Coral Andrews's Blog
Posted by Coral Andrews
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Posted by Coral Andrews
It is called 1914-1918 and it running from Nov 4 to Nov 11.
The names of 68,000 fallen soldiers of WW1 will be projected on Ottawa's National War Monument and other monuments around the world.
Posted by Coral Andrews
I met Graham Chapman in 1987 and 1988.
I still take his advice to “ignore all advice” and I don’t “eat anything that stands around in a field chewing cud, but things that run around a lot.”
In another surreal life moment in 1994 I met The Beatles Outside Circle- Cynthia Powell Lennon, Pauline Sutcliffe (the late artist Stuart Sutcliffe’s sister), Pete Best (The First Beatles Drummer), Louise Harrison (George Harrison’s sister) and Allan Williams – The Beatles first manager.
I led an hour long panel discussion with this Fab Five from
I had the book Imagine with me, by Andrew Solt and Sam Egan, found a lovely pic of John and Cynthia together in
AND.. I discovered that upon giving Allan Williams BACK his hard cover copy of The Man Who Gave the Beatles Away, that in the soft cover edition (with William’s scribble) there’s an inscription from someone else in
It says: “To Allan Williams. This is now your copy of YOUR book. Thanks for signing mine. Only one favour. If you ever decide to give it up please let me know. I’ll be damned (insert another expletive here) if I’m going to bid against some bloke in order to buy me own autograph….”
Anyway, To John Lennon and Graham Chapman … I’ve no doubt you like minded wits now hang out in the Hereafter….
Grip Fast
Coral
Posted by Coral Andrews
Posted by Coral Andrews
With luminous puppy dog electro-orbs, the rusted robot brings to mind Charlie Chapin’s Little Tramp.
One day Wall–E discovers Eve, the droid of his dreams, and due to an innocent gift from her rusty paramour, Eve’s mission is compromised and she must leave.
Wall-E, follows Eve to the ends of the earth and beyond in his love for her. Compound this with oodles of fast paced comedic escapades, and very little dialogue including Wall-E’s heartfelt finale, and at times, Wall-E is like a splendid sci fi treatment of Chaplin silent movie classic City Lights.
Eve’s home, the Axiom is a spaceship housing bloated, lazy consumer driven, cyber medicated Earthlings.
Humans these days are always sitting in front of screens - televisions, computers, DVD’s, Blue Ray Players, PlayStations, and as world technology goes into overdrive, these screens grow ever smaller – Ipods, cell phones, Blackberries… Why shouldn’t screens invade our personal space following us around wherever we go?
It’s the next logical step.
In this Consumer Overload Big Box World will we become the Wired Whales depicted in Wall-E constantly clicking for the Next Big Box Thing?
Wall-E’s tricket laden abode delivered another warning – the manual egg beater, bubble wrap, eight track tape, cassette player and the VCR repeatedly cranking Hello Dolly’s Put On Your Sunday Clothes. Wall-E found valid use for these discarded items in conjunction with his Ipod because in today’s disposable world, Wall-E’s wise enough to know that “everything old is new again”
So I'm putting on my Sunday clothes, finding my sweetie and leaving this screen. Like the song says …. “There's lots of world out there, put on your silk cravat and patent shoes, we're gonna find adventure in the evening air.”
Posted by Coral Andrews
It says “Hi Coral, Thanks George Carlin.” Underneath "Hi Coral" “Carol” is scratched out.
When I was 26, I contributed to the arts sections of two weekly newspapers.
Carlin’s New York publicists Rogers and Cowan granted my interview request. But the day of the scheduled chat, they said my fave counter culture guru had “escaped” from his office!
What the F%$####.K???? and Those Other Seven Words You Can Now Say!
I had two excited editors holding the presses for my story which was not to be.
The day of Carlin’s concert, backstage, I screwed up my courage armed only with tiny AIWA cassette recorder, determined to get an autograph and a radio station ID.
Pre show, Carlin who has been watching a ball game in the green room, clad in black and ball cap came up to me. “Hey, sorry about that interview stuff,” he said as I shook his hand. I said “That’s okay. But now you owe me. Would you do a station ID for me.”?
“Yeah, I guess so, gimme the call letters…”
Carlin did the ID, said his speedy goodbyes and left anxious to return to his game and smoke a pre-show joint. When I went to play my little audio gem there was NOTHING there. I frantically asked Front of House to find Carlin again.
He came back a little puzzled. “Hmmm... Lemme give this one more try.” ….
Apre sound bite, I boldly informed Carlin about my chats with comics Graham Chapman, Billy Connolly, and Dan Ackroyd.
“Wow, that’s a real rogue’s gallery. Listen, the next time I’m through here, call my office, tell them who you are, and I’ll chat with ya okay? Anytime…"
I never did get that second chat but I got TWO Station IDs.
Rant in Peace George Carlin, ever part of My Effing Rogue's Gallery Comic Wall.
Signed “Carol”
Posted by Coral Andrews
I have a feeling that Jeff is somewhere swaying, swinging and grinning along.
I first Jeff at age 21 backstage after one his great live rock and blues shows.
We talked about a possible interview for the Canadian music industry magazine The Music Scene. Knowing Jeff was a jazz enthusiast I told him I had recently acquired a Fletcher Henderson record at a flea market but couldn’t recall the title. Jeff was immediately curious to know what this title was.
The next day a warm dulcet tone graced my answering machine.
“Hi Coral. Jeff Healey here. I am not feeling so great. I wanted to take the train up and meet you somewhere in town because I like Kitchener, but I don’t think I will be able to make it. Would it be all right to do the interview at my place? Then you can see the rest of my jazz collection. Talk to you soon.”
That chat resulted in my first national cover story called Blues Power: At the Crossroads with Clive.
1988 was a banner year for The Jeff Healey Band. They signed with Clive Davis’ (Whitney Houston, Sly Stone, Janis Joplin) American record label Arista Records landing the deal of deals including complete control over any music released under Healey’s own RCA records deal in Canada.
The world will remember Jeff as one of the music’s finest guitar virtuosos touring the world with The Jeff Healey Band or in later years pursuing his great passion for of 20 and 30s jazz with his band The Jazz Wizards.
But I remember Jeff Healey as a soft spoken musicologist with a rampant wit, wise beyond his years. For a man who had been blind since the age of three, Jeff Healey had tremendous insight into music and life.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Last year my theatre company Poor Tom Productions presented the work of Murphy's former student Adam Kelly in his one man show The Anorak to small but engaged houses. I discovered The December Man in 2007 when it premiered at Enbridge PlayRites Festival. Obviously, it’s not an easy play to watch, but anyone who has ever had family conflict will be able to relate. Similar to Harold Pinter’s Betrayal, in its structure, The December Man is written backwards with slice of life humour nuances as three characters unravel through an unspeakable tragedy. The December Man deals with ripple effects of the Montreal Massacres and may or may not be based on Polytechnique student Sarto Blais, while The Anorak deals with the other side of the tragedy. The Anorak as playwright Linda Griffiths noted is more “on the nose”, with Adam playing Marc Lépine. Adam who has performed the award winning monodrama in Montreal and Toronto,has since moved to New York planning to do The Anorak there. Murphy's cheering on her "sturdy" student hoping "Big Manhattan doesn't swallow him up" Tom and I also wish Adam well but I also wish Colleen Murphy continued success with this TO play premiere. As I hear of yet another high school lockdown, Canadian audiences need to support The December Man. In these dangerous times, we need playwrights like Colleen Murphy, Linda Griffiths, J Karol Korcynski, and Adam Kelly - prophetic voices who help us that chose progressive theatre aisles, to better comprehend the human condition.
Posted by Coral Andrews
I thought changing the name from The Stratford Festival of Canada to The Stratford Shakespeare Festival was not the wisest thing to do – but that’s nothing compared to having three artistic directors that didn’t even last through one season.
Marti Maraden, (she will direct The Trojan Women, and All's Well That Ends Well ) and Don Shipley have abandoned their AD Posts..
That leaves The Music Man - Broadway’s Great New Hope Des McAnuff as The Captain.
Well he may have had a hit with Jersey Boys, The Who’s Tommy and the recent Farnsworth Invention and maybe he will do the same with upcoming biker’s Romeo and Juliet Cry Baby, but he's also responsible for 2000 box office disaster The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle.
Was ANYBODY talkin’ to Bob de Niro after that?
For 2008, there's a much more international flair and Stratford is going back to the golden days of Stage Stars – bringing in the likes of box office draws like Christopher Plummer,Brian Dennehy, and Simon Callow BUT …
Meethinks the Festival's still in need of some serious cultural cavalry – so Thank God for Richard Monette who has come riding to the rescue.Say what you will about him, thou critics! I think he was brilliant - just the right mix of commercial and mind blowing theatre because one must happen to support the other.
Welcome to the real world of theatre these days.
Monette created The Studio Theatre where I have seen some of the best work ever produced from Harlem Duet, and Pentecost to Shakespeare’s Will. Kudos to Antoni Cimolino for bringing the Festival’s former King back to oversee Love’s Labour Lost while director Michael Langham recovers from a broken leg.
Zounds, one wonders what more will happen.
Did someone utter the name of the Scottish Play in the theatre?
Posted by Coral Andrews
This is it - the Night of Nights! with Faux Pundit Host Jon Stewart.
For my small part, our store Far Out Flicks has 2007 indee titles from The Lookout and Lust, Caution to The Namesake.
Here’s Mee Picks.
Best Supporting Actor
Javier Bardem – No Country for Old Men.
I first saw Bardem in The Sea Inside. Bardem deserves Oscar for his role as the ruthless Anton Chigurh in No Country for Old Men
Best Supporting Actress
Cate Blanchett - I’m Not There.
Todd Haynes' six dimensions of Bob Dylan is pure genius and Blanchett’s Jude – channels this enigmatic music minstrel.
Best Actress
Marion Cotillard – La Vie En Rose
Move over Courtney, Lisa and Brittany. A legendary forerunner has you beat for tragedy and talent. Cotillard is dazzling as French chanteuse Edith Piaf.
Best Actor
Daniel Day Lewis – There Will Be Blood.
Daniel Day Lewis is winning awards galore for playing oil obsessed / morally conflicted Daniel Plainview this high octane action drama. There will be Oscar.
Best DirectorJoel and Ethan Coen - No Country for Old Men
I’m a Coens fan from 1984 debut Blood Simple to Fargo and Raising Arizona. (Briefly lost Coen Luster after Intolerable Cruelty) Visceral duster No Country for Old Men, gives them there Coen boys a potent comeback. Yippie-yay -yo-kay-yay, motherf***kers!
Best Picture - Atonement
Juno is 2007’s Little Miss Sunshine.So there’s that…But The Academy loves Sweeping Romantic Timeless Epics.
Animated Short – I Met the Walrus
Animated Feature – Ratatouille
FL. Documentary – Sicko!
Foreign Language Film – 12
Adapted Screenplay – Ronald Harwood - Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Original Screenplay – Diablo Cody – Juno
That’s All Folks.
Posted by Coral Andrews
I was helping CKMS fight for its life.
On the eighth day of Christmas My Recasting Choice would be
STRIPE - Ebenezer Scrooge – The Meanest Gremlin!
Ruby Deagle – Marley’s Ghost (re: Billy’s Dog Barney) – “He'll get what he deserves, a slow painful death. Maybe I'll put him in my spin-drier on high heat”. … hmmm … I’ll get you and your little dog too!
Grandfather - Ghost of Christmas Past – “You do with mugwai what your society... has done with all of nature's gifts. You do not understand.”
Gizmo - Ghost of Christmas Present – “ Bright Light, Bright Light…“ (Always happy Gizmo croons his joyful Mugwai song!)
Brain Gremlin – Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come – “Now, bear in mind, none of us has been in New York before. There are the Broadway shows - we'll have to find out how to get tickets.”
Bob Kratchit – Billy Peltzer – spends both movies trying to contain Gremlin epidemic and stop Stripe and Brain.
Mrs Kratchit – Kate Beringer – Helps Billy. “Billy, if we get through today alive, you're in big trouble.”
Mrs Dilber – Lynn Peltzer – Gizmo and COMPANY make one helluva mess and she always has to clean it up.
Old Fezziwig – Grandpa Fred
Eight Eating and rapidly multiplying Mugwai, attacking Seven Seething Fang Meisters feeding on six sit com siblings fighting over five bowls of lasagna for four Siamese shadows, scaring three dog-blasted-ornery-no-acount-long-eared-varmaints, Two bottles of Prozac and Tony Soprano joined by Yosemite Sam trying to whack the flea-bitten Tribble drinking lots of Romulan Ale in the Tree.
But during next The Four Days... Cindy Brady spills water on Mugwai who multiply and attack mutating Tribbles while feasting on Garfield’s lasagne. Tony Soprano, out of Prozac, at his wit's end, WHACKS everyone.
The PARTRIDGE calls 911.
Posted by Coral Andrews
On the Seventh Day of... Next Christmas! (at this rate!) My Recasting Choice would be.
Nosferatu – Ebenezer Scrooge – “I feed erratically, and often enormously.”
Dracula - Marley’s Ghost – “The Blood is life and it shall be mine. Blood has always been the coin of our realm.”
Marius de Romanus - Ghost of Christmas Past – “We have no more claim upon those we kill than any creature that seeks to live."If I hadn't become a vampire, I would have missed out on the Internet, TIVO, World of Warcraft... and GPS.
The Vampire Lestat de Lioncourt - Ghost of Christmas Present – “Tell me how bad I am. It always makes me feel good.”
Mick St John - Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come - “If I hadn't become a vampire, I would have missed out on the Internet, TIVO, World of Warcraft... and GPS”
Claudia - Tiny Tim - "I shall never grow up.”
Mr. Cratchit – Louis de Point Du Lac – “What if all I have is my suffering, my regret? ”
Mrs. Chatchit – Jesse Reeves – “All a vampire has is time. I’m not as precious as you think.”
Mrs. Dilber - Miriam Blaylock - “When you need to feed, you will need me to show you how.”
Old Fezziwig – Grandpa Munster - “Oh, what I wouldn't give for a nice Bloody Mary. Or Dorothy or Emily.”
Seven Seething Fang Meisters feeding on Six Sit com siblings fighting over Five Bowls of Lasgana for Four Siamese shadows, scaring Three dog-blasted-ornery-no-acount-long-eared-varmaints, Two bottles of Prozac and Tony Soprano joined by Yosemite Sam trying to whack the flea-bitten Tribble drinking lots of Romulan Ale in the Tree.
Posted by Coral Andrews
On the Sixth Day of Christmas my Recasting Choice would be..
The Eternal Sister’s Shadow - Jan Brady – Ebenezer Scrooge – Marsha! Marsha! Marsha!”
Marcia Brady – Marley’s Ghost - Hates her nose, is "destroyed” when she gets braces, snitches on Brother Greg smoking, and wants to press charges when her diary is stolen.
Mrs. June Cleaver – Ghost of Christmas Past -TV’s Most Sensible Mom can handle these Brady Brats and say please.
Ghost of Christmas Present – Bobby, Peter, Greg, and Cindy Brady - always telling Jan what to do.
Lois Griffin – Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come - “You all think Christmas just happens. You think all this goodwill just falls from the freakin' sky. Well, it doesn't! It falls out of my holly jolly butt! So you can cook your own damn turkey. Wrap your own damn presents. And hey, while you're at it, you can all ride a one horse open sleigh to hell!”
Mike Brady – Bob Kratchit – He's always working.
Carol Brady – Mrs. Kratchit left alone with three kids to raise… so SIX?
Cousin Oliver – Tiny Tim –Ooh! Oliver said the word sex in the last episode. Shades of Stewie Griffin yet to come?
Mrs. Dilber – Alice Nelson – “If there's anything I can't stand, it's a perfect kid. And SIX of 'em, yecch!
Mr Fezziwig – Sam the Butcher – gave Alice a Bowling Ball in lieu of an engagement ring. “When I saw it, I thought it was right up your alley.”
Six Sit Com Siblings fighting over Five Bowls of Lasagna for Four Siamese shadows, scaring Three dog-blasted-ornery-no-acount-long-eared-varmaints, Two bottles of Prozac and Tony Soprano joined by Yosemite Sam trying to whack the flea-bitten Tribble drinking Romulan Ale in theTree.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Meeee - Ow!
My four cats forced me to write this.
On the fifth day of Christmas my Recasting Choice would be….
Garfield - Ebenezer Scrooge – “All right, wise guy, I got another game for ya. It's called the "My Claw In Your Butt" game. Now let me out!”
Heathcliff - Marley’s Ghost – A Bad Tempered Orange 80’s No Nonsense Tabby
Old Deuteronomy - Ghost of Christmas Past – “Old Deuteronomy's lived a long time. He's a cat who has lived many lives in succession…” (just The Cat to teach Garfield some new human tricks)
The Cheshire Cat – Ghost of Christmas Present – (True. He's quite mad but he does have amazing insight into things…) – “You’ve picked up a bit of an attitude. Still curious and willing to learn I hope?”
Mr. Bigglesworth – Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come - “That makes me angry and when Dr. Evil gets angry, Mr. Bigglesworth gets upset, and when Mr.Bigglesworth gets upset, people DIE.”
Top Cat – Bob Kratchit – T.C is always trying to get ahead and will do anything to make a buck.
Penelope – Mrs. Kratchit - Pepe Le Peu’s unfortunate amour. She can never catch a break. – “Le Meu.. Le Sigh…
Nermal - Tiny Tim - (He is very small…)
Mrs. Dilber – Grizzabella – “You see the border of her coat is torn and stained with sand and you see the corner of her eye twist like a crooked pin.”
Old Fuzzywig – Bagpuss - “The Most Important, The Most Beautiful, The Most Magical... saggy old cloth cat in the whole wide world.”
Five Bowls of Lasagna for Four Siamese shadows, scaring Three dog-blasted-ornery-no-acount-long-eared-varmaints, Two bottles of Prozac and Tony Soprano joined by Yosemite Sam trying to whack the flea-bitten Tribble drinking Romulan Ale in theTree.
Posted by Coral Andrews
THIS is the fourth day of a Christmas Carol and my Recasting choice would be …
Oogie Boogie – Ebenezer Scrooge – “When Mr. Oogie Boogie says there's trouble close at hand you'd better pay attention now 'cause I'm the Boogie Man”
Lock, Shock and Barrel – Marley’s Ghosts – “We're his little henchmen and we take our job with pride. We do our best to please him and stay on his good side.”
Sandy Claws – Ghost of Christmas past (Cuz Jack’s taken over!) – “Release me now or you must face the dire consequences .The children are expecting me so please come, to your senses.”
Jack Skellington – Ghost of Christmas Present – “You know, I think this Christmas thing is not as tricky as it seems. And why should they have all the fun? It should belong to anyone.”
Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come - The Shadow - " Boys and girls of every age wouldn't you like to see something strange?"
Harlequin Demon – Bob Cratchit – “Won't they be impressed, I am a genius. See how I transform the old rat into a most delightful hat.”
Sally – Mrs. Cratchit – (She has to do all the housework for Dr. Finklestein and make Jack’s Sandy Claws outfit!) “I sense there's something in the wind that feels like tragedy's at hand.”
Corpse Kid – Tiny Tim - “Making Christmas, making Christmas, It’s almost here.”
Corpse Mother - Mrs. Dilber – “Something’s up with Jack.”
Old Fezziwig – The Mayor – “What a splendid idea. This Christmas sounds fun. Why, I fully endorse it. Let's try it at once.”
Four Siamese Shadows, scaring Three dog-blasted-ornery-no-acount-long-eared-varmaints, Two bottles of Prozac and Tony Soprano joined by Yosemite Sam trying to whack the flea-bitten Tribble drinking Romulan Ale in theTree.
Posted by Coral Andrews
On with the show.
This is It!
On the Third Day of A Christmas Carol My Recasting Choice would be..
Yosemite Sam – Ebenezer Scrooge - “Why it’s getting so a man c’aint earn a dishonest livin’ no more”
Elmer Fudd – Marley’s Ghost - “Ooh you tweachewous twickster. Hewo. Acme pest contwol, I’ve got a pest I want contwolled.”
Duffy Duck – as Ghost of Christmas Past – “Desthpicable! Wooo … Hah.. hah … hah hah.. ha ha ha… I’ll see what the little stinker is up to on my super video detecto set.”
Bug Bunny – Ghost of Christmas Present - “Nyah…Pardon me Mac”
Marvin the Martian – Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come in his Uranium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator – “Oh that wasn’t a bit nice. You make me very angry, verrrry angry indeed.”
Sylvester the Cat - Bob Cratchit - ”Aaaahhhh shaddup”
Miss Prissy – Mrs. Cratchit - “Yeeahus”
Tweety - Tiny Tim - “I tot I taw a puddy tat “ (***Author’s note…you did you did. Thufferin Thuccotash! Sylvester Cat is Bob Cratchit !***)
Granny - Mrs. Dilber - "I was hep to ya all the time. You ought to be ashamed of yourself!”
Porky Pig - Old Fezziwig -“Ah beah beah beah ..
Three dog-blasted-ornery-no-acount-long-eared-varmaints, Two bottles of Prozac and Tony Soprano joined by Yosemite Sam trying to whack the flea-bitten Tribble drinking Romulan Ale in theTree.
....That's all Folks!!
Posted by Coral Andrews
Says Tony Soprano “I wipe my ass with your feelings.”
On the Second Day of A Christmas Carol My Recasting Choice would be.. (Geez, I hope they don't put a hit out on me..)
Tony Soprano – Ebenezer Scrooge
Corrado Erico “Junior” Soprano - Marley’s Ghost
Dr. Jennifer Melfi / Camela Soprano – as Ghost of Christmas Past
Salvatore “Big Pussy” Bonpensiero ( Cuz he lived best, while he DID live) – Ghost of Christmas Present
ALL of The WHACKED! - Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Artie Bucco - Bob Cratchit
Charmaine Bucco – Mrs. Cratchit
A.J. Soprano - Tiny Tim
Janice Soprano - Mrs. Dilber
Herman “Hesh” Rabkin - Old Fezziwig
(Author's Note ***Chris Moltisanti and Adriana La Cerva couldn’t be The Cratchits – lived too dangerously and Silvio, and Pauley - whatdyagonnadoo? ***)
**Two Bottles of Prozac, and Tony Soprano trying to whack the Tribble drinking Romulan Ale in a Tree.**
Posted by Coral Andrews
At this festive time of year, it is more than usually desirable that I should make some slight writing provision for those with No So Called Social Life who continue to read these Vaccuous Xmas blogs.
(***Besides it's a cheezy, fun filled way to fill my Suite Blog Quota!!! **)
While there’s till time… Save Yourself!
So Be It.
Hey You there. Yes You, Remarkable Reader, Intelligent Reader!!!
I assure you I'll be watching 1951 Black and White classic Scrooge (Colourized Version is Cinematic Blasphemy!!!) with Loved Ones, Sherry / Egg Nog and Hot Mince Pie in hand.
But till then I thought I would waste your valuable time and mine - uh.. wait a minute .... shouldn’t you be out shopping???
I have NO money and will be shopping At The Very Last Minute which will really drive me nervous !! So I have LOTS of time to invent more Ridiculously Re-Casted Christmas Carols.This year instead of Nephew Fred who's somewhat boring I thought Old Fezziwig would be a jolly grand edition!
Coral’s Log – StarDate 12052007 - Scrooge boldly goes where no Scrooge has gone before.
On the First Day of Christmas My Recasting Choice would be....
Mr. Spock – Ebenezer Scrooge (C’mon, he has no emotions)
Admiral James T. Kirk - Marley’s Ghost
Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy – as The Ghost of Christmas Past
Lt. Montgomery Scott "Scottie" – The Ghost of Christmas Present
Captain Jean Luc Picard - The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Lt. Pavel Chekov - Bob Cratchit
Nurse Christine Chapel - Mrs. Cratchit
Lt. Hikaru Sulu -Tiny Tim
Lt. Uhura – Mrs. Dilber
Old Fezziwig - Cyrano Jones
And one Tribble drinking a cup of Romulan Ale in a Tree.
For all you Trekees, there’s going to be a fantastic 40 city Star Trek Tour starting January 2008. Seriously, it you don’t believe me, check out William Shatner’s official message at StarTrek.com
Posted by Coral Andrews
CBC was broadcasting a 25 minute documentary on a show to be performed in Montreal that night – the 17th anniversary of one of the darkest days in Canadian history.
As Tom sat there, he heard a calm voice with a desperate need to be understood, a matter of fact voice that would not be silenced. Tom was immediately filled with a strange mix of revulsion and curiousity.
Who the hell was this?
As he listened, Tom soon discovered the voice was that of Montreal playwright / actor Adam Kelly performing from his one man show The Anorak. He was playing Marc Lépine, the reviled killer who had murdered 14 women at Montreal’s L’École Polytechnique 17 years ago.
Tom was dumbfounded and stayed in the car to get the all the information he could about this performance.
Thanks to Amy Barratt at The Montreal Mirror, Tom and I were able to contact Adam Kelly who said he was not ready to relinquish the rights, but that he would be happy to come and perform The Anorak for Poor Tom Productions
That was a year ago and sadly other similar incidents have occurred, Virginia Tech and most recently the campus shooting in Tuusula, Finland.
If you ask Adam why he performs The Anorak, he will tell you he is still trying to figure why these sort of events continue to happen. Like his audience, he does not know.
I truly believe that theatre is discourse.
Adam requests an audience forum after each performance. It is a way for him to ‘debrief’ from such a emotionally taxing role, but it is also a way to encourage crucially important public dialogue on why these events keep happening. Notes Kelly, it is not just about the play, it is about the issue itself.
Posted by Coral Andrews
I was 15, and had to go and see Woodstock because Lee was showcased in the film that defined a generation. I had no idea Woodstock would define the rest of my life.
We lived in an upscale suburb. The only way into town was the Hamilton bus.
I stood on Highway #8's shoulder miserable in the teeming rain wearing a navy blue Ingo sweater, jeans, and a God-Awful Hot Pink Raincoat, thinking about my so called life.
The damn bus, which was late, roared right past me, splashing me.
Throughly pissed off, I jaywalked across the highway. Standing dazed in the middle of the four lanes, I remember two headlights careening towards me…
It is said I was hit by one car, then dragged a different direction by another, because The God-Awful Hot Pink Raincoat caught onto the license plate.
My Dad emailed me this letter yesterday.
“We had just returned from Ottawa to get my passport extended and came off the 401 onto Hwy 8 and saw all the flashing lights of the police and the ambulances. All the traffic was being diverted from Hwy8 to Edgehill Drive. When we got home, you were not there and we then began to really worry. I called the K-W Hospital and they told me the terrible news; your Mum started screaming when I said you were in the accident. The operator at the hospital told me to go and hold her and tell her you were badly injured but that you would be OK. Then we went to see you; couldn't believe it when we saw you, all bruised and your leg in a cast up to your hip---and a smile on your face!!!!”
By the way... I did see Woodstock four years later. My brother didn’t look that much like Alvin Lee…
Posted by Coral Andrews
Whose scathingly brilliant idea was it to have Ryan Seacrest as the host ???
He has all the personality of a small soap dish.
How about that Moronic Seating Plan? Boston's Legal's James Spader said it best “These are the worst seats I’ve ever had.” Emmy in The Round? T'is not The Bard .. t'is The Tube!
Loved the fact The Sopranos won Best Drama and the Standing O when the cast entered the stage. But the Jersey Boys singing whimbly wambly Four Seasons songs instead of perhaps a live version of Sopranos theme Woke up This Morning by A3?
Cement blocks anyone?
Highlight – Sopranos' David Chase "In essence, this is a story about a gangster. And gangsters are out there taking their kids to college, and taking their kids to school, and putting food on their table. And, hell, let's face it, if the world and this nation was run by gangsters — maybe it is."
Lowlight – Another Sally Field Acceptance Speech – “If Mothers ruled the world there would be no G-D wars…”
I hated that. I really really hated that.
Stephen Colbert, sob, --last year,Barry Manilow, this year,Tony Bennett.
BUT - South Park's Make Love, Not Warcarft won an award. Good for you! Thannnnnks, Emmys.
And Lewis Black "Red, White and Screwed".. over by Tony Bennett was Emmy Saviour with his rant about screen crawls, fast credits and pop ups ads during TV shows.
Ever tried reading headlines as they crawl across the bottom of your screen?
They go by so fast, you can barely read them and then you wait for them to come around again….Can you say motion sickness?
I proclaim that Lewis Black hosts next year’s Emmys.That’ll save Teeveeland from watching reruns of The Sopranos.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Though we only knew each other a short time, I had enormous respect for Bob Leslie.
He loved history and there was nothing I liked better than listening to Bob hold court at the Leslie family dinner table over a homecooked meal as he reminisced about his life adventures from his legendary Rockwood Ontario hardware store, to endless war vignettes, or his young days as a schoolboy.
Every Christmas, Bob would write a witty anecdote about the Leslie family history, the typewritten epistle neatly folded and placed in every family member’s card, with an Xmas cheque and $10 worth of lottery tickets.
Bob was a man of character, a no-nonsense straight shooter with endless determination, and razor wit, a kind and gentle man who loved his wife and family very deeply.
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun split clouds – and done a hundred things…
In High Flight, a mantra to all pilots, Magee is talking about flying which Bob loved to do, but after reading this poem many times, these two lines make me think of Bob’s peaceful lifestyle at his cottage near Remy Bay Road on Georgian Bay.
Be it watering giant sunflowers, sailing the Bay through the channel in his boat “Big Blue” with beloved wife / navigator Joan Ruth, pulling in the dock ladder for the season, or making sure every utility shed tool was in its place, these cottage homes were Bob’s favourite place in the world to be.
Bob would spend idyllic summers under sun -split clouds doing a hundred things that needed to be done.
Until 1999, I had little or no idea what cottage life was like, and each year I learn a little more. Tom and I and his daughter Christine go for the last two weeks in August every summer. I have so many fond memories of this place, including the first Leslie family Christmas in 2006. So there will be many more Leslie Cottage blogs to come.
But of all these great times, I do recall one absolutely perfect August morning at Leslie Cottage.
I remember walking along the path from the Bunky (nickname for the other cottage back behind main cottage) to the bay. The cloudless sky was peacock blue, and the sun was out in all its glory, with a hint of breeze tickling the trees.
No one else seemed to be around. There was a delicious aroma wafting through the air and I simply had to find out what it was so I followed my nose to the bay.
My mother in law was seating at the family picnic table, outside the main cottage peeling cucumbers. She looked like a queen surrounded by her adoring seagull subjects. On the table there were potato pealers and knifes amidst a colourful cornucopia of white porcelain tubs, vats of diced vegetables – brimming with onions, cucumber, tomatoes and many spices.
I wouldn’t be surprised if these same veggie vats were once used to do the laundry, bath children, and I suspect grandchildren.
The picnic table had a bright aqua, yellow and pink plastic tablecloth which was covered in peelings galore from the various ingredients. There were bags of Spanish onions and the biggest cucumbers I have ever seen. These “cooks” has been there for a quite a while and the heavenly smell was emanating from the fresh garden vegetables.
Bob and lady wife Joan were making their famous homemade relish. It was something they did every year. Joan had many of Mason jar in the fridge, but now it was time to make more.
I was invited to join in, so I started cutting the enormous cukes, privileged to be part of this pickling event.
Joan was working away as the seagulls continued to squawk approval but the image that stuck in my mind was the sight of Bob and his chosen utensil for the task.
He was Joan's King, standing proudly at the head of the picnic table decked out in white sun hat ,matching tee shirt, and shorts churning the veggie contents in his 45-cent antique Grinder which he had picked up a flea market- another great anecdote. The Grinder was perched at the end of the table doing its appointed duty. It had a long elegant handle and was beautifully shaped almost like a wine goblet. The Grinder was part of this Leslie family recipe and it was doing a fine job. .
Bob eyes were dancing as he grinned at me grinding away in glee, and I snapped his picture.
I keep that picture as a screensaver and when I feel blue, I look at Robert Clayton Leslie his twinkling eyes in high flight, and I think of that magical Remy Bay Relish Day.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Kenneth and Therese had planned to travel to Kent, the home of Monty Python’s now deceased Graham Chapman who once lived in a rambling abode called The Old Hermitage.
I was recently watching Monty Python’s Personal Best – Graham Chapman on PBS, and laughed uproariously when the other Python lads mentioned that Graham made a lot of ‘instant friends.’ on the road, which in my case, was very true.
When Chapman was touring Canada in the late 80’s, we spent the night together – not what YOU wankers think – we stayed up all night talking about comedy, and Python’s pithy forefathers. I had written a piece for now defunct pop-culture gospel Graffiti Magazine called Life After Python and we simply continued our discussion from the first meeting.
For Graffiti, I had Graham comment on various Python solo projects from Terry Gilliam’s Brazil and John Cleese’s Clockwise, to Terry Jones’ Personal Services and Michael Palin’s The Missionary. I felt quite comfortable further discussing the various genres of Brit wit – yes there is a difference between Oxford and Cambridge comedy schools of thought.
So when Kenneth and Therese said they were going to Kent I concocted my madcap Spam and Soil scheme. The Emberlys and good pal driver Derek who recently joined Graham in his heavenly domain, drove off to find Barming, Kent. Kenneth told me when they reached the town, the word Barming on the sign had been crossed out and replaced by 'Barmy. '
They couldn’t find the Old Hermitage but did, manage to bring me some Barming soil and -selfish me- didn’t even stop to think of the mad cow disease risk! Oh Barmy..my lionheart...
My Spam wish also came true with great panache. I received the classic square tin from life during wartime complimented by the modernized round can model.To the curiosity of many friends, I proudly displayed the Spams in my kitchen window, and sadly with time, the labels faded and the tins rusted. If opened, the Spams would explode, the stench of rotting luncheon meat spewing everywhere as if five million volts had been pumped through it.
Kenneth and Therese think I am Barmy. I know Derek, to whom I dedicate this blog, had a delicious sense of humour, and called me Red, thought I was.
And Tosh, I did ask the Mighty Graham - why Spam?
He took a long drawn out puff on his pipe, and quietly replied ...“there’s not an easy answer to that question… “
Posted by Coral Andrews
I recently received an email.
Subject – The Saddest Song in the World but E-mailer did not send an attachment.So E-mailer sent another message with the subject OOPS and the $#@ song… I’ll call him idiot at moron dot com.I could not open my usual server because of the size of this file, so I had to go another website to delete this.
I was waiting for OOPs to download and PFFFFFT! ...My system croaked. Reboot, reboot, reboot.. PFFFFFT....For someone that writes online and has as many email business addys as I do, this is NOT good.
For me, my computer is my livelihood, a communications necessity and sadly I cannot exist very well without it. For others, it's a play-toy, a cyberspace dalliance, something to amuse themselves, and infuriate others.
I detest chain letters, “send this to your five best friends”… “this is sooo cute” - petitions, ten original size digital pics all at once….The nauseating list goes on forever… a billion trillion MBS.
My little server cannot handle mega files. I am a writer and this machine to me is nothing more than a glorified Remington with lots of bells, whistles and beeps. In fact , I am sure I can hear my real Remington Noiseless Portable sniggering behind me on its display shelf.
I write and I send my work away. I keep my stories on file and I do endless research.
I’m a PC dial up… and proud of it.
Before I disconnected the other computer which was definitely pooched after a long drawn out Inter-squawk, I had to copy out all my email addys because my old system did not have back up abilities.
So I spent hours copying them all out long hand before I switched systems.
I now have a brand new Windows Vista system… which I had to allow. Seems that all new PCS will be Vista – and so I must adapt.
Now hear this - all circuits, ports, chips and anything else remotely electronic!
If anyone and I mean anyone, dares misbehave, I shall personally disconnect you, take the power chord and thrash all of you within an inch of your digital lives.
Zounds... a revelation…. Could the run of bad luck I’ve been having have to do with deleting all those damned chain letters…OOPS..
Posted by Coral Andrews
When I disposed of said Globule, I unknowingly created a monster.
A Lump began to grow on my stomach
Well, at first I ignored it – probably a fat deposit, no big deal.
Then it got bigger, and like an idiot, I refused to see a doctor.
Instead, research pig that I am – I looked up every known Lump symptom I could find beginning with spider bites – well the weather has been rather erratic - and I had seen a little black spider near my desk.
Could I have been so wrapped up in Suite writing that the little black bastard infiltrated my waist space and sunk its miniscule teeth into my flesh?
Nah…
I took Lump everywhere with me, the radio show, plays, long, long, brooding walks hoping fervently it would melt away.
But it did not. It got worse and began to hurt like hell.
Finally, with the manic insistence of everyone I know who parroted “Are you crazy???” ... I phoned my doc, who promptly told me he could see me in a week.
A WEEK!
My imagination was now working overtime, and I started to feel extremely tired and nauseous. I looked up more symptoms, even the worse case scenario.
Finally I went to the Doc.
“Well, it’s not what you think it is,” he said.
“What the hell IS it? “ I asked, beyond panic-stricken.
“It’s a boil – a nasty infected ingrown boil..
A BOIL????
Whaaaaat whaaaat whaaaaaaaaaattttt ?
Holy Crap. The image of Richard E. Grant in How to Succeed in Advertising flashed across my mind. And yes, the doctor had seen the film.
I named The Boil .. Peter.
Peter Boil was indeed the result of that damn Red Globule. During my Stomach Lurgee I was too weak to fight him off. So he became a full fledged creature growing large, red and angry.
Antibiotics galore helped to quash Peter bringing him closer to the surface, but while I was watching Deepa Metha’s Water – a profoundly moving experience, P.B decided to have his own profoundly moving experience… the most God-awful thing I have ever had to endure, and all alone I might add.
The lesson here - Never annoy Little Red Globules on your stomach or they may come back to annoy YOU….
Posted by Coral Andrews
I believe in chiropractors and have gone to one for years.
I discovered the need for a chiro when I was taking ballet – a momentary lapse of physical reasoning - but a creative exercise outlet.
My ballet mistress told me my sacroiliac was not pirouetting the way it should and said get thee to a chiropractor, hence my ballet career was short lived.
Since then, I get “cracked” once a month, and I know better then to miss several treatments.
My so called crazy life kept me from making my regular appointments for the last three months.
Too Much Bedrest combined with Not Enough Exercise equals Lower Back Red Alert.
I hate staying still and had to stay in bed to recover from Dreaded Stomach Lurgee. To make matters worse, I had this annoying red globule on my stomach which I promptly disposed of. Take that!
After seeing the chiro, I slathered ointment on my back, alternating with ice packs – 10 minutes on… 10 minutes off.
I sat on a towel on my dining room chair alternating between writhing and writing - my hind quarters confined to hard surfaces. Finally, fed up with that, I went back to my cushy office chair with a towel for support.
I fooled myself into thinking I was feeling much better.
So while bending over the dining table trying to find a CD in the Coral FM bag, I went to straighten up. I couldn’t. My whole back became Spasm Central. I'd done this before eons ago merely ascending from a car which sent me right to emergency as my whole lower being went into ...what's the word ... oh yeah .. PAIN.
Is all this back nonsense a result of my accident (when I was 15, I got hit by two cars on a highway but that’s another blog) or do I not know how to get out of a damn car-seat?
Aha! This time was different because I knew what to do to avoid emergency ward fate…
I sank down very s-l-o-w-l-y on the floor and c-r-a-w-l-e-d to the fridge to get my ointment which I immediately s-l-a-t-h-e-r-e-d on my lower back – Fr-e-e-e-e-ezing cold and then hot. Then I stayed on the floor on my hand and knees for a good 15 minutes (to the delight of my four cats) and then very s-l-o-w-l-y straightened up.
It worked…
Countless ice packs and various pain killers later, I was fine, but that red globule on my stomach was anything but.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Someone told me it was from Montreal.
In my case, it wouldn't matter if it was from Timbuktu.
I seem to pick up everything and anything always around this same time of year.
I drink oceans of water, wash my hands incessantly - Purell now my preferred hand lotion.
I take vitamins, wrap my head in a fake fur leopard headband, and my feet in furry boots in the bluster of winter because this non- driver trudges everywhere.
I'm hard-core townie. I live and work in the heart of my city.
My workplace Far Out Flicks is a block away from home - a cool indee video store.
People come in and pick up their entertainment wares often coughing, sputtering and sneezing all over the latest new release in the process - heaven to any lurking superbug.
I have often thought about wearing a mask - leopard of course.
'I'll have this one'.. they collectively sputter, totally indifferent to the legions of germs spread in a mere five seconds while handing DVD or VHS choice (yes VHS still exists) to me while paying the rental fee.
Money changing hands is another absolutely fabulous way to catch germs.
Of course, I can't Purell incessantly.
Hand sanitizers can only do so much, and I caught this dreaded stomach, ears, nose, and throat lurgee anyway.
While I was resting I noticed a progression of pain twinges in my lower back.
Pshaw… t'is nothing I thought.
I was sooooooooo wrong.
Posted by Coral Andrews
I was always playing with Ring - twirling him around my finger.
One day I had it .. the next day .. gone.
T'was a simple yet elegant trinket set with a little amber stone surrounded by thistle leafs - Celtic in design. It didn't cost much but the sentimental value of it is priceless.
When Tom put Ring on my finger in our private mediaeval ceremony in Scotland's Balgonie chapel, that was true and timeless magic. Ring has been there for me through all our adventures from 2001 right up to early January 2007.
Ring never left my finger except for daily ritual summer swims in Georgian Bay no matter what the water temperture.
I have searched every pocket of every coat I own for Ring - purses, totebags, gloves, mitts, socks and shoes. (I once found a lost necklace in my fave black boot). I have scoured every inch of my apartment - under the bed, in my pillowcases, every drawer, every jewelry box, every cupboard I can think of, down the cracks in the couch, under armchairs, in the bookcases, around the kitchen, the dining room, the hutch - even my camera case, and CD bag. I constantly rummage in there to change music each week for Coral FM.
I remember twirling Ring around my finger many a time at the video store where I work. So I scanned bins, boxes, nooks and crannies from Anchorman to Zelig.
I've searched the fresh kitty litter and even the soiled litter box on more than one occasion hoping one of my four cats -Zeus, Squonk, Feste or Reggie -snatched Ring up for a pretty play thing..
I think of my Ring every night and last week I had a scathingly brilliant idea.
While I was at work, Tom went down to the storage locker and pored through every Yuletide bin and box cherished ornaments, thinning tinsel, reams of multi colour lights - and my last hope the Christmas tree bin where I had to squash the branches to fit into their assigned bin space. Perhaps Ring had become a reluctant decoration having become impaled on a tree branch.
Nothing...
I miss Ring terribly.
I won't adorn my fingers with anything else - partially out of fear but more out of loyalty. I guess Ring must have just quietly slipped off my finger and maybe one day we will reunite when I least suspect it. One Christmas Tom gave me a beautiful Celtic cross necklace to match Ring and it rarely leaves my neck, but nothing can replace my one and only Celtic circle of promise.
For now, I face the world a little sadder, sans Ring, my long slender wedding finger au naturel...
Posted by Coral Andrews
My father was an mechanical engineer so where he went, the family went - from Ontario, Canada to the beauty of Cobham, Surrey in England and then to the politically volatile climate of 1960's Belfast, Northern Ireland.
There’s a bridge over the railway line between Finaghy Rd. North and Finaghy Road South – a marker not only between the streets but between the faiths. The Protestants live on Finaghy North and The Catholics live on Finaghy South. The agnostic Andrews family lived in an upscale suburb of Belfast near picturesque Upper Malone / Lady Dixon Park district. But just down the huge hill where I used to ride my bike each day, to get white-bagged red-licorice Cherry Lips at the local Spar variety store, I soon discovered there was an entirely different side to Finaghy life. As I walked down to the bottom of the road, en route to Finaghy Primary School towards Lisburn Road, I saw the row upon row of tiny flats and I always wondered how people ever lived that way and still seemed so cheerful.
People would say 'top of the morning to you.' and I would shyly reply 'hello.'
Life for a young Canadian girl was very strange but at age 11 you take it in stride.
I had a lot crazy things happen to me in Belfast – going to ultra-posh girls' grammar school Richmond Lodge, learning to ride a horse, living next door to a Mormon compound, gypsies on our doorstep, and befriending a family of 15, two of their sons lost in the war a few years after we left for Canada– but that’s another blog. We left Belfast in 1969 - the year the war started.
But all these years later and being a fan of Irish playwrights, particularly Sean O'Casey I realize that I did see, firsthand, some of the poverty that O’Casey writes about in his Irish Trilogy. Each week we would travel through the working class district of Sandy Row where the papers reported daily unrest in the streets. We kept the car windows up and the doors locked en route to the weekly swim at Belfast's historic Ormeau Baths. The reward – Beattie’s newspaper-wrapped fish and chips for Tuesday night supper.
Sean O’Casey characters bring to mind my favourite cleaning lady. She was a tiny hard working woman with very few front teeth. She had a huge family of 12 who lived in one of these cramped little semis down Finaghy Rd. hill. Of course she loved kids, and became a member of our family too. When my parents went to Greece on holiday, my sister and I had several babysitters including our own …I’ll call her Mrs. B. and one night we came to her house for Sunday dinner.
The Andrews household Sunday dinner would alternate each week between roast beef, roast mutton, roast pork or BBQ spareribs - so different from our maid's repast. Mrs B's little kitchen was crammed with family members of all ages, everyone so jovial as they passed around endless plates and tea cups. There were shifts at the kitchen table. My sister and I sat with Mrs B’s girls, and we all had tons of mashed potatoes and gravy, baked beans, and a barely a sliver of roast beef with bread, butter, jam and tea. No complained and everyone was satisfied with the meal. That was dinner or Sunday “tea” as the Irish call it - a night I will never forget.
Sad to say, we had to let Mrs. B go sometime later as she had been pilfering in our closets and took a mint-green emu / mohair hair sweater that my mother has knitted for my sister. We knew it was Mrs. B because mum used to put a thin band of elastic at the bottom of each sweater so they would hold their shape. One day mum saw a young girl walking down Finaghy wearing the missing sweater. I guess Mrs. B figured we were rich Canadians, so what harm could it do?
At the time I was shocked and angry, and disappointed but now looking back, I realize that our wee workaholic domestic did this to survive, likely selling the sweater to keep putting roast beef, tiny as it might be, on her own family’s table. Though your actions were wrong, your intentions were honorable – a mother feeding her own.
Sláinte! Mrs. B. wherever you are.
Posted by Coral Andrews
I was so excited Sunday night I decided to have a drinkee in celebration.
Instead of making myself a White Russian (vodka, Kahlua, and milk) - I was once a formidable bartender - I concocted a mixture of vodka, Baileys and milk – Absolutely ghastly - also called a Bailey’s Comet, which hit my stomach like a lead balloon especially when Reese Witherspoon announced Best Actor.
As I watched Forest Whitaker accept, I could hear Richard Burton whisper into O’Toole’s ear “Well, old sod, you beat me.”
Peter O’Toole now tops Richard Burton for the most Oscar nominations and NO wins - O’Toole’s Honorary Academy statuette, notwithstanding.
O’Toole and Burton are amongst the finest actors in film history but were always very naughty boys off set. O’Toole makes no bones about the viscosity of Tinsel town. So if God forbid, Peter O’T should shuffle off this mortal coil with no Golden Boy to his credit, think of the delicious irony in that.
I’m sure he has.
Life without Oscar goes on, with O’Toole is writing volume three of his book Loitering with Intent -' the one with the meat.' Oh, that I were a fly on that wall that I could see the oh-so-naughtier book bits O’Toole decides to edit.
The worst thing about watching Peter O’Toole not make Oscar history- being cheated out of a damned fine pithy acceptance speech.
Time for another properly concocted drinkee..
( DRAT !!! - I completely missed Best Picture in Blog Previous but Little Miss Sunshine did triumph at Independent Spirit Awards - the coolest awards soiree of 'em all!)
Posted by Coral Andrews
I work in a cool indee video store called Far Out Flicks and I’ve only seen three of the nominated films.What’s my excuse? I’ve spent the last month saturated in six seasons of The Sopranos.
Whadya gonna do?
Little Miss Sunshine I saw last Friday night. An Inconvenient Truth, I listened to in shock and awe while I was serving customers - also in shock and awe ( I need to absorb AIT again!!) Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest – I saw on the big screen accompanied by surround-sound, popcorn with a touch of butter and a diet coke.
Movie blockbusters - the big screen, indee films – the small screen. Bada Bing. Whoa.. I'm channeling Silvio and Pauley here. So, very last minute, (because I’ve spent all my time renting out these films!) based on my sixth movie sense, and customer osmosis, here’s my take on who’s NOT going to win Oscar.
The envelope please….
And the Oscar for Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role won’t go to…
Leonardo DiCaprio (Blood Diamond), Ryan Gosling (Half Nelson) or Will Smith (The Pursuit of Happyness).That leaves Forest Whitaker for the Last King of Scotland and Peter O'Toole for Venus! …. Run Forest Run !!!! .... because Peter O'T a.k.a Florence of Arabia might beat ya! [Peter O’Toole and director Martin Scorcese reluctantly share the “Susan Lucci of the Oscars” moniker!]
And the Oscar for a Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role won’t go to…
Jackie Earle Haley (Little Children) – [nice comeback tho], Djimon Hounshou (Blood Diamond) or Mark Wahlberg (The Departed) .. so it’s Dreamboy Eddie Murphy (Dreamgirls) or Adam Arkin (Little Miss Sunshine) - (remember him croonin' up a storm, stapling that fake snow in Eddie Scissorhands?)...I saw three golden ships come sailing in ….
And the Oscar for a Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role won’t go to ….
Penelope Cruz (Volver), Academy Queen Meryl Streep (The Devil Wears Prada) Academy Grand Dame Judi Dench (Notes on a Scandal) [ film looks positively lascivious with Dench downright daunting in the trailer! ] or Kate Winslet in Little Children – so that means another, pithy acceptance speech, from Helen Mirren if she has any left under her crown!
And the Oscar for a Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role won’t go to …
Adriana Barraza (Babel) Cate Blanchett (Notes on a Scandal) Rinko Kikuchi (Babel) or sob sob…. shimmy, shimmy .. the refreshingly real Abigail Breslin for Little Miss Sunshine.Ya know, Jennifer Hudson must feel good to have proved American Idiot’s Simon Cowell or Simon Cower as I have dubbed him, uh, what's the word … WRONG. Florence Ballard deserves her Supreme due! (Bad pun intended)
And the Oscar for Achievement in Directing will not go to…
Clint Eastwood (Letters from Iwo Jima) [ Eastwood has Golden Boys (Unforgiven, Million Dollar Baby) – come on, give someone else a chance] Babel (Alejandro Gonsalez Inarritu) Stephen Frears (The Queen) So, get it over with and give the blasted statuette to Marty S. already????
And the Oscar for Best Motion Picture of the Year will not go to…
Babel, The Queen, Letters from Iwo Jima, or even the gobsmacking Departed. Drum-roll please..Little Miss Sunshine like its ultra-cool little Olive will kick ass, beeping and chugging, with all those little Oscar ballots pushing it triumphantly into first place.
Time for champers. .
That’s all…
Posted by Coral Andrews
Peter O'Toole, is nominated an eighth time for his role as Maurice, a cynical septugarian actor who falls for a much younger woman, in the film Venus.
Critics are saying this is the performance of O'Toole's career.
O'Toole, now 74, 'and proud of it,' wants to win Oscar now, not for an entire body of film work though, persuaded by his daughters, O'Toole begrudgingly accepted his Lifetime Achievement Oscar in 2003.
If O'Toole does win, it will be 44 years since his first Best Actor nod for 1962 epic Lawrence of Arabia!
There have been many Best Actor nominations in between - Goodbye Mister Chips (1969),The Ruling Class (1972),The Stunt Man (1980) My Favorite Year (1982) and O'Toole has also been nominated for the same role twice - King Henry II in Becket (1964) King Henry II in The Lion in Winter (1968)
Right from the horse's or Pig's mouth, as Lion in Winter co-star Kate Hepburn aptly nicknamed him, Peter O'Toole and his pithy screen alter-egos prove why he and Oscar should share a drop!
1) I want to win the lovely bugger outright.
2) Damn you, I’m not an actor, I’m a movie star – Alan Swann –My Favorite Year
3) "I love the notion of a dirty old man and a sluttish young woman having a romance. "
4) "For what I am about to receive, may I make myself truly grateful. " - Jack Gurney –The Ruling Class
5) "My dear boy, I should have won for them all."
6) "I don’t like premieres and things like that. I’d just rather do my acting and then piss off."
7) "You dare to damn me, do you ? Well, I damn you back." - King Henry II in The Lion in Winter
8) "Always the bridesmaid, never the bride, my foot."
9) "Am I the strongest or am I not?" King Henry II in Becket
10) "I’m a working stiff baby, just like everyone else."
The Oscars will be broadcast Feb 25. To be sure, The Last King of Ireland will have had more than a few drops before they announce the Best Actor category!
Posted by Coral Andrews
And the Slurs ! Oh the Slurs !
" The difference between critics and audiences is that one is a group of humans, and one is not."
" American critics are like American universities. They both have dull and half dead faculties. "
" I have a fine sense of the ridiculous but no sense of humour … "
On the Twelfth Day of Christmas My Casting Choice Would be....
Edward Albee – Ebenezer Scrooge
Samuel Beckett – Marley’s Ghost
Thornton Wilder – Ghost of Christmas Past
Harold Pinter – Ghost of Christmas Present
Wallace Shawn – Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Wendy Wasserstein – Mrs Dilber
Anton Chekhov – Bob Cratchit
Paula Vogel – Mrs. Cratchit
David Mamet - Fred
Tiny Tim – Joe Orton (well… he was in the same sarcastic mind set … )
(Honorable mention for Ghost of Christmas Past –Tennessee Williams who also despised critics)
****Twelve Pulitzer Prizes , Eleven Pundits Piping, Ten Pairs of Manolo Blahniks, Nine Viles of Vicodin, Eight Fat Boy Slim Jigs, S-S-S-S-S-S- even Cartons of Milk, Six Dirty Martinis, Five Effing Goolllllllllld Claims, Four Pints of Duff Beer, Three Vats of Mead, Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and the Last Round of Glenmorangie Single Malts for Albee, O'Toole, Leary, Walken , Falstaff and (Barney Gumble has passed out), Stewie, and House ( continuing Rude Off- Victory is Miranda's! ) and Towelie getting higher on Vicodin at The Really Sexy Party as Calamity Jane (now back in the tree) watches George W. get dumped on by The Partridge. ***
And as Mrs Dilber said - "A Merry Christmas if it ain't out of keeping with the situation."
A Christmas Coral
Posted by Coral Andrews
Like this one ....
"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we." —President George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Aug. 5, 2004
On the eleventh day Of Christmas … (more like Eleventh Hour) … My Casting Choice Would Be..
George W Bush – Ebenezer Scrooge
George H.W. Bush – Marley’s Ghost
Donald Rumsfeld - Ghost of Christmas Past
Dick Cheney – Ghost of the Christmas Present
Nancy Pelosi – Ghost of the Christmas Future Yet to Come
Bill O’ Reilly – Bob Cratchit ( Can you say Grovel?... )
Ann Coulter – Mrs. Cratchit ( ... and Charwoman is too good for the likes of 'ER !!! )
Margaret Thatcher - Mrs Dilber
Al Franken - Fred
Tiny Tim – Stephen Harper ( tho he thinks he's Marley)
****Eleven Pundits Piping, Ten Pairs of Manolo Blahniks, Nine Viles of Vicodin, Eight Fat Boy Slim Jigs, S-S-S-S-S-S- even Cartons of Milk, Six Dirty Martinis, Five Effing Goolllllllllld Claims, Four Pints of Duff Beer, Three Vats of Mead, Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and a Huge Round of Irish whiskey and Glenmorangie Single Malts for O'Toole, Leary, Falstaff and Barney Gumble, Stewie, House, and Miranda ( having a Rude Off- Victory will be Miranda's ) and Towelie getting higher on Vicodin at The Really Sexy Party as Calamity Jane (now back in the tree) and Walken listen in on George W. preachin' to a possible voter. ***
Posted by Coral Andrews
On the 10th day of Christmas My Casting Choice would be …
Meryl Streep - (Miranda Priestly –The Devil Wears Prada) - Ebenezer Scrooge
Meryl Streep - (Lisa Metzger– Prime) - Marley’s Ghost
Meryl Streep - (Ethel Rosenburg - Angels in America) - Ghost of Christmas Past
Meryl Streep - (The Angel of Australia – Angels in America) - Ghost of Christmas Present
Meryl Streep - (Madeline Ashton - Death Becomes Her- remember that neck twist!…yeesh.. ) -Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Meryl Streep - (Rabbi- Angels in America) - Bob Cratchit
Meryl Streep - (Francesca Johnson – The Bridges of Madison County) - Mrs. Cratchit
Meryl Streep – (Helen Archer – Ironweed) - Mrs. Dilber
Meryl Streep ( Gail Hartman – The River Wild) - Fred
Meryl Streep – (Jessica Lovejoy – The Simpsons) - Tiny Tim
****Ten Pairs of Manolo Blahniks, Nine Viles of Vicodin, Eight Fat Boy Slim Jigs, S-S-S-S-S-S- even Cartons of Milk, Six Dirty Martinis, Five Effing Goolllllllllld Claims, Four Pints of Duff Beer, Three Vats of Mead, Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and Another Round of Irish whiskey and Glenmorangie Single Malts for O'Toole, Leary, Falstaff, Walken, and Barney Gumble, while Stewie, House and Miranda Priestly are having a Rude Off – (Miranda’s winning) and Towelie's still getting high on Vicodin at The Sexy Party as Calamity Jane climbs back up the Tree.***
Posted by Coral Andrews
On the Ninth Day of Christmas My Casting Choice would be.....
( Okay, I know. I know .... I"m three Crimble days behind and it's now 2007. So sue me.. ( Anyway, Bob and Doug McKenzie call those three days The Mystery Days, eh)
HEY - it was Christmas. I had to work at Yon Indee Neighbourhood Video Store, Travel to the Snowless North, and Buy Prezzees... Just cuz I'm writing about all these Scrooges - doesn't mean I AM one! )
Gregory House – Ebenezer Scrooge ( ES could take some pointers...)
James Wilson - Marley’s Ghost
Toss up between David Zorba ( Ben Casey) or Marcus Welby ( Marcus Welby M.D.) - Ghost of Christmas Past.
(Those who don't know who these people are, look 'em up!)
Doug Ross (ER) - Ghost of Christmas Present
The Carver (Nip/Tuck) - Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Luka Kovac (ER) - Bob Cratchit
Samantha Taggart (ER) - Mrs. Cratchit
Liz Cruz (Nip/Tuck) - Mrs. Dilber
George O’Malley (Gray’s Anatomy) - Fred
Alex Taggart (ER) - Tiny Tim
****Nine Viles of Vicodin, Eight Fat Boy Slim Jigs, S-S-S-S-S-S- even Cartons of Milk, Six Dirty Martinis, Five Effing Goolllllllllld Claims, Four Pints of Duff Beer, Three Vats of Mead, Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and a Round of Irish whiskey and Glenmorangie Single Malts for Walken , Leary , O'Toole, Falstaff and Barney Gumble, Stewie, House ( having a Rude Off ) as Towelie gets high on Vicodin at The Sexy Party as Calamity Jane falls out of the Tree.***
Posted by Coral Andrews
On the Eighth Day of Christmas, My Casting Choice would be...
Christopher Walken - Scrooge
Dennis Hopper – Marley’s Ghost
Jack Black - Bob Cratchit
Joan Cusack - Mrs. Cratchit
Morgan Freeman – Ghost of Christmas Past
Jack Nicholson - Ghost of Christmas Present
Billy Bob Thornton – Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Mrs. Dilber –Minnie Driver
Fred – Zack Braff
Tiny Tim –Abergail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine)
****Eight Fat Boy Slim Jigs, S-S-S-S-S-S- even Cartons of Milk, Six Dirty Martinis, Five Effing Goolllllllllld Claims, Four Pints of Duff Beer, Three Vats of Mead, Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and a Round of Irish whiskey and Glenmorangie Single Malts for O'Toole, Leary, Falstaff and Barney Gumble, Calamity Jane and Stewie and Towelie getting high with Walken at The Sexy Party in a Tree.***
Posted by Coral Andrews
And when you have money, you don't have to hang out with a bunch of poor asses like you guys. Screw you guys, I'm going home. ( to Marley's Ghost .. HO HO HO)
On the Seventh Day of Christmas, My Casting Choice would be...
Eric Theodore Cartman - Scrooge
Stan Marsh and Kyle Broflovski - Marley’s Ghost
Towelie and Chef - Ghost of Christmas Past (Respect My Authority! Towelie sucked and Chef is pissed at Matt Stone and Trey Parker! )
Kenny McCormick - Ghost of Christmas Present
Mr. Hankey - Ghost of Christmas Dinners Yet to Come
Mr Mackey - Bob Cratchit
Mrs. Choksondik - Mrs. Cratchit
Mrs. Dilber – Shiela Broflovski
Tiny Tim - J- J - J immy or TIMMMMAH !
Fred - Leopold " Butters" Stotch
****S-S-S-S-S-S- even cartons of milk, Six Dirty Martinis, Five Effing Goolllllllllld Claims, Four Pints of Duff Beer, Three Vats of Mead, Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and a Round of Irish whiskey and Glenmorangie Single Malts for O'Toole, Leary, Falstaff and Barney Gumble, Calamity Jane, Stewie and Towelie getting high at The Sexy Party in a Tree.***
Posted by Coral Andrews
And how about this juicy little Yuletide soupcon while you're all running around in circles having a Sexy Chistmas Party?
"Easy. Massage the scalp. You're washing a baby's hair, not scrubbing vomit off your Christmas dress, you holiday drunk.... "
On the Sixth Day of Christmas, My Casting Choice would be.
Stewie Griffin – Scrooge
Bertram – Marley’s Ghost
Peter Griffin – Bob Cratchit
Lois Griffin – Mrs. Cratchit
Brian - Ghost of Christmas Pissed
Cleveland Brown , Glenn Quagmire - Ghost of Christmas Present
Death - Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Joe Swanson - Tiny Tim
Mrs. Dilber – (Lois mother) Mrs. Pewterschmidt
Fred – Tom Tucker
****Six Dirty Martinis, Five Effing Goolllllllllld Claims, Four Pints of Duff Beer, Three Vats of Mead, Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and a Round of Irish whiskey and Glenmorangie Single Malts for O'Toole, Leary, Falstaff and Barney Gumble, Calamity Jane and Stewie all having a Sexy Party in a Tree.***
Posted by Coral Andrews
Here anyone can sally forth and make a fortune. But beware. Says its morally corrupt town boss. "In life, you have to do a lot of things you don't effing want to do. Many times, that's what the eff life is, one vile effing task, after another." This 1876 Scrooge supervises Deadwood - a gritty, hard-living outlaw settlement with No Law and Order overflowing with whiskey, profanity, whores, and gold.
On the Fifth Day of Christmas, My Casting Choice would be...
Al Swearengen– Scrooge
Wild Bill Hickok – Marley’s Ghost
Seth Bullock –Bob Cratchit
Alma Garrett – Mrs. Cratchit
Doc Cochran - Ghost of Christmas Past
E.B Farnum - Ghost of Christmas Present
Mr. Wu - Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Jewel - Tiny Tim
Calamity Jane - Mrs. Dilber
Fred – Johnny Burns
****Five Effing Goolllllllllld Claims, Four Pints of Duff Beer, Three Vats of Mead, Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and now a Round of Irish whiskey and Glenmorangie Single Malts for O'Toole, Leary, Falstaff and Barney Gumble, and Calamity Jane in a Tree.***
Posted by Coral Andrews
On the Fourth Day of Christmas (Thanks to Simpsons fanatics-in-crime Tom and Christine) My Casting Choice would be ...
Charles Montgomery Burns – Scrooge
Homer Simpson – Bob Cratchit
Marge Simpson – Mrs. Cratchit
Mr. Waylon Smithers - Marley's Ghost
Bleeding Gums Murphy - Ghost of Christmas Past
Moe Szyslak, Lenny Leonard, and Carl Carlson - Ghost of Christmas Present
Sideshow Bob - Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Edna Krabappel - Mrs Dilber
Bart Simpson - Tiny Tim
Nelson Muntz - Fred
***Four Pints of Duff Beer, Three Vats of Mead, Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and Another Couple of Tumblers of Glenmorangie Single Malt Scotch for O'Toole, Leary, Falstaff and Barney Gumble in a Tree.***
Posted by Coral Andrews
On the Third Day of Christmas My Casting Choice would be...
Shylock (Merchant of Venice) – Scrooge
Banquo (Macbeth) – Marley’s Ghost
Ariel (The Tempest) Ghost of Christmas Past
Falstaff (Henry VI) – Ghost of Christmas Present
Richard III- (Richard III) Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Mistress Quickly (Henry VI) – Mrs. Dilber
Benedick ( Much Ado About Nothing ) - Bob Cratchit
Beatrice (Much Ado About Nothing) – Mrs. Cratchit
Puck (The Tempest) – Tiny Tim
Ferdinand – (The Tempest) – Fred
*** Three Vats of Mead, Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and a Tumbler of Glenmorangie Single Malt, O'Toole, Leary and Falstaff in a Tree.***
Posted by Coral Andrews
On the Second Day of Christmas - (and there are SOOOOOO many to choose from!!!) My Final Casting Choice would be...
Denis Leary – Scrooge
Steven Wright – Marley’s Ghost
David Letterman – Ghost of Christmas Past
Jon Stewart – Ghost of Christmas Present
Stephen Colbert – Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Larry David – Bob Cratchit
Cheryl Hines – Mrs. Cratchit
Verne Troyer – Tiny Tim
Eddie Izzard– Fred
Margaret Cho – Mrs. Dilber
****Two Highballs of Jack Daniels, and a Tumbler of Glenmorangie Single Malt for O'Toole and Leary in a Tree. ***
Posted by Coral Andrews
I do a lot of Recreational Casting on Coral FM.
So, I got to thinking. How about having some casting fun with Charles Dickens' timeless tome A Christmas Carol.
I've always wanted to play Mrs. Dilber … maybe someday, with my Poor Tom as Scrooge.
My all time favourite is, of course, the 1951 black and white classic Scrooge known world wide as A Christmas Carol starring Alastair Sim, (who died in 1976) as the Meanest Man in London, and Kathleen Harrison ( who died in 1995) as Mrs. Dilber. There is no version better.
Yet, this story has been done in so many ways, I thought why not have a jolly good stab at it myself?
So in a very silly, but seasonal, 12 part series, I present for your reading pleasure - The 12 Days of A Christmas Carol brought to you by A Christmas Coral. In this casting case I am leaving Sir and Dame names out - too much work- and I have Understudies because I just couldn't choose!
On the First Day of Christmas, my Casting Choice would be.
Peter O’Toole – Ebenezer Scrooge
Alan Rickman - Marley’s Ghost
John Gielgud – as Ghost of Christmas Past
Orson Welles – Ghost of Christmas Present
Anthony Hopkins - Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Ian Holm - Bob Cratchit
Judy Dench - Mrs Cratchit
Young Master Mark Lester -Tiny Tim
Pauline Collins – Mrs. Dilber
Young Master Albert Finney – Fred
(Alan Bates - Understudy for Ghost of Christmas Present
Richard Harris - Understudy for Scrooge
Richard Burton - Understudy for Ghost of Christmas Past
Lynn Redgrave - Understudy for Mrs. Dilber.)
*** and Peter O'Toole inbibing a Tumbler of Glenmorangie Single Malt in a tree ****
Posted by Coral Andrews
Many from that horrific time know well "The Disappeared" and the National Stadium.
The National Stadium in Santiago and the Caravan of Death were daily descriptions that still turn blood to ice. It an arena of horror reminiscent of Hitler’s Final Solution the atrocities performed under Pinochet’s rule were unspeakable - tortures, mutilation, rapes, hideous faceless crimes in unmarked graves found much too late. Random arrests, random beatings, random death.
Ariel Dorfman lived in U.S exile during the murderous reign of Chilean dictator General Augusto Pinochet. In 1990, Dorfman returned to his battered homeland. Today he remains undaunted in his efforts to inform the world about crimes against humanity. Dorfman has written volumes about the political turmoil forced upon his own people, during the 17-year Chilean military coup that ironically began Sept 11, 1973.
In 2003, my good friend Chilean actor / writer Isabel Cisterna of Neruda Productions presented Dorfman's Death and the Maiden (playing tortured protagonist Pauline Salas) to mark the 30th anniversary after Pinochet's murderous reign.
Cistena found a kindred spirit in Dorfman and the playwright offered his assistance in the production of his play.
Pinochet was never properly brought to justice for his heinous crimes as he was declared mentally unfit for trial, but near his death he did take responsibility for what he had done. For Cisterna, and thousands more, it’s still not enough. Cisterna still lives with vivid memories which she describes in her performance piece The Letter.
.... The streets became narrow… I lost my faith looking for you… no one would give me your whereabouts, go to pajaritos, go to estacion central.. no one would tell me where they took you and why ….I got this letter today.. isn’t it funny Pablo? I waited for twelve years to get an answer and now I don’t rush to open it… the body of Pablo Morales Diaz was recovered in an unmarked grave together with 342 more …. a single gun shot to the head … you can claim the remains…
When Cisterna heard the news of Pinochet’s passing, she said "Yesterday was a bitter sweet day, part of me was happy and another very nostalgic, I wish I could go home to experience this monumental time in history, one chapter closed and I wasn't there"..
With Pinochet gone, hopefully the souls of The Disappeared can finally rest in peace. She may not have been in her homeland when Pinochet passed, but here in Canada, Isabel Cisterna, like Ariel Dorfman, did her part to make sure the world does not forget.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Everyone Jack ever knew, is gone - taken and executed by one of several government factions. Could it be global revolutionaries, the great unwashed "dirt eaters", or has this horror been conceived right in his own backyard. Noone knows, so Jack appoints himself The Designated Mourner.
My husband saw Eric Peterson in The Designated Mourner in 1997.The piece made such an impact that Tom decided he would one day direct this play if we could find the right performer.
Ere the days of Poor Tom we discovered the like-minded Isinglass Theatre, and the only man to play Jack - actor, now photographer, Ted Phythian who one critic called - "a tour de force as the acidly charming Jack." It took almost a year and half of rehearsals to put The Designated Mourner up on its feet. Phythian was nothing short of amazing in (as Eric Peterson noted ) an extremely difficult role with cast members Katharine Mills as Judy, and Scott Crockard as Howard as the ghostly, maybe loved ones, of Jack's past.
I watched Phythian, as Peterson put it, "track through", and "build his own house."
Wallace Shawn's lauguage, the rhythm, the musicality of it, was mesmorizing - the interlocking monologues, beautifully merged with Jack's rambling arias in this chilling Orwellian existence. For the Isinglass production, I was Phythian's line coach and I especially loved Jack's fascination with his 'self.' ... in The Designated Mourner.
From then on.. more and more often I'd find my mind had just slipped away from me, following some peculiar will of its own. One day she (Judy) said to me something like, " I don't understand your relationship to society. I don't understand your relationship to the world you live in." "Can I tell you something"? I said to her snappily. "Do you know something? I don't understand my relationship to my own ass. I mean, I was standing naked in the bathroom this morning, and when I saw my ass in the mirror, I just said to myself, "What is that? What is that? And what does it have to do with me.?"
Posted by Coral Andrews
Lynn Redgrave played a lady-in-waiting in a November 1963 production of Hamlet at London's National Theatre, directed by Lawrence Olivier. The only conspiracy the audience was thinking about was the one at the court of Elsinore, until events in another country intervened. She recounts:
While we were in the middle of a performance, JFK (John F. Kennedy) was assassinated, and those of us who were ladies-in-waiting and having long gaps in between when we weren’t on stage, learned about it first on the radio down in the canteen.
There was this horrifying feeling of coming back up onstage and knowing that not everybody knew. You knew this terrible news, there had been a couple of intermissions and certainly the audience all knew by then, as well.
My father [Michael Redgrave, playing Claudius] stepped forward at the end of the performance and asked for a two-minute silence. It was a most extraordinary experience to be onstage at the end of a great tragedy – everybody has just died you know – Hamlet has died, the Queen has died, and everybody is lying there dead – and then ( for my father) to stand up and then talk about this devastating assassination and then to ask for silence.
Everybody cried.
It was most extraordinary, and that of course was England. He wasn’t our president but it had that sort of effect.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Peter O'Toole was playing Hamlet, and my father (Michael Redgrave) was Claudius the king, and there numerous various ladies-in-waiting. It was long and it was the uncut version, which ran about four hours.
It was directed by Lawrence Olivier and it had some wonderful things in it, but it was plagued with problems. We had a huge set designed by the late Sean Kenny and it looked a bit like – well, it was supposed to be rocks in a big semicircle, but it looked like a huge dinosaur. It was rather ugly and it was placed on a revolve and it was supposed to come around and form different shapes and the revolve was on a rake so the stage was slanted and that meant that when the weight of the "dinosaur" – as we liked to call it – got to the bottom of the revolve on a sort of downhill end, it had to use a lot of energy to get it uphill and sometimes it would stick.
I remember the first time that the revolve stuck was during the first Elsinore scene. The King and Queen are on stage and all of us ladies-in-waiting and lords, Osric, and everybody are milling about.
All of a sudden this thing sticks and there’s about to be all sorts of big entrances and we are trying to push it around with our feet while adlibbing. You know, when people are left to adlib their Shakespeare crowd sounds it tends to come out like ‘So, how are things in Elsinore?' And you hear these ripples of giggles from the audience, and it was quite tricky.
(Peter) O’Toole was at times extraordinary. He was very erratic, his performance. I think he was going through some problems in his life at the time, and of course it was a mammoth undertaking and there were days or scenes – sometimes not whole performances - where he was absolutely electrifying, but it came and went a bit.
(Amanda Plummer will be performing Lynn Redgrave's extraordinary one woman show Shakespeare For My Father at Montreal's Saidye Bronfman Centre for the Arts Feb 4 - 25 2007.)
Posted by Coral Andrews
When Kenneth first told me about The Visit - his own play lauded by Tennessee Williams, I was dumbfounded. It seems surreal to me that years later, our own theatre company Poor Tom is now going to present The Kindness of Strangers featuring Williams one act I Can't Imagine Tomorrow and a premiere of The Visit.
Emberly joked … “You came along and said enough of this bullsh**t, let’s put this on.”
Emberly, like Williams, is an EARLY riser, so we chatted at 8 a.m - an accursed hour for Coral FM to conduct any interview!!! Emberly called Tom and I at 7 a.m. chiming "Rise and Shine" in his best Amanda Wingfield. He had been up since 5 a.m! He mused a little more about Mr. Williams, while I asked him about his own creative process.
What playwrights shape your standards and attitudes?
Harold Pinter. I could keep reading him forever- his early work. I am not too much drawn to later Pinter because he gets very political and that’s fine but I am much more drawn to the intimate and the personal, which is one of the things I liked about Tennessee Williams.
Especially his early work. Later in life when people get on the bandwagon of social causes and issues and after we have all been alive for half a century. ..God, I’m getting old (a gruff laughs) ...It’s almost irresistible to become Bono or something – but I don’t recommend it – I think it would be great if people would just pull back from that – because there are preachers in their pulpits, there are politicians in their little offices and they’ve got their trip – If you want to be a preacher, be a preacher, if you want to be politician, be a politician, if you want to be an artist ( he says ARTIST in a menacing tone )... Obviously you are going to bring that in – but to make it a focus, it doesn’t appeal to me. I don’t think I’ll ever write a politically motivated kind of thing.
Is it hard to write, whether it's a short story or play? How do you write?
It’s a discipline. This has been said one hundred times. It’s work. You have all these flashing ideas and some things are a jolt of inspiration – for instance the story Still Life In Leather which was published alongside Williams (play The Red Devil Battery Sign in literary journal Prism International) was written in one morning literally, with one minor revision – and that was it. But that’s rare. When you have a moment like that, and it ends up being published and acclaimed, you think the Gods are smiling on you for some reason.
But generally it doesn’t happen that way. It’s this frustrating ordeal of going over it and over it and the more you write, and the longer you write, the harder it gets because you get more critical. You can outthink yourself and if you start to do that - you’ve lost your spark, you’ve lost your inspiration. I was trying to write a piece last spring and the ideas to me were great ideas – I liked it but when I looked at what I was doing it was over thought and …. it was garbage. I’ve thrown thousands of sheets of paper away and speaking of paper, I prefer to write with a pen. I am not crazy about computer technology. It’s very nice to scroll and all that stuff but it doesn’t have that feel. I am there with the paper that people are going to read. I don’t think anybody is going to get all that much from reading off of screens. It’s not that pleasant and you can’t take it to the bathroom. Well, I guess you can with a lap top, if you must.
Hmm.. It’s more of a generational thing and a lifestyle mindset. (Hell, I write mostly online!)
As we are dealing with Mr. Williams here, he had an absolute rigorous policy. He would be up at five in the morning and he would sit at that desk and he would write for about four hours whether it was crap or not and (Ernest) Hemingway was the same. And stay hungry. Don’t have breakfast. Don’t get comfy. Stay on edge and discipline yourself and do it. Regardless of what he did the night before –whether he even went to bed – Williams would be at his desk and he would be working.
Tennessee Williams once said that life is one long nervous breakdown .. You agree?
(Laughing) Yes, I would have to in a lot of ways. That’s a very colourful expression and it would be from Mister Williams, wouldn’t it? He did have his share of those breakdowns. I share his loathing for psychiatric intervention and so forth, because in many ways, if all the people were locked up that probably the authorities think should be, there wouldn’t be many people walking around, and aside from the odd raving psychopath, we need our instability to find stability. That’s how you govern yourself and balance. You go, okay, that’s going to kill me. One more day of this and I am done.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Despite the fact This is Wonderland only lasted three seasons, George Walker and Dani Romain have nothing but praise for “the captain of the ship” Cara Pifko, who played "Alice de Raey ". They believe without her this legal 'dramedy' would not have succeeded as long as it did. Pifko says she’s not sure "the boat would have sunk" but she took her "jobs and responsibilities seriously."
I spoke to Pifko earlier this year while discussing her work in playwright Rosa Laborde’s political drama Leo just a few days after This is Wonderland had been cancelled. She says:
I guess it saddens me a bit; now that it’s canceled, that seems to be all we have to talk about. The fact that it was canceled should not be the only focus. I think that we can still focus on the value that the show had and what it did for this city (Toronto) and this country and the recognition that it got, the following that it had, and the stories that it told. I am immensely sad at the thought of not following through on some of these story lines. I want to see what happens to Elliot (Michael Riley); I want to see what happens to James (Michael Healey), and Alice – these are people we have come to know and love. I have come to know and love Alice de Raey intimately (laughing).
It's like a family. …
When you think about it, they’ve really pissed off all the major city centres – canceling Da Vinci’s in Vancouver, Wonderland in Toronto, and The Tournament in Montreal, that’s angering a lot of this country. I won’t be surprised if there’s a back lash, and I will be interested to see what their answer is because I have a hard time seeing what the long-term plan is when they already had these shows that had a following – why not just put more money into supporting those shows?The amount of employment that Wonderland provided was outstanding, and the multicultural face of it... it just doesn’t seem right to me that this is the choice they’ve made and yet I can’t say I was totally surprised, but we had rumours of this coming down the pipes for a little while. So perhaps I was not as shocked as the general public maybe was, but I was no less saddened.
If you could write Alice’s fate – what would it be?
Alice has been a more slow organic growth and development rather than major plot-points – there was the boyfriend and the attack that happened at the end of Season Two when Alice was beaten up – those were certainly development points for her. What I love so much about the show is the way the writing slowly and organically developed Alice, and that’s what I would love to have continue. If I were blessed with a quarter of George and Dani’s writing talent, that’s where I would continue to push it. Alice became more confident, more knowing that this is where she wants to be, as opposed to the Alice in Wonderland whirlwind feel of first season (morphing into Alice) “You're just here because you’re here... but you don’t remember really.. why … but you’re here... so you’ll just do what you can.” Whereas now she’s made the choice that she wants – to stay here.
What will you miss the most?
To be perfectly honest, the thing that makes me the most sad about the show being over is the thought of not working with George anymore. That’s the thing that breaks my heart. There will never be anything like Wonderland.
Check out this blog or "blarticle" site (I was on the Wonderland set !!!) for more chats with the cast of This is Wonderland including Michael Murphy, Michael Riley, Michael Healey and Ron Lea.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Canadian dramas have become critical darlings outside of Canada. These include theatre industry parody Slings and Arrows and the cancelled series written by George F. Walker and Dani Roman, and now in world -wide syndication This is Wonderland. It was an unusual hybrid of theatre and television that swept Canada's Gemini Awards in 2005, and led the nominees with 12 Gemini nods for 2006.
It was no surprise to me at all that Wonderland (fighting to stay on the air after its second season) was completely shut out at this past weekend's Gemini Awards. I believe it had something to do with the furor caused by the public when a petition (started by viewer Mark Cayer) with over 4,000 names including Canada’s top actors, directors, writers, lawyers, people in social services, and viewers across the country demanded the CBC NOT cancel the show. I was the second person to sign it. It was a grassroots movement that made Canadian viewer history, but it fell on deaf network ears. Even George Walker, (who had ironically just received The Order of Canada) was amazed by the response.
Fear not, meethinks Walker and Romain will return to the small screen – likely to the much more supportive Movie Network who was responsible for the big Gemini winner this year. If This is Wonderland had to lose to anyone, I am glad it was Slings and Arrows. Walker and Romain lost to writer/actors Susan Coyne and Mark McKinney, plus Bob Martin (The Drowsy Chaperone). Cara Pifko, who was at the event presenting an award, lost to Slings and Arrows leading lady Martha Burns.
God knows what Pifko was thinking when the writer's category was announced as Dani Romain and George F. Waker! This faux pas for Canada’s most prolific playwright was NOT corrected. On behalf of Walker fans everywhere - Sorry George.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Odette found Quebec yodeler Petunia at a recent Toronto gig and asked him to cover several Jimmie Rodgers songs from Hobo's Meditation to I'm Lonesome Too.
Country stringband The Backstabbers also features Miss Kristine Schmidt singing Mystery of Number Five - so the CD's a mighty fine scrapbook of yodeling yarns mixed in with country / bluegrass melodies.
The songs on Sleeping Dogs were produced and engineered by Odette's pals J. Richard Hutt and Ron Chilton, at Kitchener's Cedar Tree Studios, and by Neil Clark at Toronto's Soulkiosk Studios.
These 15 tracks from Petunia's Yodeling Cowboy to Gwen Swick's soulful lament of the film's title song, provide perfect harmony to Odette's unsentimental family tale set in no-name suburbia.
The soundtrack was part of a LCBO brown paper swag bag supporting cast-members Tom and I received along with sharpie pens, plus nylon navy Sleeping Dogs farmer's cap.
The soundtrack is now available for public consumption, y'all sally on forth and grab one.
Yeehah!
Posted by Coral Andrews
I remember sitting in my cubicle making my usual calls for orders 9 a.m. that morning (in another lifetime, I worked at the order desk for a major chicken processing conglomerate). My customers were begging me not to travel. "Are you crazy? Please don't go to Balgonie Castle. There's talk of more attacks."
My insides were churning and I felt white hot. Three planes down and now the Pentagon as well. I thought it was the beginning of World War Three. I just wanted to go home.
Despite many well-meant warnings, there was no way I was not going to Balgonie Castle. Tom and I were getting married in an intimate mediaeval ceremony. That was my groom-to-be's dream, and I'll be damned if I was going to shatter it.
Sept 14, 2001 - I remember being freaked out as I stood in a seemingly endless line at Toronto airport. No one was going anywhere fast. I took my cassette deck and mic (I wanted to do some radio features about Scotland for my show Coral FM) and held it above the thundering din. It was surreal. People had been waiting for days. There was another couple there about to get married as well and the bride-to-be was crying.
It was heart-breaking.
Tom and I came back home able to comfort each other within our circle of friends and family for a few days more.
Sept 16, 2001 - Thanks to my father's persistence, Tom and I went to the airport, re-booked on another Glasgow flight. There were other things on my mind. My 14th century burgundy and gold custom-designed wedding gown was still not ready... and my passport had lapsed. How the hell had I let that happen?
I sat, frazzled, waiting anxiously in the airport bar blubbering at a weary Tom, sipping slowly from a huge theraputic tumbler of cabernet. I called my mother and sobbed into the cel phone. She and my best friend who had seen us off, were waiting at a highway rest stop in case they had to come back. In an amazing stroke of good luck, a kindly airport security official felt sorry for me and gave me a special pass to board the plane... but that all seemed so trivial in the bigger scheme of things.
The world was never going to be the same again.
After hours of extra security measures, we finally boarded the plane but I was terrified. The last thing I wanted to do was fly anywhere as I am a nervous flyer to begin with. Horrific images of planes hurling into the Twin Towers were burned into my mind. Tom calmly reassured me this was likely one of the safest times to fly.
Coming from Glasgow by train, we made it to the village of Markinch, in the breath-taking Kingdom of Fife. The townspeople of Markinch were worried about the "Canadian couple", but were relieved to see us sauntering up the lane, to Terras - a combination photographer's/confectioner's shoppe, baggage and one year of planning this dream, still in tact. The shop was just a jaunt down from our lovely B and B cottage and hostess Carol at Wester Marknich
Sept 21,2001 - My wedding gown arrived 40 minutes before I got married. As the Laird of Balgonie escorted me down Balgonie Castle's wee wedding chapel aisle to the harpsong of Bjork's Like Someone in Love I felt our odyssey had been worth it..
Happy Fifth Anniversary Poor Tom.
Love Coral FM.
Posted by Coral Andrews
I have heard Season Three is the stuff that dreams are made of.
Yes, William Hutt plays an older actor (Charles Kingsman) whose dying of cancer whose also a heroin addict.
It's fantastic - such a great character - you get shades of (Hutt's Stratford play and film performance from) Long Day's Journey into Night plus Bill's (King) Lear has never been filmed.
So you obviously you can't see the whole production but you get to see bits of Bill's Hutt's Lear.
It is great for posterity as well -great fun to do.
And the show is a critical darling outside of Canada!
Oh yeah - we are on the Sundance ( Channel ) and we have been really well received in the States.
The New York Times reviewed it very favorably and we were on the cover of the New York Times TV supplement which was fantastic.
If you are doing King Lear, who is playing Cordelia?
Sarah Polley is playing Cordelia to Hutt's Lear, and is cast member (Frank's) Michael Polley's daughter.
What do you think of the recent cancellations of acclaimed Canadian TV series Da Vinci's City Hall and This is Wonderland?
I don't know where we are headed.
If they just think we are going to import American series for us to watch, we have to produce our own and these shows were very successful so I just don't understand it.
It's fortunate Slings and Arrows was not on CBC.
There are bunch of new series coming up and they are either for Showcase or The Movie Network and you think maybe the networks have to get a little more brave. But there is no reason why one of those networks couldn't have produced Slings and Arrows and they chose not to. There is all kinds of stuff coming and if they don't get busy and get behind it, they are going to get left out.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Is Artistic Ghost Oliver Welles based on anyone or is he a composite of a whole bunch of people?
I think a composite - I mean some people have thought it was directly relating to (Stratford Festival artistic director) Richard Monette, but not at all - I mean - I think Oliver is from my own perspective, a composite of every artistic director that I've ever known and then just some totally made up stuff. (Ouimette laughs knowingly)
When Oliver dies, in Season One, what was that like going through that process - just lying there in the casket?
That's the weirdest thing ever, and of course you know you in the movies you sort of sit around for a long time while they fiddle with the light, so I ended up spending a lot of time in that coffin. It wasn't very much fun, I've got to tell you.
But the two actors playing the undertakers (The Mortimer Brothers - Robert Persichini (Dogberry in Stratford Festival's Much Ado About Nothing) and Julian Richings - (Bucky Haight in Hard Core Logo) remoniscing about Oliver's career were very funny.
In Season Two, Geoffrey Tennant decides to stage The Scottish Play taunting the theatre myth, and his sanity as Oliver Welles 'opines' at him from the Great Beyond or the Burbage Storage Closet. On Geoffrey's personal playbill - the fairly gargantuan ego of actor Henry Breedlove (Geraint Wyn Davies) and foul corporate exec Sanjay Rainier (Colm Feore).
The second season is jam-packed - The Scottish Play, Romeo and Juliet and a new Canadian play and so there is lots and lots of really great and funny stuff.
Posted by Coral Andrews
I've been a huge fan of Slings and Arrows from Season One, Episode One - Oliver's Dream .
I have just finished a three-part series on Stephen Ouimette discussing Doug Wright's I Am My Own Wife .
But my fave thing to yap about with Ouimette is Slings and Arrows because our theatre company Poor Tom (hell-any community theatre troupe!!) can relate SO completely to their woes - from Don McKellar's (The Drowsy Chaperone) insufferable swishing about leather-pant director Darren Nichols (Tom and I have been THERE, done THAT) to ego-sodden actors like Season Two's Henry Breedlove ( 24's Geraint Wyn Davies) plus neurotic playwrights like Lionel Train ( Jane Show's Jonathan Crombie).
Ouimette is currently starring opposite, William Hutt, and Paul Gross, in Season 3 of Slings and Arrows (The Movie Network, Showcase, Sundance Channel,The Arts Channel) television's sublime theatre parody and critics' darling - "where the real show is behind the scenes."
For those who love theatre, Slings and Arrows is joyous with NO audience interuption.
For those IN the theatre, Slings and Arrows is must-see therapy.
Act One - The story begins with a ludicrous production of Hamlet, harried artistic director Oliver Welles, infamous nemesis Geoffrey Tennant, and the continuing behind-the-scenes saga of the New Burbage Theatre Company as it teeters on the tightrope between artistic integrity and commercial sellout.
Act Two (abridged) - When Oliver Welles snuffs it in a freak accident, New Burbage is forced to find an unlikely replacement.
Despair not, those who have not seen the show.
I present to you a three-part behind-the-scenes "blarticle" (see BLOG after next two) from the Ghost.
Oliver Welles is the artistic director of The New Burbage Festival and in the first episode (Oliver's Dream) on opening night of Midsummer Night's Dream, he gets drunk at the party and stumbles into the street and is killed by a pig truck (Ouimette laughs- the truck says Canada's Finest Hams). But he comes back as a ghost and he can only be seen by one other character the actor (Geoffrey Tennant) that has left the company seven years before and who is going to take over as artistic director.
Geoffrey Tennant (Paul Gross) is a brilliant (but after exiting Hamlet in true "madman" fashion) eternally tortured, actor/director of his own theatre company which boasts mission statement - The Right of the Insane to Put on Productions That No One Will Ever See.
That's where Geoffery Tennant was when he left the New Burbage Company after his breakdown. He started his own company in whatever the nearest big city is called - Theatre Sans Argent - Theatre Without Money(Ouimette laughs again)
How much fun are you having and what's your favourite line so far?
Mark McKinney (show - co-writer) Don McKellar, Rachel McAdams - working with these people is a non-stop laugh fest - Paul Gross and Martha Burns.
My favourite line - Oh, there are SOOOOO many. "Not a good position for prison."
Posted by Coral Andrews
Director Terrance Odette's Sleeping Dogs is part of the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival's World Contemporary Cinema and has also been selected for the Vancouver International Film Festival in September.
In a story about familial conscience, Mr. Gloss Brian Stillar - a half-blind diabetic curmudgeon - escapes his hospital confines determined to save his dog King from euthanasia at the hands of his brother Eddy Alan K.Sapp .
Thomas Benga Tony Adah an orderly dealing with his own problems and personal loss, is sent to find Gloss.
A search begins for Gloss, and Thomas.
As they portage through suburban wasteland each wary traveler ponders a lifetime of emotional landmines, which creates an unusual urban kinship.
In 1999, Terrance Odette took the festival circuit by storm with directorial debut Heater starring Stephen Ouimette and Gary Farmer as two homeless men on a madcap adventure with an electric baseboard heater in the dead of Winnipeg winter.
Heater received rave reviews and writing kudos for Odette's street-wise back-and-forth in this modern day " Waiting for Godot" combined with Scorsese-que cinematography and gritty gorilla directing style.
Second feature Saint Monica was another more spiritual look at the "displaced" through the eyes of Monica, Genevieve Buechener and homeless woman Mary, Clare Coulter set to the exotic backdrop of Toronto's Little Portugal.
I have known Terrance - Terry - since his singer-songwriter days and have quietly watched him flourish from award-winning music video director to acclaimed feature filmmaker.
He is a talented director with an attentive, compassionate eye on humanity.
To me, he's Canada's Martin Scorsese using natural street tapestry and sound-scapes as a clever character device from the humming of the snowplough in Heater's winter wonderland mall scenes to the curbside rituals and whizzing highway rhythms of Saint Monica.
As the camera pans, the viewer can absorb, and often identify with Odette's high-realism viewpoint.
A year ago I had the chance to experience that viewpoint firsthand.
In a wild turn of events, I was at the Sleeping Dog auditions writing notes for a feature article on Odette.
After reading a role, right out of the 'ole life intimating art', I became part of Sleeping Dogs
I helped in the casting process ( They call me The Puppetmaster) and I got a small role as wise-cracking ward nurse Amele - cutting room floor notwithstanding!
If credits and characters prevail, my husband Tom played Foul Mouth Cabby.
See the film (featuring a killer soundtrack!)
The Sleeping Dogs process was enjoyable because Odette who directs from the hip, loves to improvise so anything can change instantaneously - especially your lines!
In record time, actors and crew became an accommodating makeshift family to make Terry's vision a reality.
I celebrated my birthday on set and Supporting Dog King alias 'Lili' became everyone's darling.
I wouldn't be surprised to see a film dedication to Lil.
As Sleeping Dogs debuts at TIFF many more discerning movie lovers will get the chance to find out what I have known all along - Terrance Odette is destined to be one of Canada's breakthrough directors.
Posted by Coral Andrews
On Cats Who Look Like Hitler I think there's a whole lotta photoshopping going on, still the latest "Kitler" - that's what they are called - "Frodo" does look pretty menacing.
Most of these "feline fuhrers" seem to be black and whites "tuxedos" or "jellicles" after T.S.Eliot's Cats , but there are calicos as well.
Two cats, Domino and Hermes , are looking for homes, one in Bloomington, Indiana and one in New York, so there is some heart behind this unusual concept.
The number one Kilter has the trademark stache, but I think the likeness is more in his demonic stare.
The site could also be dubbed Cats That Look Like Charlie Chaplin .
I have a huge bust of Charlie Chaplin and there is an eerie similiarity to A.H.
Anyway, don't take my word for it.
I have four cats - Zeus (a grand old tortoise shell tabby) Squonk (a scrappy calico) Reggie ( a skitterish marmalade boy) and Feste (gray and white -no stache) and tho none of them resemble Adolf, they can sure act like him when they do not get fed on time - very demanding.
You can also add your comments and complaints to the site and a pic of your cat should he or she suit this bizarre description.
But it's all in good fun and means no offence.
Could cats one day take over the world?
As every wise cat owner knows, you do not own them.
They own you.
Posted by Coral Andrews
As I espied the various "psychics", my consternation level hit the Richter scale.
I also noticed that no one connected to Lennon estate, especially Yoko, had anything to do with the thing.
No one, that is except the Beatles alleged first manager, Allan Williams .
I am a Beatles / Lennon fan, and in 1994, when a Beatlemania convention rocked through Toronto, I met the Outer Circle -John's first wife Cynthia Lennon , Beatle's first drummer Pete Best, late Beatle bass player Stu's Sutcliffe's sister Pauline Sutcliffe ,( who showcases Stuart's artwork) George's sister Louise Harrison , and of course, Allan Williams " The Man who gave the Beatles away".
All of the above have since written their own Beatle books.
But Williams, like a Cockney Willy Loman, made quite a tacky impression gulping his hotel vodka and orange, while peddling John Lennon lithographs and the like.
Meethinks, he hath been giving the Beatles away for a LONG time.
As I watched the Spirit of Lennon credits roll, and expectedly saw Williams name in the mix, me mind rolled back to that surreal day in 1994.
After chatting, mostly listening to Williams, about all things Beatle, he got a scathingly brilliant idea.
"To whom it may concern,
This letter is to confirm that Coral Andrews has the right to negotiate my book "The Man Who Gave the Beatles Away" , to be published in the USA and Canada within six months of the date of this letter Oct, 6, 1994."
I lost the letter ... and then found it again this year - 12 years too late.
I possessed the hardcopy of the ultra-candid Man Who Gave the Beatles Away but I gave it back to Williams, (well he wrote it, I rationalized,) as he exchanged copies for my newly-signed paperback.
Now the same tell-all hardcover edition book is a Top Pop Collectible on E-bay from $12 to $85.
I still have my autographed paperback.
Over the years, I have seen Allan Williams being interviewed, feeding off memories of his precious Liverpool Lads in various unauthorized programs.
I am surprised Williams wasn't part of this seamy séance circle. The only other parasite missing was Albert Goldman .
And I sometimes imagine what would have happened had I tried to publish the book on this side of the pond.
Regarding the idea of this deplorable program longtime Yoko and John pal Eliot Mintz said a John Lennon pay per view séance for $9.95 ( brought to you by British music-hall impresario Paul Sharratt of The Spriit of Diana $ 14.95 pay-per-seance infamy) was not John's style of communicating his message to the world.
His MUSIC was.
AND - Allan Williams self-proclaimed "Fool on the Hill" should know better.
The last cosmic laugh is on John Lennon, because unlike many thousands of duped pay per-view subscribers, he didn't have to pay to see this piffling tripe.
If Lennon had a message, the word PEACE is so bloody obvious.
An ape could have asked him more intelligent, less obvious questions and his goggled spectre super-imposed on infrared cameras in Lennon's fave New York café haunt, was beyond ludicrous.
If John Lennon had anything to say, wouldn't it be quite topical and wry?
How about ... "Can't believe England lost The World Cup and that wanker David Beckham resigned".
Likely Lennon was watching this televised rubbish having a sudsy libation with George Harrison.
Blimey! Is he next?
I predict Paul Sharratt and Allan Williams are thinking about it right now.
Posted by Coral Andrews
It was a typical matinee of My Fair Lady and all was running like clockwork when toward the end of Act One, the audience focus suddenly shifted.
I had come down from Information Central to the Festival Theatre Aisles to attend this performance with my mother.
Suddenly she nudged me.
Veteran actor Barry McGregor who was playing Colonel Pickering, had acquired an enormous Unidentified Flying Insect on the back of his jacket.
Of course, to the audience's immense delight, Macgregor continued his lines, UFI accessory notwithstanding, opposite Colm Feore as Professor Henry Higgins.
SM Cyndi, armed with mega-powerful binocs, had now espied the interloping creepy crawler watching its every move through the hypotenuse triangular window of Information Central.
As McGregor emerged for his next scene, the audience snickered.
The pesky hitchhiker was now front and centre deciding to rest momentarily on Pickering's elegant burgundy ascot. After flying about the stage further amusing itself and the audience, it landed for a luverly cuppa brew on the Higgins household tea trolley, before repositioning itself on the carpet.
To Cyndi's great relief, Colm Feore stamped his foot in perfect time affecting the giant UFI's public demise while singing "I'm An Ordinary Man".
But this was no ordinary bug!
"We leave the back doors open when we strike the stage, to let in the air, and all of sorts of things fly in including birds sometimes. We had been trying to find that bug for three days. It was wonderful the way Colm desposed of it in time to the music." she laughed.
Barry Macgregor does not recall his Supporting Player, but cackled with laughter at the thought of it and Cyndi's dilemma.
"Ah, darling Cyndi! I don't remember that particular occasion, but I do know that they can be very, very annoying.
In that scene in The Lark ( 2005 season) when Joan, Amanda Plummer, is in the cell in the end, there is just the one hanging light over the centre of the stage.
Well, there was a moth flying around in that and it was totally acceptable.
It's weird isn't it? If you're at home and a bug's in the house, there's a bug in the house flying around, everybody accepts it. But you go into a stage and everyone goes, well, they obviously don't look after the theatre. They've got a bug on the stage, and I think, wait a minute... wait a minute .... here we are trying to tell this story, and we have a bug which is helping us and you are in actual fact more interested in that because it shouldn't be there. It is a very weird aspect of the theatre."
Just one of many during a day in the life Stratford Festival Stage Manager Cynthiahh Toushan!
Posted by Coral Andrews
"All the world's a stage. And all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances. And one stage manager plays many parts..."
That's an understatement!
I have known Stratford Festival stage manager Cynthia Toushan for many years and I have always wanted to know what it would be like to watch her work behind the scenes at the Festival stage.
A few years back I was in Cyndi's dancewear store The Dressing Room picking out special shoes to wear with my 14th-century custom design wedding gown.
I told Cyndi (I've always called her that) that I was getting married in a Scottish castle in mediaeval garb (another blog!) She picked me up, whirled me around in a bear hug, and shouted in glee right across the store.
I found my groovee black leather lace-up booty flats and finally summoned the nerve to ask Cyndi about sitting behind the Festival scenes to watch her 'call' a show.
"Yeah, why the hell not?" she agreed.
A few weeks later, not fessing up to my chronic fear of heights, I found myself tottering along the walkways high above the Festival Main Stage - not exactly with catlike tread.
"Hang on to the rails, and don't look down," cautioned Cyndi who, of course, has traveled this maze hundreds of times at breakneck speed.
I was astonished when we reached Information Central - a little triangular-shaped room where the magic really happens.
Cyndi controls the pulse of the show and there lies the secret to the stage manager.
If actors are the soul of the show, the stage manager is the heart.
I am sure stage managers are the hardest working people in the business and it is a daunting, eternally fascinating, process.
Here's my defintion of a stage manager - take over the show from the its director and conduct hundreds of technical cues; exits and entrances, split-second set changes and unforeseen calamities waiting in the wings, while effortlessly creating a techno-flawless backstage note-for-note symphony in the process.
Cyndi's a born maestro, having worked on many of Stratford's main stage musicals including The Sound of Music , Fiddler on the Roof , My Fair Lady , Guys and Dolls , and 2005's Hello Dolly .
Unlike leading lad Master Twist, Cyndi has a full plate, as stage manager for Stratford Festival's 2006 production of Oliver .
AND Cyndi lives by one simple decree.
Whatever rules exist in theatre, there is always an exception.
This zany SM, now in her 11th season, is the quintessential den-mother to everyone in the company finding ways to make the actors feel as comfortable as possible during a show.
She will make sure an understudy has all necessary props in place.
She will organize birthday parties for the cast because all actors who live and breathe this crazy acting schedule often spend more time with each other than they do actual families.
Sensitive to all actors' needs, having been one once herself, in addition to choreographer, director and producer, The Divine Ms. T. will go to any lengths possible to make every show a good experience.
I experienced first-hand, the endless nuances, unbeknownst to the audience, that need the utmost attention during a performance.
That process is a show in itself!
Read on, Macduff!
During My Fair Lady , Cyndi asks the musical question...
What the hell is that on Pickering's jacket?
Posted by Coral Andrews
Before the days of our theatre company, Poor Tom Productions my husband Tom was in a production of Timberalake Wertenbaker's Our Country's Good for community theatre.
As Timberlake Wertenbaker likes to write multiple roles, Tom played Midshipman Harry Brewer, love interest of comely camp convict Duckling Smith and Captain Campbell -a Scot with a brogue so thick you canna reeeely unnerstan' what's he sayin'.... " eeh .. difficult.. mmm "
Tom's challenge was finding dimension between the guttural lingo of Campbell and tortured hangman Brewer who keeps hearing the voices of all the dead convicts in his head.
Everyone had their personal Wertenbaker task in the cast -solid and assured of their characters in this "play within a play".
Rehearsals were going swimmingly as the cast transformed its collective mind to the atrocities and tiny pleasures of prison life at Botany Bay.
But one night, about a week before opening, Tom came home perplexed.
The cast were informed they had to move the set pieces themselves - the tech director's scathingly brilliant idea.
Fine.
That's a given in many productions.
BUT these set pieces were MAMMOTH.
When OCG scenes - more like vignettes - were finished, the cast had to move whatever set piece was there, often huge paper mache rock formations, tents or benches, and very often, the set change took longer than the actual scene.
I sat there in horror thinking " Oh My God, OCG is being eaten by props!"
Tom was particularly frazzled one night.
He knew he had mastered the eternal anguish of Wertenbaker character Harry Brewer in one last tragic vignette.
The monologue finished, the audience near tears, Tom promptly arose from his deathbed, bundled it up and hauled it off stage right.
This reminded me of Stratford Festival's deplorable Family Experience Hunchback of Notre Dame as slaughtered villagers arose and walked off the stage for scene change.
That was some 'experience', but I still think OCG tops Quasimoto's hell.
In another OCG vignette , Harry takes his Duckling for a late night row around the cove.
Harry is jealous of Duckling's attention to other marines in the camp and wants to win her back.
It's an important scene as Harry assures Duckling a part in the camp play The Recruiting Officer as assurance she will remain faithful to him.
After the scene, Harry and his poor Duckling heave this enormous 12x4 foot row boat - constructed of a 2x4 frame and covered all sides with ¾ inch plywood -to the side of the stage, a back-breaking maneuver for two people- virtually impossible to move in 30 seconds.
"Accompanying the boat -two six foot long 2x4 oars. The thing was definitely seaworthy!" recalls Tom.
For Tom and his cast-mate, the motivation for this pivotal scene turned from lust at sea to moving that floating monstrosity and its giant oars in record time!
Of the endless set changes, this was the WORST and Tom has since christened this production of Our Country's Good, the The Boat Show
Have YOU ever had this type of logistical nightmare during a show?
Try and top this one at
Posted by Coral Andrews
To this day, Bennett's beloved Fringe solo Take a Pew is sublime - a Beyond the Fringe favorite.
In stiff-upper-lip falsetto set to ceremonial pianoforte, (likely courtesy of Dudley Moore) Bennett opens the sketch in ministerial sing-song orating 'the text to us tonight' in scintillating stream-of-pompousness and repetition - a favourite device of all four Fringe men.
This introduction is amply supplied with pregnant pause. 'But My brother Esau is a hairy man.... but I am a smooth man.'
Bennett, digresses into further pious inanity, accentuating the age-old question 'where do you think you're going?' or 'the gist of that' - Bennett given this incentive when an irate railway station employee yells at him for going through the wrong door at the station en route to the sermon.
Another example of his sermonial point features Bennett and friend's life-altering climbing expedition as they reach a Scottish mountain summit.
"The mists of the evening began to come down, and the sun to set, and when we reached the summit, we sat down to watch this magnificent sight of the sun going down behind the mountains, and as we watched my friend very suddenly and violently ...vomited.
Some of us think life's a bit like that, don't we?
But it isn't.
Life, you know, is rather like opening a tin of sardines.
We're all of us looking for the key.
And I wonder... how many of you here tonight, have wasted years of your lives looking behind the kitchen dressers of this life for that key.
I know I have.
Others think they find the key, don't they?
They roll back the lid of the sardine tin of life, they reveal sardines, the riches of life therein, and they get them out, they enjoy them. But you know .... there's always a little bit in the corner you can't get out.
I wonder.
Is there a little bit in the corner of your life?
I know there is in mine....
And so now, I draw to a close, I want you when you go out into the world, in times of trouble and sorrow and hopelessness and despair amid the hurly-burly of life ..... if ever you're tempted to say.... 'stuff this for a laugh', I want you at such times .....to cast your minds back to the words of my first text to you tonight - but my brother Esau is a hairy man, but I.... am a smooth man".
Amen Brother Bennett.
Amen!
Posted by Coral Andrews
From Stratford Ontario, to London's West End, I always get the aisle seat.
In London it was a fluke I think ... as I was there to see my friends Gerry and the Pacemakers when they were in Ferry Cross the Mercey, but I did follow tradition - delicate plastic white wine glass in hand.
From my 2006 aisle seats, I have seen my first four shows at Stratford this year.
Bravissimo!!
I will not tell you what I have seen yet.
That's another blog.
"Four for four" as Poor Tom puts it.
"Poor" Tom Leslie is my husband and my Permanent Complimentary Guest. (We run a small but mighty, theatre company called Poor Tom Productions - yes that Poor Mad Tom from King Lear.
My friends are happy for my aisle soul-mate but equally sad because once upon a time when I was single, they were all my Guests.
I had quite a List.
But Poor Tom, who acts and directs, shares that same grand passion for the theatre that I do...except musicals, farces and the lighter 'feel-good' fare.
Those tickets he will gladly give to others.
I can tell right away if he hates a show- folded arms, and a grimace followed by that unsuspecting, un-relenting head-snap...
Tom is also producer /co- host of my campus radio show Coral FM in addition to his inside-sales plumbing day-job.
Must have that day-job to fulfill your heart's desire at nights.
We two have the greatest discourse on the radio because, theatre is about reaction.
Doesn't matter if you detest it, or adore it - just react please.
Poor Tom and Coral FM do not always agree.
We did this time from Friday evening performance to Sunday matinee.
"Four for four" doesn't often happen to a reviewer.
I call myself 'reviewer', because I feel the need to know much more before I dare call myself 'critic.'
My personal fave, New Yorker Dorothy Parker was a 'critic'.
I am neither 'highbrow' nor 'lowbrow'.
I am .... 'no brow'.
But I do like a drinkee!
Sadly my hero Parker, Queen of the Quipping 1920's Algonquin Round Table alias The Vicious Circle imbibing with fellow merry magazine scribes Robert Benchley, Harold Ross and playwright George S.Kaufman has had her own sipping fate unwittingly sealed.
Thanks to The Algonquin's latest marketing ploy, Parker is doomed to eternally clutch the delicate glass base of "The Gonk's" Blue Bar $10,000 martini glass which boasts a diamond in it inspired by her famed avowal "I love a Martini..."
But me, a long-time barwench in support of this writing addiction, who often enjoys a libation, sometimes to help me from intermission to curtain - I shake a caustic cosmopolitan.
Poor Tom and I have a pithy,vicious circle of our own comprised of writers, actors, directors and such called The Cranks.
To quote Ms. Parker - I am a "rhinestone in the rough".
Posted by Coral Andrews
Coral's Copy - a Playwrights 101 exclusive- will feature interviews with actors especially selected from my vast interview collection.
Edward Atienza has many tales to tell from his days at Royal Shakespeare Company with John Gielgud and Lawrence Olivier, to his time at Stratford Festival when he played the ill-fated Kemp in Joe Orton's Entertaining Mr Sloane.
Veteran actor Edward "Teddy" Atienza played Kemp in Entertaining Mr. Sloane for the 1991 Stratford Festival season. Actor Wayne Best called it "Teddy's Year of Abuse" from playing Willard in Robertson Davies World of Wonders to The Tempest's Trinculo to Kemp in Entertaining Mr. Sloane where he gets 'offed' in very violent way while getting his teeth knocked out.
Teddy Atienza - "Entertaining Mr. Sloane made Joe Orton's reputation in the '60s and I nearly brought a house opposite where they lived in that part of London (Noel Road - Islington) as a matter of fact, so I would have been there when the murder occurred."
"Orton wrote several plays - I have been in another of his plays - Loot. Orton is black humour that is hysterically funny but to do with death. Orton is as critical and satirical of society and people in society as Oscar Wilde, as the restoration playwrights, none of which you see are what they seem to be - rather sort of posh in pretty costumes. They are biting satires of the people and society of the time and that's why they are so exaggerated in their way."
"Entertaining Mr. Sloane is the same thing only Orton deals with the lower class, or lower-middle class and it is an absolutely brilliant play. It is extremely difficult to do in the sense that to hit the right note of the scale for the style and to get the style right is very,very difficult. There are only four people in it so that's kind of nice too and it's lovely, again it's like Waiting for Godot or something , like a string quartet- wonderful. But it is deceptive because it just looks like a lot of Brit talk you know .. 'allo 'allo ... and you think it's just that, but it's actually extremely difficult as you unravel the various implications."
"Kemp is the father of this woman [Kath] who lives in this house, who has a brother who comes in and she takes in this lodger, this boy, who they are both after one way or another. She gets pregnant by him.. and he beats me to death and that's basically the plot."
(He laughs)
"The brother has his own ideas. This old man Kemp, who is the girl's father and the boy's father, the son who doesn't live there but comes in, is the only one who actually tells the truth. The rest of it you don't know what is true because quite clearly, they are saying whatever they like in order to serve their own purposes. I know that this lodger is a murderer, and also I am a bit stupid and uneducated and full of horrible racial prejudices, and I won't compromise and can't do what they all do to get out of their problems so I get pfffftttpped ....
I am a man of principle by stubbornness, not by intelligence.
Whether people get it of course, is another story."
Posted by Coral Andrews
Many women have played Shirley Valentine and I do love Pauline Collins' interpretation. (Collins recently had the distinction of being on venerable BBC sci-fi series Doctor Who as Queen Victoria.)
But I have fond memories of another Shirley.
Here in Canada,Corner Gas star Janet Wright, also played this mid-age heroine at The Stratford Festival just before Richard Monette took the artistic director's helm. I've covered the Stratford Festival for many years, but never had a backstage pass until I met Ms. Wright.
The House Manager of the Tom Patterson Theatre (then Third Stage) brought me back to Wright who was in The Slut Hut, a cozy little dressing room; 'utterly corrupt and unprincipled', a fabulously chaotic place where actors were banished when they smoked, including Stratford grand dame, Wright's close friend and comic foil, the late Kate Reid.
Ms. Wright immediately put me at ease. She laughed and told me she needed a staple gun to keep all her Shirley well-wishers' cards on the walls. I was wearing a pair of coloured glass tear-drop earrings which had cost me a mere five bucks at my favourite sally-ann. Janet loved them, and by interview's end, I gave them to her in case 'Shirley' felt inspired to wear them one night. This role proved to be a turning point in Janet's life as her sister, actress Susan Wright, had died tragically and Janet had as a tribute to her sister, and her family, bravely decided to carry on in Susan's place.
"When I am out there doing this show, we are doing it together. I didn't want to do it this at first, because it was such an overwhelming experience but then I started to miss Susan really badly. I'd rather if they were going to carry on with it, that it was me because it's sort of for them, and they would be proud of me.
"Willy Russell is amazing. I just can't believe Shirley Valentine was written by a man. There are times when I was learning this," Wright says (pointing out that the lines were very hard to learn because of the rhythms in them), "and it's not easy stuff to learn, but you couldn't say one word wrong because of the way Russell phrases things and he just knows women really well. It is incredible. That's why for me it couldn't have been a better time to do this in my life because in a way it was reaffirming to me that you can go through just about anything. You can either come out bitter, angry, or else the other way. That's been my journey with the role, cup half-empty, cup half-full. This particular show means a great deal to me and couldn't be more perfect."
Posted by Coral Andrews
Recently Monty Python online gospel,The Daily Llama reported that Britain's Channel Four, (Chapman once did the Opinions program for them) recently hailed Monty Python's Life of Brian the greatest film comedy of all time. Seems the character of Brian Cohen was born in Paris...
Graham Chapman - Initially after the Holy Grail, I suppose we were all thinking, well, where next? Perhaps they find it, (the Grail) or whatever, what happens? We were thinking this kind of thought while actually doing some promotional work in Paris for Holy Grail in a Chinese restaurant I think, and Eric Idle suggested a ridiculous title which we all laughed at but were outraged by at the same time, for our next movie as being called Jesus Christ, Lust for Glory. We thought no, we can't possibly do that. Shut up, Eric. But then we thought, wait a minute! Something set in those times would be rather good so originally it was going to be about a character Brian who was the 13th apostle basically, so it was going to be the gospel according to Saint Brian. He was always late turning up for miracles and that sort of thing and we began to write that script. We were looking forward to it, because it was a fascinating era. We came to a point where we had to write a nativity scene and thought it ought to be Brian in it and if Brian was going to be the Apostle, he ought to see something he didn't know about. It fell to John and myself to write that particular scene and we couldn't quite see how to do it because you've obviously got to have Himself there with the big H. Then we hit on the idea of the three wise men going to the wrong manger, the one next door, and thereby going to see Brian and then we thought,well,we'll follow Brian, so that's how the whole idea came about. It wasn't to offend. Rather more, it was to enlighten I think. Cohen was a good Jewish name. I mean Jesus was a bit Semitic, after all.
We are interested obviously in Brian querying whether people are believing things in the right way, whether they've got hold of the right aspect or not. To us in all this Christianity business, love your neighbour is the important thing, not dressing up and belonging to a club, and not allowing other people to belong to it. It doesn't seem to particularly Christian, does it?
Posted by Coral Andrews
Did you know that, from the way Arthur Mller's written this beat in Death of a Salesman, Biff and Happy Loman could be poultry-in-motion?
You decide.
WILLY: You wait, kid, before it's all over we're gonna get a little place out in the country, and I'll raise some vegetables, a couple of chickens...
LINDA: You'll do it yet dear.
WILLY: And they'll get married, and come for a weekend.
To quote Jon Stewart. WHAT? WHAT? WHAAAAT?
Posted by Coral Andrews
In 1999, I was privileged to perform in Top Girls. In 2004, when an original cast member became ill, we decided to remount the piece in her honour. Churchill has a penchant for writing in overlapping dialogue, and that can be maddening. It takes a while to master, but when delivered in the right tempo, the reality of the multi-layered voices waxes rather symphonic.
This device is particularly brilliant in Act One - the restaurant fantasy scene - when Top Girl Marlene decides to play Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, with history's most intriguing women.
Churchill also likes to have the same actors play different roles. I had great fun playing Victorian traveler and writer Isabella Bird. (Yes, she has an ultra-cool vintage garb brand namesake). In Act Two, Churchill turns Isabella into Joyce, a working-class mother trying to make ends meet while raising her slow-witted daughter Angie.
The first time I performed these roles, I did not connect the relationship between Isabella and Joyce. I thought this was Churchill's demented style just scrambling my brain. But in the remount, I realized that self-centered Isabella gallivanted around the world, writing of her adventures leaving her loyal sister Henny behind. Joyce was the sister who was left behind to clean up Marlene's dysfunctional family mess. I learned about one character through the other. Hence, my continued fascination with Lady Churchill.
Posted by Coral Andrews
Hustle and Flow best-actor nominee Terrence Howard presented the award for documentary short subject at the recent 2006 Oscar awards.
"They are called documentary short subjects, but they are long on impact. The four nominated films examine four different aspects of war. I don't need a lot of words to tell you what these movies are about: Hiroshima, Sudan, Rwanda, and V.E. Day. Attention must be paid."
Howard was referring to films: God Sleeps in Rwanda, The Mushroom Club, The Death of Kevin Carter: Casualty of the Bang Bang Club, and A Note of Triumph: The Golden Age of Norman Corwin, but theatregoers across the world recognized Miller's words as spoken by Linda Loman in Death of A Salesman.
Corwin, known as America's "poet laureate of radio" won Oscar gold. It was a powerful moment, beautifully defined for me, by the eloquence of Terrence Howard and the lasting brilliance of Arthur Miller.
