Songs of Hangings and Redemptions
I am beside myself with delight and pride. Graham Weir has been nominated for an award for Best Performance in a Cabaret in Songs of Hangings and Redemptions which I directed!!!!! The brilliant show with Graham Weir, Pitchie Rommelaere and Simon ‘Fuzzy’ Ratcliffe ran at The Kalk Bay Theatre at the end of last year. Now we’ll take this as a huge kick up the bum and make sure it happens more, for those of you who didn’t get to see it. YAY Graham! Watch this space for where and when.
weird one
I only saw tiny bits on TV while up in Jozi, but that test was a weirdy. I’m glad we won, regardless. I’m back in town and ready to go and see some stuff this week. I’ll keep you posted.
jozi
We’re off to Jozi today for the weekend and I’ll be back on Tuesday. On Wednesday night I’m off to see Claire Watling and Godfrey Johnson in Kissed By Brel at the Intimate Theatre. I can’t wait. I love Brel, think Claire Watling is the most talented somebody by far, and I adore Godfrey. He is a colleague and a friend.
I’ll be keeping my ear to the ground with regard to the cricket. Big Friendly has just told me that we’ll only hear today whether Hershel is playing or not. And it’s no secret that with the openers’ scores having been in the high single digits for the last million tests, we need Hershel. All of this reminds me…When Big Friendly and I were not married yet we went up to Jozi for fandamily stuff. We had borrowed my boet’s car and were listening to the cricket on the radio. I was so happy. Big Friendly on my left, cricket commentary in my ear. In a wave of emotion I grabbed Big Friendly’s knee and said, “Gibbs!” I still have no idea why. Although I have had great success in turning Big Friendly into a cricket mad statistician he has never grabbed me on any part of my body and shouted, “Boucher!”
back on at kbt
Tonight was our first theatresports show back at the Kalk Bay Theatre since its revamp. Big up to them for making the stage and seating areas bigger and better for performers and audience. we had a smallish audience, but it was a crazy show. For those who missed it (and I know who you are) my own personal highlights (and that’s probably because I was in them) were the Jane Austen scene with the title At the Watering Hole, the prize giver’s pole dance and the Shakespeare set at the airport. I guess you had to be there. I love it.
we lost
we lost we lost we lost. we lost. we lost.
So now we are one all in the series (with one test to go). And Hershel has his hearing soon. All this makes me very nervous for the world cup in March. Wish I was going. Sigh. I’ll keep you posted.
Chart Throb
I spent a lot of time this weekend finishing Ben Elton’s Chart Throb – a vicious, hard-core satire on Pop Idols and reality TV. I loved it! It’s outrageous, disgusting and 100% true. What makes it worse is that I’m slightly addicted to reality TV, even though I KNOW it’s complete bullshit and there is absolutely nothing real about it. Highly recommended. In fact, I wish I had stayed home on Saturday night and read.
Oh, and as Simon pointed out in his comment, check out www.therealreview.co.za for Brent Meersman’s take on R and J. I am not alone!
organ donors
Just come back from walking the refugees on the beach. A beautiful, still, peaceful summer Sunday in Cape Toff spoilt by the organ donors. You know, the idiots on fifteen thousand Rands worth of bicycle who insist on riding two or three abreast in the middle of the road, and even illegally on goddamn highways? So this is the worst time of year for them, after end of year pig outs they’ve all resolved to start training for the damn Argus, and they ALL do it on a Sunday. On the highway. They are ORGAN DONORS!
iVirgin Boyoboy
I’ve just got home from the Baxter. I went to see iVirgin Boy and I’m so glad that Big Friendly had work to do and stayed home. This was not one for him, for sure. Now, I had all sorts of stuff around this play and I really wanted it to be brilliant…or at least good. It won the PANSA playwriting festival last year (and I had directed one of the playreading finalists in Cape Town), so I wanted it to be a good script. Then, I know Bruce Little and I think he is fabulous and talented, so I wanted this to be a brilliant showcase for him. Also, it was my second play this year and I wanted a goodie to cancel out the very big baddie of Romeo and Julio. And I paid for the Saturday night tickets and I didn’t want it to be a waste.
Now here comes my first pet hate. I HATE it when writers direct their own plays. I hate it for a lot of reasons. Number one, it feels to me that the writer thinks that nobody else will ‘geddit’ and do the piece justice. Number two, the writer then disses the special job of a director to interpret the script. Number three, the writer keeps telling the actors to do what he tells them he means. All of the above with iVirgin.
Ok, so the set was rubbish and even fell down. Ok, the lead character Alan Whitfield takes a ‘brand new’ suit out of tissue paper and a box and it’s been specially made for the character, but when he holds the pants up there’s some funny old gluey stuff on the one hem, and when he puts them on they’re three inches too short. Oh ja, and there was gratuitous nudity (which I’m usually ok with when it’s funny or something) in a message driven play. So all that wasn’t so good.
The performances. Bruce Little was amazing. Subtle, believable, empathetic, detailed, intelligent and absorbing. Pity he was in a vacuum of his own, most of the time, because of trite and inconstant dialogue in endless dreary confessional scenes with a ’social worker’. The two other guys were good enough and their character work wasn’t too bad in the little they had to do. I did feel sorry for them during the graphic visualisation of the schoolboy moment though. Poor Denise Newman had very little to work with as the counsellor and even though she was on stage most of the time she was hardly present.
My biggest problem was that the production could have been so much better. It’s a great story; meaningful and very relevant, but it disintegrates into a lecture demonstration that offends. We KNOW why he was raped. We GODDIT the first time round.
Peter Krummeck, writer and director (and responsible for the set too, I heard), get outside help to make your play better.
I know it’s only play number two of the year, but it’s already not in the top ten. Askies iVirgin Boy, but Aikhona wena.
Silly Smith
Big Friendly said to me this morning while we were walking the refugees, “listen, if you want to do stuff today, go do it, I’m stuck on the computer working.” I was, like, “ag man, ok.”
Then I remembered he wants to watch the cricket on TV. I have turned him into a cricket junkie. He quotes stats at me every five minutes, hates our captain, knows everything about everything, and that’s all because I love cricket.
So today he tells me that Graham Smith cost us 39 runs yesterday because of bad captaining. Big Friendly really doesn’t like our captain. And let’s face it the Proteas (national flowers from now on) were all out for 124! Against Pakistan on what was supposed to be a batting wicket. Lucky it’s a test match, and today is only day two. I’ll keep you posted.
what’s for lunch
Big Friendly sent me this link this morning. I love it. http://www.rahoi.com/2006/03/may-i-take-your-order.php
Reminds me of when I was in India and there was ‘chicken blue inside with pain apple’ on the menu. I was too squeamish for that and opted for ‘corn flex’ instead.
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Randomness
