"It wasn't until relatively recently that I actually saw a porn film in which a man and a woman had normal sex." -- Eamonn McCusker , 'DVD Times'
Film Excellent obituary to VHS video tape from DVD Times and the reader comment is fun too: "At home we got a VCR in 1984 and it was a Video 2000 from Philips. When I left home I took the machine with me (it was replaced by a VHS) and have used it ever since. Never saw the need to buy a VHS as that machine just kept on going. I bought most movies on Laserdisc so had no need for a VHS to buy movies. When a videoshop nearby decided to get rid of their V2000 collection I volunteerd to take them off their hands. The ones I didn't like I later sold on a flea market, but still ended up keeping around 100. [...] Now it has a place of honour in my living room and it is still working fine."
"I have done almost every human activity inside a taxi which does not require main drainage." -- Alan Brien
Travel The New York Taxi is receiving a redesign. The prototype looks more like a limousine than something you could simply jump into on the sidewalk. I much prefer the approach used in some parts of this country were ordering a taxi leads to a minibus turning up.
"Wagner's music is better than it sounds." -- Edgar Wilson Nye
Music Classic FM teams up with Phil for 08 season: "THE Liverpool Phil is set to become possibly the most heard orchestra in the country - thanks to a new broadcasting deal inspired by Capital of Culture. Classic FM - with six million listeners - will air no fewer than 25 Liverpool concerts next season."
"Dad, is this art or is it vandalism?" -- Bart, 'The Simpsons'
Art Having invigilated in museums and art galleries I know that there is always a schism between an artist's imagination and what can be kept safe from the the public. Sometimes its nearly impossible to invigilate an exhibition successfully. I have the utmost sympathy for the staff who are looking after Doris Salcedo new crack at Tate Modern -- get too close to the visitor and you're impinging on the aesthetics of the piece but stay away and this potentially happens and you get the blame for not being there. It's a lose/lose situation. You can't erect barriers either.
I once worked at a gallery which housed an installation that included a giant golden sphere. The whole piece was covered in gold leaf of the most expensive quality. It was marvelous, massive and impressive. But you can't get enough staff to cover something like that from all angles, and as with the crack if you told every visitor not to touch as they walk in it spoils the moment. An object like that is very tactile and inevitably it was touched by a member of the public, and some of the leaf came away in their fingers leaving gaps in the surface begin. The artist then had to be called in -- flown in from Paris -- to touch up the work at great cost.
But there are certain some things you can't legislate for. I used to enjoy anything with pictures or painting or video art because people are less likely to to have physical contact with the work so you didn't need to be quite so authoritative. This is the last thing you would expect to happen:
I once worked at a gallery which housed an installation that included a giant golden sphere. The whole piece was covered in gold leaf of the most expensive quality. It was marvelous, massive and impressive. But you can't get enough staff to cover something like that from all angles, and as with the crack if you told every visitor not to touch as they walk in it spoils the moment. An object like that is very tactile and inevitably it was touched by a member of the public, and some of the leaf came away in their fingers leaving gaps in the surface begin. The artist then had to be called in -- flown in from Paris -- to touch up the work at great cost.
But there are certain some things you can't legislate for. I used to enjoy anything with pictures or painting or video art because people are less likely to to have physical contact with the work so you didn't need to be quite so authoritative. This is the last thing you would expect to happen:
"Around 3:30, half an hour before closing, four vandals wearing black masks stormed into a space known as the Kulturen Gallery while shouting in Swedish, “We don’t support this,” plus an expletive. They pushed visitors aside, entered a darkened room where some of the photographs were displayed and began smashing the glass protecting the photographs and then hacking away at the prints.You can detect the blame game going on in this article "No guards were on duty in the gallery" and “There was one woman who works at the gallery who tried to stop them until she saw the axes and crowbars [...] These men are dangerous.” Later it says that security has been bolster implying it had been lax earlier. The attendant did try to stop them and then did just the right thing for her personal safety by standing aside. It is a nightmare, but even considering the notoriety of the artist and the type of show it is, it was unimaginable that something like this would occur to why would you need to have a high level of security? Like the crack the last thing you want to be is a barrier to stopping the visitor experiencing what they've come to see [via].
The bumpy video, evidently shot with a hand-held camera by someone who ran into the gallery with the attackers, intersperses images of the Serrano photographs with lettered commentary in Swedish like “This is art?” before showing the vandals at work.
"I have called this principle, by which, each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of Natural Selection. " -- Charles Dickens
Science Jerry Fodor offers a case against Darwin's theory of natural selection:
"In fact, an appreciable number of perfectly reasonable biologists are coming to think that the theory of natural selection can no longer be taken for granted. This is, so far, mostly straws in the wind; but it’s not out of the question that a scientific revolution – no less than a major revision of evolutionary theory – is in the offing. Unlike the story about our minds being anachronistic adaptations, this new twist doesn’t seem to have been widely noticed outside professional circles. The ironic upshot is that at a time when the theory of natural selection has become an article of pop culture, it is faced with what may be the most serious challenge it has had so far. Darwinists have been known to say that adaptationism is the best idea that anybody has ever had. It would be a good joke if the best idea that anybody has ever had turned out not to be true. A lot of the history of science consists of the world playing that sort of joke on our most cherished theories."Which is what I like about science -- even orthodoxy can be challenged and questioned. I can't really give an answer either way, except that I don't understand why environmental circumstances and natural selection can't work together on this -- surely a survival instinct is induced if an environment becomes harsher and it's the strongest of the species which copes?
"Ah, dessert! Chilled monkey brains." -- Eel Eater, 'Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.'
Food Fraser Lewry is going to eat the alphabet one animal at a time for The Guardian. He began with Ant biscuits and entertainingly the comments are a mixture of people trying to decide whether ants can be classed as animals and whether he wimped out this early stage. Typical:
"I do think he could have been a little more adventurous with his "A" Animals. Alligator Aadvark Armadillo Anteater."This wikipedia entry offers some other suggestions, although 'ape' does conjure up a certain scene from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. And the Gourmet Club from The Freshman for that matter.
" I was so happy." -- Julia Styles
Film Often actress Julia Styles has directed a short film and is very happy about it: "I absolutely loved every minute of it! I loved having to solve problems constantly. I loved collaborating with the production designer and cinematographer. I loved racing the clock but having to stay focused. I loved seeing the story evolve and take on a life of its own-to see it go from something I imagined alone at my computer to seeing it actualized by the actors and the locations. I loved being in the editing room and playing with all the possibilities."
"I was on the same forum as Keith Topping once."
tv The Doctor Who Fan Phrasebook Part 2. He's back ...
"It's repetitive that they keep featuring politicians in Doctor Who and why do we have to have the companions families in every other episode?
I understand that most people around here watch and frequently reference brave, challenging TV show like Lost, The West Wing, The Sopranos and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, yet I still can't get my head around the idea of running plot threads."
"It's repetitive that they keep featuring politicians in Doctor Who and why do we have to have the companions families in every other episode?
I understand that most people around here watch and frequently reference brave, challenging TV show like Lost, The West Wing, The Sopranos and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, yet I still can't get my head around the idea of running plot threads."
18 Orson Welles
Hamlet played by Orson Welles.
Directed by Orson Welles.
Orson Welles was one of the great Shakespeareans of the 20th Century. His book Everybody’s Shakespeare examined the potential the bard had to reach the popular audience and he strove for much of his life to produce some great interpretations of the canon and sometimes succeeded. In the end, only his Macbeth would have a relatively unhindered passage to the screen but even that was compromised because it was produced for a tin-pan alley studio more used to producing westerns and unable to provide the budget his vision required.
He would go on to complete just two other screen adaptations -- Othello and Chimes At Midnight (a conflagration of Falstaff’s story from Henry IV parts one & two and sections of Merry Wives of Windsor) -- but on both occasions production spanned years, with shooting occurring only when financing was available from Welles own pocket as he provided voiceovers and performances in films he cared little for. Both of those films are messy curiosities, snatches of brilliance mixed with failure, but nevertheless inventive even as he had to recast parts in mid-flow. Desdemona is obviously portrayed by at least three actresses, two of which were overdubbed in the final mix.
On stage he found rather more success and his voodoo Macbeth at the Federal Theatre was considered a triumph and it was with some amazement I discovered that he did indeed also play Hamlet albeit in production of an hour’s duration for the Columbia Broadcasting Company’s Columbia Workshop, a series of experimental radio dramas broadcast in 1936 just two years before his own Mercury Theatre would receive a regular spot on the same network ( which is when the War of the World incident occurred). The production, such as it is was broadcast in two parts, firstly on September 19, 1936 and then after what must be the longest interval in theatrical history the second part appeared on November 14, 1936, two months later. Judging by the introduction to the first broadcast, the second was by no means certain:
“In deciding to present an abbreviated version of Hamlet the Columbia workshop found itself facing a considerable dilemma. Would it be feasible we wondered to give merely the plot in our short space of time, or should we concentrate on certain well-known passages, and let the story proceed confusingly. Our final decision was this: to present the first two acts of the play, presenting whenever possible, the most notable scenes in their entirety. And giving you, we hope a clear dramatic statement of the causes of Hamlet’s tragedy.”
The method utilised by Welles in his production is to have actors speak with rapidity and concentrate solely on those scenes featuring Hamlet, his adaptation being a psychological study in revenge. After presenting much of the opening scene on the battlements, the focus shifts almost totally the prince; once Hamlet agrees not to go to Wittenberg, Horatio is quick to advise him of the ghost who quickly appears minutes later to be followed by the fishmonger and the players closing with a delicious cliffhanger -- ‘The play’s the thing, wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king.’ The only interruption is the introduction of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, presumably because as I gather these plays where presented live it would have given Welles, who has the dramatic weight a moment to mop his brow and take a drink of water.
Brilliantly, Welles cuts Ophelia and Laertes altogether. For all we know, Polonius has no children and is merely Claudius’s adviser. This allows us to concentrate on Hamlet’s emotional state and Welles’s performance is a tour de force, despite being pretty much alike with every other performance Welles has given. It’s difficult throughout not to think of Charles Foster Kane or Harry Lime, but this isn’t because he lacks range -- he does generality and darkness particularly well, and indeed it’s amazing hear that five years before Kane brought him to a (slightly) wider audience his acting persona was already so clearly defined. The only disappointment is that without Ophelia there isn’t the nunnery scene and without the nunnery we do not get to here Welles’s version of ‘To Be Or Not To Be’; but these are supposed to be ‘experimental’ productions and cutting the play’s most famous speech is certainly that.
Then two months later, in the second half, and I can’t believe I’m criticising Orson Welles, it all goes horribly wrong. The pace is markedly even faster in the second segment and subtlety goes out of the window. Unlike the first broadcast, if you weren't already familiar with the plot, despite the more detailed expository voiceover you've little clue of how the narrative pieces fit together; it ultimately descends into a melodramatic soup and if I was someone who’d never heard Shakespeare’s work before I’d probably be of the opinion that this is exactly how I feared it would be like. It is perhaps unfair to criticize the second half as being part of the same production because Welles no doubt thought these broadcasts would have the same ephemeral quality as auditorium theatre living only in the memory of the listener and certainly wouldn’t have expected them to be unified one after the other. He might not even have been expecting that he would have to fit the last three acts when much of the meat of the play occurs into another half an hour.
But even considered on its own as a separate entity it fails, firstly by falling into the trap of doing exactly what was threatened in the introduction to the first part of giving ‘merely the plot in our short space of time’ and secondly because the sometimes subtle performance Welles gave in the opening segment which drew the audiences in gives way to pure ham as he desperately tries to give the character some psychological depth in such a short space of time. As adapter too he spends far too much time over The Mousetrap, perhaps because of its theatrical resonance which leads to the likes of the scenes in the bed chamber being skipped over lightly, the climax with the exception of ‘The readiness is all’ and Hamlet’s death speech being a generally incoherent mess.
The other problem is the sudden appearance of Ophelia and Laertes, unconvincingly knitted back into the story. The genius of losing them from the opening two acts creates a problem because they are so critical to the climax (Hamlet can hardly have duel with himself, although as the Coranado film demonstrates that is sometimes worth a try). Ophelia first drops in during a quick exchange before The Mousetrap and Laertes even later in the narration upon his return to Denmark looking for his father. There’s no emotional connection Polonius or Hamlet though and so when the prince desperately says that he loved Ophelia it comes out of the blue, in a way that’s not unlike soap opera. When Ophelia goes mad we haven’t enough time to grieve.
Such criticism should be taken lightly though when faced with the fact that this was Welles trying to frame Shakespeare’s tragedy for an undoubtedly intelligent audience that might never have heard Shakespeare before. As with all of the other attempts to produce a version of the play with at least three hours of the action missing there are bound to be compromises and the first half really is excellent. In addition, how marvelous to be able to listen to Welles’s adaptation seventy years after its broadcast; the version I listened to was obviously recorded onto LP during the original radio broadcast and so as well as the interference from what sounded like a shaky AM reception there’s also the pops and scratches of vinyl giving the recording an wonderfully atmospheric quality. The music, mostly fanfares, was produced by Bernard Hermann who would go on to provide a score for Kane as well as many of Alfred Hitchcock films. You can’t ignore the fact that this is a piece of radio, theatrical and to a degree film history and on that level it’s priceless [via Wellesnet where there is a link so that you can hear and enjoy this production yourself].
"You will be deleted." -- Cybermen, 'Doctor Who'
About I really need to get myself a copy of proper Word. I've just spent an hour writing a review of another Hamlet in the Word Processor that comes as part of Works and then lost it when I accidentally closed it down and there isn't an autosave and recovery. I'll try and recreate it tomorrow. That's by way of an explanation of why something more interesting isn't here today. But, just in case you missed them, I have also posted, this, this and this elsewhere in the past couple of days to keep you company.
“Dreams of silver screen quotations”
TV One of five’s new imports, the David Duchovny starring Californication which begins on Thursday in a double bill with 30 Rock has attracted some average reviews. It’s rather popular in Australia, although the reaction from some sections of the viewing audience has been interesting. They’re calling it smut basically:
“Protestors are not backing down on their stance against the controversial Californication TV series, with dozens of demonstrators still gathering for weekly vigils. Demonstrators have been gathering outside Channel 10’s Sydney studios every Monday night, when the program is broadcast to a massive audience around Australia. Last night, protesters held candles outside the studios while saying prayers and singing hymns for anyone watching the show.”
"I'm a Doctor, not an elevator." -- Bones, 'Star Trek'
Film Really useful interview with Star Trek co-writer and executive producer Roberto Orci which clarifies that the new film isn't a remake or a re-imagining, it is mostly canon and they're only messing with anything that hasn't officially been established: "The reason we aren’t starting over is because the people involved, both fans and behind the scenes, have worked so hard to specify what is canon - then to simply ignore it would be unnecessary. There is so much about The Original Series that is worth continuing. It is not like Batman where you can ignore everything. That being said there are some things that have never been specified fully in canon that we take liberties with."
17 Tony Meyer
Hamlet played by David Meyer.
Hamlet played by Tony Meyer.
Directed by Celestino Coronada.
Balanced precariously between art piece and feature film, Celestino Coronada’s Hamlet is not for the faint hearted. Sometimes described as ‘The Naked Hamlet’, it cuts the poetry to ribbons has little regard for the story (Ophelia’s madness is shown even though Polonius’s death isn’t) and instead sets about emphasizing every shred of the apparent homoerotic and incestuous subtext present in the play almost to the point of parody -- no sorry -- crashing straight into parody and galloping even further. It’s one of the most difficult interpretations of the play I’ve had to deal with so far and between my shouts of ’Oh come on’ and ‘Oh for goodness sake’ (substituting the g-word for the f-word more often than not) it’s the first time since the abbreviated National Youth Theatre Production that I was happy to get to the end of it.
Obviously it’s of its time and that being the case I’m very pleased that was too young to notice what that time was like. The mood is set from the off when Hamlet is shown nude on a slab being visited by his father, also bollock naked, to deliver the story of his murder. It’s not clear whether the man is supposed to be a ghost or in his son’s dreams but what is clear is that implication is that something rotten was going on in the state of Denmark even before Hamlet Snr’s murder. From then on we’re greeted by an approach to the play which is on the one-hand sub-Jarman on the other sub-Passolini (the film is dedicated to Pier) and is mostly the kind of thing which would be shown late on Channel 4 when it first started, probably with a red-triangle slapped on the front and as a lead in to Naked Yoga.
Funded by the Royal College of Art in London and filmed on a shoe-string in a darkened studio with the acoustics of a community centre (throughout you can hear doors opening and closing and people chatting off camera) there isn’t much room for scenes changes and most of its costume design and presentation takes elements of the burlesque and camp, silk costumes in primary colours (when people are wearing them) and hair and make-up perhaps influenced by Restoration stage craft, mixed with the sensibilities of the seventies. Frankly, Quentin Crisp as Polonius looks like Batman’s Joker all green hair and white face paint and Barry Stanton's Claudius seems to have wandered in from Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s Relax video.
There is a good idea at the centre of all this though. Coronado’s casting of the brothers Tony & David Meyer (which means I can add two Hamlets to the list this time) allows them to emphasize the dual nature of Hamlet’s character playing the obviously mad and feigning madness versions off against one another and sometimes they appear in a scene together, fighting each other for supremacy. In this production ’Now is the very witching time of night’ becomes a two-hander the two actors demonstrating that Hamlet is very much in two minds. Unfortunately this is all undermined because clearly one of the brothers (it’s difficult to tell which) is clearly a better actor than the other and they also both have the extra weight of having to portray Laertes and it all becomes desperately confusing.
Given the circumstances of the production, you can’t really blame the actors for being inconsistent and just plain bad but the the Emmy, Bafta and Oscar winning Helen Mirren saddled with playing both Ophelia and Gertrude (that duology again, hey) is just awful, blankly regarding the other actors and doubtless wondering what made her sign up to this. Quentin Crisp looks equally bored and it’s unfortunate that with all of the emphasis on symbolism and imagery that the director has forgotten to take care of his cast. Coronado is more orgasmic over the possibilities inherent in the then new video mixing technology with a montage sequence which resembles a Top of the Pops Pans People filler directed by Ken Russell and each and every scene features some kind of super imposing of one character over another. This was a year after the premiere of Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody video and it shows.
Obviously this was not created as an exercise in drama -- like Stoppard’s fifteen minute distillation, the audience isn’t supposed to be able to follow the narrative in a traditional way. It’s the filmic equivalent of an academic essay written for the International Journal of Sexuality and Gender Studies and I'm sure just that kind of essay could even be written about the film explaining the emblematic relevance of everything. In the end though, the whole fancy leaves a nasty taste of misogyny in the mouth; the inference is that none of this craziness would have happened if Gertrude and Ophelia hadn’t been quite such tasty propositions and although the thing ends with the naked bodies of the two acting brothers (one playing Laertes this time not that it matters by then) writhing around one another as the duel is substituted for some Greco Roman Wrestling in one of the worst examples of confused homo-erotic testosterone since Kirk fought a shirtless clone of himself in the Star Trek episode The Enemy Within. Mirren is variously uncomfortably stroked, massaged and snuffed, her make-up smudged all over her face in some kind of ur-version (or more precisely ugh-version) of torture porn. Dreadful.
16 David Meyer
Hamlet played by David Meyer.
Hamlet played by Tony Meyer.
Directed by Celestino Coronada.
Balanced precariously between art piece and feature film, Celestino Coronada’s Hamlet is not for the faint hearted. Sometimes described as ‘The Naked Hamlet’, it cuts the poetry to ribbons has little regard for the story (Ophelia’s madness is shown even though Polonius’s death isn’t) and instead sets about emphasizing every shred of the apparent homoerotic and incestuous subtext present in the play almost to the point of parody -- no sorry -- crashing straight into parody and galloping even further. It’s one of the most difficult interpretations of the play I’ve had to deal with so far and between my shouts of ’Oh come on’ and ‘Oh for goodness sake’ (substituting the g-word for the f-word more often than not) it’s the first time since the abbreviated National Youth Theatre Production that I was happy to get to the end of it.
Obviously it’s of its time and that being the case I’m very pleased that was too young to notice what that time was like. The mood is set from the off when Hamlet is shown nude on a slab being visited by his father, also bollock naked, to deliver the story of his murder. It’s not clear whether the man is supposed to be a ghost or in his son’s dreams but what is clear is that implication is that something rotten was going on in the state of Denmark even before Hamlet Snr’s murder. From then on we’re greeted by an approach to the play which is on the one-hand sub-Jarman on the other sub-Passolini (the film is dedicated to Pier) and is mostly the kind of thing which would be shown late on Channel 4 when it first started, probably with a red-triangle slapped on the front and as a lead in to Naked Yoga.
Funded by the Royal College of Art in London and filmed on a shoe-string in a darkened studio with the acoustics of a community centre (throughout you can hear doors opening and closing and people chatting off camera) there isn’t much room for scenes changes and most of its costume design and presentation takes elements of the burlesque and camp, silk costumes in primary colours (when people are wearing them) and hair and make-up perhaps influenced by Restoration stage craft, mixed with the sensibilities of the seventies. Frankly, Quentin Crisp as Polonius looks like Batman’s Joker all green hair and white face paint and Barry Stanton's Claudius seems to have wandered in from Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s Relax video.
There is a good idea at the centre of all this though. Coronado’s casting of the brothers Tony & David Meyer (which means I can add two Hamlets to the list this time) allows them to emphasize the dual nature of Hamlet’s character playing the obviously mad and feigning madness versions off against one another and sometimes they appear in a scene together, fighting each other for supremacy. In this production ’Now is the very witching time of night’ becomes a two-hander the two actors demonstrating that Hamlet is very much in two minds. Unfortunately this is all undermined because clearly one of the brothers (it’s difficult to tell which) is clearly a better actor than the other and they also both have the extra weight of having to portray Laertes and it all becomes desperately confusing.
Given the circumstances of the production, you can’t really blame the actors for being inconsistent and just plain bad but the the Emmy, Bafta and Oscar winning Helen Mirren saddled with playing both Ophelia and Gertrude (that duology again, hey) is just awful, blankly regarding the other actors and doubtless wondering what made her sign up to this. Quentin Crisp looks equally bored and it’s unfortunate that with all of the emphasis on symbolism and imagery that the director has forgotten to take care of his cast. Coronado is more orgasmic over the possibilities inherent in the then new video mixing technology with a montage sequence which resembles a Top of the Pops Pans People filler directed by Ken Russell and each and every scene features some kind of super imposing of one character over another. This was a year after the premiere of Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody video and it shows.
Obviously this was not created as an exercise in drama -- like Stoppard’s fifteen minute distillation, the audience isn’t supposed to be able to follow the narrative in a traditional way. It’s the filmic equivalent of an academic essay written for the International Journal of Sexuality and Gender Studies and I'm sure just that kind of essay could even be written about the film explaining the emblematic relevance of everything. In the end though, the whole fancy leaves a nasty taste of misogyny in the mouth; the inference is that none of this craziness would have happened if Gertrude and Ophelia hadn’t been quite such tasty propositions and although the thing ends with the naked bodies of the two acting brothers (one playing Laertes this time not that it matters by then) writhing around one another as the duel is substituted for some Greco Roman Wrestling in one of the worst examples of confused homo-erotic testosterone since Kirk fought a shirtless clone of himself in the Star Trek episode The Enemy Within. Mirren is variously uncomfortably stroked, massaged and snuffed, her make-up smudged all over her face in some kind of ur-version (or more precisely ugh-version) of torture porn. Dreadful.
"Man is by nature a political animal." -- Aristotle
TV Just to let you know that the rather marvelous, sadly canceled Party Animals will be getting a repeat appearance on BBC Four from this Thursday 11th October at 11pm so that all but the three of us who missed it can catch up with one of the best shows of the year. I previously wrote about it here and here, but please be weary of spoilers particularly in the second link which is a review of the final episodes.
"Evolution is gentics plus time." -- Professor Steven Jones
This afternoon I attended a lecture at Liverpool University given by Professor Steve Jones from the Department of Biology at UCL with the title ‘Why evolution if right and creationism is wrong.’ It’s part of a series of talks being organized by the Department of Philosophy on the subject of ‘Thinking about Mathematics and Science’. Just to add to the eclecticism, they’re currently appearing in a lecture theatre in the Law Building, a modernist wooden paneled room set out like a court room, with definite witness boxes, jury benches and a very grand set of chairs at the front where the judge probably sits.
I’ve always thought of Jones as being one of those celebrity professors in the same bracket as Richard Dawkins and Stephen Hawking, a household name with books and television and radio productions with his name on them. So I was amazed to hear that no one I mentioned the talk to had heard of him, which possibly says more about me than them. But I did want to go along to see the man essentially doing his day job, lecturing to students (although the talk was open to all). He was a highly entertaining speaker, offering photographs from bushorchimp.com to demonstrate the similarity between humans and primates.
Despite the surrounds, he wasn’t about to put creationism on trial as such -- this wasn’t going to be an academic version of Inherit The Wind. He even opened the talk by saying that the Old Testament was probably the first genetic text book, full of evolutionary questions such as the development of ancestry. Instead he simply dismissed it out of hand, talking about how the story of Adam and Eve is just one of countless thousands of creation myths all of which are perfectly interesting but unlike Darwin’s theory cannot tested against available data.
He also agreed with my argument from the turn of the year that ‘intelligent design’ is simply an annoying way of trying to rationalize the current unknowns in science and that it’s barmy to teach it on the same level as evolution in schools -- he called it ‘creationism with a college education‘. He said essentially that you could, as I once did, believe that all of science was sparked by a God, but that had nothing to do with the science itself -- the two are entirely different entities and that to talk about the philosophy of science doesn’t work.
This simplifies a one hour lecture and a question and answer session down to its fundamentals but Professor Jones covered more ground as he demonstrated how evolution works, using the spread of the AIDS virus as an example. I’m not even going to try and pretend I understood all of this (the last time I looked at a science text book was at the age of sixteen) but I think what he was essentially saying was that the reason that AIDS has spread in humans rather than chimps is because at least physically we’re far less evolved than they are -- there are elements of their immune system better suited to coping with an influx of the virus -- we’re essentially the primate that didn’t evolve.
But the fundamental difference is that we’re intelligent enough to be able to cope with the appearance of the virus because we have the capacity to research and discover ways of treating patients so that they live far longer, we’re clever which is why we’re largely able to survive. Unfortunately, we’re also economically evolved and if I understood the inference as he talked about the plight in Botswana were the average life expectancy has dropped by forty years because AIDS is so virulent and isn’t being treated by the expensive drugs available in the rest of the world. What he did say though was that some members of that population have stronger immune systems than others, so, to use his example, sex workers can have the virus and it doesn’t present itself even as their clients contract pneumonia.
He spoke too of language development, explaining that Darwin could have been influenced by Sir William Jones, a language expert working in the late-Eighteenth century who was the first to infer that all language has a common origin (in much the same way that all life must have developed from somewhere). There was a startling audio clip of the Queen talking to her fellow countrykids during the second world war at the age of sixteen and then of her grandson Harry at the same age, her cut glass receive pronunciation giving way to his posh-mockney. When I originally went to college I remember our hall president noting that within a week or two everyone would be talking in the common student accent -- now it seems everyone is slowly affecting those speech patterns as well.
Eventually, at the close of the Q&A (after I’d asked why humans aren’t described as having breeds to be told that its because we can all make love with each other perfectly well from the Eskimo to the Aboriginal) an argument sprang over the question of whether creationism should be taught in schools. Surprisingly, Profressor Jones said that he thought that it should, but then tempered that admission by saying that it should only be at the opening of a science course to say ‘at one point we thought that the world was only 6000 years old -- now we think it’s something rather different’.
On the way home I did wonder why we are given religious education in school in this day and age at least as a separate subject. Then it occurred to be, that its actually a simplified version of a Theology and Philosophy class, getting kids to think about the big questions in a small way, just as all of the other subjects are simpler versions of the larger subjects they become at university level. Instead of Wittgenstein and Socrates though, in school they have a stricter context and at the same time (assuming things haven’t changed too much since I went to school) introduce children brought up in one faith into the ideas and teachings of others.
All of this does touch upon some deeply held beliefs. Jones notes that one of the reasons that he is skeptical about religion (he’s an atheist) is because gene research has actually found a part of our make-up which means that we have tendency for religious belief, and why would we have that if God exists? But even he concedes that we need to at least have an awareness of religion because it’s part of society and we’d have to be entirely ignorant if we decided to try and stop ourselves from being exposed to it, even if it’s to understand the opposing view. As he says, you can’t refute that The King James Bible is an amazing piece of literature.
Ultimately, the lecture didn’t change any of my own beliefs but at least confirmed that in some cases I was on the right track. I won’t be changing what I’ve written on Facebook under the Religious Views heading to something other than ‘Questioner‘. I really can’t explain why, despite my misgivings about monotheistic religions why I’m often awed in churches. As I’ve said before though it could simply be that I’m taking in the human achievement that’s led to the creation of even the smallest of medieval churches and their historical legacy.
After all, I felt much the same way as I sat in that lecture theatre today with its Scandinavian-style wood panelling -- but perhaps I was just feeling a bit nostalgic, it being the first time I’d sat in an ampitheatre of learning since I left university for the second time last year. I can’t ever deny to myself that I’m never happier than when I’m learning and I suppose if Professor Jones can go, as he described, from working at Unilever to becoming one of the foremost thinkers on Biology, that scarily enough my academic journey might not be over just yet.
I’ve always thought of Jones as being one of those celebrity professors in the same bracket as Richard Dawkins and Stephen Hawking, a household name with books and television and radio productions with his name on them. So I was amazed to hear that no one I mentioned the talk to had heard of him, which possibly says more about me than them. But I did want to go along to see the man essentially doing his day job, lecturing to students (although the talk was open to all). He was a highly entertaining speaker, offering photographs from bushorchimp.com to demonstrate the similarity between humans and primates.
Despite the surrounds, he wasn’t about to put creationism on trial as such -- this wasn’t going to be an academic version of Inherit The Wind. He even opened the talk by saying that the Old Testament was probably the first genetic text book, full of evolutionary questions such as the development of ancestry. Instead he simply dismissed it out of hand, talking about how the story of Adam and Eve is just one of countless thousands of creation myths all of which are perfectly interesting but unlike Darwin’s theory cannot tested against available data.
He also agreed with my argument from the turn of the year that ‘intelligent design’ is simply an annoying way of trying to rationalize the current unknowns in science and that it’s barmy to teach it on the same level as evolution in schools -- he called it ‘creationism with a college education‘. He said essentially that you could, as I once did, believe that all of science was sparked by a God, but that had nothing to do with the science itself -- the two are entirely different entities and that to talk about the philosophy of science doesn’t work.
This simplifies a one hour lecture and a question and answer session down to its fundamentals but Professor Jones covered more ground as he demonstrated how evolution works, using the spread of the AIDS virus as an example. I’m not even going to try and pretend I understood all of this (the last time I looked at a science text book was at the age of sixteen) but I think what he was essentially saying was that the reason that AIDS has spread in humans rather than chimps is because at least physically we’re far less evolved than they are -- there are elements of their immune system better suited to coping with an influx of the virus -- we’re essentially the primate that didn’t evolve.
But the fundamental difference is that we’re intelligent enough to be able to cope with the appearance of the virus because we have the capacity to research and discover ways of treating patients so that they live far longer, we’re clever which is why we’re largely able to survive. Unfortunately, we’re also economically evolved and if I understood the inference as he talked about the plight in Botswana were the average life expectancy has dropped by forty years because AIDS is so virulent and isn’t being treated by the expensive drugs available in the rest of the world. What he did say though was that some members of that population have stronger immune systems than others, so, to use his example, sex workers can have the virus and it doesn’t present itself even as their clients contract pneumonia.
He spoke too of language development, explaining that Darwin could have been influenced by Sir William Jones, a language expert working in the late-Eighteenth century who was the first to infer that all language has a common origin (in much the same way that all life must have developed from somewhere). There was a startling audio clip of the Queen talking to her fellow countrykids during the second world war at the age of sixteen and then of her grandson Harry at the same age, her cut glass receive pronunciation giving way to his posh-mockney. When I originally went to college I remember our hall president noting that within a week or two everyone would be talking in the common student accent -- now it seems everyone is slowly affecting those speech patterns as well.
Eventually, at the close of the Q&A (after I’d asked why humans aren’t described as having breeds to be told that its because we can all make love with each other perfectly well from the Eskimo to the Aboriginal) an argument sprang over the question of whether creationism should be taught in schools. Surprisingly, Profressor Jones said that he thought that it should, but then tempered that admission by saying that it should only be at the opening of a science course to say ‘at one point we thought that the world was only 6000 years old -- now we think it’s something rather different’.
On the way home I did wonder why we are given religious education in school in this day and age at least as a separate subject. Then it occurred to be, that its actually a simplified version of a Theology and Philosophy class, getting kids to think about the big questions in a small way, just as all of the other subjects are simpler versions of the larger subjects they become at university level. Instead of Wittgenstein and Socrates though, in school they have a stricter context and at the same time (assuming things haven’t changed too much since I went to school) introduce children brought up in one faith into the ideas and teachings of others.
All of this does touch upon some deeply held beliefs. Jones notes that one of the reasons that he is skeptical about religion (he’s an atheist) is because gene research has actually found a part of our make-up which means that we have tendency for religious belief, and why would we have that if God exists? But even he concedes that we need to at least have an awareness of religion because it’s part of society and we’d have to be entirely ignorant if we decided to try and stop ourselves from being exposed to it, even if it’s to understand the opposing view. As he says, you can’t refute that The King James Bible is an amazing piece of literature.
Ultimately, the lecture didn’t change any of my own beliefs but at least confirmed that in some cases I was on the right track. I won’t be changing what I’ve written on Facebook under the Religious Views heading to something other than ‘Questioner‘. I really can’t explain why, despite my misgivings about monotheistic religions why I’m often awed in churches. As I’ve said before though it could simply be that I’m taking in the human achievement that’s led to the creation of even the smallest of medieval churches and their historical legacy.
After all, I felt much the same way as I sat in that lecture theatre today with its Scandinavian-style wood panelling -- but perhaps I was just feeling a bit nostalgic, it being the first time I’d sat in an ampitheatre of learning since I left university for the second time last year. I can’t ever deny to myself that I’m never happier than when I’m learning and I suppose if Professor Jones can go, as he described, from working at Unilever to becoming one of the foremost thinkers on Biology, that scarily enough my academic journey might not be over just yet.
Eye of the Gorgon (Part One)
TV Well there I was feeling rather ashamed for not contributing to this season of Stripping Down, when this week’s The Sarah Jane Adventures does the job for me. Who would have thought that there would be a massive reference to the Sontarans in the spin-off in the same week that a giant shot of Stinx, Binx or Minx whatever his name is illustrates the front page and somewhat confirming the possibility that the potato heads are going to be reappearing next year?
I’m sure it’s a coincidence. Not for one minute do I imagine that Russell had to call up Emma Thompson’s mum and say ‘Phyllida love we need you back in for a reshoot. We just found out that Damon Querry’s selected The Time Warrior for the new Stripping Down session on the Behind The Sofa blog and I want to frighten the shit out of the them all for what they said about Torchwood. Plus I’ve decided we’re hold back on the revenge of the Krynoids until the fifth series so we‘ll have to change that bit of dialogue. Yes, right oh. Marvellous. Hoorah!’
The Sarah Jane Adventures: Eye of the Gorgon: Episode One
Less showier than the last fortnight’s sort of series opener but nonetheless enjoyable, Gorgon showed the first signs of growing pains. These generally located around the scenes related to Maria and her parents which in some senses were of the kind you’d expect to find in CBBC dramas and had little to do with the main plot. Character building is important and similar scenes occurred throughout the first few seasons of Buffy The Vampire Slayer and as eventually happened here, the parent did become embroiled in the story, mostly by being effected by whatever supernatural entity is being fought that week - see Bad Eggs as a rather unfortunate example.
In this case, perhaps writer Phil Ford, a veteran of the likes of The Bill, Bad Girls and Waterloo Road (not to mention Captain Scarlett) slipped into the kind of voice used in those shows, and felt that in order for that rather special cliffhanger to have any resonance Alan’s character needed to be built up, for us to be sympathetic to him. The problem is in order to do that, he skipped over a potential rule of showing Maria’s parents outside of her point of view and in a rather long scene about the reasons and consequences of their divorce that mostly seemed to be taking up screen time better served by building the central mystery and the more genre related material. Perhaps the episode ran short and these were the two actors who were available to fill the time, but I do think the show has to decide who the most important characters really are.
I think that cliffhanger would have worked perfectly well if all we knew about the bloke is that he’s Maria’s father -- that’s why it’s shocking. But it is very difficult as an adult to gauge what’s important in children’s drama and it is perhaps a bit unfair to be having a go at the show for something which might just be a fundamental need in something which is being made now for a far younger demographic. Perhaps everything needs to look like Tracey Beaker these days. I don’t know. But I will say that for all that they were very well played, with Yasmin Paige’s moody meltdown a particular highlight reminding me of similar outbursts of aaaaaaaaaah! when I was her age.
The rest of the episode enjoyed a far slower pace than the opening two stories, slowly developing its story rather than simply using some sledgehammer exposition. It’s the first story which hasn’t immediately been about the kids (despite Clyde being the one to suggest they investigate); in another reality it could have Sarah Jane and the tin dog visiting the old people’s home at the start and being given the talisman. In fact, the kids fulfilled a far clearer ‘companion’ role, getting into scrapes, being kidnapped, not doing what they were told leading to everyone falling into a trap.
Yet again, this show is following the OldWho model. Which goes too for the idea of the Gorgon being an alien, influencing the myths of ancient Earth then appearing in the present looking to create havok if it didn’t succeed in gaining the mcguffin of the week? I did wonder though why the Nuns didn’t at least try to gain access to Sarah’s house whilst everyone was out in case the gang had left it behind. But then the sight of three nuns trying to break into a suburban home, even one with turrets, might well have attracted a bit of attention. That said, the scenes in which Sarah Jane described the Greek myths were rather lovely (and Reithian) and I remember my Dad doing exactly the same thing when I was young.
Then there was the aforementioned Sontaran reference which I’m sure only really had resonance to us old timers, and the kids with parents buying the dvds. I suppose you could argue that in this scene, we’re Sarah Jane and the target audience are Maria being told what she needed to know. Plus we've another slightly ambiguous Torchwood reference in the shape of Ghost Machine's concept for the area recording things happening within which can be played back later (see also Kneale's The Stone Tape). That said, at least it’s not the Torchwood reference I imagined initially, that Captain Jack had been married to Phyllida Law’s character Bea all of those years ago and this was another Small World.
Speaking of whom. it’s always surprising and lovely to see and actress of the calibre of Law appearing in this kind of show -- it elevates things somehow and made her character’s condition all the more real. Was I the only one reminded of Billy Hartnell though as she walked through the gardens with Luke in tow? Liz Sladen was given slightly more to do within the story this time and again didn’t disappoint, she really is a marvel and a commanding presence when required. Even taking into the account the audios and video, doesn’t it feel as though she’s been doing this week in and out since the grandmother series was originally on? Daniel Anthony’s Clyde has mellowed too and there’s a lovely little double act on the go with Tommy Knight's Luke -- I suppose that makes him Geordi to the star boy’s Data.
All that’s left to say as we wait for next week’s cliffhanger resolution is that it still remains a very good looking series. Those statues from the same alien artist behind the Blink angels. The totally unrelated Alice Troughton continues to the give the piece a scale which wouldn’t disappoint the mother series -- notice the hand held work as the kids slipped through the convent. As for that convent -- in case you don’t know it’s Cardiff Castle. I know that because I visited in 2005 -- that area where Sarah Jane confronted the Sisters is the library. It’s not authentic at all, a bit of a folly all told but absolutely beautiful and I hope we get to see more of it next week. The children’s play room which has fairy stories and ancient myths painted on the walls would be an opportunity missed.
Next Week: Stone the people.
15 John Dougall
Hamlet played by John Dougall.
Directed by Eoin O'Callaghan.
So from Hamlet in an hour, to half an hour and now a production in half even than that time. Tom Stoppard’s Fifteen Minute Hamlet is excerpted from his longer 1976 play, Dogg's Hamlet, Cahoot's Macbeth, the former section of which is an intellectual exercise in demonstrating the schism between words and context. Three school children, speaking in a new language ‘Dogg’ attempt to put on a production of Hamlet, with this being their resulting production, a collection of excerpts from the major scenes and famous speeches mostly keeping the narrative sense of the piece. Unlike those other short forms though, this is played for laughs and no attempt has been made to construct a story lucid enough to be understandable a novice or someone approaching the play for the first time.
It would be pointless to list all of the omissions, except to say that The Players get but one line, there isn’t time to see Laertes off and that we hear more of mad Ophelia than Ophelia the sane. Rosencrantz and Guidenstern are only mentioned in Hamlet’s letter to Horatio reporting their death. Amazingly, he does manage to cram in Fortinbras though and spends a couple of minutes over the fight sequence, presumably because when staged this would still provide the thrilling conclusion on stage. It’s worth noting too that of the themes he chooses for his narrative through line (such as it is), the emphasis is on the quick marriage of Hamlet mother to his uncle -- many of the lines which aren’t ‘well known’ refer to that.
Then at close of the first run around (which actually lasts thirteen minutes), and after some appreciation from an audience, the play is repeated, in an encore lasting but a two minutes; a whirlwind, there’s scarcely time for anything but Hamlet gets most of the wordage and it only features the actors who would be on stage for the finale. I was reminded of The Last Night of the Proms, the ever quickening tempo during Pomp and Circumstance in which the conductor and orchestra are trying to catch the promenaders out.
This production was broadcast as part of BBC Radio's Three and Four’s Stoppard season in June and July 2007 and since it works so pacefully the radio, I can’t imagine how it might be accomplished on stage. Produced much in the same style as the BBC Millenium productions, weighted with atmospheric sound effects and orchestral music it’s certainly a passionate rendition and through Eoin O'Callaghan's direction importantly shows that in cutting, Stoppard still managed to give each of the characters and so the actors a moment to savour.
What that means is that amazingly it is possible to say that none of the actors embarrasses themselves and that John Dougal’s is a very lucid Hamlet, brooding when he needs to be, his delivery of what’s left of ‘The Readiness is all’ just perfect. It does have a touch of the Olivier’s, but with so little time and so few words to develop a psychological profile for his version of the prince he’s bound to pick a tried and tested model. The cast work so well together, that it’s a shame that all we’ll ever hear of them is in this fifteen minute fragment -- I certainly would have liked to have heard what Jasmine Callan would make of Ophelia over a longer period, Nitin Ganatra’s Horatio too.
"It’s alarming how charming I feel…" --Maria, 'West Side Story'
Film Amazingly, saw West Side Story for the first time tonight and although my media buffeted attention span miniaturized brain thought it was just slightly too long (which would probably be less of an issue if I'd seen it in a cinema where it was originally intended to be seen) I absolutely understand why its considered a classic of its form. I've just discovered that the original stage production is fifty years old this year but everything about the music somehow remains fresh and modern. Here, Mark Steyn considers its origins:
"The year before West Side, My Fair Lady opened, cleaving to the rules of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical play and doing it so spectacularly that, afterwards, the form had nowhere else to go. West Side symbolised the possibilities of the future: New stories told in new ways. West Side doesn't have an opening number as such, just a wordless musical "Prologue" to accompany the Sharks and Jets as they dance out - or mime - their increasing hostility until, finally, the Shark leader cuts off the ear of a Jet. Never mind waiting for Pauline Kael to pronounce it dated, on its very opening night it risked sniggers: the gentlemen of the chorus nancying about pretending to be tough guys. But the audience bought it: Jerome Robbins, Broadway's master stager, proved you could tell a story about gang warfare through show dancing."It certainly can. It's a bit of trust between the audience and the film or production -- that we're watching a fantasy set in a world with different rules about social interaction. This may be going a bit too far though.