Theatre 2020 list

Uncle Vanya (pinter)* henry vi (globe)* The Visit (NT) Midsummer Night’s Dream* (Watermill @ Wiltons) Rough at the Theatre II / Endgame (Old Vic) Lehman Brothers* (NT) A Number (Bridge) Cyrano de Bergerac* (Playhouse) &Juliet* (Shaftesbury) —- This House (NT) Jane Eyre (NT) Amadeus** (NT) Twelfth Night** (NT) Drawing the Line (Hampstead) Wonderland (Hampstead) Wasted* (Southwark Playhouse) Romantics Anonymous (Bristol Old Vic) Les Blancs (NT) Small Island (NT) Alice in Wonderland (Royal ballet) The Madness of George III (Notts Playhouse) Henry V (Behind the Barn Door) Richard II** (Globe) Barber Shop Chronicles (NT) A Dolls House (Lyric Hammersmith) La Fille Mal Gardee (Royal Ballet) A Midsummer Night’s Dream** (Bridge) Woolf Works* (Royal Ballet) Jekyll and Hyde (Old Vic) Coppelia (Royal Ballet) The Metamorphosis (Arthur Pita) The mother (Arthur Pita) Flight Pattern* (Royal Ballet, Crystal Pite)

Okay, this is… well, it’s fucking 2020. Everything from mid-March was streaming. ** is stuff I’d seen in previous years but is still amazing

Best nine:

Uncle Vanya (Pinter) sad and hysterical and gorgeous and Richard armitage and fuck the fuck off, professor, seriously and we’ll get drunk and crawl into cupboards while the countryside collapses around us.

Henry VI (Globe) Everyone don the football shirts to differentiate ourselves (great trick when you’ve condensed it), everyone wear *fabulous* themed velvet and embroidered suits. Let the violence be untramelled and you idiots you let Richard off the leash… (girl next to me: ‘I don’t get shakespeare, I don’t know the War of the Roses, I got tix for the boyfriend, I may need help?’ By part two, she’s gone full glued to the action convert. mwhahaha.)

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Watermill @ Wilton’s) happy happy couples and Bottom and singing *happy sigh*.

Lehman Brothers (NTLive) oh my god.  the dynasty and the family and how theatre can make you believe *anything*, where Simon Russell Beale is a small girl and a patriarch with nothing more than a change in body language and Adam Godley is suddenly the sexiest, slinkiest flapper EVER and you’d swear that he was wearing a coat with a high fur collar and yes there is a tightrope in the middle of the stage, you can’t see it?

Cyrano de Bergerac (Playhouse).  James Mcavoy as a shaven headed glaswegian Cyrano on a blank stage and all the fights are rap battles? Roxanne’s statement of ‘I just love words.  That’s all.’ Christian *is* that pretty and falls for Cyrano while they’re away at war. Leave me alone, I need to absorb the awesome some more. &Juliet (Shaftesbury) so the Shakespeares re-write the end of R&J for a happy ending and Juliet fucks off to Paris with her mates and it’s all done to Britney and Pink and Christina and Backstreet Boys and the audience is screaming with laughter.  Result.

Wasted (Southwark Playhouse) The Brontes tell their story in a rock musical. Of course Emily is a full goth Kate Bush, don’t be silly.

Woolf Works (Royal Ballet) Three separate dance pieces choreo’d by Wayne Macgregor based on Mrs Dalloway, Orlando and the Waves.  Mrs Dalloway was the weakest but the other two – especially The Waves – are just stunning.

Flight Pattern (Royal Ballet, Crystal Pite) the refugee experience of trying to get across countries and sea is just stunning.  Like the best modern dance of conjuring people and waves out of nothing but ripples in the crowd.

‘Fuck off, keep fucking off, and fuck off again, you’re boring and tiresome and self-involved and why the fuck should I care about you?’ Award:

The Visit (NT) – Tony Kushner.  Billionaire visits home after leaving as a teen and takes revenge on town and ex. Just too. fucking. long.  Could have had at least two scenes cut.  Way too self indulgent.  couple of very funny bits (yay Lesley Manville) but it all blurs. Seriously, Tony, can you not learn from Caroline or Change?

Top Ten (ish) Theatre of 2019

Box of Delights (Wiltons)
Matilda (Cambridge)
Edward II (Globe)
Pirates of Penzance (wiltons)
Richard II (Globe)
Romeo and Juliet (Globe)
Macbeth (Watermill)
All my Sons (Old vic)
Swan Lake (Bourne)
Small Island (NT)
Death of a Salesman (Young Vic)
Emilia (Vaudeville)
A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Bridge)
As You Like It (Rain or Shine)
Merry Wives of Windsor (Globe)
Present Laughter (Old Vic)
Peter Gynt (NT) *endless screaming* *left at 2nd interval*
The End of History (Royal Court)
A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Bridge)
Henry IV part 1 (Globe)
Henry IV part 2 (Globe)
Henry V (Globe)
A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Regents Park)
A Midsummer Night’s Dream (globe)
As You Like It (globe)
Romeo and Juliet (Bourne)
Tree (Young Vic)
Dada Masilo’s Giselle (Sadler’s Wells)
Lungs (Old Vic)
The Antipodes (NT)
The Wind in the Willows (Rain or Shine)
Fairview (Young Vic)
Teenage Dick (Donmar)

Best… however many?  Which, er are 99% Shakespeare?

Richard II at the Globe was glorious and golden with a way of bringing out the words and just damn good acting. All female, all WoC, with an emphasis on them all wearing the clothes of their ancestors and changing depending on class of character.  And one of those endings of ‘fuuuuuck’ as the entire stage became the English flag as a banner of red fell from the ceiling in a bang.

Swan Lake (Bourne) – My happy place of swans and insecure princes falling in love with each other and gauche royal girlfriends who get more adorable with each production. Always cheer the corgi.

Small Island (NT) music and fabulous use of a giant stage to show off the tiny horrible minutiae of racism in England and dreams and love not being what you think and using people to get away.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Bridge) WE WILL BE GAY AND WE WILL DANCE TO BEYONCÉ AND BE BITCHY AND BE MORE GAY THAN YOU CAN POSSIBLY THINK. We’re going to swap Titania and Oberon so he can fall in love with Bottom but the problem is Bottom’s only really interested in a one night stand. And the lovers are very bisexual and Puck is bitchy and Mancunian and the fairies are on silks and Gwendolyn Christie will
be glorious and regal and the competition for the acting job will go full X-Factor while the previously tyrannical Theseus falls totally in love with theatre and the mechanicals’ll nick your phone and take a selfie and we’re going to cover the groundlings in a giant rainbow flag and send out a giant inflatable moon for us to bounce around while we dance to Beyoncé.

Present Laughter (Old Vic) Andrew Scott is being world weary, full-on channelling Noel Coward and going full drama queen. Indira Varma is here to deliver fabulous put-downs whilst wearing amazing outfits. We’ve also gone very bisexual. Bonus slutty tux wearing Enzo Cilenti.

Henry IV and V (Globe) all day Henries! By the time Henry V came round the groundlings and actors had gone a wee bit loopy so they and we were giggling at every other line in the prologue. Henry IVs – Falstaff! Falstaff that nicked anyone within reach’s beer and cider (and yes, was drinking it!). Changing clothes onstage so you had some beautiful, strangely affecting moments where Henry IV changed into or out of Doll Tearsheet – a speech would become Henry psyching himself up as he removed his makeup, with scenes overlapping. All the genderblind, Sarah Amankwah as Harry not as psycho as some Harrys (looking at you, Jude Law) and not as inspiring as others (of course I’m bloody talking about Jamie Parker) but resolute and forthright and driven. Henry V was not quite as impressive in my memory but I did get bonus handful of chewed up leek.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Globe) – all carnival, all fun. Half the reason Demetrius dumped Helena is because she’s so aggressive – he’s actually scared of her. Lysander croons soul music constantly. Oberon’s an old queen and Bottom truly loves herself, and we totally understand why Quince desperately wants to throttle her. Totally justified. This production goes full audience participation, getting a member of the audience to play one of the rude mechanicals along with the usual Globe party and groundlings. This production has the unique selling point that *everyone* is Puck – all the cast plays them at some point in a t-shirt with ‘Puck’ spray-painted on it and a pair of deely boppers – with them often only doing half a scene and another taking over. Which came to its awesome fruition of them all blowdarting the others to get to do the next line of Puck’s final speech. (blowdarts established as Oberon’s way of sending people to sleep) Plus Hippolyta runs off with Bottom.

As You Like It (Globe) Return of last year’s production, complete with genderswapped and genderqueer Orlando (Bettrys Jones) and Rosalind (Jack Laskey) and deaf Celia (Nadia Nadarajah) and Jacques (Sophie Stone), more genderblind casting for the others, more genderqueer, more signing, the Duke’s now at least partially deaf and hiding it, and James Garnon’s playing Touchstone and I may possibly be in seventh heaven. He signs almost constantly out of reflex from years of being around Celia, and will get into gesture fights with bearded members of the audience in the gallery, as well as being really quite possessive and attached to Audrey after a while. With added bonus of military helicopters going over just as Celia and Rosalind are discussing how the court’s getting more hostile and Rosalind gesturing ‘see?’. Sophie Stone as Jacques is possibly the most sad (and mournful) Jacques I’ve seen, her deafness closing her off from society and being hurt by it as the court hurt her carelessly with thoughtlessness (she only signs when she knows someone)

Teenage Dick (Donmar) I was really regretting booking this. Richard III rewritten for American high school where Richard is running for school council? US High School politics and world has been done to death, for fucks sake, and it’s so screwed up and alien it’s ridiculous. However. This is hysterical, Richard weaponises his disability (hemoplegia in this case), it’s constrated with Buck’s experience of being in a wheelchair where she’s quite happy with her lot – pointing out the difference in lived experiences – Susie Wokoma as the teacher who’s desperate not to give offence but constantly putting her foot in it. Anne’s role is greatly expanded and she’s given her own story and wants separate from politics, with a quite brilliant dance sequence with Richard. Biggest bonus points, however, are how Richard has a habit of dropping into Shakespearean and everyone thinks he’s a weirdo for it. Speeches to the audience? Buck: ‘He’s gone again.’

‘Fuck off, keep fucking off, and fuck off again, you’re boring and tiresome and self-involved and why the fuck should I care about you?’ Award:

Peter Gynt (NT) reworked Peer Gynt. Oh god it’s Ibsen. Why did I book this. WHY. Peer Gynt is now Scots, makes up stories that all come from old films, everyone knows it. there’s random musical scenes that Do. Not. Work. The trolls are full on Bullingdon Club in pig masks, WE GET IT, the love interest he left behind wants more than this provincial life, random shagging, and second act he gets rich, goes full Trump, there’s rich people conferences in the desert and fake cults and OH DO FUCK OFF YOU’RE TIRED AND HEAVYHANDED AND NONE OF THIS IS INSIGHTFUL. This gets the award of only the second play I’ve left at the second interval.

 

 

Top Ten (ish) theatre of 2018

In reverse date order :

The Convert (Young Vic)

Dr Jekyll and Ms Hyde (Rain or Shine)
hadestown (NT)
wise children (Old Vic)
measure for measure (donmar)
a very very very dark matter (Bridge)
twelfth night (young vic)
antony and cleopatra (NT)
twelfth night (Wiltons/ Watermill)
Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo (Peacock)
Sylvia (Old Vic)
othello (globe)
Dance Nation (Almeida)
Fun Home (Young Vic)
much ado about nothing (abbey ruins)
winter’s tale (globe)
much ado (rain or shine)
machinal (Almeida)
a midsummer nights dream (watermill)
two noble kinsmen (globe)
translations (NT)
as you like it (globe)
cinderella (bourne)
the way of the world (donmar)
absolute hell (NT)
the writer (Almeida)
strictly ballroom (Piccadilly)
the inheritance (Young Vic)
caroline or change (Hampstead)
much ado (globe)
book of mormon (Prince of Wales)
gundog (Royal Court)
the york realist (Donmar)
hamilton (Victoria Palace)
dry powder (Hampstead)
the brothers size (Young Vic)
julius caesar (bridge)

Top Eleven (in no particular order)

Twelfth Night (Young Vic) – relocate the action to Notting Hill during carnival, replace some of the text with songs, add dancing, add the cross gartering being jogging lycra and Malvolio on a segway and doing full broadway tap, and …uh… I may have seen this twice.

Twelfth Night (Watermill / Wiltons Music Hall) *rubs hands* right, we’re going to set this in a 1920s speakeasy, transfer it to a shabby victorian music hall, the cast are all actor-musicians (it’s a watermill thing), do a whole bunch of modern songs in Postmodern Jukebox style, (Lourde’s Royals is the most *perfect* Malvolio song), Sir Toby Belch is female, Orsino is tone deaf, and Malvolio finds himself by dressing in  stockings, suspenders, satin knickers, a waist cincher, smeared makeup and a metric tonne of body glitter.  QUESTIONS?

Sylvia (Old Vic) – not finished musical of the Pankhursts. (due to cast illness, the second act was still very creaky and they had the entire run as in preview)  Literally a raised fist for female empowerment, suffrage, rights, family rifts due to differing ideals, and a resounding ‘fuck you’ to Winston Churchill and the establishment. (especially from his mother and wife)  Alongside the amazingness of Beverly Knight as Emmeline Pankhurst was the tininess of the entire audience doing an indrawn breath on ‘Oh, hi, Emily’.

Fun Home (Young Vic) When there’s audible sobbing at least twice during the musical and then the bar is full of people crying on each other afterwards, that is a damn good job of hitting the audience where it hurts with your tale of growing up in a funeral home and discovering your sexuality.  We’re not even mentioning the set.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Watermill) Cast of actor-musicians?  check. the fairies are mostly dressed as shabby magicians?  check. Titania is glorious? check.  Bottom is female, turns male as a donkey, and is one of the most gifted physical comedians ever and could gurn for England? check and *mate*.

As You Like It (Globe) Half the cast is genderswapped, Celia is deaf and signing and bringing the house down, Touchstone is completely deadpan and tormenting the entire audience because it’s fucking Pearce Quigley finding new jokes you could only do in the Globe and James Garnon is playing Phoebe and has *not* overdone the blusher, thankyou.

The Writer (Almeida) – we’re going to go entirely meta, we’re going to rage against sexism in theatre and writing and direction and life and we’re going to ask what the hell a baby is doing onstage.  And every. single. woman in the audience will hiss.

Strictly Ballroom (Piccadiily) Take the film.  Add MORE dancing and neon and lycra and ruffles and sequins and then add Will Young as an Emcee doing most of the singing and at one point put him on rollerskates for the hell of it.

Caroline or Change (Hampstead) Sharon D Clarke, we are not worthy.   (also we’re going to give extra chocolate to the costume designer)

The York Realist (Donmar) – How to break your heart with the tale of a yorkshire farmer who gets cast in the Passion Plays and meets a young director up from London.  No sexuality issues, just utterly lovely and family and life getting in the way.

Hamilton (Victoria Palace) – everything you’ve heard is true.  Jaw droppingly amazing, deserves every possible plaudit and the london cast is brilliant.  And there’s nothing like a london audience laughing contemptuously at King George III doing a Boris Johnson.

WORST

Absolute Hell (NT) The characters may bloody be trapped in purgatory of not going anywhere, the audience doesn’t have to be.  First play I ever walked out of.

Measure for Measure, Donmar Warehouse

Thoughts about the Donmar’s cut then swapping time periods and sexes Measure for Measure starring Hayley Atwell and Jack Lowden as Isabella and Angelo, aka sexual harassment by those in power the play.

It was very, very interesting in what it had to say and how stuff had changed and how it’s seen when you change who’s in power. And interestingly, perception of faith.

First off, the 1604-set bit was so far, so shuddery – watching Angelo physically intimidate Isabella just by standing too close, then touching while she visibly shut down and shook was horrible. And then everyone discount her and shut her up at the trial, especially after the duke in disguise had told her she would be taken seriously. And then Mariana, so desperate and broken (they actually interrupt her in a moment of trying to self-harm) trying to support her at the trial (showing pointedly how much the her and Isabella support each other at the trial and before and get strength from each other), and clearly
grabbing onto the strands when the Duke orders her and Angelo’s marriage and then deeply, utterly unhappy when she comes back. Still haunted and so traumatised and knowing that this will only fix the surface problems like respectability. And then the bit where the Duke casually says ‘oh, by the way, you’re marrying me’ to Isabella isn’t reacted to at all by anyone but Isabella, who goes utterly still. Because what she wanted for her life doesn;t matter. At all. So when she’s left alone with him after everyone else departs the stage, her scream of rage in his face as response is catharsis and response.

Fast forward to current day, Isabel is the politician and Angelo’s a recovering addict. This one is funnier. More pointed bits using phones. (which sometimes doesn’t work too well in updated Shakespeare, but worked really well here, including Isabella’s ringtone song being a trigger for Frederick (modern Mariana)) At the same time, Isabel’s colleagues are constantly questioning her where they’d only do slightly unhappy looks at Angelo’s puritanism, which shows how effective different readings of the exact same line can work. Isabel’s enforcing of the already existing law comes across as proving herself and actually making sure this is getting enforced as it should be whereas Angelo came off as puritanical unflinching dogma. Isabel talking to herself about lust came off as a bit girly and then her predatory nature in the second encounter was just as skin-crawling, only she was groping him – they made the harassment far more physical in the current day. With the wincing different reasons for why someone wouldn’t believe him as opposed to why no-one would have believed Isabella of 1604, using her gender against him in the way Angelo of 1604 used his patriarchal power against Isabella. Horrible and I think the problem here is… so very rare and more likely to be seen in a fictional context as opposed to the 1604 man in power case being all too common. I think that’s the main problem with it. What she’s doing is awful but comes across as more invented when they’re gaining our sympathy with her being undermined professionally but at the same time showing she’s an awful person. (and fortunately not trying to excuse her behaviour) Add that to the sex tape getting played at the trial which would never happen to undermine a man. Interestingly, Isabel actually recovers from that better – she goes full teflon and while the forced marriage undermines her agency it’s clear that she’s chucking him in all of five seconds.

Right. Other bits. Claudio. His position actually changed the most. 1604, he’s afraid. This is very real and depressing and he knows that sleeping with Juliet was wrong in the eyes of society so retribution was always a possibility. When he gets the sudden sentence of death in the current day it’s a massive shock. He’d been joking around with the lawyers prior to that because sleeping with your fiance is normal. And when Angelo comes to him in prison, asking him to sleep with Isabella is seen by Claudio as a ‘just fucking get it over with, I’m in real trouble, what’s the problem?’ situation – ie, a man would do it for his brother, where Angelo’s revulsion is very much the lesser evil, and brushing aside the harassment and wrongness. Claudio’s being wilfully blind because he sees it as the lesser evil to get through with gritted teeth, any man would do it, why can’t you?. Unlike the 1604 Claudio who knows that what he’s asking his sister the novitiate to do is deeply
wrong – spiritually, morally, everything. Her vow of chastity is far more important than him asking her to break it for a wrong he did, even if it might mean his death, because that would condemn them in the eyes of heaven. Which then comes back and reflects on his dealing with the Duke in disguise as a visiting friar. 1604, blessings and sermons for the condemned are a very powerful and welcome thing. It’s important work. It’s a powerful scene, the Duke with his hand on the head of the kneeling Claudio. Current day, the guard is rolling his eyes at this do-gooder who won’t have any effect and it’s imposed, not wanted. Claudio’s sitting in a chair across from him, arms crossed and rolling his eyes at this idiot he didn’t ask for, nervously preaching this airy fairy sermon at him when he’s got better shot to be worrying about. Some man of the cloth showing up no matter how well-meaning is going to be brushed aside. No authority whatsoever.

And now let’s talk about the Duke. Aka ‘Fuck you and the horse you rode in on, you are the WORST.’ In 1604, he takes a break, decides to use it to spy on his deputy, is a bit in denial about just how bad he was at ruling (see when Lucio makes comments and he gets sniffy), then gets off on playing power games, then out of nowhere decides that just
because he’s got a bit of a crush on Isabella, it’s totally okay to order her to marry him after messing with her head and making her think her brother was executed. Never mind that she thought he was her confessor to be trusted, and marrying Angelo and Mariana off would fix Mariana’s problems. Or running roughshod over what she wanted and had been preparing to do, which was take her vows and become a nun. And that she hadn’t shown one slightest bit of interest in him. I really do see him getting stabbed in the night. Even if she didn’t just run off to the nunnery anyway.

Present day Duke. JFC. I think the best word to sum him up is ‘weak’. He’s got absolutely no authority, hides from his problems even when not in disguise, tries to make excuses for not doing things constantly, going to visit Claudio is just a power trip that rightly comes off as weak sermonising at someone who has absolutely no interest in it (really, the prison guard and Claudio have the best read of him of anyone in the play) and then when he’s literally counselling a troubled Angelo over what he can do re: trying to save his brother, starts kissing him, and when Angelo pushes him away with a rightfully shocked and disgusted expression, just pouts and acts like he’s the one who’s been hurt.
Never mind that it was him who took advantage of the situation and started molesting someone who he was supposed to be helping. Fast forward to the ego games of the court later, when he’s completely failing to take any responsibility, especially when Claudio’s clearly physically fucked up from being in solitary. And then he says he’s going to marry Angelo and tries to kiss him again. Never mind that he’d already made completely unwelcome advances. Angelo shoves him off and goes to Claudio, Claudio collapsing into his lap and shaking, and it’s suddenly really clear how deep their relationship actually is. And the Duke’s just standing there with a bemused expression. Just as bad a predator as Angelo/Isabel his deputy. The stage goes black and 1604 Isabella appears again, to scream in rage in his face. Because that predatory bastard needs calling to account.

The Winter’s Tale, Shakespeare’s Globe

It’s never not going to be funny seeing something described as a ‘winter’s tale’ in the blazing sunshine. (three people next to us had to leave due to the heat) Previous productions I’ve seen have fully embraced the concept in the first act, from furs to Christmas trees, setting up for the quickly oncoming atmosphere of a chilly and austere Sicilia. Here, however, the court of Sicilia is outfitted in a creeping-towards-Turkish Mediterranean style which certainly segued with the heat, while Bohemia plumped for modern European.

This Sicilia was not austere nor chilly; at the beginning it was jovial and the marriage of Leontes and Hermione happy. However, even within this Will Keen as Leontes showed an anxiety and twitchiness in how fast he spoke and the jittering of his hands that eventually descends into the full-blown paranoia that fracture his marriage and court as he becomes consumed by it. In many ways, this first act was marked by the righteous anger of women; Hermione’s disbelief and anger at her accusation and treatment, Priyanga Burford alternating between trying to keep distress at bay when with her son and disbelieving anger at being falsely accused. Then came Sirine Saba as Paulina, a performance of such towering rage that you were in danger of being scorched by her eyes. It’s a tribute to Will Keen that he managed to give the impression that he’d been so consumed by his paranoia that not even this could affect him as all around shrank from it. As ever, part of the Globe experience is how much the audience gets caught up by the play and the society onstage; when Leontes tears up the Oracle’s edict, they gasped in shock and disbelief that he would discard something of such import.

The second half was sunbaked and scatty and joyous, everyone kitted out for Glastonbury or Reading festival and Becci Gemmell’s Autolycus charmed and bamboozled the audience and shepherds as she conned her way through life, pleasingly genderfluid as she gleefully flitted from one role to another. The young lovers were sweet and caught up in the flush of young love, with this Florizel less cynical and calculating than usual, where his love for Perdita is more an act of defiance towards his father than a diversion. Annette Badland, in her first appearance at the Globe, deserves special mention as Perdita’s adoptive parent. Although she hadn’t quite managed the projection required for the Globe, she proved her comedic talents effortlessly. Possibly the only disappointment of the show was the bear; here a banner that collapsed with a bang which completely dispensed with any sign of a physical threat that even the shabbiest bear suit conveys.

Writers: DON’T DO THIS

okay, reading a deeply awesome Ancient Rome-set gladiator school book. Great characterisation, interesting plot, good side characters, made the story flow properly without making it seem like you’ve dumped all the research on the readers heads…

EXCEPT.

whenever the writer mentioned the gladiator training school, they used ‘ludus’ instead of ‘training school’, and when it came to clothing, ‘subligar’ instead of ‘loincloth’.

*headdesk*

It literally brought me up with a jolt every time.

SERIOUSLY.  Don’t use words there’s a translation for when everyone’s speaking the same language.  A specific type of boat?  I see your trireme in the bay, it looks very menacing.  A specific weapon? Just don’t wave that trident near me. Type of wine? Pass the Falernian.  Just… not everyday items.  It just makes you look like you want to show that you did research when we can see you did your research already. A subligar’s not a bloody toga.  Everyone knows what a toga is, we literally don’t have any other word for ‘giant piece of cloth that you drape and wind around your entire body’.  But we do have a word for a loincloth.

I looked up ludus after finishing the book to confirm it meant what I thought it did.  I’d figured it out by context, but why didn’t you just use ‘training school’?  And worse sin by editor: ‘subligar’ and ‘ludus’ were italicised.  To draw even more attention to it.  You weren’t using ’panem’ every time you mentioned them eating bread.

Costuming peeves

Just realised this one really was doing my head in.

It’s the semi- post apocalyptic event films and tv series, the ones where a hundred or so years have passed.  Enough for a few generations and stories about the old world.  The cities/towns were destroyed, or maybe they had to flee, or they’re in space.  Whatever.

And they’re still wearing current clothing.

That clothing is normally a bit battered, washed out and a tiny bit threadbare. Maybe a couple of holes. There’s no darning or patching, no-one’s wearing those hand-knit gapey sweaters you see in a lot of post apocalyptic stuff or even the mad max/waterworld futures where nearly everyone’s in leather and bits of handmade chainmail.

Excuse me while I reach through the screen and yell at the person responsible for costuming.  it won’t take a minute.  Okay.  maybe a few.

Clothing does not survive that long.  Especially the store-bought stuff of now.  Cotton and linen and wool and silk *rots*.  Most importantly, if everyone’s only got a few changes of clothing, it’s going to wear out. Anything polyester will wear out even faster than the natural fibre stuff. Much faster than it will now, when you’ve got several changes of clothing and you’re not doing much manual labour that would produce extra wear and tear.

The clothing of the 1910s that still exists has been carefully stored.  it’s not been worn every day by a population that needed every scrap of clothing it could get its hands on, which got darned and patched until it got cut up for rags, which is what happened to 99% of the clothing from that era and beyond.

And the stuff of the last few decades isn’t of half the quality.  The material isn’t as sturdy.

So yes, costuming, I am glaring at you.  Give me hand-knit sweaters, dammit.

Minimalism as supposedly faux asceticism

https://t.co/NqSIIoGu8Z This post has an interesting takedown of minimalism as a rich people thing that’s cast as faux-spiritualist asceticism. Except that’s what asceticism always WAS. Rich people casting aside possessions to show how spiritual they were.

Ever notice how in tales of saints and monks (we’re including Buddha here) etc it was always the PRINCES and NOBLES and RICH PEOPLE who threw away their worldly possessions to go live in a cave/large jar and got points for it? Poor people who had nothing to start with never claimed they were extra holy for staying poor when they joined monasteries or fucked off to become a hermit. (re: monasteries – it wasn’t uncommon at one point to give your extra-mouth-to-feed son to the monastery because that was he a) wasn’t a burden on the family b) got a guarantee of a roof over their head and food)

to quote… Pratchett, maybe? If you look at the the prince who goes off to be a no-possessions ascetic, it’s amazing how they never seem to be found dead from starvation because they’ve got no money for food or shelter, like those piles of poor people who freeze to death in winter.
So, yeah. Minimalism-as-lifestyle with added spiritual claims isn’t *faux* asceticism, it’s just *modern* asceticism.

Nowt wrong with minimalism, or not wanting clutter, or getting rid of/selling stuff you don’t need or no longer works. Just try not to act superior about it. See the Sam Vimes boots theory of economics.

Top Ten (ish) theatre of 2017

Saint Joan (Donmar)
Platinum (Hampstead)
Kinky Boots (Adelphi)
The White Devil (Globe)
Sex With Strangers (Hampstead)
The Play That Goes Wrong (Duchess)
Twelfth Night (NT)
The Taming of the Shrew (Globe)
Twelfth Night (Merely Theatre)
Love in Idleness (Menier)
Othello (Globe)
The Red Shoes (Bourne)
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (Old Vic)
The Treatment (Almeida)
Romeo and Juliet (Globe)
Salome (NT)
Romeo and Juliet (Union Theatre)
Madame Rubinstein (Park)
Woyzeck (Old Vic)
Twelfth Night (Globe)
Common (NT)
Twelfth Night (Rain or Shine)
Gloria (Hampstead)
Life of Galileo (Young Vic)
Ink (Almeida)
Tristan and Yseult (Globe)
The Ferryman (Gielgud)
Certain Young Men (NT)
Wind in the Willows (Progress)
Yank! (Charing Cross)
Against (Almeida)
Much Ado About Nothing (Globe)
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Apollo)
Wings (Young Vic)
Boudica (Globe)
Young Frankenstein (Garrick)
Albion (Almeida)
St George and the Dragon (NT)
Young Marx (Bridge)
Oslo (Harold Pinter)
The Secret Theatre (Globe)
Dracula (Rain or Shine)

(It was kind of the year of Twelfth Night)

Anyway, in no particular order, the top 10 were:

The Red Shoes (Bourne) – gorgeous, lyrical, funny with some very nice period dance pieces and AMAZING set changes (the onstage proscenium arch swivelled to show backstage). It’s Matthew Bourne.
The Play That Goes Wrong (Duchess) – imagine an amateur theatre company, and then imagine every possible thing that could go wrong. And hurt yourself laughing.  Several times.
Twelfth Night (NT) – We are stylish.  You are peasants.  Everyone is gay or at least bisexual.  And of course the Elephant is a drag club, it’s Antonio’s local.
Boudica (Globe) – FIGHT.  Never fucking forget you’re a queen and that you will have bloody vengeance, and then fucking yell London Calling to the heavens.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern (Old Vic) – Daniel Radcliffe and Joshua Maguire are here to be confused at you, and the Player King is here to really confuse you.  Hamlet is here to drink cocktails in a deckchair on the boat to England.
Twelfth Night (Globe) – Fuck the text, we’re going to go to the 70s on a disco cruise ship, crash into a scottish island, and everyone is going to dance at all times, wear kilts and have terrible mullets.  Olivia’s going to be in her 40s and be seduced by Sebastian in one seriously sexy tango. Bring your inner diva.
Much Ado About Nothing (Globe) Mexican Revolution. Horseback done by puppetry and stillts.  Full. On. Beatrice and Benedick sniping.  A seriously menacing Don Pedro. ‘Nothing rhymes with senorita but…’ *audience* ‘Margarita!’ ‘Oh, not bad…’ And achieved the impossible by making Dogberry make sense for once by having him be an American film director who can’t speak the language.
Oslo (Harold Pinter) – documenting all the behind the scenes meetings of the Oslo accords, where they achieved the miracle of getting the Palestinians and Israelis to sit in a room and talk to each other.  unbelievably tense, utterly brilliant.
Tristan and Yseult (Globe) – Everyone needs love.  You may go back to being part of the Unloved. You also need to do it in a funny, impressionist dance and song way with lots of trailing red cloth.
Wings (Young Vic) – recovery from a stroke, from the point of view of an ex wing-walker rediscovering her sense of self, memories and ability to communicate.  And btw, Juliet Stevenson will do all this while mostly spinning on a trapeze above the audience.

The worst (avoid like the plague)

Common (NT) This was TURGID.  and DREARY.  And REPETITIVE. I actually wrote a blog post on how much I hated it.
Against (Almeida) – Elon Musk-alike decides to rediscover himself by going out and talking to people across America, do some really terrible journey of Jesus allusions, and say absolutely fucking nothing but does disappear up his own arsehole.  Only even vaguely watchable due to Ben Whishaw.

male gaze and sexualisation in film and tv

Horrible fact of our society: The male gaze and sexualisation of women on screen is so prevalent that you actually get the jolt of noticing when a film or tv show *doesn’t* do it.

Wonder Woman and Mad Max were… female bodies in motion, female bodies doing action and not once did the camera linger on tits or arse or legs.  The difference between how the Amazons were filmed during their action scenes and how Black Widow is filmed in Avengers is huge.  Look where the focus rests, where the centre of the frame is.  How it lingers or doesn’t.  Whether their hair is perfect, how far the zipper goes down.  Where the bruises are painted on by makeup.  Are they artfully placed to highlight bone structure?  How much muscle is shown?  Is it enough muscle to actually believably do the job or is it just enough to be ‘aesthetically pleasing’? (seriously.  Look at Scarlett Johansson, who by all accounts worked out like mad, and then look at the Amazons)

Then we go to the violent crime/horror shows.  We’ve got long experience of crime and horror focussing around dead and tortured bodies of young women and how the camera lingers on their naked and half-dressed corpses.  And then you get the weird, random ones like Hannibal, where they made the commitment that there would be no sexual violence.  Naked bodies in sick and twisted art formations but it wasn’t voyeuristic (you can always tell).  The Exorcist, rebooted as a tv show. (priests still battling to save a girl’s soul from a demon) In this case it’s a pretty blonde girl in her late teens, and we know how those get filmed in horror. Except… not.  Huh.  Camera always very careful not to show skin, or have her self-harming on camera, and when there was a female corpse on a gurney we got a foot and a shoulder and her jawline.  It’s vomit and bile and blood and tears and hair pulled out during the exorcism scenes and not once does it highlight her cheekbones, or have that tear in her shirt pulling to get a glimpse of her unmarred skin.

And you notice because it’s so different that it’s out of place in the glossy entertainment of Hollywood.