going full steam without me.
Friday, October 27, 2006
Three more performances ...
... counting tonight. It is a weird play, to use an adjective that occurs in the review in The Record. (Where you can also see a couple of video clips by Philip Bast -- I don't know how long before these go behind the subscriber wall.) You're not going to see this at Drayton. But Stratford? I don't know about that. "You will see."(Another photo from Dwight Storring. Iva, Daniella, Gary.)
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Yes or No!
Daniella Forget, Iva Zendelska(photo by Dwight Storring)
Yes or No! at the Registry Theatre in Kitchener, Oct 25-29
Tickets through the Centre-In-The-Square box office
UPDATE: Iva's blog is here.
Yes or No!
Nicholas Cumming, Daniella ForgetIva Zendelska, Gary Kirkham
(photo by Dwight Storring)
Yes or No! at the Registry Theatre in Kitchener, Oct 25-29
Tickets through the Centre-In-The-Square box office
Monday, October 16, 2006
Silky voice: check. Brain: oops...
On CKWR this evening. Majdi spoke words, sentences and whole paragraphs. He answered questions as if he had been waiting all his life for them to come.
Then it was my turn. Managed to answer "What got you interested in playwriting?" Then the question I had been expecting and preparing for all weekend. Where did I get the idea for the play? "Well, I have been thinking about that." I announced with a great deal of confidence -- and then Mary-Lou looked away from me to the monitor -- and this kicked off the "pause until I get eye-contact again" reflex -- but she didn't look back -- and I said "A dream ... ah ... dream ... ummmmmm" -- Majdi reached over to still my drumming fingers -- and at this point the "I'm an idiot" reflex kicked in. Anyway, got out of it somehow.
Afterwards, I complimented Majdi on his smoothness, and he said "But Douglas, this is what I studied in Lebanon: Radio and TV broadcasting. I've spent hours in radio studios. So it's not talent, just hard work."
So I didn't feel so bad. I'm just the writer, remember that.
Then it was my turn. Managed to answer "What got you interested in playwriting?" Then the question I had been expecting and preparing for all weekend. Where did I get the idea for the play? "Well, I have been thinking about that." I announced with a great deal of confidence -- and then Mary-Lou looked away from me to the monitor -- and this kicked off the "pause until I get eye-contact again" reflex -- but she didn't look back -- and I said "A dream ... ah ... dream ... ummmmmm" -- Majdi reached over to still my drumming fingers -- and at this point the "I'm an idiot" reflex kicked in. Anyway, got out of it somehow.
Afterwards, I complimented Majdi on his smoothness, and he said "But Douglas, this is what I studied in Lebanon: Radio and TV broadcasting. I've spent hours in radio studios. So it's not talent, just hard work."
So I didn't feel so bad. I'm just the writer, remember that.
Friday, October 13, 2006
Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony
Balzac: I shall never make a name.Laure: Nonsense! with such books, any one could make a name.
Balzac: You are right, by Jove! . . . these books must live. . . . Besides, there is Chance. It can protect a Balzac as well as it can a fool. Indeed, one has only to invent this chance. Let some one of my millionaire friends (and I have a few), or a banker not knowing what to do with his money, come and say to me: ‘I am aware of your immense talent and your anxieties; you need such and such a sum to be free; accept it without scruple; you will pay it back some day or other; your pen is worth my millions!’ That’s all I require, my dear sister.
You don't have to be a millionaire to make a pledge, but if you are one, or better, a billionaire (and we have a few), then it would only take such and such a sum to set them free -- and you can say you saved ... a Balzac!
Thursday, October 12, 2006
This and That
I have put up a new website for Isabella using Google Page Creator. It is not very sophisticated but it is less embarrassing for me (the supposed computer guy) than the one I had previously. I said, "Don't you have any designer friends?" Well, that didn't work, so this is what happens.On the left one of Isabella's drawings which might possibly be in the show at Harbinger Gallery opening on Saturday. Sigh. I am in love. With my very talented painter wife, of course. The model is Ewa. Not to be confused with Iva, who is appearing in my play.
It seems I will be on Mary Lou Schagena's Monday Night with the Arts, on CKWR 7:30 to 8:30, with Majdi Bou-Matar, to discuss Yes or No! I must practice my silky radio voice.
Sunday, October 08, 2006
Gestures
I have been so self-involved with Yes or No! coming up (and you would think I'd be involved with my collaborators but no, it's with my self) that I didn't realized what Isabella was up to until after she'd done it. She spoke at a symposium on drawing at the University of Waterloo Fine Arts Department. (Not that she would have wanted me in the audience. Maybe that's why I missed it.) Next week she opens a show, Gestures at Harbinger Gallery with Noriko Maeda, her shodo sensei. I will try to remember.
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
Yes or No!
On the night of the 1995 Quebec referendum, a newcomer from Yugoslavia draws a Canadian concert cellist into her own crisis of identity.
Don't miss the newest production from The MT Space (The Multicultural Theatre Space)
Performances Wednesday to Saturday at 8 pm and Matinee Sunday at 2 pm
Adults: $18 in advance / $20 at the door / Students & Seniors: $15
For tickets call 1-800-265-8977
or order online at www.centre-square.com
Group Bookings available at 519.585.7763 or email info@mtspace.ca
Thursday, September 28, 2006
The Hon. Peter MacKay writes me
Yesterday I received an email from the Honourable Peter MacKay, Minister of Foreign Affairs. It was in response to an email I sent on the 17th of July (of this year) just after our Prime Minister so memorably referred to Israel's bombing of Lebanon as "measured". I objected that this was (at the very least) an abuse of the English language. I sent it to our M.P., Andrew Telegdi; to the Foreign Affairs critics for the Liberals, N.D.P. and Bloc Quebecois; and to Peter MacKay, and (of course) the Prime Minister. I did not receive a reply -- and usually they are so eager to respond! (In fairness, the B.Q. critic could hardly be expected to care about an abuse of the English language.)
But in my inbox, yesterday, this:
A18627-2006 IN REPLY TO YOUR EMAIL OF JULY 17, 2006
But in my inbox, yesterday, this:
A18627-2006 IN REPLY TO YOUR EMAIL OF JULY 17, 2006
Thank you for your email of July 17, 2006, co-addressed to the Right Honourable Stephen Harper, Prime Minister, and to other members of Parliament, in which you express your concerns regarding the upsurge of violence in the Middle East. I regret the delay in replying to you.Etc. etc. Everything you might expect. Thank you, Peter! Just a wee bit late. Curious you should remember me. My play "Yes or No!" will be running at the Registry Theatre in Kitchener, Oct 25-29th if you happen to be in town. Perhaps we can arrange a discussion of the events in the Middle East with members of the company.
I have taken good note of the issues raised in your correspondence and I understand your concerns in this respect.
The words of a courtier
In the Guardian. I am reminded of the scene in the Last Emperor where a doctor sniffs a bowl of the infant emperor's shit.
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
Desert Island Discs
Desert Island Discs
I didn't buy anything of what could be called pop or rock until I was ... oh, let's check Wikipedia ... until 1983, when I bought Synchronicity, by The Police. I took it home and closed all the windows.
In the 90s, a German friend of ours played us some heavy-metal. He was embarrassed that we listened to it so attentively. I wrote (drunkenly) lyrics for his band "Hellwar" just so they would have an original song that wasn't in broken English. I don't know if it was included on the album they recorded and which was voted as one of Germany's worst heavy-metal albums of some year or other in some obscure fanzine.
One year (1993 if Wikipedia is to be believed) I bought (on the recommendation of the New York Times) P.J. Harvey's Dry. I used to astound friends and co-workers with it. I could probably have run for office in the U.K.
Last year, or the year before, Isabella developed a passion for the music of Bob Dylan, and so I am reasonably familiar with his voluminous output, and know many cheerful facts about Bob. I might even be convinced to go to his upcoming concert in Toronto which would be a first for me (i.e. any kind of what could be considered a "rock concert.")
But if I were to go to a desert island today (and you might suppose I am already living on one), probably most of the disks I'd take would be considered "classical".
Of course, I have just this year turned fifty.
Young should be concentrating her efforts on exposing guests who implausibly pick classical music for their desert-island listening. While senior politicians and pop are hard to swallow, it's just as difficult to believe claims by people in their 30s or 40s that they would be listening to Shostakovich, et al, while on the island.If you'd asked me at the age of, say, twenty, what discs I would take to a desert island, I wouldn't have said Shostakovich because I hadn't listened to him, but I would have said: Hindemith, Stravinsky, Debussy, Moussorgsky, Mahler ... and maybe some Gilbert & Sullivan.
I didn't buy anything of what could be called pop or rock until I was ... oh, let's check Wikipedia ... until 1983, when I bought Synchronicity, by The Police. I took it home and closed all the windows.
In the 90s, a German friend of ours played us some heavy-metal. He was embarrassed that we listened to it so attentively. I wrote (drunkenly) lyrics for his band "Hellwar" just so they would have an original song that wasn't in broken English. I don't know if it was included on the album they recorded and which was voted as one of Germany's worst heavy-metal albums of some year or other in some obscure fanzine.
One year (1993 if Wikipedia is to be believed) I bought (on the recommendation of the New York Times) P.J. Harvey's Dry. I used to astound friends and co-workers with it. I could probably have run for office in the U.K.
Last year, or the year before, Isabella developed a passion for the music of Bob Dylan, and so I am reasonably familiar with his voluminous output, and know many cheerful facts about Bob. I might even be convinced to go to his upcoming concert in Toronto which would be a first for me (i.e. any kind of what could be considered a "rock concert.")
But if I were to go to a desert island today (and you might suppose I am already living on one), probably most of the disks I'd take would be considered "classical".
Of course, I have just this year turned fifty.
Tuesday, September 05, 2006
Asphalt Jungle Shorts
Asphalt Jungle Shorts is ... well, let me quote from the email:
ASPHALT JUNGLE SHORTS is an exciting evening of several short, site-specific plays to be performed in various unexpected locations in Downtown Kitchener.
• Plays by eleven playwrights from Kitchener to California, including Gary Kirkham’s Beth at Fifty & Live Nude Mannequin, Linda Eisenstein’s Balancing Act & Justice of the Peace, and Donna Spector’s award winning Short Term Affairs.
• Six directors including Kathleen Sheehy, Darlene Spencer and David Antscherl,
• Thirteen actors from here to Toronto, including Heather Gurd, Shelagh Ranalli and Brendan Schaefer.
• Produced by Paddy Gillard-Bentley with Nicole Lee Quesnel as Stage Manager, generous sponsors and partners like The City of Kitchener and Jump Logistics, various downtown businesses and a wonderful heap of talent.
This will be theatre like Kitchener has never seen it.
TICKETS are $15.00 general admission, and as we are registered with eyeGO.org students can purchase $5 tickets.
SHOW TIMES: Thursday Friday & Saturday – September 14, 15, 16 & 21, 22, 23, 2006, 8pm. For TICKETS call (519) 744-9708 or email flush-ink@skyedragon.com
Reserved tickets can be picked up at the Duke St. Parking Garage (between Queen and Ontario streets), at the Ontario St. entrance. This is the starting point for the event. Audience sizes are limited so act quickly. For tickets, please be there at least fifteen minutes before show time (7:45 pm), to pick up your tickets.
Monday, August 28, 2006
Bio
I was asked to write a bio for the Theatre & Company website and came up with the following:
Douglas Campbell joined Theatre & Company's Writer's Bloc in 2001 and found writing for the theatre to be exhilarating and addictive. A fragment of his play Pamphilia was produced as part of the New Works Festival in 2003, and Little Crickets was given a workshop and public reading as part of the NU2U program in 2005. He is also involved with MTSpace Multicultural Theatre who are developing his play Yes or No! for performance in October. In his forties Douglas was seized by the dance bug, and took every kind of dance class imaginable, including Flamenco, Tap, and Highland Dancing. He has appeared on stage several times, notably in a ballet recital, where he was the only male creature within a league of the theatre. (Not all pictures have been destroyed.) He has also studied Aikido for several years and knows how to disarm an assailant wielding a sword (in theory).This will be appearing somewhere in here soon. I hope they are able to find something for me to do, a man of my parts.
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Tickets for "Yes or No!' on sale now ..
Tickets are now available through the Centre in the Square box office. Just go to the Registry Theatre and click on Buy Tickets (the direct URL is so ugly I refuse to permit it on my blog)
Tickets are $18, Students & Seniors $15.
Tickets are $18, Students & Seniors $15.
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
Cilla Vee
One more show, tomorrow night at Clay & Glass Gallery, 7:30pm. Movement and video. There were moments when my mind was overloaded with the projected images, the dancer and her shadow and could no longer make out what was what. Dancer, Claire Elizabeth Barratt and musician, Lee Garbutt.
Outdoors on the deck at the Huether a horner or wasp alighted on our table and with deliberation set down a pupae and flew away. Much speculation as to the significance of this event.
Outdoors on the deck at the Huether a horner or wasp alighted on our table and with deliberation set down a pupae and flew away. Much speculation as to the significance of this event.
Thursday, August 03, 2006
Cilla Vee
The MTSpace presents New York's Cilla Vee Movement Projects performing at Clay & Glass, August 16th 5:30 & 17th 7:30. The show is a half-hour long and tickets are $10. (The idea of the 5:30 start time is that people can catch it on the way home from work -- this is an experiment.) And you can hang-out with the artists afterwards; look at the picture above to decide if you think that's worthwhile. Full details on the show on the MTSpace page, and scroll down for a movement workshop conducted by Cilla Vee. Oh, and scroll up, way up, for a note on Yes or No!, playwright me, and I wish there were pictures of our wonderful cast, who are already busy at work developing.(New York -- that oughta get them over from the Perimeter Institute.)
August 16th 5:30pm, 6pm 2006 — CityScape— at Canadian Clay and Glass Gallery, Waterloo
Cilla Vee Movement Projects "Percussion, projection, sound and dance evoke moments of New York City life"
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Sunday, July 16, 2006
Woman in the Dunes
Went to the Princess to see Woman in the Dunes by Teshigahara. Madame wanted to see it too but thought it would be next week, so she left for a weekend at a cottage in the far north with women friends (as they are wont to do). And I would have missed it too out of solidarity, and inertia, but it was so hot that the idea of a couple of hours in air conditioning was very appealing. Had a glass of water before the five-minute walk to the Princess and an iced tea on arrival in a pronounced sweat. Sparse audience consisting mostly of lone men -- hoped the promise of eroticism hadn't attracted the wrong type -- hoped I didn't look the wrong type -- took consolation from the T-shirt I wore, Isabella's, which said "Festival of Art & Spirit" and "St. Jerome's University" on the other -- obviously I was there for the spiritual aspects of the film.
Not long into the film realized my mistake in watering myself so generously. But I will say this -- nothing makes you concentrate on plot points so much as the urgent need to piss -- it was an education, calculating how much it could reasonably go on, and with all those shots of sand blowing in the wind, collapsing, sifting, the answer was -- I just had to make a trip. And when I came back, I realized I'd just missing the third act turning point -- something had happened, the woman was in pain, the villagers were moving her -- anyway, that was it.
It made me think of Beckett's Act without Words I which I watched a few weeks ago -- sand, confinement, scarcity of water, false hopes, even the scissors. I wonder if there is a relation. Some fellow on Amazon dismisses the Kobe Abe novel that was the basis of the film as "derivative" of Kafka's The Castle. This is like saying I am derivative of my parents. Or that I look like somebody else. Of course I am. And I do. Everything has a genealogy, even if it is accidental.
Not long into the film realized my mistake in watering myself so generously. But I will say this -- nothing makes you concentrate on plot points so much as the urgent need to piss -- it was an education, calculating how much it could reasonably go on, and with all those shots of sand blowing in the wind, collapsing, sifting, the answer was -- I just had to make a trip. And when I came back, I realized I'd just missing the third act turning point -- something had happened, the woman was in pain, the villagers were moving her -- anyway, that was it.
It made me think of Beckett's Act without Words I which I watched a few weeks ago -- sand, confinement, scarcity of water, false hopes, even the scissors. I wonder if there is a relation. Some fellow on Amazon dismisses the Kobe Abe novel that was the basis of the film as "derivative" of Kafka's The Castle. This is like saying I am derivative of my parents. Or that I look like somebody else. Of course I am. And I do. Everything has a genealogy, even if it is accidental.
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
Yes or No!
Just noticed an article in the UW Student Newspaper, Imprint, on MTSpace Theatre, and its artistic director, Majdi Bou-Matar. Of particular interest (to me, anyway) is the reference to this fall's production of Yes or No! with script by playwright Douglas Campbell, that is to say, myself, and not the famous Canadian actor of the same name. (There is a mistake in the article -- the writer has doubled the size of the cast -- there is one Canadian couple and one Yugoslav couple.) We have a cast. Rehearsals start next week -- I should say development, because Majdi uses a lot of improvisation in his process, and my script will be a kind of rough guide. When he said this after the final audition, I gave a laugh which came out like a whimper, which earned me a hug from the actor next to me. And Iva said "Then you'll have two plays!". Iva is recently from Macedonia, so we have one speaker of the language formerly known as Serbo-Croatian, when we'd wanted two, but there are Serbian language tapes at the KPL, so I'm sure Gary will be okay. Performances will be at the Registry Theatre.
October 25 - 30, 2006 Yes or No! - at the Registry Theatre, Kitchener, Ontario
On the night of the Quebec referendum, two couples are drawn into a crisis of their own Yes or No! A comedy about sex, politics, identity and… Halloween!
Thursday, July 06, 2006
Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition
Isabella will be at TOAE this weekend, purple section, booth 209. Be sure to visit her and bring lots of money. A deposed emir living in Nigeria has already expressed an interest in the picture at left (as well he might); unfortunately he does not have ready access to his considerable fortune, and Isabella politely declined the complicated financial arrangements he proposed. Nevertheless it's quite possible he and his retinue might fly in to Toronto for a short visit, so if you want to buy this piece (or indeed any of the pieces in the show; it's rumoured he has made offers to every artist exhibiting) then you'd better get down to Nathan Phillips Square bright and early. That's Isabella Stefanescu, booth 209, purple section (her booth is hard to miss. Her sister refers to it as "the castle". It is designed to withstand hurricanes. I believe it could survive a collision with a fully loaded 707.)
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
Our Theatre: Too Kind?
Interesting article in This Magazine (July/August issue) on Canadian political theatre by this writer entitled "The Dangers of Playing it Safe: How kindness is killing Canadian political theatre". One example he gives is Tomson Highway who can't get productions of his plays because it's hard to find enough professional Aboriginal actors (and directors are afraid to use non-Aboriginals because they are "worried about being accused of 'cultural appropriation'"). I wonder about that; there is the concept of "color-blind casting" -- in the production of Our Country's Good by the UW Drama Dept that I saw earlier this years, the cast who doubled as convicts and English officers included one black woman, and the two aborigines were played by an East Asian and Indian student (I believe). And if you can translate Les Belles-soeurs into Scots or Yiddish -- well, what I am saying is, this is theatre! Tomson says it's okay! So do his plays!
The other example is My Name is Rachel Corrie which was given a secret reading in Toronto at an undisclosed location. (I know! How thrilling!)
Here is something from Hipparchia's Choice by Michele Le Doeuff. I don't know if it is apropos. But I have been to Aikido for the first time in two weeks, and Kilkenny intermittently in hand I transcribe from my favorite philosopher:
The other example is My Name is Rachel Corrie which was given a secret reading in Toronto at an undisclosed location. (I know! How thrilling!)
Here is something from Hipparchia's Choice by Michele Le Doeuff. I don't know if it is apropos. But I have been to Aikido for the first time in two weeks, and Kilkenny intermittently in hand I transcribe from my favorite philosopher:
Over the last twenty years interest seems to have been concentrated on the theoretical possibility of destroying language and undermining all speech. Having started as a theoretical phenomenon, this focus soon became social; it became integrated into everyday relations between intellectuals. We were begged not to use old words, all of which were suspected of bearing within them the sedimented residue of oppressive enemy thinking, either 'bourgeois' or 'metaphysical', depending on the preferences of the person you were talking to. Words were thought to be saturated with 'naiveties' (which were themselves complicit in an order which had to be broken) and were accused of surreptitiously leading back to theories which, it went without saying, we had all agreed to rid ourselves of. In a consensus on reciprocal censorship we have reduced each other to silence.and
Of course ordinary reference points can be criticised and commonly held ideas may be untoward. But it is one thing to discuss something step by step with another person, with his, her or our common liberty in view, and quite another to practise the intellectual terrorism which robs the other of speech.Excuse me, I have been called to bed.
Monday, July 03, 2006
Sunday, July 02, 2006
Canada Day
Spent the afternoon and part of the evening with extended family that keeps on extending, most recently (and unexpectedly) from Eastern Europe to East Asia in my grand-nephew who arrived just three weeks prior to today, Canada Day, its father's eighteenth birthday. Our two mothers came for lunch at Isabella's sister's, as did their aunt; mixture of German and Romanian at the table but predominantly English. Wandered next door to my brother's to see the other nephew (the sensible one, that is to say, seven years old) and niece, and their swimming pool; then back to be serenaded on guitar and recorder by the teenage nephew and niece (the niece is sensible). And I don't know what possessed me but I think feeling guilty for always trying to edify the nephew, most recently with a DVD rental of Fellini's Amarcord (since the niece had a project on Fascism), which he watched to his credit with only a little complaining at the beginning -- but feeling guilty, as I said, I went to GenX and returned with Mars Attacks! which I thought would be a suitably escapist piece of entertainment for a rather blithe young man on his birthday. And all I can say is "Ack Ack! Ack Ack Ack!"; our heads almost exploded.
It's muggy. There was a too brief shower. Sounds of fireworks in the distance. And it's raining again.
It's muggy. There was a too brief shower. Sounds of fireworks in the distance. And it's raining again.
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
The Sex of Knowing
One Sunday afternoon not too long ago I was walking in to the UW Library (because I needed a walk and I needed a book) and I overheard a couple walking towards me in the direction of the Perimeter Institute. The conversation went something like this:
He: ...
She: Well, I would argue there is no such thing as a feminist physics.
He: ...
That's all I caught. They were moving quite fast. Maybe they were particle physicists. Anyway, when I got to the library and was browsing the catalog and couldn't think of anything to read (since everything bored me), I remembered the library had gotten Michele Le Doeuff's The Sex of Knowing and I had never gotten around to checking it out. And partly the recollection was prompted by Isabella's Notebook Project, because the notebook covers the early nineties and this is when we were reading Hipparchia's Choice: An Essay Concerning Women, Philosophy, etc. There is a page of the notebook where Isabella records visiting the library at the Pompidou Centre in Paris and discovering that Hipparchia's Choice, a book of philosophy, had been cataloged as sociology!
The Sex of Knowing is about women and knowledge, and comes down on the side of "She" above, and against what she calls the "feminists of difference".
He: ...
She: Well, I would argue there is no such thing as a feminist physics.
He: ...
That's all I caught. They were moving quite fast. Maybe they were particle physicists. Anyway, when I got to the library and was browsing the catalog and couldn't think of anything to read (since everything bored me), I remembered the library had gotten Michele Le Doeuff's The Sex of Knowing and I had never gotten around to checking it out. And partly the recollection was prompted by Isabella's Notebook Project, because the notebook covers the early nineties and this is when we were reading Hipparchia's Choice: An Essay Concerning Women, Philosophy, etc. There is a page of the notebook where Isabella records visiting the library at the Pompidou Centre in Paris and discovering that Hipparchia's Choice, a book of philosophy, had been cataloged as sociology!
The Sex of Knowing is about women and knowledge, and comes down on the side of "She" above, and against what she calls the "feminists of difference".
We are assured that "women's way of knowing" requires an affectionate, attentive rapport with the object of knowledge or an involvement typical of the closest emotional relationships, a kind of empathy whose effect would be either to classify Marie and Irene Curie as honorary great men or to erase them entirely from the discussion.and
My learned women friends are often irritated to the point of anger, as if this form of feminism undermined their morale at least as much as -- if not more than -- the ambient misogyny in which they workand
To put it as bluntly as possible: I differentiate between sciences said to have been founded by men alone, and sciences managed by men who refuse entry to anyone but men.But that's by no means the principal target.
De Maistre did not invent the telescope himself, nor did he write the Illiad; but, when he affirms that the "masterpiece" is always a masculine product, he can imagine for an instant that algebra is almost his own creation.And here's something I've been thinking about:
Utopia is not a crazy dream. It is a laboratory where, in the space of a page where a discourse displays its premises, ideas are reflected and test their coherence. Many ideas that were thus elaborated have passed into the realm of facts.And I don't know where to stop. I'll stop here.
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
From the Lighthouse
Spent last week as Assistant Lighthouse Keepers at Cabot Head Lighthouse on the Bruce Peninsula. As the lighthouse is no longer operational, duties were light. (There is a fully automated and solar-powered beacon on a tower next to the original lighthouse.) Essentially we were living in and helping to look after the museum. This amounted to sweeping the stairs and putting out the sign. Also, I signed a paper for the fire inspector. And I shooed some tourists out of the gift-shop (in the lighthouse keeper's house, not shown) which was closed for the day while the keepers were away. And we counted the tourists -- maybe 15-20 a day. Otherwise, blessed silence and solitude.
Don't think I've every actually watched birds before, but found the cormorants, loons, terns and the cedar waxwings who congregated in a dead tree, quite absorbing. (I mean, it was just the waxwings in the dead tree, not the whole lot of them.) Isabella saw a bald eagle over Wingfield Basin from the tower one morning. Splendid vista of Georgian Bay from the tower and once in the middle of the night I went into the tower and the sky was glorious. (Don't especially like that word, glorious, but I've already used splendid.)
The week started cool but by the end it was hot and the bugs were jumping, making walks on the rocky beach short and nasty. How is it that in a strong wind a deer-fly can still hover in your face? When I put up my hoodie I felt like monk. When we parted the keeper told Isabella "I don't know if we can have you back, you make too much noise!" We were like hermits. Sometimes I wish I liked people. I mean I do but ... once last year when I was going through a bout of insomnia, Isabella said, "Imagine you are on a beach." and I said, "No, I couldn't, there might be people there."
Sunday, June 11, 2006
Storytelling, etc.
To the Latitudes Storyteller Festival yesterday morning principally because I wanted to see the short piece MTSpace developed for a recent conference on the employment problems of immigrants, Me Here, Me Happy. Also saw the African Women's Alliance of Waterloo Region storytellers (including shy teenage dancers) and Isabel Cisterna, who told a story and also talked about arpillera, which are kind of story-telling quiltlets. She also runs Cafe Cabaret which will be in Victoria Park in a tent next to the clock tower, June 17.
And coming up, Legion of Memory, "a site-specific performance exploring war memorial and the displacement of war refugees who have come to live in the Kitchener-Waterloo region from the former Yugoslavia." June 16-25, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.
And coming up, Legion of Memory, "a site-specific performance exploring war memorial and the displacement of war refugees who have come to live in the Kitchener-Waterloo region from the former Yugoslavia." June 16-25, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
A Rat
Last night I got into bed and heard the footsteps of what I took to be a heavy-footed mouse -- very heavy-footed -- in fact at first I took it to be our long-dead cat Popescu -- and if I were a rational creature I should have bolted from my bed and gotten a flashlight and a broom and started heaving boxes around (because the archives are in my bedroom too) -- but I have unparalled powers of wishful thinking and I managed to convince myself it was a mouse, albeit one that had eaten rather heavily (not surprising in our house where generations of mice have socked away dry cat food from the bowl of our cat, long senile before he died). And after I had fallen asleep I was awoken by groans and murmurs that suggested either some mammal was in the throes of amourous embrace or else giving birth -- but as I say -- wishful thinking -- it must have been a mouse.
But today I returned from work and saw the unmistable hindquarters of a large brown furry creature disappear under Isabella's computer table. Perhaps -- an opossum? What to do? Isabella is at her life drawing class -- no help there. I called the brother and asked about the Live Animal Trap. The brother said it would very likely be among our father's effects, in my mother's garage or basement. But he didn't volunteer to take care of the mammal problem himself. Damn. So I called the sister-in-law -- phone busy -- answering machine -- teenage nephew very likely on the phone. I left a message on the machine and waited. From under the computer desk, low whimpering. Not possibly a rat! Rats don't whimper! They squeak! Could it be that species of friendly South American desert mammal that had infested Globe Studios? These creatures know no natural enemy and are extremely friendly. Oh please, let it be!
No response from the sister-in-law, so I walked over to their house. They are very outdoorsy people -- the niece and nephew do wolf calls and my sister-in-law can listen and say "No, that's not right, it's winter." They will know what to do. We consulted. The whimpering very possibly indicated a juvenile animal of some kind -- maybe a young racoon? A guinea pig? ( I suppressed the image of its tail.) The sister-in-law made me supper while the niece gave me a detailed synopsis of a young adult novel about fugitive Jews in Vichy France. Meanwhile the brother-in-law collected various fish nets. We dropped in on my mom to pick up the Live Animal Trap.
And I was still looking for a flashlight when the brother-in-law poked under the computer table with a fish net and said "It's a rat" in his phlegmatic voice and adroitly scooped it up while I not quite gagged. He took it outside and dumped it down a drain. An odd thing to do but I suppose it was fitting.
So I am finishing a bottle of wine here trying to get over my scunner at the idea of a rat in the house. It's almost done.
But today I returned from work and saw the unmistable hindquarters of a large brown furry creature disappear under Isabella's computer table. Perhaps -- an opossum? What to do? Isabella is at her life drawing class -- no help there. I called the brother and asked about the Live Animal Trap. The brother said it would very likely be among our father's effects, in my mother's garage or basement. But he didn't volunteer to take care of the mammal problem himself. Damn. So I called the sister-in-law -- phone busy -- answering machine -- teenage nephew very likely on the phone. I left a message on the machine and waited. From under the computer desk, low whimpering. Not possibly a rat! Rats don't whimper! They squeak! Could it be that species of friendly South American desert mammal that had infested Globe Studios? These creatures know no natural enemy and are extremely friendly. Oh please, let it be!
No response from the sister-in-law, so I walked over to their house. They are very outdoorsy people -- the niece and nephew do wolf calls and my sister-in-law can listen and say "No, that's not right, it's winter." They will know what to do. We consulted. The whimpering very possibly indicated a juvenile animal of some kind -- maybe a young racoon? A guinea pig? ( I suppressed the image of its tail.) The sister-in-law made me supper while the niece gave me a detailed synopsis of a young adult novel about fugitive Jews in Vichy France. Meanwhile the brother-in-law collected various fish nets. We dropped in on my mom to pick up the Live Animal Trap.
And I was still looking for a flashlight when the brother-in-law poked under the computer table with a fish net and said "It's a rat" in his phlegmatic voice and adroitly scooped it up while I not quite gagged. He took it outside and dumped it down a drain. An odd thing to do but I suppose it was fitting.
So I am finishing a bottle of wine here trying to get over my scunner at the idea of a rat in the house. It's almost done.
Friday, June 02, 2006
pat...
Pat the Dog was successfully launched with T-shirts and buttons bearing the image of Pat. Pictures of inebriated playwrights duly to appear on web site (and since I am one of them we will not attempt to link to it, scroll down if you are curious, I'm sure you'll find it somewhere.) Our leaderess Lisa O'Connell to whom we are so grateful for so many things will be having a reading of her play Ellie at Theatre & Company this Saturday and Sunday at 2:00 I believe but you may want to check with the box office on that since I am an inebriated playwright and as for the link, again, you are on your own.
Pat, if you must know, is Mackenzie King's dog, or rather the name of the corporate dog -- what am I saying here -- Pat is like the Pope, or Dr. Who, it is rather a title held by serial manifestations of the same entity than a proper name, and we chose it as a local reference, since Mackenzie King went to school here, and in fact a bronze statue of his youthful self can be seen sitting on the front lawn of Kitchener Collegiate Institute unless it's been stolen to sell for scrap as has happened to so many fine equestrian statues in the United Kingdom due to the high price of bronze. Good night. And so to bed ...
Pat, if you must know, is Mackenzie King's dog, or rather the name of the corporate dog -- what am I saying here -- Pat is like the Pope, or Dr. Who, it is rather a title held by serial manifestations of the same entity than a proper name, and we chose it as a local reference, since Mackenzie King went to school here, and in fact a bronze statue of his youthful self can be seen sitting on the front lawn of Kitchener Collegiate Institute unless it's been stolen to sell for scrap as has happened to so many fine equestrian statues in the United Kingdom due to the high price of bronze. Good night. And so to bed ...
Saturday, May 27, 2006
The Duchess of Malfi
On Victoria Day (observed, that is May 22) got a pair of rush tickets to see a preview performance of The Duchess of Malfi at Stratford which opens June 2. My first time at the Tom Patterson Theatre, the "winter home of the Stratford Badminton club" -- I love the long stage. I also love the Studio Theatre. But I just hate the stage at the Festival Theatre -- I hate it. My heart sinks whenever I enter the Festival Theatre because whatever play is being done will look the same. It makes any play look like an arrangement of figurines on a hutch-cabinet. And in the middle, that damned post. Saw The Country Wife there once and they stuck a phallus on the post -- what else could you do? I'd like to take a chainsaw to that post.
Excuse me.
The Duchess of Malfi -- I suppose I shouldn't say anything since this was a preview -- but nobody's reading this -- here -- I'll tell you -- very striking visual design, everything black, the props, the set, the costumes (except for the Cardinal of necessity in red), the makeup (that is, black highlights, rather Goth in fact), and especially a long strip of vinyl? linoleum? anyway, a long very shiny strip that made the Patterson stage seem even narrower, almost Japanese. The scenes of violence were marred for me somewhat by a woman behind me who gave these little complacent, condescending, mirthless laughs (hardly laughs) usually rendered as "heh heh", expressing her understanding that someone in fact was not being strangled on stage, it was just acting.
The music -- in general I wish there was more live music in theatre -- I wish the madmen and women had sung "Oh let us howl a heavy note" instead of it being piped in. Of course there is the expense -- some of them were already naked, and how much it costs to have someone naked sing, I don't know. (But it is done.) Perhaps I am reimagining The Duchess of Malfi as a Jacobean Three-Penny Opera.
I don't know why we didn't think of rush tickets for Stratford before: you can reserve them by phone two hours before a performance, and in Waterloo we're an easy half-hour from Stratford. It takes a while to adjust to reduced circumstances. (I had stock options...)
Excuse me.
The Duchess of Malfi -- I suppose I shouldn't say anything since this was a preview -- but nobody's reading this -- here -- I'll tell you -- very striking visual design, everything black, the props, the set, the costumes (except for the Cardinal of necessity in red), the makeup (that is, black highlights, rather Goth in fact), and especially a long strip of vinyl? linoleum? anyway, a long very shiny strip that made the Patterson stage seem even narrower, almost Japanese. The scenes of violence were marred for me somewhat by a woman behind me who gave these little complacent, condescending, mirthless laughs (hardly laughs) usually rendered as "heh heh", expressing her understanding that someone in fact was not being strangled on stage, it was just acting.
The music -- in general I wish there was more live music in theatre -- I wish the madmen and women had sung "Oh let us howl a heavy note" instead of it being piped in. Of course there is the expense -- some of them were already naked, and how much it costs to have someone naked sing, I don't know. (But it is done.) Perhaps I am reimagining The Duchess of Malfi as a Jacobean Three-Penny Opera.
I don't know why we didn't think of rush tickets for Stratford before: you can reserve them by phone two hours before a performance, and in Waterloo we're an easy half-hour from Stratford. It takes a while to adjust to reduced circumstances. (I had stock options...)
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