Jan Svankmajer - tma svetlo tma

jan svankmajer darkness light darkness 1989

Hello, fellow theatre-adorers, long time no see!!! I thought you all might be interested in this fab Jan Svankmajer film from 1989... Cheaper and shorter than Pete Hall's 50th anniversary production of GODOT, dontchafink!!!

Plucked from the headlines

Wouldnt it be luvvvverleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee to see these three in Trev's touring bonkbuster My Fair Lady???? I'm wasted as a brilliant theatre director - I should be in casting!!!


Orl I want is a bonk round 'ere Wiv a little bit of bloomin' luck!

I'm back!

Sorry, fokes - I know, I know: it's been TOO LONG! (as the bishop said to the actress after a matinee of Hamlet!). I plead no excuse - it's just, quite litrally, I have had NOTHING to BLOG!!! Theatre is going through a renaissance again, which is fab. As far as I understand there are now MORE PLAYS ABOUT IRAQ THAN AT ANY TIME IN HISTORY and this can only be a GOOD THING!!! For if theatre is to stay relivant then it must ONLY deal with ISSUES. I'm sick and tired of IRRELIVANT PLAYS and MUSICALS!!! In fact I've just applied for an Arts Council grant to go to Basra to research a DRAMATIC CRITIQUE of TONY BLAIR!!! Col says I'm sure to get funding cos his best mate Alyssia got one for her brilliant ATTACK on the Israel/Contra scandal (if I got some of those details wrong, forgive me, I'm not very interested in politics, just people, esp people who've lost a limb or three...).

Another good sign - Mark Ravenbald has twenty-five plays and musicals now running in the West End!!! Plus those endless columns in the broadsheets berating emerging talent!!! He's great!! Truly, the Noel Cowerd de nos jours!!!

So these are fab times to be working in the theatre. And Celebrity X Factor too!!! Truly, a wonderful time to be alive!!!

Hiatus

My dearest loyal subscribers, I am taking a month's sabbatical: to rest my brain and recharge my passion for THEATRE. I have been moved, occasionally overwhelmingly so, by your silent support for what I have to say.

As Sammy Beckett (now in his hundredth glorious year) said when he received his 1962 Oliver Award for Shortest Masterpiece:

Aaaarghhh!!

Aaaaaaarrrgghh!!!!! And aaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrggghhhh!!!

And on top of that aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrggghhhhh!!!

I call on Sir Jeremy Irons and his great mate, Sir David Poirot, and also Sir Lord King Bendhisley, to join me in a mass picket of Culture Secretary Sir Tessa Jowels, this Friday!!!

NO MORE UNFAIR CRITICISM!!! WE ARE ARTISTES (plus one MFA)!!! WE CANNOT BE SILENCED!!!!

Whatsonstage.com

I have recently been contributing to that fine website, whatsonstage.com You always get a properly intellectuous debate (important for an intelligent & committed theatre practitionist and MFA, I'm sure you'll agree). Recently, there has been a particularly illuminous discussion about noisy theatregoers (who I cannot stand, by the way - there, cards on the table).

A "June" recently contributed this post (click on link) to this discussion. You can view the whole thread here.

What do you think? Should four course meals be compulsory in the West End? Would Ibsen be better served if you had a Big Mac between acts? Please add your comments below. After all, if theatre isn't about anything what are we all doing with our lives?!

The Laurence Oliver Awards 2006

Laurence Oliver - possibly and arguably our finest thesp in recent memory - gave his name to these awards that they might continue to furnish the glittering West End with award-winning shows and other thesps. THEREFORE THEY SHOULD BE AWARDED ONLY TO THE DESERVING. Yes, I'm referring to YOU, Mr ----- --------- (name disguised to prevent libel). You are a DISGRACE to thespianism, with your pointy eyes and flirtationousness with younger unformed talent. I rest my case.

Oh yes. And Tifton College has been given a Plaque for Services to Craft by Pocks County Council. The officiating ceremony is next Tuesday, if you are in the area.

Theatre is changing (a manifesto)

Okay, I'm sorted (I think those chips helped - thanks, Col) . Sorry about my little sojorn away from bloggerdom, I think it was simply a need for fresh air after the intellectuous rigours of witnessing BLACKPUDDING* a week ago. In the intervening "jours" (a french word meaning, litrally, 'days': hence journal, journey, joury duty, jourst one cornetto, etc etc) I have had time to inwardly cogitate (I don't recommend this if you've been drinking heavily, by the way), and now I have come up with my All New All Fab Shaun Spock Theatre Green Room Manifesto des Arts Practicquel et Magnifique(s)TM

1) Art is a three letter word for a reason
2) Never compromise your Art
3) Theatre is Life
4) Life is Art
5) The artistic imperative is, at once, self-reflective but never narcissississitic**
6) Could I have extra salsa on that***

















And so, in conclusion, I offer you this, by way of a summation:

Be rigorous. Be true. Be artistic.

BUT ABOVE ALL

Be-have.







*thankyou to eagle-eyed blogfan Finty Germaine for pointing out my mistaken use of the 'gap' in the title
** check speling here+
+delete this footnote
***definitely delete this - it is extremely irrelevant and will only irritate my loyal fans

Recovering

I am tired. I fear theatre-going is too intellectuously demanding. My brain needs chips.

Black Pudding: A Masterpiece du Theatre

Oh my God, I can't not believe what a sheer MASTERPIECE (and I use the term correctly) the stunning new West End production of BLACK PUDDING is. It is sheerly and truly a masterpiece of the most purest kind, almost desicatted in its milieu and aspirancy. That fine thesp Robin Allham plays a mid-50s man who lives in what looks like a big white room with lots of rubbish cleverly spread everywhere (take a bow, Eastern European designer Orgula Ngkschtt). Into his sad batty old life comes nymphet and parvenu (note to self, check dictionary) Hattie (played by the skittish actrine Khloe June) . It transpires - in a deliciously dull threnody that occupies the full running time - that they know each other.

A truly fascinating evening's entertainment with a stunning coup-de-fordcortina at the climax, when the walls of the theatre quite litrally rise up, to reveal a totally diffrent set. A final dance de mort as the protagonists punch each other in the gizzards sets the seal for what has been - as I'm sure the crtics will atttest - an awesomely somnambulistical exercise in what I like to call Dead Theatre (a la Peter Brook, my hero).

Go see. Then go see it again. Then and only then - react (inwardly). You won't regret it.

Hello, loyal fans!!!

Gosh, it's been a while but I haven't forgotted you!!! No, indeed!!! Every night before zzzzz I think of you all going to your local theatres and SUPPORTING THE ARTS!!! Which is SO important because without theatre the world would quite litrally be BEREFT!!!

Anyway, enough of all this intellectualism: I just wanted to show you the amazing number of visiters I get EVERY WEEK!!! Already, we are almost at the significant 600 views point after only OVER SIX MONTHS!!! This is staggering, and a great testament to my writing abilities and creative energies, but also because I can see you truly care about art, like what I do!!!

Anyway, here's the figures!!

Shaun Spocks Green Room (sm5shaunspock) -- Site Summary --- Visits Total .......................... 393 Average per Day .................. 1 Average Visit Length .......... 0:00 This Week ........................ 4 Page Views Total .......................... 599 Average per Day .................. 1 Average per Visit .............. 1.0 This Week ........................ 4 http://sm5.sitemeter.com/stats.asp?site=sm5shaunspock --- Visits this Week --- Day Hour 1/24 1/25 1/26 1/27 1/28 1/29 1/30 Total ---- ----- ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------- 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 9 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 10 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 11 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 12 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 13 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 14 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 15 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 16 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 17 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 18 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 19 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 20 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 21 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 22 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 23 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 24 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------- 0 0 0 2 0 1 1 4 --- Page Views this Week --- Day Hour 1/24 1/25 1/26 1/27 1/28 1/29 1/30 Total ---- ----- ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------- 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 9 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 10 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 11 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 12 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 13 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 14 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 15 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 16 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 17 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 18 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 19 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 20 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 21 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 22 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 23 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 24 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------- 0 0 0 2 0 1 1 4


Until the next blog, toodlewink and happy theatre-going!!!!

Hollywood stars: a Christmas thought

I actually like them*. Controversial, maybe. But when did you last see a major theatre production without one? I rest my case.
*except cartoon stars like Bugs Bunny. I can't imagine him in Jacobean tragedies, although it would be interesting to see him try.

The mystery of Yuletideness

Christmasness comes but once a year
The snow lies thick on ground
But cos of global warmingness
The snow is slush (I've found).

O ye who drive your SUVs
And ye who fly your planes
Did Jesus mean us to be hot
Because of your selfish pains?

Each time we throw a light switch
Or eat a Big Mac meal
We're killing each and everyone we know
With fundamental zeal

So hearken to my verses
Torn from my soul with tears
And wave farewell to Christmasness
Like ones of my childhood years

copyright Shaun Spock
from his new as yet unpublished anthology
"Yule Be Sorry"

The angry silence!!!

I am ANGRY!!! I have been silent for over a month but now sheer ANGERMENT is all I feel!!! Guess what - I got my MFA, right - but NOT EVEN A HINT OF A OFFER OF A JOB!!! Who does the Arts meant to be if it's not for me and my kindred?!! I offer probably the finest and most passionate PRAXIS of anyone heretoforthwith and I am IGNORED!!! I spoke at length to Col this morning and he says "slowly slowly catchee monkey" but what use are nursery rhymes in this TIME OF CRISIS FOR THE ARTS!!! I mean - seriously - if Shaun Spock can't find a job, what hope is there for Theatre in general???

I offer up this suggestion:

1) All MFA courses to have GUARANTEED artistic directorships attached upon gradualisation
2) The Government to WAKE UP TO THE IMPORTANTNESS OF THE ARTS ONCE AND FOR ALL - I mean, the Arts isn't just health or education or national security - it's the MORAL PLACENTA THAT NOURISHES ALL THE LIMBS OF THE BODY CORPOREALATE!!!
3) Immediate investment of MONEY for all the Arts

We need ninety days to achieve this - no more, no less. I second the motion.

- Shaun Spock MFA

P.S. Mark Ravenbald has quite rightly condemned new writing. As he so correctly says: "All new writing is very bad for the theatre and should be banned. Except my own plays because they are at least a week old and about important issues like drugs and fucking, but everything else should be banned." I heartily concur and convex... Thankyou, Mark, for raising this important issue.

My assesment goes really well!!!!

<--------- Tubby Sipps, assessment examiner

Hello, everyone!!! Shaun here!!! I'm just so amazingly excited because - although I've yet to hear - I think I did really really well at my assesment thingy!!! This is so important - not just for me, but also for the theatre establishment generally!!! Because I am the new voice, the guy who could well bring about a new way of envisioning theatre!!! As those of you who know me well will know well, I chose to explore the important theme of Boredom in the Arts in my final 20-minute presentatiuon... I consulted my thesaurasus (a big book that Tifton College gives all its students on the first day so that they can substitute long difficult words for those easy ones you find in tabloid papers) and came up with the following:

ENNUI AND PRAXIS: TOWARDS A DISTANT OBJECTIVE IN THE ARTS

The judging panel - Vernon, Tubby Sipps (a practitioner of mime) and Thelma Wasp (from the Arts Council of Tifton - sat in awed silence as I spoke thusly (I have printed it in full so as to afford you a glimpse into my ethos):

It has long been my theorem that - while not untowardly genetic in its praxis - the Arts generally, and occasionally in more specific instances, can wholly be afforded the nominem of dullity (or tediosity), owing to the prevalation of TV-ness (to coin a phrase) in our media-saturated existence. I think it was Pietro Hoopla, the Dutch bioligist and pundit, who opined:

'Each society extends its governance exponentially (viz, 67x by ambrose) insofartoward it can, and it is this irony we choose to call sun-down...'

A little research will unveil the extraordinary and yet vivid praxis of Michelangelo's bottom, carved in three inch styrofoam in the Sistine Chapel, yet howmsoever it be sculpted, such a posterior only underscores the fluid emergence of viscosity in the Arts or even, Arse.



Actually, I won't continue, because the whole essay is available for download in PDF form from www.tiftonwanker.com

The important thing is that I am sure I have now got my MFA!!! Certinly, I have yet to officially hear, but Vernon smiled nicely at me as I wound up, and I'm sure the suppressed laughs from the rest of the panel were as good an indication of my humorus gifts!!!

We shall see!! In the meantime, I have begun a new play - a summation of all what I have lerned. I shan't tell you what its about except this: it features an onstage act so shocking that no-one will leave the theatre unaffected... There's also going to be a very good part for a dwarf, if I can find one who can speak Urdu.

Keep in touch, okay!!!

Absence of theatre in my life

I have been crisitized for not seeing enough theatre recently... This has got me to thinking: why is theatre so boring? It can't only be because I've yet to stick my imprint on Drama's jacksie... Theatre is boring because it HAS TO BE... Yes, I know this is a controversial statement, but I really think it's true... Think about it - if theatre WASN'T boring, people would go and check it out, and where would that leave the TV companies what fund theatre slightly? It's in the interests of TV-dom that theatre stays boring so people will stay in watching Ant & Dec and Carol Vooooderman etc... anyway, this is not just my theory - it's also the topic of my upcoming assessment next week...

Oh yes, and I've got a really dull headache. Honestly. It's really getting on my nerves. Quite literally, actually.

Watch this space, okay!!!

Reviews for BRIEF CANDLE/Interview with Catherine Smegs!!!

Hi again!!! I know, I know - I've been very tardy writing my blog... But you know, it's quite difficult juggling all my balls!!! After all, I'm not only a Master of Fine Arts Trainee, I am also a scribe and thinker... Anyway, enough about me - that theatre company, ETIX SAGET FELT, finaly sent me the Edinburgh reviews for their production of my oeuf, BRIEF CANDLE. I can't say I'm sorry I missed it now, after reading these:

"This is a miserable evening in a miserable venue..." Millicent Thistle, The Glasgow Fumes

"I hate theatre, and this is why." Scott Ellison, Richmond Gazebo

I knew it was too ambitious a work for a tuppenny threepenny set-up and these reactions confirm it.

However! I have recently had the great honour of meeting and interviewing Catherine Smegs, currently starring in EURYTHRITIS at the National. We met over a cup of campuchino in the NT's backstage snug. Here is what she said:

SS: Catherine, thank you so much for agreeing to be interviewed for my blog!!!

CS: Could you pass me that spoon?

(I do so.)

SS: You're currently starring in EURYTHRITIS by Syphilis. Is that a challenge?

CS: (stirring her campuchino) In what way?

SS: I regret I have yet to see it but the word on the street is that it's amazingly challenging.

CS: What word on which street? Who are you, anyway? How did you get in here?

SS: (laughing with abandon) Seriously though... I bought the playtext and it's very verbose.

CS: Do security know?

SS: Your character, Eurythritis, spends most of the second act upside down and naked. Is that what attracted you to the role?

CS: Goodbye.

Catherine Smegs as Eurythritis


I think you must agree - this is quite a coup. I plan to publish this interview - alongside my most memorable essays - in a forthcoming Shaun Spock's Guide To Directing For Novices... Watch this space!!!

Back from hols!!!

Well, hello everybody!!! Did you miss me??? That's right! I've been on holiday!!! Fantastic time at Tifton Head, sun-trap of the South Coast!!! Lots of donkey derby and Race the Snail!!! Faberoonysville!!!

I will write again soon - not least because it's been Edinburgh Festival time again, and a dysxelic theatre company ETIX SAGET FELT, mounted my oeuf BRIEF CANDLE!!! I have no idea how it went but they've promised to send the two reviews and pay me royalties!!! Which is great!!! I'll let you know, okay?!!!

Keep reading my blog!!! You know it makes cents!!! (That's a joke for my off-Broadway chums!!!)

Reflections on my MFA

Some of my reguler readers (Bernard Cantanker, Jimmy Munt, Anonymous) will be concerned what I have not written much recently. This is to be understood. My mind has been elsewhere. Vernon has recently told me that my Master of Fine Arts is being terminated as a result of "industry apathy" (his words). This is a pretty state of affairs. Vernon says there is simply no demand for my type of cutting edge drama, and that the Arts Council of Tifton are unlikely to fund to any serious degree my art.

WELL, WHAT IS ARTS FUNDING FOR IF IT ISN'T TO FUND ART?!

I am not swayed by Vernon's comments. Indeed I cannot afford such self-indulgencing. The true artist must forge ahead, friendless and despised. What is which I shall do. I must be strong. I must be vigilent. I must be True To My Muse.

BRIEF CANDLE is not a one-off. My pen itches to create, and having created, create more. If there is no audience, then so be it. I have played to audiences of no-on before. I am happy to do it again.

Watch this space...

(By the way, Mum has booked me for holidays this summer so there will be a hiatus in my blogging.)

Are you listening, Tony Blair???

Phew! Just got back from LiveB8!!! The feelings and emotions we managed to feel were just pure magic!! I was a bit late getting there because I found out (on the day - THANKYOU BRITISH RAIL (not)) that there are litrally NO trains what go direct to Edinburgh from Tifton Parkway!!! Even for an occasion as important and POTENTIALLY LIFE-CHANGING as LIVEB8!!! Anyway, Col and I were able to do some serious brain-storming about our Edinburgh fringe production of my ouef, BRIEF CANDLE. We're going to approach Sir Lord Bob Geldof to introduce it and act as patron, because LiveB8 so impressed us... As a direct result of LiveB8 Col and I have decided to eat tuna for the REST OF OUR LIVES!!! Only this kind of WORLD ACTION can halt the alarming dolphin deaths around Japan!!! I will come back to LiveB8 at intervals because it's frankly too important to ignore. All would ask is that you each consider adopting a sardine. It's not diffuicult - just buy a can of sardines in your local Tesco and lay it on a piece of buttered toast - delicious AND revolutionary!!!