Rev Stan's other stuff

David Tennant is Hamlet

As Jen and I were leaving the Courtyard Theatre in Stratford on Thursday night she said to me: 'Do you feel like you've just seen something historic?'.

Credit: RSC (www.rsc.org.uk)

There is a reason why there are probably half a dozen actors at best whose Hamlet's remained emblazoned on theatre-goers and critics memories, it is probably one of the most complex roles an actor will undertake and probably one of the most mentally and physically demanding. It is, after all, the longest part in any of Shakespeare's plays.
The 'interesting energy' I hoped David Tennant would bring to the role when I first heard he'd been cast was there in abundance. He managed to convincingly pull off languid melancholy to barely contained coiled spring and erratic lunacy.
But the 'historic' question of Jen's wasn't merely refering to Tennant but to the whole cast and production. While Hamlet was like a bomb waiting to go off and occassionally doing so, Patrick Stewart's Claudius was considered and quiet.
Mariah Gale's Ophelia, a happy, confident young women who is completely broken by tragedy. I could go on (and on).

Credit: RSC (www.rsc.org.uk)

What director Gregory Doran has done is create a Hamlet that is both satisfying to aficionado's while being accessible to those attracted to the theatre by the stage appearance of Dr Who. He has also managed to draw out the tragedy and comedy in the play, the latter often neglected, to produce an imaginatively staged and thoroughly entertaining play.
When we got back to our hotel we sat up for hours talking about what we had seen and the interpretation of the play. And that is why I think I answered 'yes' to Jen's question.

 

My how time flies

Last October I wrote this because I'd just got my Hamlet tickets through the post. I've wanted to see it since I heard more than a year ago that David Tennant was taking the lead and I can hardly believe that tonight is the night.
So the hotel is booked, our itinerary planned, all I need to do now get over to Jen's so we can hit the road. The play has long since sold out and there is a front row ticket going on ebay for £300 this morning but I wouldn't sell for any money. V. v. excited.

Hamlet ticket

Life QotW: Working 8 to 6

Some companies are trying out a new four day work week. Is this something you would like to see your company try out?

I work for a weekly magazine and we go to press on a Thursday night which leaves Friday redundant for some departments although not mine. For my particular job, four days a week would be quite tricky as we work on rolling deadlines but I could certainly work a 9-day fortnight, which I believe is what journalists do at The Guardian newspaper.

Having every other Friday off is extremely appealing. The number of extra hours I do each week wouldn't have to increase that much, if at all, in order to earn alternate Fridays in lieu.

I guess that in introducing such a practice, the company would have to officially recognise the real amount of extra, unpaid work a lot of employees routinely do.

Going green...sort of

The good old property industry is jumping on the green bandwagon. But it's not that it has suddenly developed conscience about the planet but in the main because it has realised that so-called green buildings will be worth more in a few years time when it's time to sell. Kerching.
I've sat through countless building presentations by developers and their agents about how the loos flush with rain water, the carpets are made from recycled tyres and the chief execs office is panelled in sustainably-grown birch blah, blah and indeed blah.
Even if I hadn't already seen through their laudable efforts, the green credentials kind of fall down when they push towards you the extra-gloss coated, boxed-set of three brochures to take away. Even worse when the polite refusal is followed up by not one, but two copies of the box-set being carefully enshrined in cardboard and then biked to the office, where after a brief repose on my desk it completes it's journey in the recycling bin. Not that I'm sure you can recycle that sort of high-gloss coated cardboard. (We have the bare minimum paper storage in our office - why let cabinets get in the way of cramming in another desk or two.)
The environment is becoming one of the key issues of the 21st century and computers are fast becoming the key means of communication. Shame then that the two can't be used together more effectively. If a property company took a holistic approach to being environmentally friendly for some genuine reasons maybe then I might, and I say might, get vaguely excited about their green agenda.

Start wearing purple

The wonderfully entertaining Eugene Hutz of Gogol Bordello, originally uploaded by Rev Stan.

Took this at Get Loaded in the Park yesterday. It's been a while since Mosh and I went to a music festival. The desire to spend hours getting to and from a glorified field, queue for chemical toilets and listen (coz you rarely get to see anything when you are my height) to bands you love for half an hour sounding shit because it's too windy for the sound system has strangely worn off.
But this was Clapham Common a mere 20 mins walk/bolt home and there were some good bands playing so we thought we'd give it a go.
There were times I loved it (down at the front jumping up and down to the fab as ever Gogol Bordello) but there were also times when I hated it.
The queues, the shit food, the warm drink, the scrum for the loos, the way you didn't stand a chance of enjoying the music unless you were somewhere near the stage but as the day wore on, down the front attracted more and more pissed up twats who's idea of a good time was to push each other around and jump on each other so that you were half watching the band and half watching to see if an elbow was coming towards your head.
And no one told me you had to go in fancy dress, I haven't seen such efforts since the Oakham Guide and Scout Carnival 1982. It's a shame my camera battery died.
Still I was brought back to Clapham with a bump when someone threw a tartan picnic blanket on the stage during Supergrass.
And it was only a 20 minute walk home.
A few more pics at www.flickr.com/photos/revstan

Entertainment QotW: Fall Line Up

What T.V. series are you looking forward to starting back up in the fall?

Grey's Anatomy because of

Dr McDreamy

And...

Dr McSteamy

With a bit more of

Dr McDreamy

Oh go on then and a little bit more of:

Dr McSteamy

Mmm mmmm mmm

QotD: Chip Off The Old Block

Which side of your family do you resemble more?

My father, which is ironic because I haven't had anything to do with him for a very long time. I've never met my half brother but the first time I saw a picture of him I knew exactly who he was. I see far more of myself in him than I do my brother and sister.
Nature can be cruel sometimes.

QotD: There's a Monster in My Closet

What were you afraid of when you were younger that seems silly to you now?
Submitted by wandie

Daleks

When you are four the fact that they can't go up stairs, thus making them quite easy to get away from, doesn't make them less scary. 

I love a room with a view

I love a room with a view, originally uploaded by Rev Stan.

Sometimes a night away from home for work can almost be worth it. This is the beautiful Exeter Cathedral.

New Royal connection

Drumkilbo House, originally uploaded by Rev Stan.

I'm not really a massive fan of the Royal's but can now number a whopping two (tenuous) connections with the Queen.
This picture of the most recent, is the beautiful Drumkilbo House near Perth in Scotland where the Queen spent the night back in 1963 and where I spent the week with friends back in July.
I was surprised too. (I bet her room wasn't in the servants quarters.) Not only did they allow us to rent the place but also Glamis Castle is just a few miles down the road and was the childhood home of the Queen Mother.
Now Drumkilbo is beautiful and amazing to stay in, particularly when you live in a small one bedroom flat in Stockwell but for the Queen who has a handful of castles and palaces perhaps it was a novelty because if I'd been given the choice, I'd have probably plumped for Glamis:

Glamis Castle (pronounced Glarms for those that are interested)

I bagsie one of the turret rooms.
Oh and loads more pics from Scotland here

New art/water fountain on the South Bank

New art instalation on the South Bank, originally uploaded by Rev Stan.

When the water stops it's time to move

Love the outdoors but hate exercise?

Watching the Olympics in Trafalgar Square, originally uploaded by Rev Stan.

Then you need to watch the Olympics on a big screen in Trafalgar Square.

Culture QotW: The Olypmic Games

The Olympics are now in full swing, what event(s) are you looking forward to watching the most?

The swimming/diving. I only cheer on the men who are wearing speedo's though ;0)

...some trace of her at the National

Well my reading marathon of Dostoevsky's The Idiot paid off. ...some trace of her, which was inspired by the novel was breathtaking, frustrating, fascinating, distracting and utterly engaging all at the same time.
I actually left the theatre feeling a bit shaky.
But how can I describe a performance unlike anything I've ever seen before? I can't hope to do it justice but I will at least try.
If you imagine a film set. A black and white movie. And it is being acted, lit, shot and sound recorded on a stage in front of you while simultaneously being editing and projected onto a screen hanging above the stage you get a bit of the idea.
There were no technical crew on stage though. It was all done by the actors with choreographed precision. (And live musician's back stage.)

Ben Whishaw as Prince Myshkin from this webiste: http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/the

At any one time three people could be playing in a shot. For example there was a scene where Prince Myshkin played by the once again far too talented Ben Whishaw is eating soup while deep in thought. Someone is filmed filling the soup spoon with soup and lifting it as though to their mouth, stage right while stage left, Whishaw completes the action lifting a soup spoon to his mouth and eating it. In the centre a third actor provides a voice to Myshkin's thoughts.
It is all instantly edited together so that on screen you are watching the Prince eat soup and listening to his thoughts.
At the same time the remaining actors are providing necessary sound effects and rapidly setting up for the next scene. In a film, each scene would be shot perspective by perspective then edited together at a later stage.
It all sounds a little chaotic and it was at times and quite distracting. Sitting close to the front, as I was, you are level with the stage so you did get sucked into what was happening there rather than watching it all come together on screen.
But it ached with cleverness at times. The sheer imagination and organisation and not forgetting the performances as there often wasn't another actor to play off.
Critics of it argue that you go the theatre to see the actors and it was difficult to see them in the flesh at times with lighting rigs, props and off-scene actors dodging about, especially as the stage had low lighting so as not to interfere with the 'film' lighting. But the thrill of the live performance was magnified by the fact that there were so many different technical elements all coming together at once right before your very eyes.
Katie Mitchell who wrote and directed has chosen to pick out the bare bones of the novel's story and pieced together its overall themes using a series of very loosely connected set pieces. There is little conversation and a lot of monologue.
A lot of the Dostoevsky's characters have been jettisoned to concentrate on the love triangle between the central characters. And that isn't a great shame, but I felt the Aglaya character who serves to complicate the love triangle in the book was introduced a little too late and the character underplayed.
One or two characters also seem to pop up randomly and this is where the background knowledge of the novel certainly helped to add to some context.
So it certainly wasn't without its floors. But the thrill of the live performance certainly made up for it.

 

 

Music QotW: Music Road Trip

If you could go on a summer tour with one band, which one would it be?

Duh!

Muse at Wembley

Suffering for art

It's been a bit of a marathon. 15 days and 652 (classic Penguin font) pages. In fact sometimes it's felt a little like

Holiday reading

being back at Uni studying English Literature, calculating the number of pages per day I'd need to read before a particular tutorial. But today I finally completed Dostoevsky's The Idiot in preparation for seeing ...some trace of her, a play it inspired at the National tomorrow.
And although I confess I did skip over a page or two when characters fell into lengthy espousing of Dostoevsky's ideas I did actually enjoy it far more than I thought I would.
I don't pretend that I understood it all in great depth  and there were times when I hated it.  In completing it I certainly felt like I went on a journey with the central character Prince Myshkin or the idiot as he is perceived.
The plot is far too complicated to describe in any simple and meaningful way. There are so many characters Dostoevsky gives you a list on the opening page. Myshkin is often referred to in critiques as a Christ like figure whom the society of the day were unable to appreciate. I'm not entirely convinced by this interpretation. Certainly he behaves in a manner far more honourable than most of the characters but then his character does skate very close to the same characteristics of madness that many of the other characters seem to possess. In short my impression of 19th century middle class Russians after reading The Idiot is that they are all essentially a bit bonkers.
If you strip out a lot of the characters and scenic plot routes it is essentially about two men who love the same woman. Dostoevsky skillfully builds a sense of foreboding but the final denouement was faintly disappointing.

Some Trace of Her at the National Theatre

I've read reviews of the play, in which Ben Whishaw portrays the Prince, which say it is incomprehensible without having read the book but then a friend has watched it 'blind' so to speak and thoroughly enjoyed it.
Tomorrow night will be the acid test.
...some trace of her is described as a multi-media performance which has a voice in the back of my head screaming 'arty wank'. Indeed there is a video trailer on the website. But regardless of how much of the story and themes I comprehend and how much is art for arts sake, it is seeing Whishaw on stage again that I am most excited about.
It was his casting that made me want to see  it in the first place and consequently read the book.
I'm feeling a kind of post exam elation at the moment having completed my homework and having my free time back again. I'm hoping all my prep is rewarded.

Culture QotW: Packing Light

What do you think about airlines charging for your second bag? Will this change the way you pack?

One bag has always been enough for me on holiday even when I went away for three and a half weeks to New Zealand but then I am barely taller than a hobbit so I guess my clothes take up less space than most peoples.

Ben Whishaw is (still) stalking me

It was just over a year ago when I first realised that Ben Whishaw was stalking me. And now it seems he's at it again. Walking up Charlotte Street to dinner with some friends and there he is sat outside an Italian restaurant.
He's tried to grow a beard to disguise himself but I knew it was him immediately.
He even lingered over his meal so that in the time it took us to order, eat and pay and retrace our steps he was still sat there as bold as brass slowly tucking into a fancy ice cream dessert.

Ben Whishaw: still stalking

I'm just hoping he doesn't throw anything at me this time when I see him in his play next week at the National.

There is life after the X Factor, ahem

There is life after the X Factor, ahem, originally uploaded by Rev Stan.