Requiem for Australian TV

'Coming soon' - or already here? (the sequel)

Just remembered a couple more of my favourite trailers so thought I would throw them into the mix....

The Life Of David Gale turned out to be a pretty bad film, but the trailer was really exciting. I guess the issue with a lot of good trailers that turn into bad movies is that in a trailer you just have to show us moments of excitement and tension, with no responsibility to explain the set-ups, etc. When viewing the finished movie, sometimes these same moments can be exposed as contrived, unjustified or unrealistic.

I thought 8 Mile was actually a good movie - although still not as good as the trailer!

'Coming soon' - or already here?

Writing my post the other day about titles raised some questions in my mind about the nature of art. Can the title of a book, movie, song, or similar have a kind of artistic merit by itself, regardless of the quality (or otherwise) of the work it describes? Most of the examples I gave were titles that appealed to me because they triggered something in my mind - a memory, or the recognition of an emotion from the past - that might have nothing to do with the content of the work.

I have similar feelings about movie trailers. Occasionally I see a trailer that appeals to me as something to watch on its own (although the difference is that if I like a trailer it almost inevitably makes me want to watch the movie). For instance, take a look at this trailer for Kenneth Branagh's 1996 version of Hamlet, and see how exciting it is:

The cast! The music! The colour and movement! The action! ... The cast! The movie itself turned out to be pretty good, but who would want to sit through a four-hour unabridged version of Shakespeare's longest play, when you can see all the best shots, and glimpse all the big stars, in a minute and a half? I was 15 years old when I first saw this trailer, and I remember it leaving me breathless with excitement. I wanted to watch it over and over again. I kind of still do.

But the tone and mood of a trailer can often be surprisingly different from that of the film in its entirety. For instance, the trailer for Baz Luhrmann's Australia:

gave the impression of an old-fashioned sweeping epic in the style of Old Hollywood. So, on watching the movie I was very surprised to see it incongruously infused with Luhrmann's trademark slapstick elements, speeded-up camera footage, etc. I loathed Australia-the-movie. So much. One day I may write a post about it - called Baz Luhrmann earned my trust and then abused it spectacularly, leaving me feeling depressed, confused and angry.

Another favourite of mine - and an example of a great trailer that promotes a mediocre movie - is this one, for 1997's Paradise Road:

Doesn't it look great? Corny, sure - but all those great actresses; a rollicking great war story; triumph over adversity (through art!) - how could you not be thrilled? In fact, it was pretty average. But even knowing that, I still find the trailer exciting.

Then there's the old disguising-the-fact-that-this-movie-has-subtitles trick:

In fact, I thought 8 Women was a really fun movie, and would recommend it to anyone, but I do think it's strange that the only line of dialogue in the trailer is the isolated (and dramatically irrelevant) moment when one of the characters says "That is the question" in English - and that the rest of the plot is covered by an (English-language, naturally) voice-over. That's like advertising an American movie in France, and including a random shot of someone saying "C'est la vie!". It seems to be trying too hard to say 'Look! This movie is accessible to you!", rather than concentrating on what really makes the film appealing.

All of the points mentioned above hinge around one major issue - the fact that a trailer is not created as a piece of art, but as a promotional tool - no matter how noble the film-makers' intentions, and no matter how free from studio interference they have been, the trailer is always created entirely to persuade people to shell out and buy a ticket. Does this mean there can be no artistic merit?...

The most exciting trailer around at the moment (for my money) isn't for a movie at all, but a TV series - Boardwalk Empire. The first episode was broadcast a couple of nights ago in America, so we'll soon see whether it lives up to the trailer's promise...

Gimme More

I'm very excited about taking Britney Spears: The Cabaret to Melbourne in October. This remarkable little gem of a show was written by Dean Bryant as a one-woman show for the incredible Christie Whelan - originally for the Adelaide Cabaret Festival 2009. We at Luckiest Productions have been fortunate enough to produce the show in Sydney last year, and now an upcoming season at Chapel off Chapel in Melbourne.

The show is a brilliant and multi-layered piece, which is both a satire (of Spears's public image, and of wider celebrity culture) - but also an attempt to make audiences empathise with the girl in the spotlight (not an easy task for a writer or performer where this girl is concerned!) A large part of the success of the show is the incredible job Musical Director Mathew Frank has done of adapting Britney's perky, sexy, and over-produced pop songs into cabaret numbers - from a slow and stripped-down Toxic, to a version of Slave 4 U which gives a glimpse into Britney's life as a hard-working and strangely sexualised child star on The Mickey Mouse Club. The way that Christie scales this range of moods and emotions in her performance is testament to her considerable acting talent, as well as her versatility as a singer, dancer and comedienne. One of the most common reactions from people who've seen the show is that they expected to laugh, but were shocked that they ended up crying too. It takes you on a journey - as any piece of art should - and works in many ways more like a piece of theatre than a cabaret show.

One of the best things about being a producer is being able to take shows that you believe in, and try to bring them to wider audience. It's really rewarding working on Britney Spears: The Cabaret because I'm so confident that every person I get through that door will walk out satisfied and fulfilled.

I'm also looking forward to spending three weeks living in Melbourne while the show is on - a lot of my friends are living down there at the moment, but I have a complicated attitude towards that city. But that's for another blog!

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On Titles

I've been thinking today about titles. Titles of books, films, albums, etc have always been important to me, and sometimes a good title will stay with me for a long time, even after I've forgotten much about the work it describes (or perhaps never seen/read/heard it). It's very hard to describe why a title has an effect on us - it can be penetrating, or humorous, or surprising... I guess any memorable title is something that contains a truth that jumps out at us and helps us to relate to something in our own life in some small way. In that respect I suppose a good title has the same qualities as any good piece of art, only in miniature.

I know that when I was coming up with a title for this blog I spent a whole evening mulling over various alternatives, before eventually settling on the above pun because I felt it encapsulated the melding of high and low culture that I wanted to explore.

Here are some of my favourite titles. As for the works they describe - some of them I love with all my heart, some I quite like, and some I am completely ambivalent about....

Leslie Howard, I want to be like you...

"Howard was one of early twentieth century Britain's most revered actors and matinee idols ... He usually served as producer and/or director of the Broadway productions in which he starred. He was also a playwright ... His Hollywood roles included Professor Henry Higgins in the film Pygmalion, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award ... Howard is perhaps best remembered for his role as Ashley Wilkes in Gone With The Wind, but he was uncomfortable with Hollywood and returned to England to help with the war effort ... He died in 1943 when his aircraft was shot down by the Luftwaffe ... Howard had been traveling through Spain and Portugal, ostensibly lecturing on film, but also meeting with local propagandists and shoring up support for the Allied cause ... The Bogarts named their daughter Leslie after him."

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You can be stupid and still dangerous...

Glenn Beck, 28th August 2010: "I am not a journalist". (3:35)

Glenn Beck, 31st August 2010: "I am launching a news website".

If you are like me, watching the news or reading the paper can be an exercise in exasperation. It’s so hard to find a place that helps me make sense of the world I see.
Too many important stories are overlooked. And too many times we see mainstream media outlets distorting facts to fit rigid agendas. Not that you’ve ever heard me complain about the media before. Okay, maybe once or twice.
But there comes a time when you have to stop complaining and do something. And so we decided to hire some actual journalists to launch a new website — The Blaze. And we moved fast. We built the team and the site in just two months.
We want this to be a place where you can find breaking news, original reporting, insightful opinions and engaging videos about the stories that matter most.
The Blaze will be about current news — and more. It’s not just politics and policy. It’s looking for insight wherever we find it. We’ll examine our culture, deal with matters of faith and family, and we won’t be afraid of a history lesson.
Flame is a powerful image. It has long stood for a burning truth. A truth that is not consumed. The Blaze will pursue truth. Of course we will make mistakes. Honest mistakes. And we’ll be quick with corrections. We intend to earn your trust and keep it day in and day out with hard work and a lot of transparency.
And don’t expect everything to be deadly serious. Boring is bad. We intend to have plenty of fun.
We’ve put together a solid team of writers and reporters. I intend to keep them busy by sending a zillion story ideas at all hours.
We’re also counting on you. Your comments. Your feedback. Your tips! You will help us build and shape The Blaze.
Thank you in advance.
Glenn Beck

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/a-message-from-glenn/

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And the winner is... Competition

Something that's really irked me recently is a podcast from the BBC's Today programme about the dismantling of the Audit Commission in the UK. David Cameron's Conservative Party have been in power there for several months now, and are pursuing an agressively cost-saving agenda that is purportedly a way of digging the UK out of deficit, but is also raising concerns about the value that Cameron's Conservatives (13 Old Etonians in the Cabinet, folks) place on services that are important to poorer people, as well as institutions that hold government accountable. It seems that any time a Prime Minister tries to position himself as a regular, balanced kind of guy who's just like you, he's about to try and justify a plan to reduce the checks and balances on his own office.

Now, who knows whether the Audit Commission was doing a good job or not? Whether it was necessary or not? Whether it was efficient or not? Its stated aim was to monitor and regulate the spending of local government and the NHS - which certainly makes it sound like the commission was saving money rather than wasting it, but maybe there's more to it than that. Lord knows I can't claim to be an economic expert. What bothers me about all this is the way in which the Conservative government has gone about dismantling the body, and the dubious reasoning they have used to justify it to the public. It seems to be one of the least attractive character traits of the right wing that they demonstrate a low opinion of the public's intelligence, and show a tendency to push blatantly dishonest reasoning onto us, and then steadfastly defend it with a straight face. It's insulting - and very, very irritating.

The aforementioned podcast featured an interview with Local Government Minister Bob Neill, who had been sent along to explain the reasoning he - and Secretary of State for Commumities and Local Government Eric Pickles - used in making their decision.

Incidentally, this is what Bob Neill and Eric Pickles look like.

I think we can all agree that - speaking purely aesthetically for a moment - you couldn't find two more objectionable examples of everything people hate about Tories.

Anyway - among the things the Audit Commission is attacked for in this interview are:

- Buying pot plants for its offices

- Providing bagels for guests who had come in for meetings

- Funding a 'day out at Newmarket Race Course' for its staff

Incidentallly, on that last point - what they had actually done is hire some conference rooms at Newmarket for staff training (on a non-racing day), as they had established that this would be cheaper than maintaining in-house facilities. This is so absurdly different that it makes the government's 'spinning' veer dangerously close to outright lies.

Bob Neill boasts in this interview that the Conservative government has just cancelled the contract for newspapers delivered to minsters' offices, "because we don't think that's necessary. Individual people can bring in their own - that's what happens in most of the world isn't it?" This view of newspapers as recreational shows a terrifying lack of interest in world events that has echoes of George W Bush's White House. Besides, how much money is this going to save? Less than a fiver a day? Not going to make much of a dent in the 160 billion pound deficit, is it?

But the really offensive part of the justification comes when the government attempts to explain why they want to replace the Audit Commission with identical services farmed out to the private sector. Asked whether he thinks these private companies would spend similar or greater amounts on catering, conference rooms, etc, Neill replies incredulously that that would be entirely a matter for them, and certainly none of his business - as if these expenses exist completely independently of the companies' business activities, and will have no effect whatsoever on the ultimate cost charged back to the taxpayer.

One of the words that Neill uses repeatedly in this interview is "competitive" - using the private sector is better because the prices are more competitive; the Audit Commission has been dumped because it was not competitive enough. But I don't want my public services to be competitively priced - at least, I don't want that to be their first concern. I want their first concern to be that they do the job required of them, properly and thoroughly. Does anyone really believe that the private sector can do these jobs more cheaply because they've found a magical way of getting 150 pence out of each pound? Or do we all actually understand that they do so by cutting corners, fudging figures, manipulating appearances, exploiting workers, and of course charging things through the back door?

Blindly prizing the wisdom of the private sector over good public ownership has often produced horrific results - from the woeful train services in the UK, to the USA's notorious healthcare situation. But it saves money - so no doubt conservative politicians will keep following the same road, in their endless quests for tax cuts. Like everyone else, I think it would be lovely to have lower taxes because we've saved waste in govenment - but I don't see that abolishing the Audit Commission is a very logical way to do that.

Dry Season

I'm currently having a month off alcohol. No, wait, wait - this is not one of those smug announcements that's meant to make me look superior to you because I've managed the gargantuan feat of stumbling my way through 31 entire days without pouring a bucket of vodka, lime and soda down my throat at regular intervals. And I'm certainly not looking for sponsorship (Dry July coming second only to Frocktober in the list of underwhelming achievements for which we are asked to shell out actual money, in my opinion).

The truth is, I have forced myself to have an alcohol-free August because I needed it. I'd spent June at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival - which is of course a booze-fest first, and a gathering of international artists second. This is fair enough, but when I came back to Sydney in need of a rest period, I actually walked slap bang into a July that was strangely crammed with birthdays, leaving parties, opening nights, and the like. As a result, I partied more in July 2010 than I have in possibly any other month of my life. Not always in a fun, crazy way - but often in an excessive, increasingly unattractive, and eventually belligerent way, that displayed all the signs of someone who didn't know how to say no, and was starting to lose touch with whether drinking and partying was actually enjoyable, or just Something They Do. Other warning signs included one morning where for the first time in my 29 years, I woke up and remembered nothing at all after a certain point the night before (including getting home); and a list of lost items from my nights out that included my beloved leather jacket, my favourite scarf, some $400 glasses that I'd purchased only a month earlier, and - most mortifyingly of all - my friend Dean's laptop (yes, that was all in July).

In addition to this, I had worn myself down to the point where getting out of bed each day (not just the days after a binge) had become a trial, and where much of my life was spent in an exhausted daze. So a dry August was more of a necessity than an indulgence; and because I am by nature an all-or-nothing kind of person, I decided to rule out tea and coffee at the same time. There would be no uppers, and no downers - just decent food, and lots of good nights' sleep.

So far I'm two weeks in, and I have to say the effect is clearly noticeable. I have very swiftly become a morning person - something I never thought would happen - and get out of bed every day with a spring in my step. By contrast, I have very little desire to do anything in the evenings except stay in and watch a DVD, read a book, or something else equally relaxing. I have also become much more motivated than before, and have got around to doing lots of little things I have been putting off for ages - booking a dentist's appointment, finding an accountant to file my tax return, etc.

All of this leads to the question: what am I going to do when September comes around? I do miss the social side of drinking (I can't see myself going to the pub, or a party, or an opening night, without having a few drinks), and I really miss having a coffee too (I live in Potts Point, for goodness sake). But I'm also really relishing my new energy levels. I suspect the only real way to have both will be the dreaded Exercise. Now that I'm pushing 30, I can no longer expect to regularly pound my body with toxins for recreational purposes, and then roll out of bed 6 hours later with bright eyes and a bushy tail, ready to seize the day. I'm still not anywhere near being able to face joining Fitness First, but if you do happen to see me running up and down the Woolloomooloo steps, or glimpse me lifting a dumbell through the windows of my apartment - be aware that it's not a 'new me', but merely a trade-off for the opportunity to enjoy my next Saturday night outing.

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This is what a champion looks like...

Like a good middle-class British boy, I love tennis, and especially Wimbledon. It seems to be taken for granted that men's tennis is more exciting to watch than women's, but I always preferred the women's game. Watching Wimbledon as a kid in my school holidays, I witnessed the last years of Martina Navratilova's dominance, followed by the rise of Steffi Graf, and the rivalries always seemed more exciting than those between, say, Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi. For the last decade of course, the dominant figures in the women's tennis world have been the Williams sisters, Venus and Serena. Their success is extraordinary in many ways, but the most amazing thing about it is the unconventional way in which they entered the circuit. Trained by their father from a young age, he largely kept them out of the junior competitions that it was always assumed were a necessary training ground for the major tournaments. Instead, they were unleashed onto the tennis world as adults around 1997/8, surprising everyone by becoming strong competitors immediately, and dominant forces within only a few years.

I have huge respect for them both, but for various reasons Serena has always been my real heroine. Largely it's because she wears her heart on her sleeve more than Venus, who is a much cooler customer. Serena never hides how hard she works to win, or how important it is to her to do so. As a result, I go on the ride with her every time. There's something so thrilling about the tennis she plays - both powerful and skilful - and about the fact that it seems to come from instinct, defying all the conventions of this most conventional game. It's always appealing when an outsider bursts into a stuffy and uptight environment and shakes it up, and Serena has been able to do this because she is demonstrably the best player in the world, and therefore commands respect - however grudgingly people in the tennis world afford it to her (and that's without even going into the race issue).

The above Nike ad sums up what it is I admire about her - I know it must have been invented by a marketing executive, but it distills the impression she gives about her attitude to her career (in this case, when she had to work her way up the rankings after taking time out due to the murder of one of her sisters - when she returned people mocked her for being out-of-shape and 'past it').

In fact, Serena gets a lot of criticism, mainly for being aggressive, arrogant, etc - most of which, it seems to me, is rooted at least to some degree in good old-fashioned sexism. But the great thing is that, while this bothers people like me, she herself doesn't seem to care. She's not interested in being liked, she just wants to be the best player she can be.

"Luck has nothing to do with it, because I have spent many, many hours, countless hours, on the court working for my one moment in time, not knowing when it would come." Serena Williams

There's no place like [insert city here]

Is it true that absence makes the heart grow fonder? I've spent most of the last month in Adelaide - this would normally be a cause for despair, but since it was for the Adelaide Cabaret Festival, one of the most fun and exciting events of the year, it was actually pretty wonderful (not to mention that Leo Campbell had just made his debut in the world and I got to hang out with him a lot). But even though I had an amazing time in Adelaide, it was still thrilling to come back to Sydney. My concepts of 'home' are very confused - I was born in London, grew up in Bedfordshire, spent some very resonant years at university in Norwich, and then created my adult life back in London again. But for the last two years I have lived exclusively in Sydney, and it's unquestionably where my life is at the moment. I have been amazingly lucky to make so many wonderful and exciting friends, and to somehow end up doing an amazing job with people I love. I have the enviable experience of being conscious every day of how much I love living in the city I live in, and doing what I am doing for a living (something I doubt I would do so much if I had lived here all my life, or always done the same job).

I know that a lot of people attach sentimentality or emotion to things, places or people that have been in their lives for a long time (childhood homes, schoolfriends, etc), but for some reason I have always got a thrill from the new. I have a habit of making new friends that jump straight into the centre of my life - I have an instinct for people that I will get along with particularly well, and am not shy about making them into close friends immediately. This is not to say that I don't have some very close old friends - the new ones are added to the old, they don't replace them. And it's the same with Sydney - I wouldn't argue that it's 'home' to me in any sense except the literally physical, but it's the only place I want to be right now - even though I do miss my friends in London (and around the world) terribly. Becoming a Sydneysider, with all that that has entailed, has not made me any less of a Londoner, and does not mean that I value my life in the UK any less. When I lived in London, I was something of a 'London snob', and hated having to leave, even for the weekend. Even getting to the stage of moving over here for a year (as I initally did) took a great deal of maturing, and opening my eyes to the wider world. I got to an age where I realised that if I left town for a week, or a month, or a year, or longer, my friends wouldn't forget about me, I wouldn't have closed the door on my career, and I wouldn't have lost touch with British culture. The fact that I am now in Sydney indefinitely also doesn't make me feel any further away from the UK (figuratively) - not least because there are so many Brits in Sydney, and I'm friends with most of them! (Skype also helps).

I think some of my friends in London found it hard when I left, because they understandably thought that the fact that I wanted to make a new life somewhere else (even for a while) meant that I must be in some way unhappy or unfulfilled in the life I had there, with them. That's not even remotely true. I can't explain what it was that made me come to Sydney, or stay here - but it's no reflection on London, which I still love - and certainly no reflection on my London friends, who are still some of the most extraordinary, and important, people in my life.

I have no idea when I will return to the UK, or even if I'll end up living in another country at some point. But where some people might be worried by this uncertainty, I thrive on it. To pull out a cliché - the world is my oyster. How lucky can you get?

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The Harcourt Interpolation

Sometimes I see things on Wikipedia which are so great that they're worth simply cutting and pasting for your amusement....

The Harcourt interpolation was a minor scandal of Victorian London.

The 23 January 1882 edition of The Times included a report of a speech made at Burton upon Trent by Sir William Harcourt, then Home Secretary. Into this speech an unknown prankster inserted the parenthetical observation that "The speaker then said that he felt inclined for a bit of fucking". The piece read:

I saw in a Tory journal the other day a note of alarm, in which they said “Why, if a tenant-farmer is elected for the North Riding of Yorkshire the farmers will be a political power who will have to be reckoned with”. The speaker then said he felt inclined for a bit of fucking. I think that is very likely. (Laughter). But I think it is rather an extraordinary thing that the Tory party have not found that out before.

—The Times, 23 January 1882

Sir William Harcourt

The interpolation was not noticed until after the newspaper had been circulated. A revised copy was printed for subscribers, and an apology appeared in the issue for 27 January 1882:

No pains have been spared by the management of this journal to discover the author of a gross outrage committed by the interpolation of a line in the speech of Sir William Harcourt … and it is hoped that the perpetrator of this outrage will be brought to punishment.

—The Times, 27 January 1882

The culprit was apparently not immediately identified, because a similar addition was made to an advertisement for the book Everyday Life in Our Public Schools in the issue of The Times for 12 June 1882. This book was said to include "a glossary of some words used by Henry Irving in his disquisitions upon fucking, which is in common use in these schools". The Times maintained a dignified silence about this, but for many years after it was a rule on the Times that any compositor who was sacked left immediately and did not work out a period of notice.

Add Some Music To Your Day

Warning: if you are going to read this blog, then you need to be aware that I am obsessed with Brian Wilson.

I will probably be going on about him (and the Beach Boys) a lot, because my tiny brain cannot really handle how much of a genius he is, and so I regard him as a kind of demi-god. I have many musical heroes, but for me, the music Brian Wilson has created is in a different league. It has had a profound effect on my life - listening to it gives me the same feeling as you get when someone gives you some totally unexpected, fantastic, life-changing news.

So - that said, here is a great video of Brian performing live. it's kind of a perfect representation of his music, because it starts out with Surf's Up (a triumph of melody and harmony, and possibly the most beautiful of all his compositions), and it ends with a song about vegetables.

Enjoy!...

The Kindness of Strangers

I was thinking today about the series of evening appearances by visiting writers that I attended while studying English & American Literature at the University of East Anglia from 1999-2002. The prestigious reputation (if I say so myself) of UEA's School of English & American Studies gave it the chance to draw some stunning literary heavyweights to give readings and be interviewed in front of us students, right there in Lecture Theatre 1.

This is Lecture Theatre 1

Guests that I had the chance to see first-hand for only a few pounds a ticket included not just major UK-based authors like Kazuo Ishiguro, Jung Chang, and Dame Muriel Spark (authors of four of my very favourite books between them - respectively The Remains of the Day & When We Were Orphans; Wild Swans; and The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie); but also writers visiting from overseas - like Joseph Heller, and even Arthur Miller. Arthur Miller! A man who not only wrote some of the most celebrated plays of the 20th century, but who of course was also married to Marilyn Monroe - which surely is no less impressive an achievement. And this man sat down and read from his own works, was interviewed by one of my lecturers, and took questions from the audience - just so that I and my fellow students (plus some interested Norwich locals) could hear him.

Arthur Miller in conversation

It was a rare privilege (not least because Heller, Miller and Spark all died within a few years of my seeing them), and one that makes me value my time at university even more in retrospect. What a wonderful sense of community writers have - to traipse around the world sharing their talents with others for what must be pretty limited financial gain - and often ending up speaking to audiences which are frankly beneath them intellectually (a fact Joseph Heller tacitly acknowledged when the floor was thrown open to the public, by pre-empting what must depressingly be the most common questions he hears: "No I didn't have anything to do with the movie of Catch 22; Yes I liked it."). Christopher Fry was full of anecdotes about 'Larry and Vivien' and the golden age of British theatre - and at more than 90 years old he was still willing to come out and share them with us on a rainy winter's night.

I admit to falling somewhat into the trap of youth by subconsciously assuming that life would always afford me opportunities like this - taking for granted that such titans would always present themselves on my doorstep and for my entertainment and betterment - and it's only now that I look back and appreciate it fully. But I'll always have my signed copies of Catch 22, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, etc. I'll always be able to remember that when I told Muriel Spark that Brodie was one of my favourite books, she looked genuinely thrilled - as if nobody had ever said it to her before - and said "Really?" in a delighted tone, (especially gratifying from someone who had a rather legendary reputation as 'difficult', to put it tactfully). And not only do I have those memories and mementos, but these experiences contributed immeasurably to my love for literature. When I saw Joseph Heller, I had never read Catch 22 - but I soon did, and it blew my mind. When Frank McCourt (then a million-selling celebrity with the success of Angela's Ashes) told us that he hadn't started writing until late middle-age, it expanded my notions of what I could do with my life. And most impacting of all, having the chance to see and even speak to people who had so shaped the world of literature and wider culture before I was even born, went some way to helping me understand the sometimes thrilling, and sometimes terrifying, truth of Faulkner's words:

"The past is not dead. It's not even past."

Extraordinary People

These two people can really act.

I know I'm about 30 years late to the party on this one, but I just watched Ordinary People for the first time. I loved it! Having known it only as That Movie That Should Never Have Beaten Raging Bull To The Best Picture Oscar, I was really impressed by the subtlety and intricacy of the plotting, writing and acting. Unlike the American 'family dramas' that my generation grew up watching, there was no manufactured drama, no sentimentality, and definitely no pat happy ending. It was a painful but realistic portrait of a family being torn apart by an inability to communicate in the wake of two terrible (connected) events. Mary Tyler Moore was a revelation in a very unsympathetic role; and I now finally understand what all the fuss was about where Timothy Hutton was concerned. What a great performance, especially for a debut! It's a tragedy that he didn't make a better movie career for himself - just think of the performances he could have given.

Of course the down-side of all this is that it does make me a bit depressed, in a they-don't-make-them-like-this-anymore type way. It's a testament to the fact that getting major writers, directors and actors together can produce an interesting film that actually says something. When was the last time you saw a new Hollywood movie like that?...

Not this one, that's for sure...

Anyway, I'm so glad I finally got around to watching Ordinary People - on the plus side, isn't it great when you experience for the first time a film; or book; or any piece of art, that has been around for a long time - and you're moved by it? It makes me feel like there is so much more out there to discover.

"The best moments in reading are when you come across something - a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things - that you'd thought special, particular to you. And here it is, set down by someone else, a person you've never met, maybe even someone long dead. And it's as if a hand has come out, and taken yours."

Alan Bennett, 'The History Boys'

Ain't No Sunshine...

My friend Kirsty resenting the Sydney rain - October 2009

Rain in Sydney is a curious thing. It's pretty rare, and when it happens it's generally no worse than anywhere else in the world - and best of all, it doesn't usually hang around very long. But it produces a resentment in Sydneysiders (including myself) which is strangely out-of-proportion. I guess when you're spoiled with good weather (as with anything), you're bound to have a worse reaction when it's taken away, even for a short while.

From my own point of view, I think my resentment comes from having moved here all the way from London - and although the weather wasn't a particularly big factor in my re-location, I do have a subconscious sense that Sydney has a duty to live up to its reputation somewhat. I admit that I can occasionally be heard to whinge (and how Australians love to hear 'whinging poms') that "if I wanted rain I'd have stayed in London" - which is neither logical nor realistic - nor indeed, true.

Certainly, since living in Sydney I have become much more aware of how the weather affects people's moods. I'd given it lip-service acknowledgement before, but when you move to a warmer climate it really is astounding how much of an effect it has on your life. I've also noticed how true the cliché is about British people constantly talking about the weather. All I hear in the winter from my British friends on Skype, email, Facebook, etc is how miserable the weather is; then in the summer (briefly) how glorious it is. I suppose there's always something to talk about in the UK because the weather is so changeable - after the 100th straight day of sunshine in Sydney, you don't really think to mention it.

Anyway, as I'm typing these words, the Sydney rain is pattering on the window in a particularly British drizzle, and I'm trying my best not to be irritated by it. This always helps:

(Don't) Stop messin' about...

I'm reading The Kenneth Williams Diaries at the moment. He was a peculiarly British character, and his celebrity was a testament to my home nation's enduring affection for eccentrics of all types - even effete, acidic homosexuals at a time when such a thing was still illegal.

His diaries are fascinating. I was a little apprehensive before I started reading them that the day-to-day pensées of even someone as witty as Williams wouldn't hold the attention for 800+ pages, but in fact it's as gripping as any novel or autobiography. Not just his name-dropping, forthright opinions, and outrageously indiscreet anecdotes, (all of which are extremely entertaining), but also the way you can clearly map how the repression of his sexuality - even while audiences loved him for his camp extravagance - led inexorably to agonising, self-loathing, and eventually suicide.

The diaries are heartily recommended, and let's cherish all our great British eccentrics - from Tony Benn and Patrick Moore, to Brian Sewell and the Two Fat Ladies. Here's a bit of Ken in his native habitat....