ONE each of disapponting and good theatre trips that bookended the working week. 'Private Lives' (Noel Coward) in a new production at Hampstead theatre on Monday - the only merit of the evening ended up being the venue itself. We'd not been there before but was hugely impressed by the building. The auditorium was almost a mini version of the fabulous new opear house in Copenhagen: lots of Scandinavian-style wood panels and good view/sound from every seat The cast and crew should be praised for their effort, which unfortunately was wasted on an underserving play. Coward's best moments, for me, are the farcical scenes involving multiple characters (I'm especially thinking of some of the most hilarious moments from Present Laughter) - which are the few truly funny moments in this play about an ex-couple bumping into each other on their respective (collective?) honeymoon with their new spouses. His two-person exchanges, be they smouldering or fiery moments, are not effective in any way. Pity. On Friday the ferociously topical 'Roaring Trade' (Soho Theatre, about - you guessed - a bunch of traders at an investment bank) played to a roaring full house. It reminded me of the (equally popular) store-floor-set production of Oxford Street we saw at Royal Court Upstairs last year, in that neither tried to be didactic about any grand theme or profound theme, but instead depicted a specific corner of life with totally convincing vitality from everyone involved.
TWO Japanese films at Barbican's 'After Tezuka' season, brilliantly curated by the resident expert Helen McCarthy. She's one of those people whose intrinsic enthusiasm for the object of her studies (which is an almost degrading term - Japanimation is clearly the air she breathes) is so totally infectious, her way of presenting the subject so succinct yet erudite, witty yet serious, that I would have happily gone along for the pre-screening talks alone. Of course the films themselves weren't half bad either: Dororo (which is actually a live action feature film) serves up all the best ingredients of a proper blockbuster, only with heaps more class and style than the regular Hollywood fare could ever dream of; Akira, being a 20-year-old manga animation, blends dizzying visual kaleidoscope, multi-layered narrative convolusion and metaphysical themes (Darwin, Nietsche, Foucault, Freud, you name it) all in one breath in such sweeping manner, that I stepped out of the dark screening room feeling physically drained.
THREE performers in the totally undefinable site-specific performance 'The Memory of W.T. Stead', in the most unexpected - and unpredictable - space that is the Steinway showrooms on Marylebone Lane. There were two hour-long performances each on three consecutive evenings, with seven invitees/audiences at each, for a specific reason. It's the sort of things that happen a lot more in downtown Manhattan (and probably far too much), but not nearly enough in London (which has both the venue possibilities and the potential audience to offer - someone smart will soon put two and two together, no doubt). We're seated in the eerily surreal ground-floor showroom, each between a pair of Steinways. They become performers already in this silence and semi darkness. Then someone appears, equipping us each with a pair of noise-cancelling headphones and all-concealing eyemasks. With the murmurred instructions, reminiscences, echoes and fantasies through the headphones (pre-recorded and live) we enter a mysterious world with our invisible guides. There's a sombre-looking piano tuner in the far corner of the room. Or is he there? How did he get there? Are we really in a perfectly real, perfectly tangible building moments away from the bustling Oxford Street, or have we somehow fallen into a (David) Lynchian world of intrigues? The performers (Swedish dance duo Lundahl & Seitl, British pianist Cassie Yukawa) explored every inch of the available space, both in the tuning workshops and in our consciousness, and made perfect judgement of the elasticity of their materials. We emerged out of the building, a bit stumbling in our steps trying to find our way towards the tube station. It would have been more reassurling to have the directions whispered to us through the headphones.
FOUR pianists heard in contrasting circumstances. On Tuesday, Cassie Yukawa's performance of Bach's Fugue in A minor (BWV 543, arranged by Liszt) was the deeply personal yet powerful climax of the performance installation 'The Memory of W.T.Stead' (see above) - all the more striking as she conjured the entire piece out of almost total darkness, literally. On Thursday, Simon Crawford Phillips and Philip Moore's piano duo recital at LSO St Lukes offered two 20th-century classics by two Russians who were both master composer-pianists themselves - Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances and Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. Knowing both well as iconic cornerstones of the orchestral repertoire of the last hundred years, hearing them in this version, side by side, was a revelation, with the shining winter sun as backdrop. On Saturday, Nikolai Demidenko gave an effortlessly exhilarating reading of Shostakovich's second piano concerto with Philharmonia Orchestra and Tugan Sokhiev. I felt all the more fortunate for having heard the rehearsal the previous afternoon in the intimacy of Henry Wood Hall - as the only 'audience' up in the gallery, I was washed over by the opening strings of the second movement, and then the piano solo, as played by this London-resident Russian, made me realise for the first time how Shostakovich did the impossible: the cross between Mozart and Rachmaninoff.
(No.) FIVE of Tchaikovsky's immortal symphonic output, with Philharmonia Orchestra under an increasingly impressive Tugan Sokhiev. One of those pieces that I know inside out (not least because I had to do a three-hour presentation about it during my academic days, now happily in the past) and frankly had got a bit sick of (reason: see previous brackets). And he gave such a fresh reading, including some remarkably daring but effective tempi and - all too rare in Tchaikovsky interpretations - meticulous precision, that it shed interesting new light on the piece for me. In a week when an older and (for now) much more famous Russian compatriot is giving a string of headlining concerts across town at the Barbican, with his own two home bands from London and St Petersburg, it pays real tribute to Sokhiev's star quality that his two Philharmonia concerts filled Festival Hall. Yes, the programms offered some big blockbuster items (second half of Saturday's concert was Rachmaninoff's Second Symphony), but London's audience wouldn't really be so generous with their ovation afterwards if the performances hadn't been so genuinely outstanding. I expect his star to rise much higher still in years to come. On top of everything else, he's so nice in person that it's impossible to envy his posession of youth, talent and good looks.
SIX more cultural events I'll have been to by this time next week. If you prefer to read about something else, let me know.
TWELVE: the number of times a certain friend told me he went to see 'Push' (the lauded collaboration last year between maverick British choreographer Russell Maliphant and iconic Parisian ballerina Silvie Guillem), because he liked it so much. And you thought I was a culture vulture of the mad kind?!
Saturday 31 January 2009
Sunday 25 January 2009
Adaptations - Part II
Donmar Warehouse presented Be Near Me - 'a stage version by Ian McDiarmid, from the novel by Andrew O'Hagan' - in a co-production with National Theatre of Scotland. It's the story of an Oxbridge-bred Catholic priest in his late fifties, who takes up a new post in a small Ayrshire town. His housekeeper, Mrs Poole, adores him and he in turn teaches her about the finer things in life from wine-tasting to French conversations. The community finds his quintessential, upper-middle-class, intellectual Englishness slightly alien but accepts him and his occasional eccentricity. He befriends a group of local youth in his charge and one fifteen-year-old boy, Mark, in particular. Grown up in a dysfunctional family and entrenched in bitterness and hostility (towards his parents, Muslims, and the world at large), Mark is gradually drawn in by Father Anderton's warmth and reciprocates the friendship by showing him around his secret drinking den (a delapidated pub) where they share a drink, smoke some pot and try to open up to each other. Inevitably, Mark ends up on Father Anderton's Persian rug one late night and the two of them are discovered lying hand in hand, by Mrs Poole who has lately been in a state of constant agitation because of her newly diagnosed cancer, and Father Anderton's nightmare of condemnation and - even worse - agonising process of soul-searching thus begin.
McDiarmid apparently loved the book so much that he decided to adapt it himself. The result is a true showcase for the veteran actor (his two London roles last year, in John Gabriel Borkman, also at the Donmar; and Six Characters in Search of an Author at Gielgud, couldn't have been more different but both encapsulated the essence of good acting perfectly), but it also provided ample platform for ensemble acting with breadth and depth, which I would argue was even more moving and gratifying. McDiarmid is undoutedly a consummate actor capable of running the whole emotional gamut within the space of one sentence, and my favourite moments of the play include Father Anderton's clumsy and desperate attempts to decipher text messages on what is evidently a newly acquired mobile phone, where no a single word is uttered but you can read the impending despair in the way he holds the device and stares at - into - it. Some might feel though that at times the tour-de-force performance (which is truly what it is) becomes too mannered, and we're made to feel as uncomfortable at the way he becries moral hypocrisy (those of others as well as his own) as the villagers are at his intellectual foreignness.
In comparison, the ensemble depicting the villagers, are compelling in different ways. Blythe Duff's Mrs Poole, whose transformation from the chirpiness and wittiness at the beginning of the play to her cancer-ridden, tortured and diminished self to her empassioned and dignified defence of her former employer in the extensive court scene in Act Two, is the most memorable. The two youngsters, Mark the 'victim' (Richard Madden) and his on-and-off, unruly girlfriend Lisa (Helen Mallon), convey their precocious lack of morality through every movement of teenage confusion effortlessly.
The production, directed by John Tiffany, starts with a stage all bare except for six chairs and a long table. The chairs are soon pulled downstage to the back of the wall where the actors who are not involved in the current scene sit, mostly expressionless and occasionally taking part in a startling manner (an almost mechanical, all-sat-down Ceilidh dance became more poignant by the minute). Father Anderton's gradual downfall and self-redemption are told through tableaux, each accompanied by the minimum props but to maximum effect (this has become a noble Donmar tradition, surely). The use of clever sound effects (the echos on the beach) and video (the teenagers giving evidence in court) are perceived as an organic part of the narrative rather than intrusive technical accessories. The folk songs - which I usually find arbritrary and gratuitous in such plays - are sung beautifully by the ensemble who almost metamorphoses into a Greek chorus. The excerpts and discussions of classical music always feel appropriate, including my first experience of hearing a five-minute discussion of a living composer on London stage.
In terms of the plot, everything that Father Anderton goes through, and the reaction of others to it, is quite predictable. In that sense there's no great dramatic arch here, but a journey that's almost too smooth. But to begrudge that would not do such a poetically realised production justice, and the notion that human nobility can transcend moral sins is rarely presented in a contemporary story so convincingly. Having grown up in a culture and society with little resemblance to the vast majority of materials presented in London's theatres, I always take note of evenings where those universal elements of humanity reach out to me from the stage despite a storyline which I have no personal connection with, and this was one of them.
McDiarmid apparently loved the book so much that he decided to adapt it himself. The result is a true showcase for the veteran actor (his two London roles last year, in John Gabriel Borkman, also at the Donmar; and Six Characters in Search of an Author at Gielgud, couldn't have been more different but both encapsulated the essence of good acting perfectly), but it also provided ample platform for ensemble acting with breadth and depth, which I would argue was even more moving and gratifying. McDiarmid is undoutedly a consummate actor capable of running the whole emotional gamut within the space of one sentence, and my favourite moments of the play include Father Anderton's clumsy and desperate attempts to decipher text messages on what is evidently a newly acquired mobile phone, where no a single word is uttered but you can read the impending despair in the way he holds the device and stares at - into - it. Some might feel though that at times the tour-de-force performance (which is truly what it is) becomes too mannered, and we're made to feel as uncomfortable at the way he becries moral hypocrisy (those of others as well as his own) as the villagers are at his intellectual foreignness.
In comparison, the ensemble depicting the villagers, are compelling in different ways. Blythe Duff's Mrs Poole, whose transformation from the chirpiness and wittiness at the beginning of the play to her cancer-ridden, tortured and diminished self to her empassioned and dignified defence of her former employer in the extensive court scene in Act Two, is the most memorable. The two youngsters, Mark the 'victim' (Richard Madden) and his on-and-off, unruly girlfriend Lisa (Helen Mallon), convey their precocious lack of morality through every movement of teenage confusion effortlessly.
The production, directed by John Tiffany, starts with a stage all bare except for six chairs and a long table. The chairs are soon pulled downstage to the back of the wall where the actors who are not involved in the current scene sit, mostly expressionless and occasionally taking part in a startling manner (an almost mechanical, all-sat-down Ceilidh dance became more poignant by the minute). Father Anderton's gradual downfall and self-redemption are told through tableaux, each accompanied by the minimum props but to maximum effect (this has become a noble Donmar tradition, surely). The use of clever sound effects (the echos on the beach) and video (the teenagers giving evidence in court) are perceived as an organic part of the narrative rather than intrusive technical accessories. The folk songs - which I usually find arbritrary and gratuitous in such plays - are sung beautifully by the ensemble who almost metamorphoses into a Greek chorus. The excerpts and discussions of classical music always feel appropriate, including my first experience of hearing a five-minute discussion of a living composer on London stage.
In terms of the plot, everything that Father Anderton goes through, and the reaction of others to it, is quite predictable. In that sense there's no great dramatic arch here, but a journey that's almost too smooth. But to begrudge that would not do such a poetically realised production justice, and the notion that human nobility can transcend moral sins is rarely presented in a contemporary story so convincingly. Having grown up in a culture and society with little resemblance to the vast majority of materials presented in London's theatres, I always take note of evenings where those universal elements of humanity reach out to me from the stage despite a storyline which I have no personal connection with, and this was one of them.
Adaptations - Part I
Adaptations are tricky matters, especially if your source material is regarded as part of the canon. Yet, I suspect, that's precisely the reason why some writers/directors are drawn to face down this uniquely formidable challenge time and again, with varying results. Katie Mitchell's take on Strindberg's A Dream Play, at the National a few years ago, was thoroughly spellbinding. It pushed the text to the edge of possibilities while a new, powerful narrative emerges from within. Her next two productions for the National, Iphegenia at Aulis and The Seagull, were almost identical in many approaches - the bleak stage set; the suffocating lighting design; the droning soundscape; the singularly nihilisic undertone with which every actor in the cast seemed to deliver every line, whatever the circumstance - while neither managed to convince (The Seagull, in particular, was almost disastrous in my view. Most characters ended up being caticatures of what Chekov intended them to be - well, if that had been Mitchell's artistic agenda, then she certainly succeeded).
Having seen two new adaptations in their previews this week (both open in the next few days), I thought I'd make an attempt at writing a review of both here.
Mrs Affleck, at the National (Cottesloe), is a modern take on Ibsen's Little Eyolf, by the young British writer Samuel Adamson, whose previous works include the original play Southwark Fair (which we enjoyed very much) and an adaptation of Ibsen's Pillars of the Community (which we sadly missed, but it received almost unanimous acclaim). I suppose the success of the latter paved the way naturally for this new venture, directed here by Marianne Elliott (whose recent work at the National included War Horse, Saint Joan and the aforementioned Pillars). Little Eyolf, being one of Ibsen's lesser-known works, features similar themes as those of his masterpieces such as Rosmersholm and John Gabriel Borkman: the ambigious and conflicting aspects of familial love, the inate battle of responsibility and desire, the inevitability of past sins - especially those of former generations - catching up with the present and the future.
Adamson is undoubtedly an intelligent writer who wanted to add even more layers to the original story by transferring the actions to 1950s England. Unfortunately, the extra devices he brought into the story in this regard seemed clumsy and superfluous. The Rat Wife in the original story, the mysterious figrue (think a quasi-malicious, female Pied Piper) who might or might not have been responsible for the boy's untimely death, is here replaced by a teenage punk, Flea (was this a deliberate anachronism - I thought they didn't materialise until the sixties?). His appearance in the first act, which ought to be suspenseful (if you read the Ibsen original, this material has potential for a truly creepy moment) is marred by the incongruous combination of metaphysical babble and street slang, and his return in the second half, in the middle of the Afflecks' grief for their now-drowned Ollie (the Adamson incarcation of Little Eyolf), amounts to more exasbating annoyance than anything more illuminating. There's also a second boy, George, who bears witness both to Ollie's ongoing unhappiness and his actual death scene. The fact that he's Carribean is cause for a whole scene in Act II, an emotional confrontation between his usually mild-mannered mother and Mrs Affleck who blurts out a viciously racial remark. Does it add anything meaningful to the emotional core of the story, except as a validation of the new historic/social context here? Not for me.
The heart of Ibsen's story is the intrinsic, moral battle of a man between the life he wants (the almost incestuous passion he's harnoured for his half sister al his life) and the one he's created (the wife whose wealth and beauty he couldn't resist, the child whose disability he may have played a part in causing, the books that he's no longer able to write). There's enough gripping dramatic depth to be explored here without the other distractions. The author and director should have also trusted the transferrability of the material (1880s Norway is a blissfully abstract enough setting) not to need the additional flag-ups. One further qualm about the plot revision is the fact that Audrey, Affleck's half-sister (Naomi Frederick, in a show-stealing performance) discovers the dark family secret - that the two of them are actually not related, thanks to her mother's promiscuity - during the action, rather than before the play begins. The original scenario would create more suspense and nuanced tension during a large part of the play until the secret is revealed, where as here, the discovery results in a moment of impulsive passion in the rain. Not all the newly added elements are problematic, however: the scene where Ollie reappears on the beach, in Audrey's imagination, playing with sand, is a beautfiul trance that we are all willing to be part of.
Finally, It's a shame that Claire Skinner's Rita Affleck is a mostly one-dimensional performance, whether she's conveying jealousy, guilt, hatred, helplessness or despair, whereas Ibsen's RIta Eyolf probably embodied all of these at the same time.
Having seen two new adaptations in their previews this week (both open in the next few days), I thought I'd make an attempt at writing a review of both here.
Mrs Affleck, at the National (Cottesloe), is a modern take on Ibsen's Little Eyolf, by the young British writer Samuel Adamson, whose previous works include the original play Southwark Fair (which we enjoyed very much) and an adaptation of Ibsen's Pillars of the Community (which we sadly missed, but it received almost unanimous acclaim). I suppose the success of the latter paved the way naturally for this new venture, directed here by Marianne Elliott (whose recent work at the National included War Horse, Saint Joan and the aforementioned Pillars). Little Eyolf, being one of Ibsen's lesser-known works, features similar themes as those of his masterpieces such as Rosmersholm and John Gabriel Borkman: the ambigious and conflicting aspects of familial love, the inate battle of responsibility and desire, the inevitability of past sins - especially those of former generations - catching up with the present and the future.
Adamson is undoubtedly an intelligent writer who wanted to add even more layers to the original story by transferring the actions to 1950s England. Unfortunately, the extra devices he brought into the story in this regard seemed clumsy and superfluous. The Rat Wife in the original story, the mysterious figrue (think a quasi-malicious, female Pied Piper) who might or might not have been responsible for the boy's untimely death, is here replaced by a teenage punk, Flea (was this a deliberate anachronism - I thought they didn't materialise until the sixties?). His appearance in the first act, which ought to be suspenseful (if you read the Ibsen original, this material has potential for a truly creepy moment) is marred by the incongruous combination of metaphysical babble and street slang, and his return in the second half, in the middle of the Afflecks' grief for their now-drowned Ollie (the Adamson incarcation of Little Eyolf), amounts to more exasbating annoyance than anything more illuminating. There's also a second boy, George, who bears witness both to Ollie's ongoing unhappiness and his actual death scene. The fact that he's Carribean is cause for a whole scene in Act II, an emotional confrontation between his usually mild-mannered mother and Mrs Affleck who blurts out a viciously racial remark. Does it add anything meaningful to the emotional core of the story, except as a validation of the new historic/social context here? Not for me.
The heart of Ibsen's story is the intrinsic, moral battle of a man between the life he wants (the almost incestuous passion he's harnoured for his half sister al his life) and the one he's created (the wife whose wealth and beauty he couldn't resist, the child whose disability he may have played a part in causing, the books that he's no longer able to write). There's enough gripping dramatic depth to be explored here without the other distractions. The author and director should have also trusted the transferrability of the material (1880s Norway is a blissfully abstract enough setting) not to need the additional flag-ups. One further qualm about the plot revision is the fact that Audrey, Affleck's half-sister (Naomi Frederick, in a show-stealing performance) discovers the dark family secret - that the two of them are actually not related, thanks to her mother's promiscuity - during the action, rather than before the play begins. The original scenario would create more suspense and nuanced tension during a large part of the play until the secret is revealed, where as here, the discovery results in a moment of impulsive passion in the rain. Not all the newly added elements are problematic, however: the scene where Ollie reappears on the beach, in Audrey's imagination, playing with sand, is a beautfiul trance that we are all willing to be part of.
Finally, It's a shame that Claire Skinner's Rita Affleck is a mostly one-dimensional performance, whether she's conveying jealousy, guilt, hatred, helplessness or despair, whereas Ibsen's RIta Eyolf probably embodied all of these at the same time.
Tuesday 20 January 2009
May virtue become the true glory
We got home after the LSO concert, cooked our simple dinner, sat down and, as always, turned on BBC News 24 online (this is a household of no TVs). Nothing but blanket coverage of the Obama inauguration. Flashbacks to the proceedings throughout the day, commentators, street interviews, tears, cheers, more tears, back to live coverage of the new First Family waving to the cheering crowds as they walk towards the White House. M turned to me incredulously: 'It's a full FIVE HOURS after the actual ceremony! Have they ever done this for any other US president inauguration in living memory?!' More incredulously, we were both watching this frankly quite mundane part of the events in full absorbtion. As I remember, back in 2000, when we still did have a TV and were living in the US, we didn't bother with the Bush inauguration at all. Then who knows what happened in 2004 - was there actually a ceremony? Did anyone care?
They showed that aerial shot of The Mall packed with crowds for what must have been the hundredth time today. Then it hit me: for millions like ourselves, i.e. the non-American generation who were born between the mid-1970s and the mid-1980s, whose apprehension of world events were, to a large extent, shaped by the American influence on the rest of the world in many ways, whose extracurricular cultural education had been encroached/dominated by American exports (from Michael Jackson to Hollywood to McDonalds), there was only one other particularly memorable occasion on which we had this identical shot: the Vietnam war-rally scene in Forrest Gump.
"Forrest - Forrest!" "Jenny!!" As Tom Hanks and Robin Wright Penn embraced in the middle of the Reflecting Pool, the all-encompassing American Dream was redefined there and then. Curiously, in retrospect, Gump actually personified what George Washington had pledged, and what was so calmly yet thrillingly reiterated today: '... nothing but hope and virtue survive.' 15 years ago, it was through a totally fictitious character that numerous Chinese (and Indian, Russian, Kenyon etc etc) teenagers were shown stories of the 20th-century USA that made the country as we knew it - and, in many cases, dreamed it. Today, everything felt infinitely more real, more palpable, the words more believable even when all the other headlines are looking more ominous by the minute. But Obama was never more convincing when he reminded us of the importance of hope. 'Hope.... is a good thing.' also Andy Dufrene, expressionless, in circumstances that couldn't be more different. (If you still haven't seen Shawshank Redemption, do. Borrow my DVD.)
Obama, as I keep reminding myself, is a politician first and foremost. Nothing will change overnight and as all this exciting carnival ends, he'll have to go back to the world of mess that he's inherited from W. Fortunately, if anything, he's far too intelligent to overlook the danger of sky-high expectations that cannot possibly be met by anyone becoming the US president at this time (no, not even Batman AND Superman combined). If I were any more cynical, I'd say the little hiccups at the actual oath-taking were deliberate and elaborate plans to show his human vulnerability - except that it's apparently been confirmed now that it was entirely the Chief Justice's fault for screwing it up, no doubt as a parting gift from W.
People were reportedly walking away from the inauguration speech with disappointment at the 'lack of big sentences to take away', but I really liked the sound of hope and virtue being the only survivors in this bitterest winter. We've all got used to the idea of 'land of Hope and Glory' (well, at least those of us who live on this little island, plus Anglophiles worldwide), and I find it rather reassuring indeed to know that, whereas the Glory of the past decade and more has been ultimately interpreted as material wealth - in whatever guises it may have taken - from now on we'll see it's possible to re-learn the concept of endurable glory, and (hopefully) question ourselves how virtuous we deserve to call ourselves.
Good luck, President Obama.
They showed that aerial shot of The Mall packed with crowds for what must have been the hundredth time today. Then it hit me: for millions like ourselves, i.e. the non-American generation who were born between the mid-1970s and the mid-1980s, whose apprehension of world events were, to a large extent, shaped by the American influence on the rest of the world in many ways, whose extracurricular cultural education had been encroached/dominated by American exports (from Michael Jackson to Hollywood to McDonalds), there was only one other particularly memorable occasion on which we had this identical shot: the Vietnam war-rally scene in Forrest Gump.
"Forrest - Forrest!" "Jenny!!" As Tom Hanks and Robin Wright Penn embraced in the middle of the Reflecting Pool, the all-encompassing American Dream was redefined there and then. Curiously, in retrospect, Gump actually personified what George Washington had pledged, and what was so calmly yet thrillingly reiterated today: '... nothing but hope and virtue survive.' 15 years ago, it was through a totally fictitious character that numerous Chinese (and Indian, Russian, Kenyon etc etc) teenagers were shown stories of the 20th-century USA that made the country as we knew it - and, in many cases, dreamed it. Today, everything felt infinitely more real, more palpable, the words more believable even when all the other headlines are looking more ominous by the minute. But Obama was never more convincing when he reminded us of the importance of hope. 'Hope.... is a good thing.' also Andy Dufrene, expressionless, in circumstances that couldn't be more different. (If you still haven't seen Shawshank Redemption, do. Borrow my DVD.)
Obama, as I keep reminding myself, is a politician first and foremost. Nothing will change overnight and as all this exciting carnival ends, he'll have to go back to the world of mess that he's inherited from W. Fortunately, if anything, he's far too intelligent to overlook the danger of sky-high expectations that cannot possibly be met by anyone becoming the US president at this time (no, not even Batman AND Superman combined). If I were any more cynical, I'd say the little hiccups at the actual oath-taking were deliberate and elaborate plans to show his human vulnerability - except that it's apparently been confirmed now that it was entirely the Chief Justice's fault for screwing it up, no doubt as a parting gift from W.
People were reportedly walking away from the inauguration speech with disappointment at the 'lack of big sentences to take away', but I really liked the sound of hope and virtue being the only survivors in this bitterest winter. We've all got used to the idea of 'land of Hope and Glory' (well, at least those of us who live on this little island, plus Anglophiles worldwide), and I find it rather reassuring indeed to know that, whereas the Glory of the past decade and more has been ultimately interpreted as material wealth - in whatever guises it may have taken - from now on we'll see it's possible to re-learn the concept of endurable glory, and (hopefully) question ourselves how virtuous we deserve to call ourselves.
Good luck, President Obama.
Sunday 18 January 2009
Another not-too-busy week
Monday: re-viewing of Woody Allen's under-rated classic 'Deconstructing Harry' on DVD. Funny how we often say of an actor 'Oh but he/she's always just playing him/her-self in whatever role...' and that's usually meant as a negative remark. For me the one exception is Allen the actor. You can't possibly picture him as anything other than the quintessential, neurotic, hapless, highly intellectual, vaguely nihilistic Jewish New Yorker. And why should he be?
Tuesday: the Guardian interview with David Hare at the NFT (I still refuse to call it the 'BFI Southbank'). We hadn't seen any of the screenings at the Hare season (TV films, really mostly 'plays on TV') but recently saw Gethsemane, his latest, at the National, which has just a few more final performances. Apart from the predictable moment when he couldn't help expressing irritation at critics who'd trashed The Reader ('Oh how satisfying it was to know that we lived amongst people who enjoy such moral certainties!'), it was a most enjoyable session. On the BBC's change in attitude towards drama (specifically, stage drama) over the years: 'Basically, journalists distrust fiction because they don't believe what we do that, by lying, you get to the truth more easily.' TV's 'fundamentally transient and transitory nature' distinguishes it from, say, the stage. On how/why all good plays are political on some level: 'The way in which what is happening makes us who we are.'
Wednesday and Thursday: in Paris, attending the Orchestre de Paris concert with a battery of Chinese artists: conductor Long Yu, cellist Jian Wang, composer Qigang Chen, and the army of (beautiful young female) soloists required for the latter's masterpiece 'Iris devoilee'. I'd got to know the work very well from recording but it was the first time I heard it live. A very full Salle Pleyel which greeted the artists with a thundering ovation at the end. A quick but efficient walking tour of the Marais (emphatically my favourite neighbourhood in Paris) and lots and lots of scrumptious food. Of which more later.
Friday: Aurelien Bury's uncategorisable, and totally triumphant theatre piece 'Les sept planches de la Ruse' at the Barbican. Simply stunning. My only regret being that I couldn't get more friends to see it as there was only one more performance left. It was obvious on Friday that, despite the mixed reviews (the critics really didn't get it this time! I'll write more about it later if possible) word of mouth had clearly got around already that this was a show not to be missed. I walked out of the theatre thinking how there was not a single wrong note in the entire production in any way, and our friend YY couldn't stop smiling with pride at the fabulous performers from her hometown, Dalian.
Saturday: 2 hours of rigourous Yoga with the incomparable Jaqui. I'd enquired last week about the possbility of joining an extra class of hers mid-week to ensure that I'm securely Yoga-ed through the week, and she brings me good news. A rare theatre/concert-free Saturday means the opportunity to catch up with laundry, grocery shopping, reading (at the moment, Alan Booth, 'Looking for the Lost') etc.
Sunday: more glorious sunshine! Full-table Middle-eastern breakfast courtesy of Waitrose (I'm quite convinced that I could live on nothing but hummous and olives for a long time - mind you, would have to be top-quality hummous and olives at that). There are many ways to spend a perfectly civilised Sunday afternoon, one of them being going to a 3pm piano recital at Festival Hall by our friend Stephen Hough. Only the best of artists could put together such a thoughtful and inspiring programme (Bach/Courot - Faure - Franck - Copland - Chopin), bound together by the themes of 'counterpoint' and 'Paris'. He said more with the brief but exquisite Faure Imprompu No.5 than some pianists could with an entire year's concerts, and the Chopin B minor sonata was delivered with such a combination of total assurance, technical virtuosity and thorough understanding of the poetry, it actually got me interested in Chopin all over again (not an easy conversion, after all those childhood hours I spent practising the same bloody Etudes, primarily to get all the right notes).
Life is good.
Tuesday: the Guardian interview with David Hare at the NFT (I still refuse to call it the 'BFI Southbank'). We hadn't seen any of the screenings at the Hare season (TV films, really mostly 'plays on TV') but recently saw Gethsemane, his latest, at the National, which has just a few more final performances. Apart from the predictable moment when he couldn't help expressing irritation at critics who'd trashed The Reader ('Oh how satisfying it was to know that we lived amongst people who enjoy such moral certainties!'), it was a most enjoyable session. On the BBC's change in attitude towards drama (specifically, stage drama) over the years: 'Basically, journalists distrust fiction because they don't believe what we do that, by lying, you get to the truth more easily.' TV's 'fundamentally transient and transitory nature' distinguishes it from, say, the stage. On how/why all good plays are political on some level: 'The way in which what is happening makes us who we are.'
Wednesday and Thursday: in Paris, attending the Orchestre de Paris concert with a battery of Chinese artists: conductor Long Yu, cellist Jian Wang, composer Qigang Chen, and the army of (beautiful young female) soloists required for the latter's masterpiece 'Iris devoilee'. I'd got to know the work very well from recording but it was the first time I heard it live. A very full Salle Pleyel which greeted the artists with a thundering ovation at the end. A quick but efficient walking tour of the Marais (emphatically my favourite neighbourhood in Paris) and lots and lots of scrumptious food. Of which more later.
Friday: Aurelien Bury's uncategorisable, and totally triumphant theatre piece 'Les sept planches de la Ruse' at the Barbican. Simply stunning. My only regret being that I couldn't get more friends to see it as there was only one more performance left. It was obvious on Friday that, despite the mixed reviews (the critics really didn't get it this time! I'll write more about it later if possible) word of mouth had clearly got around already that this was a show not to be missed. I walked out of the theatre thinking how there was not a single wrong note in the entire production in any way, and our friend YY couldn't stop smiling with pride at the fabulous performers from her hometown, Dalian.
Saturday: 2 hours of rigourous Yoga with the incomparable Jaqui. I'd enquired last week about the possbility of joining an extra class of hers mid-week to ensure that I'm securely Yoga-ed through the week, and she brings me good news. A rare theatre/concert-free Saturday means the opportunity to catch up with laundry, grocery shopping, reading (at the moment, Alan Booth, 'Looking for the Lost') etc.
Sunday: more glorious sunshine! Full-table Middle-eastern breakfast courtesy of Waitrose (I'm quite convinced that I could live on nothing but hummous and olives for a long time - mind you, would have to be top-quality hummous and olives at that). There are many ways to spend a perfectly civilised Sunday afternoon, one of them being going to a 3pm piano recital at Festival Hall by our friend Stephen Hough. Only the best of artists could put together such a thoughtful and inspiring programme (Bach/Courot - Faure - Franck - Copland - Chopin), bound together by the themes of 'counterpoint' and 'Paris'. He said more with the brief but exquisite Faure Imprompu No.5 than some pianists could with an entire year's concerts, and the Chopin B minor sonata was delivered with such a combination of total assurance, technical virtuosity and thorough understanding of the poetry, it actually got me interested in Chopin all over again (not an easy conversion, after all those childhood hours I spent practising the same bloody Etudes, primarily to get all the right notes).
Life is good.
Saturday 17 January 2009
Another perfect London day
From last Sunday: this is one of the myriad reasons why I continue to pledge my love for this city.
Foreground: Royal Naval College, Greenwich; background: the 'pesudo-skyline' (really, I'm from the City of Skyscrapers after all) of Canary Wharf. The air was cold, crisp, fresh and sobering. The expanse of greens in the park was dotted with locals walking their dog and tourists paying the requisite visit to the Royal Observatory. Everyone seemed complacent just to spend some time there at ease and soak in the very special kind of warmth bestowed by the winter sun.
A moment that crystallises just how simple happiness could be.
2009 - with everything to look forward to
For all the doomsday talk about the imminent demise of the world economy, 2009 should still hold optimism and momentum for those of us whose fundamentall happiness hasn't necessarily relied on the size of our monetary assets. Here's an interesting list of major anniversaries that Dr T has compiled, and we expect to see many activities launched throughout the year to mark them. At the very least, a quick read of such things helps put things in a bigger perspective, which is always important!
(in no particular order)
- Darwin's 'On the Orign of Species' publication:150th anniversary
- Big Ben: 150th anniversary
- Cuban revolution: 50th anniversary
- People's Republic of China: 60th birthday
- 'June 4th' Tiananmen massacre: 20th anniversary
- Cambridge University: 800th anniversary
- Unversity of Leipzig: 600th anniversary
- Galileo's use of telescope: 400th anniversary (also UNESCO's World Year of Astronomy)
- Haydn: 200th anniversary of death
- Mendelssohn: 200th anniversary of birth
- Alaska: 50th anniversary of Statehood (Hold your breath for Sarah Palin's grand return to world stage?!)
- Kew Garden: 250th anniversary
Please let me know of any other significant ones that I might have missed here.
(in no particular order)
- Darwin's 'On the Orign of Species' publication:150th anniversary
- Big Ben: 150th anniversary
- Cuban revolution: 50th anniversary
- People's Republic of China: 60th birthday
- 'June 4th' Tiananmen massacre: 20th anniversary
- Cambridge University: 800th anniversary
- Unversity of Leipzig: 600th anniversary
- Galileo's use of telescope: 400th anniversary (also UNESCO's World Year of Astronomy)
- Haydn: 200th anniversary of death
- Mendelssohn: 200th anniversary of birth
- Alaska: 50th anniversary of Statehood (Hold your breath for Sarah Palin's grand return to world stage?!)
- Kew Garden: 250th anniversary
Please let me know of any other significant ones that I might have missed here.
Sunday 11 January 2009
My favourite city
Welcome to Persimmonville. Here you'll find:
- the culture and parks of London
- the energy and tolerance of New York
- the architecture of Barcelona
- the food of Hong Kong or Tokyo (or both)
- the infrastructure of Tokyo
- the people of Copenhagen
- the climate of Rome
- the shops of Paris
I think you'll want to spend quite a bit of time here.
- the culture and parks of London
- the energy and tolerance of New York
- the architecture of Barcelona
- the food of Hong Kong or Tokyo (or both)
- the infrastructure of Tokyo
- the people of Copenhagen
- the climate of Rome
- the shops of Paris
I think you'll want to spend quite a bit of time here.
(slightly belated) best of 2008 - theatre
Having spent some 200 evenings at one cultural event or another, I thought it was worth making a list of highlights. And I'll expand accordingly where I feel there's more than one deserving candidate in each category.
The 'big four' subsidised venues (National Theatre, Donmar Warehouse, Almeida Theatre, Royal Court) continued to churn out tons of good work, and I also had some wonderful experiences in the commerical sector through careful picking, usually chosen because of the director (6 Characters at Gielgud, The Norman Conquests at Old Vic - see below).
New play: Two David Hare plays bookended our 2008 diary, and I personally preferred The Vertical Hour to Gethsemane. Neither was flawless, but TVH managed to consummate the marriage of compelling dialogues and effective dramatic structure with a much more gratifying result. One of my favourite directors, Robert Lepage, returned with the epic 7-hour Lipsynch to the Barbican (9 hours as billed, if you count the intervals too). Again, it had its weaker moments, but you come out at the end of it feeling revitalised and grateful for having been part of it.
Classics: our respective Chekov and Ibsen appetites were satisfied by Ivanov (perfect start to the Donmar in West End season) and Rosmersholm (Almeida - Helen Mcrory particularly notable). Even more memorable, however, was the fabulous Alan Ayckbourn introduction in the shape of The Norman Conquests at the Old Vic - Table Manners being simply one of the funniest things I have ever seen on stage anywhere.
Acting: Simon Russell Beale was the Actor of the Year (again), hands down. We now automatically book anything that he's in, knowing that he'll somehow transform even the most problematic script (and this rarely happens, as he's reliable with his choices, too) into a sublime experience. One to watch is Bertie Carvel, who was outstanding in The Pride at Royal Court Upstairs. Also notable were the entire Steppenwolf ensemble in Osage County (there's still time to catch one of the final performances, if you're in London), and the comedic nuance that Maria Tyzack managed to convey with every single one of her lines in The Chalk Garden (Donmar Warehouse).
The 'big four' subsidised venues (National Theatre, Donmar Warehouse, Almeida Theatre, Royal Court) continued to churn out tons of good work, and I also had some wonderful experiences in the commerical sector through careful picking, usually chosen because of the director (6 Characters at Gielgud, The Norman Conquests at Old Vic - see below).
New play: Two David Hare plays bookended our 2008 diary, and I personally preferred The Vertical Hour to Gethsemane. Neither was flawless, but TVH managed to consummate the marriage of compelling dialogues and effective dramatic structure with a much more gratifying result. One of my favourite directors, Robert Lepage, returned with the epic 7-hour Lipsynch to the Barbican (9 hours as billed, if you count the intervals too). Again, it had its weaker moments, but you come out at the end of it feeling revitalised and grateful for having been part of it.
Classics: our respective Chekov and Ibsen appetites were satisfied by Ivanov (perfect start to the Donmar in West End season) and Rosmersholm (Almeida - Helen Mcrory particularly notable). Even more memorable, however, was the fabulous Alan Ayckbourn introduction in the shape of The Norman Conquests at the Old Vic - Table Manners being simply one of the funniest things I have ever seen on stage anywhere.
Acting: Simon Russell Beale was the Actor of the Year (again), hands down. We now automatically book anything that he's in, knowing that he'll somehow transform even the most problematic script (and this rarely happens, as he's reliable with his choices, too) into a sublime experience. One to watch is Bertie Carvel, who was outstanding in The Pride at Royal Court Upstairs. Also notable were the entire Steppenwolf ensemble in Osage County (there's still time to catch one of the final performances, if you're in London), and the comedic nuance that Maria Tyzack managed to convey with every single one of her lines in The Chalk Garden (Donmar Warehouse).
Saturday 10 January 2009
My blogosphere debut...
Well, well, here I am. My dear husband is firmly convinced that a good portion of my thoughts, opinions and our (nothing if not eventful) life in London and elsewhere are worth sharing with friends around the globe on a regular basis. So, in much the same way that I finally surrendered to digital photography in 2006 (quite late, I think you'll agree), here's my debut as a blogger.
Those of you who got our year-end newsletter will know that we pride ourselves on being culture vultures in this great capital, and on leaving our footprints in far-flung corners of the world. By keeping this blog going, hopefully I'll be able to share a bit more than just plain facts throughout the year, but rhapsodic thoughts, (brief) travel journals and semi-professional reviews of all sorts of cultural happenings too. Among other things, I continue to be asked questions about China all the time, and plan to write quite a bit in this forum not only about what's happening in China now, and why it's happening, but also to record some of my stories of growing up in Shanghai as one of the first-generation fruits of the single-child-policy.
Ah, the fruit. Also known as marbolo, kaki, shi-zi. But when I first saw it in the UK, shortly after coming here back in 1997, I was amused by the label that said 'Sharon fruit'. Nowadays they usually call it - at my local Waitrose at least - persimmon.
Welcome, and Enjoy!
Those of you who got our year-end newsletter will know that we pride ourselves on being culture vultures in this great capital, and on leaving our footprints in far-flung corners of the world. By keeping this blog going, hopefully I'll be able to share a bit more than just plain facts throughout the year, but rhapsodic thoughts, (brief) travel journals and semi-professional reviews of all sorts of cultural happenings too. Among other things, I continue to be asked questions about China all the time, and plan to write quite a bit in this forum not only about what's happening in China now, and why it's happening, but also to record some of my stories of growing up in Shanghai as one of the first-generation fruits of the single-child-policy.
Ah, the fruit. Also known as marbolo, kaki, shi-zi. But when I first saw it in the UK, shortly after coming here back in 1997, I was amused by the label that said 'Sharon fruit'. Nowadays they usually call it - at my local Waitrose at least - persimmon.
Welcome, and Enjoy!
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