Kafka in his Pockets
Today's crap joke: "Did you hear Cian O Connor's horse tested positive for grass?". This is up there with "How do you kill a circus?" (go for the juggler), the difference between a Snickers and a Marathon (Paula Radcliffe can finish a Snickers) and Paula Radcliffe being the first English woman to go to Greece and not go all the way.
Thank you Marian Grealis.
Marian dragged a bunch of us along to see Stones in his Pockets in the LIT Millenium theatre last night. The play (which has been extremely successful) is set among the extras for a movie being shot in a small town in Kerry. The gimmick is that there are no props, no costume changes and only 2 (male) actors, playing 14 different characters (2 of which are women). This takes advantage of the fact that it is rare in a play for more than 2 characters to be talking to each other at any given time. Still, with only accents and body language to disambiguate the characters, the actors did an incredible job. With scenes set on a busy movie set or in a funeral home, with characters coming and going all over the place and three-way conversations happening - the whole thing is seamless. With clever use of subtle music and lighting cues, they even manage to drop in scenes from the movie they're filming.
The play is billed as a comedy, but with a suicide at the centre (hence the title), it covers some pretty serious terrain. Since it's Irish, these are the typical big-dreams/small-town stuff, but it's done fairly well. In fact, they make explicit at one point that this is supposed to be a universal thing. Sorta like the Fight Club idea that we are not all beautiful unique snowflakes, we can't all be rockstars or filmstars - and at some point everyone has to grow up and accept they will never be famous/rich/beautiful/powerful. They didn't hammer on this too much though.
At least there weren't any nuns, abusive priests or unwed mothers (which must be a first for Irish theatre). I thought the ending was a little bit sudden and weak...nothing really gets resolved. But then, I guess that's the point of the play.
The comedy part of it is ok too. They take on some obvious targets (Oirishness, self-obsessed filmstars, rural gormlessness vs. urban sophistication...and vice versa), but they have reasonably wide range.
The part that puzzles me, is would I have liked it as much if it had been done with props and a full cast? I can count the number of plays I've seen in the last decade on the fingers of one hand (and I wouldn't need the thumb) - so it's hard to make an objective judgement about the quality of the acting/writing and all that stuff. I give it about 2 years before RTE ruins it by making a lavish 3-part mini-series out of it.
Oh, and today's cool link is this one. The Sims2 meet Kafka. It's too long, but it is funny. The social bunny stuff is just plain surreal.
And last thing, Cron, if you're reading this before you leave on your epic journey, I may have exaggerated slightly when I said there would be a bed available for you here. What I meant to say of course was sofa. Slip of the tongue, sorry.
[edit] Apparently you have a bed after all. Jeff is going to California for a couple of weeks and you get your old room back.
Thank you Marian Grealis.
Marian dragged a bunch of us along to see Stones in his Pockets in the LIT Millenium theatre last night. The play (which has been extremely successful) is set among the extras for a movie being shot in a small town in Kerry. The gimmick is that there are no props, no costume changes and only 2 (male) actors, playing 14 different characters (2 of which are women). This takes advantage of the fact that it is rare in a play for more than 2 characters to be talking to each other at any given time. Still, with only accents and body language to disambiguate the characters, the actors did an incredible job. With scenes set on a busy movie set or in a funeral home, with characters coming and going all over the place and three-way conversations happening - the whole thing is seamless. With clever use of subtle music and lighting cues, they even manage to drop in scenes from the movie they're filming.
The play is billed as a comedy, but with a suicide at the centre (hence the title), it covers some pretty serious terrain. Since it's Irish, these are the typical big-dreams/small-town stuff, but it's done fairly well. In fact, they make explicit at one point that this is supposed to be a universal thing. Sorta like the Fight Club idea that we are not all beautiful unique snowflakes, we can't all be rockstars or filmstars - and at some point everyone has to grow up and accept they will never be famous/rich/beautiful/powerful. They didn't hammer on this too much though.
At least there weren't any nuns, abusive priests or unwed mothers (which must be a first for Irish theatre). I thought the ending was a little bit sudden and weak...nothing really gets resolved. But then, I guess that's the point of the play.
The comedy part of it is ok too. They take on some obvious targets (Oirishness, self-obsessed filmstars, rural gormlessness vs. urban sophistication...and vice versa), but they have reasonably wide range.
The part that puzzles me, is would I have liked it as much if it had been done with props and a full cast? I can count the number of plays I've seen in the last decade on the fingers of one hand (and I wouldn't need the thumb) - so it's hard to make an objective judgement about the quality of the acting/writing and all that stuff. I give it about 2 years before RTE ruins it by making a lavish 3-part mini-series out of it.
Oh, and today's cool link is this one. The Sims2 meet Kafka. It's too long, but it is funny. The social bunny stuff is just plain surreal.
And last thing, Cron, if you're reading this before you leave on your epic journey, I may have exaggerated slightly when I said there would be a bed available for you here. What I meant to say of course was sofa. Slip of the tongue, sorry.
[edit] Apparently you have a bed after all. Jeff is going to California for a couple of weeks and you get your old room back.
posted by batgimp | 6:08 p.m.
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