RSS feedSpeaking of Impro and Theatresports, I feel a bit guilty, because I have the no. 1 Google ranking for sydney scared scriptless and numerous other combinations, so I guess I should give a little news about it.
We’re still looking for replacement venues, since we lost the Arthouse Hotel about a month ago. Basically they were concerned that our crowds weren’t buying drinks, which is unfortunately the business that they’re in. Of course table service would no doubt have solved the problem, but that’s what happens when you hire bar staff to run a hotel. Did I say that? Hmmm… that will probably get me in trouble. No matter.
So we’re still looking, we have about a dozen venues to choose from, but arranging a meeting with the appropriate people has unfortunately been difficult for various reasons. My being in Canberra for several weeks also hasn’t helped.
So if you’d like to have a regular weekly comedy show at your Sydney venue, then let me know.
Sydney is a small place, even though we have a population of 3 879 400 people. And the centre of Sydney’s small placedness is Impro Australia.
My wife (at the time “to be”), got me into Theatresports, although I’d seen it many a year ago on the ABC in the 1980s, as did everyone else so it would seem. I figure that’s half a point for my wife, and half a point for the TV. Her brother is a bit of a Theatresports legend, as is the school friend of my last ex-girlfriend, that’s gotta be two points. Then there’s the degrees of separation, the Theatresports guy who works at an R&D lab where a friend of mine used to design graphics imaging chips, another’s brother has done work for our company and knows my boss who in turn now purely coincidentally plays as well, and our excessively overskilled accounts chick used to play with my aforementioned brother in law. My best friend, who I got into Theatresports, at one time shared a court with another friend and main stage player. Then there’s the coincidences, the friend (and player) that snuck into the Midnight Oil Goat Island gig when I was stupid enough not to*, the Mac-centric guys who started their own impro troupe, the list goes on…
But none of this helps when trying to get ahead and get roles in impro shows. If you’re not consistently annoying people for stage time, or you accidentally (or intentionally) get overlooked for a certain show, then you’re set back for up to a year before you can continue the climb. And of course lack of stage time means lack of experience, which makes the job even harder. Throw in the politics, and well, it’s tough…
Anyway, all this started when I got an email this afternoon from a friend/player saying they were looking for a solution to a spell check problem with Microsoft Word, and coincidentally my site popped up in Google with the answer. Small world…
Then there’s the intra-work coincidences. I’m at the MC5 gig on Friday night, and who do I bump into, but a Canberra based client of ours, rocking away as I was. Small world…
Speaking of Theatresports, this Friday 6th August 2004, I’m extremely lucky enough to play with some of the nicest and most talented new players around, when we compete in the St George Theatresports competition. 7pm, at the St George Bank Auditorium, Montgomery St., Kogarah. Come along and check it out, you’ll have a cack.
* 2JJJ ran a contest back in 1986 as part of their ten year anniversary, asking listeners to write in listing their 3 favourite bands. Midnight Oil was my favourite, but I wanted to support my fave indie artists, so I put The Celibate Rifles, Lime Spiders and someone else who I’ve forgotten. What they didn’t mention was that anyone who said Midnight Oil, got a free ticket to the secret Goat Island gig. Since then I’ve always been honest about my favourite artists.
Part VIII in the collection of miscellaneous bits and pieces.
I’ve just added another synthetic feed, new releases from Chaos Music.
Ooops… My RSS feed was breaking several readers, because it included 150 blog posts, and that’s just a little too big for some to handle. I’ve now set it at 30, but stay tuned for a better way to solve the problem of how to get older posts if you’ve only just joined the feed. RSS, talk about poorly designed.
As a follow on from an earlier post about Krispy Kreme Sugar Rings, I notice they have a drive through store at Sydney airport. So let me get this straight, drive through doughnuts. So like you drive up and the checkout chick says “Doughnuts?”, and unsurprisingly you respond with “Yep.”
Sydney taxi charter:
Your rights as a taxi user are to:
have the radio on or off
OK, fair enough.
Your responsibilities as a taxi user are to:
have the radio on or off
Uhuh… Now the pressure’s on…
A guy walks into a coat shop and says…
RBF: A coat thanks, black, full length.
CSG: Ahh, you don’t want a full length.
Trust me to get the only mind reading Coat Shop Guy in Canberra.
RBF: Umm, yes I do.
CSG: They went out of fashion years ago, you don’t want one of those. How many people do you see walking around with full length coats? Almost full length is all you need.
RBF: Well, I see quite a few actually, and that’s what I’d like. I don’t think fashion consciousness should be a defining criteria in the search for a coat. I mean, it’s bloody cold outside, so for someone from Sydney, temperature is a fairly critical factor.
CSG: Look, a full coat comes to here [points to ankle] and gets pretty mucky, almost full length comes to here [points to middle of calf], no difference.
RBF: Wouldn’t a full length be warmer then?
CSG: Nup, no difference.
RBF: Right, well I’ll have that one then!
Of course I’ve prematurely ended the story, because while I’m sure you’re bored already, you’d be even more bored with the extra 20 minutes it took to try them all on. Although the following exchange was mildly amusing.
RBF: [trying on coat and looking in the mirror] So, tell me about this coat.
CSG: Well, like what? What it’s made of?
RBF: Sure, let’s start with that. [under my breath] Although I’m sure I could just look it up on the little ol’ tag here.
CSG: Well, it’s made of wool.
RBF: Uhuh.
CSG: And it’s a good looking coat.
RBF: Sure. Lucky I picked this one then, hey?
Anyway, I learnt a whole lot about coats today, the fact that the length of the coat for any particular season typically bares no immediately discernable relationship to temperature or weather for example, and is based almost entirely on the cut/style. Also, the fact that coats are designed to be worn on top of a suit or similar jacket, because there are no shoulder pads in a coat, and the suit jacket helps to maintain the shape and fit of the coat. And get this…
RBF: So what about rain, how does it handle small spits of rain or other mild forms of precipitation?
CSG: Well, you could always Scotch Guard it.
RBF: Sure. But how does it come? With any chemical type of coating, or is it just the pure wool?
CSG: Well, it’s a good quality coat, it will be fine.
I was resigned to assuming none, to save the frustration of having to press the issue further.
Anyway, I now have a new coat, which is supposedly a good looking and good quality coat, with a “Peter Pan” style collar. I baulked at this at first, images of flying to Never Never Land with Wendy in tow, going through my head, but it is oh so comfortable.
Coats. It’s not about Function, it’s about Fashion.
Dateline: Canberra airport, 8:20am, Tuesday morning.
RBF: The city thanks, the Melbourne building on Northbourne.
The radio in the cab is up loud and the news is on. Taking the aural cue, I assume that we’re supposed to be listening to it, so I do.
Cabbie: Ahhh, I always get confused which one is which, although both buildings have their names on them.
RBF: That’s OK, I know which is which, I’ll show you when we get there.
Cabbie: I think the Melbourne building used to have ….. [insert unmemorable, unrecognisable name of pub here] in it. Or was that the Sydney building?
RBF: No idea. It’s the one closest to Civic.
Cabbie: They’re both in Civic actually.
RBF: OK, well it’s the one on the left.
Cabbie: Well, it depends which direction you’re coming from, doesn’t it.
Well, unless you’re going to drive up north then re-enter the city from the opposite side of town than the airport, which is where I’m coming from, then yeah sure, I guess it depends which direction you’re coming from. I try listening to the news.
Cabbie: Did you see Millionaire last night?
RBF: No.
Cabbie: Guy is unemployed for 10 years, then gets a job with Telstra, then gets on Millionaire 2 days later!
RBF: Oh. But did he win anything?
Cabbie: Dunno, I went to bed.
Cabbie: You know you can’t get a job without experience, and you can’t get experience without a job.
RBF: Except with Telstra it would seem.
Cabbie: What?
RBF: Nothing. Right, Melbourne building, coming this way it’s the second one…
This morning it is 0 degrees, which is an improvement on the same time last week when it was -7 degrees, the coldest day in Canberra for seven years.
Hidden in the brick-a-brack facade of love, hung a thread of significance not unforseen for twix unobtuse. “A feather, a feather!” he shouted, as a duck sway asunder yon hedgerow, don’t be alarmed now. The spirits of flight adorned as such on high above frequented love abound and torn a wretch that was, and was, and was.
To say I’m full of rants would be an understatement, so here’s another. Many a year ago I had an argument with a fellow literian, if there is such a thing, about how the greatest poetry and novels of this and previous ages were mostly written under the influence of various illicit drugs. Ken Russell’s film Gothic exemplifies this with a supposed dramatisation of the night that Mary Shelley invented Frankenstein. This in itself perhaps the product of a chemically modified mind.
So the argument goes, should we revere the works of artists who created their works under the influence? Or is this basically cheating? Having created works under the influence, I can indeed attest that creativity is increased somewhat under such conditions, and because the majority of the population most likely do not partake in such pastimes, if they had, then there would be more works of greatness, and our current “great” artists would perhaps not be so great after all.
Is this cheating, and similar to athletes taking steroids? Is art a representation of what the human condition is capable of, not some chemically induced effluvium dragged kicking and screaming from the subconcious of people incapable of creating under more stable conditions?
Could you create a great work while under the influence of illicit drugs? How would it compare to the works of the great poets of history? Should we revere that which seems greater than it is?