Five cultural events of the year

... the end-of-year lists continue...

Blackbird, Albery Theatre
Dark and overwrought, which is what you want from the theatre really. Plus, Catherine Tate sat in front of us when we went. Bovvered.

Cansei De Ser Sexy, Scala
Gig of the year. Made me realise that most other concerts aren't actually that fun.

Gervais, Pilkington and Merchant podcasts
These actually dropped in quality for the third series, but only a dead horse would be able to keep a straight face when Karl started moaning about his kidney stone operation.

Krapp's Last Tape, Barbican
Existentialism! Surrealism! Bananas! Fifteen minutes of quality acting from the Hurtmeister [John Hurt].

Carsten Holler, Tate Modern Turbine Hall
Aka "the slides". Most asked question of the year: "Have you been on the slides yet?" Answer: "Yes I have, and they're fucking ace."

Playing the game

Went to see a stage version of John Buchan's thrice-filmed The 39 Steps in the West End on Friday. The prodution was a lot of silly fun, and, with just four actors playing over 150 characters, also impressively professional. I think the word 'Pythonesque' has probably been devalued through overuse, so let's just say it was highly Pythonian.

Great opening too, as the hero Richard Hannay (played as a hammy "I say!" type English gent by Charles Edwards), ponders what to do with his evening. Trying to conceive of a "mindless and trivial" diversion, he suddenly announces "I know, a West End play!"

Reading up beforehand, I noticed a rather striking quote about the play on a ticket booking website:

"Exactly the thing the West End has been waiting for" The Observer

Erm, not quite. Thanks to The Guardian's liberal online archiving policy, it's quite easy to dig up the original review, which says this:

"It is its own strange small thing. Which could be exactly the thing the West End has been waiting for."

Sneaky. But then again, if the posters screamed "ITS OWN STRANGE SMALL THING", people probably wouldn't go and see it. Actually they probably would. People are idiots.


How journalism works

Let Roberts sing

Julia Roberts made her stage debut on Broadway in the play Three Days of Rain this week. According to the Reuters report, good reviews have been "in the minority". New York Times critic Ben Brantley, a self-confessed 'Juliaholic' said he was struck with nervousness on entering the theatre "as if a relative or a close friend were about to do something foolish in public". There's a cracking line in his review:

"Your heart goes out to her when she makes her entrance in the first act and freezes with the unyielding stiffness of an industrial lamppost, as if to move too much might invite falling."

The new Lowe

Went to see Rob "West Wing" Lowe in Aaron "West Wing" Sorkin's play A Few Good Men on Friday. The play appeared on Broadway in 1989 before it became a Hollywood film starring Tom Cruise, Demi Moore and Jack Nicholson. For those unfamiliar with the plot, naval officer-lawyer Daniel Kaffee (Lowe) has to defend two young marines accused of murdering a weaker recruit during a "code red" procedure (a ceremonial dressing down, which might include shaving the offender's head, or beating the shit out of him). The code red may or may not have been ordered by the marines' superior, Colonel Jessop. Courtroom drama and lots of shouting ensues.

The whole thing was enjoyable, watchable and surprisingly really good, though the characters are never quite more than the high-quality dialogue they speak. But Lowe has enough charm to keep the most jaded cynic smiling wistfully for days. If you've seen the film, what was strange about the play was the fact that the actors played it for laughs on a surprising number of occassions - and got them.

Contrasting strongly with the West End glamour of Rob Lowe's perfect hair was the grainy violence of the "initiation ceremony" footage of British marines that emerged on Sunday. It shows two naked marines fighting each other in the mud while others (also naked) stand around egging them on. When one of the men appears to refuse to fight, a superior officer, dressed as a surgeon (the other is in schoolgirl grab), kicks him in the head, knocking him out. The footage seems slightly speeded up, giving the whole thing the appearance of an old-fashioned silent movie, with the costumes adding to the surrealism. It looks like some weird ultraviolent playground. Media reaction so far has been flippant, unshocked - they are marines after all.