Jay and Tee sit below an elm tree. Jay has constructed a sculpture of a bee.
JAY: A bee! See da effigy?
TEE. Hi Jay…’kay.
JAY. Elm, nope?
Cue heiress.
HEIRESS: Tee you’ve…double, you eggs! Why’s…?
The tree is struct by lightening.
Some things I learnt recently whilst being a runner. 17 hour day. Gotta love it folks.
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DO wear practical trousers with big pockets
DON’T wear skinny chinos
DO have a spare wallet for money and receipts
DON’T screw up receipts in a ball at the bottom of your pocket then lose them
DO print off a copy of the call sheet
DON’T rely on someone else near you to have a copy
DO keep some walkie-talkie batteries charging
DON’T have three dead walkies at once
DO turn up your walkie to ear-splitting volume
DON’T communicate through flailing arm semaphore charades
DO eat food when the producer’s not looking
DON’T make them think all you’re doing is scoffing
DO have a little cash on you at all times
DON’T run around for the cashbox like a headless chicken
DO have pens, gum, tape and a lighter
DON’T forget this stuff
DO buy chocolate for the crew
DON’T just bust fruit
DO buy some fruit
DON’T give the crew scurvy
DO learn to drive
DON’T wait
DO be usefull
DON’T be useless
DO walk fast
DON’T run (despite the job title)
Poppins - The Great Exception is a 2013 British fantasy film directed by Terry Gilliam. The screenplay was written by Frank Cottrell Boyce and inspired by the work of P.L. Travers.
Plot
Born into a sadistic workhouse orphanage, young Mary (Emily Blunt) struggles to stay alive. The children’s belief in magic is what keeps them hopeful but as the boys turn to bulglary and the girls turn to prostitution, one by one they lose their magic powers. But Mary chooses to believe and wishes at the window that someone will help her. A boy dressed in green flies down from the sky and beckons her. “But it’s raining!” She cries. “Take your umbrella”. Mary tries to persuade her best friend Oliver Twist (James Buckley) to come with her but he is too scared. She promises to come back for him.
Peter Pan (Aaron Johnson) bestows upon Mary the gift of eternal youth and flight by sprinkling her umbrella with fairy dust. Peter bids farewell as he has to fight Captain Hook and refers her to a friend of his, Doctor Doolittle (Richard Griffiths) who gives Mary a job as a clerk in his doctor’s surgery and teaches her the ability to talk to animals. Mary soon grows tired of her administrative role and ventures outside. When she sees the plight of the street-children and those back at the workhouse, she can’t stop herself helping them with her new powers.
Mary’s altruism soon attracts the attention of the uncompromising child labour advocate and slave-driver Isambard Kingdom Brunel (Christian Bale). He employs his spy, Fagin (Eddie Marsan), to find out how Mary his doing this and reports back with her magical activities. In order to fight fire with fire he sets a trap to gain entrance to Neverland, using the desperate Oliver as bait. Once inside, Brunel makes a deal with Captain Hook (Steve Coogan), that if he helps defeat Mary he will provide unlimited cannons to finally wipe out Peter Pan.
Oliver escapes, finds Mary and apologises for giving Brunel access to Neverland. At that moment Captain Hook breaks in and challenges Mary to a sword-umbrella fencing match. Mary loses but manages to persuade Hook that love is all he needs and sends him back to Neverland with a whole new outlook on life.
With child-reform back on the agenda, Brunel must find a more powerful more heartless ally. He orders every farmer in the country to set rabbit traps in their gardens. As he expected, one farmer finds a well-dressed rabbit with a pocket watch. Brunel descends down the rabbit hole to Wonderland and meets with the Queen Of Hearts (Diane Kruger). Brunel promises the throne of Great Britain, as Queen Victoria cares far too much about the working man and losing her touch. Alice The army of hearts pour out of the rabbit hole into England but they are soon met by Captain Hook, the pirates and the lost boys.
As the two sides are about to collide, Mary descends onto the battlefield and tells everyone to behave themselves and go to their rooms. They do as their told. Oliver suggests to her that maybe she should seek employment as a nanny.
…
(This is what went through my head at the Olympics opening ceremony)
FAUST IS DEAD by Mark Ravenhill
GRADE: C for Countercultural
How quickly the world changes. In 1996 (a year I barely remember), grunge and the dawn of widespread internet were in full swing. At the time this play would have been current and no doubt very relevant to the audiences watching. Alas, reading it off the page sixteen years later it didn’t quite strike it with me. It may be because the character Alain’s ramblings reminded me of the media theory I had to read for my degree, Baudrillard, Jameson, Deleuze etc etc I found it hard to fully engage with the huge number of themes being thrown about.
BUT the character of Donny, a sensitive yet self-destructive manchild with a liking for slushies really struck a chord for me, despite only appearing briefly. Proof if anything that good characters, more than topical comment, stand the test of time.
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Next up: Brecht’s The Good Woman of Setzuan
Bumpkin’s back in bumpkinshire so he’s going to do a big hunk of reading and feedback to all of you…*tumbleweed*. I’ve started out with writers that I recognise. Yes, they’re all men but the last five plays I read were by brilliant women (Sarah Kane and debbie tucker green). Feel free to give suggestions for my next batch. The lottery part involves the dice on top…I roll the dice once to choose the book:
1-2 for Beckett (because a mahussive book and rather strange)
3 for Brecht (political)
4 for Bond (ditto)
5 for Ravenhill (sweary but deep)
6 for Ridley (childish but freaky)
Then I roll the dice again to see which play/s I read…
Today I shall be reading…Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett. The first play of the first book, somewhat predictable but I shan’t argue with the dice.
WAITING FOR GODOT
GRADE: A for Anthropological
Hilarious, tragic, and I want to be in a production of it already, happily playing any of the four parts. People should read this as a reminder of how little you need to make a good play. It’s quite ironic that a play so minimalist is inscribed with so many different interpretations and meanings. Beckett himself said it was “all symbiosis”, a relationship of mutual benefit, and I’d have to agree. In my opinion, it’s simply about human’s inevitable need for company and the fear or being alone. Love and friendship is reduced to a biological instinct.
Well there we go then.
Next up is Faust Is Dead by Mark Ravenhill. Ooh!
When the world is threatened by The Demon Headmaster, Archie from Balamory, the head C.B.B.C.I.A assembles a group of kids TV heroes…
BERNARD
Billionaire and genius watchmaker with the ability the stop time. But try as he might, he can’t turn back time to stop the Teletubbies killing his father.
HARMONY
Gambling addict whose powers derive from rubbing the Queen’s nose on her fifty pence piece. Highly trained by C.B.B.C.I.A before she turned rouge on a vendetta against Dick and Dom, but now they need her back.
BODGER AND BADGER
Bodger’s private menagerie seems calm enough until potato gets involved. Badger…gets…angry…
THE CHUCKLE BROTHERS
Barry The God of War, and Paul The God Of Mischeif were cast out of The Riding of Valhalla for indecisively pulling a plank of wood and back and forth. But it will be The Demon Headmaster who will be saying oh dear oh dear.
When the world is threatened by The Demon Headmaster, Archie from Balamory, the head C.B.B.C.I.A assembles a group of kids TV heroes…
BERNARD
Billionaire and genius watchmaker with the ability the stop time. But try as he might, he can’t turn back time to stop the Teletubbies killing his father.
HARMONY
Gambling addict whose powers derive from rubbing the Queen’s nose on her fifty pence piece. Highly trained by C.B.B.C.I.A before she turned rouge on a vendetta against Dick and Dom, but now they need her back.
BODGER AND BADGER
Bodger’s private menagerie seems calm enough until potato gets involved. Badger…gets…angry…
THE CHUCKLE BROTHERS
Barry The God of War, and Paul The God Of Mischeif were cast out of The Riding of Valhalla for indecisively pulling a plank of wood and back and forth. But it will be The Demon Headmaster who will be saying oh dear oh dear.
When the world is threatened by The Demon Headmaster, Archie from Balamory, the head C.B.B.C.I.A assembles a group of kids TV heroes…
BERNARD
Billionaire and genius watchmaker with the ability the stop time. But try as he might, he can’t turn back time to stop the Teletubbies killing his father.
HARMONY
Gambling addict whose powers derive from rubbing the Queen’s nose on her fifty pence piece. Highly trained by C.B.B.C.I.A before she turned rouge on a vendetta against Dick and Dom, but now they need her back.
BODGER AND BADGER
Bodger’s private menagerie seems calm enough until potato gets involved. Badger…gets…angry…
THE CHUCKLE BROTHERS
Barry The God of War, and Paul The God Of Mischeif were cast out of The Riding of Valhalla for indecisively pulling a plank of wood and back and forth. But it will be The Demon Headmaster who will be saying oh dear oh dear.
Everyone knows The Cupid
His magic smitten bow
His arrows made from dopamine
That lights the heart aglow
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But nobody knows the other
The mean and twisted one
The thing that steals your glances
And spoils your soppy fun
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It thrashes on your heartstrings
And screams you full of doubt
Makes sure you see your lover
Is happier without
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It rips you up with paper cuts
All sealed with spit and gum
Folds you in the middle
And scores your spine ‘till numb
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It tells them to not bother
To see their friends instead
You gourmet meal’s not wasted
‘til tomorrow it can spread
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It lingers outside restaurants
In bars and picture shows
Tackles your date into an alley
And pricks them with a rose
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It waits inside your postbox
Between the bills of debt
Nabs the cards of red and white
All gathered in a net
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It calls upon your exes
And tells them where you live
Shouts curses through their larynx
That you cannot forgive
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Its nest is made of petals
And bottled jars of kiss
Sweet nothings tinned in syrup
And pints of tender bliss
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And at the very bottom
Below the kindling pit
Is a bed of broken arrows
And bows all torn and split
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The Cupid has a weapon
As much for self defence
From the fearsome beast of terror
As passionate offence
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Its name, it is a mystery
But they’ve been known to name
‘The Bowsnapper’, who in its own way
Keeps all the love aflame
Nineteen Eighty-NOW!
