The Forgiven, Crimes of the Future and See How They Run

Writer and director John Michael McDonagh has taken us to this very weird place in The Forgiven, a kind of westernised oasis in the middle of  the desert in Morocco. Ralph Fiennes and Jessica Chastain are on their way to a rich person's party when tragedy strikes, or more to the point, they strike. Here is the opportunity for McDonagh to contrast Western decadence (they are all horrible bickering characters) with the poor but sensible and modest Africans.  "The tongue has no bones, sir, but it crushes all the same" says Hamid. 

The screenplay is some of the best for years, great dialogue and the large cast are generally exceptional. I'm just never sure about Matt Smith. One of the Moroccan drivers wants to go to Sweden where it is so much cooler than his burning desert that we see in most of the film. I just wonder why it was given an 18 certificate?

I don't think I have ever seen such an incoherent movie as Crimes of the Future. The story is a mess and at times inaudible. Lea Seydoux is the exception but her co-star Viggo Mortensen mumbles and Kristen Stewart's "absurd staccato performance" has no equal. I have seen so many David Cronenberg movies and sometimes when you follow a favourite director, you come a cropper. Some of his techniques are here, those ground-breaking torso plugs are from the far superior eXistenZ. The other body shots are more amusing than revolting. This was somewhat of a Cronenberg greatest hits collection and what Mark Kermode said was a "tribute to his own past". The script was apparently from 1990 and it should have stayed in the rejected folder. But memorable if not in a good way.

I was very disappointed with See How They Run. Was it meant to be a whodunnit? The clue was in the opening sequence of Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap at it's one hundredth performance. So here we are in 1953 and a brutal murder backstage. I never did understand the motive. Are we supposed to think that any member of the cast could be involved? It seemed that the idea was to completely go the opposite way to the normal set piece of the cast gathered for interview. Instead poor Sam Rockwell as the pathetic Inspector Stoppard is left chasing them around London with his unwanted but too keen assistant. Saoirse Ronan is very good as Constable Stalker but the pairing does not seem to work. A missed opportunity for this double act. 

The rest of the cast deliberately ham it up, that is except for the brilliant Ruth Wilson who is head and shoulders above them all. There are quite a few funny moments so the film is not devoid of laughs, but it is not a comedy. Unfortunately. There is, for example, a dream sequence straight out of The Shining. Writer Mark Chappell did keep the story at a good pace, but it would have made abetter TV show. And in case you wondered, the butler didn't do it.

Dahlia Figaro Mixed in September

By this time in late September, I have usually cleared the bedding plants from this border. But the dwarf dahlias go on and on, with more colour if that is possible. The plants were from Suttons Seeds and are on my list for next spring.

Maypole Crab "Ballerina" and Dwarf Malus "Wisley Crab"

 

This summer, both crab apple shrubs have produced more fruit than I can ever remember. Was this the prolonged sunny weeks in July and August? These shrubs were planted maybe twenty years ago and have never been pruned. The Maypole crab above had lovely pink blossom in April.

As did the dwarf crab below.

There are only a few crab apples left on this shrub after most had fallen and are now by the compost heap.

The Programme for Henry V111 at the Globe Theatre

 

Never before have I published a post about the programme for a play. But the one for Henry V111 at The Globe Theatre is a template for all others. I nearly didn't buy it and it was only because I wanted to find out about the cast that I found one at the interval. 

Let's look at the contents:

A Potted History of Shakespeare's Globe

The Company : the cast and all the production team (alphabetical so director Amy Hodge is halfway down)

The Globe Staff and the Shakespeare Trust

Then the good stuff: 

Sonnet 116

 Synopsis by writer Hannah Khalil

 The Play - Key Information about the Production

 A Note on the (adapted) Text by Hannah Khalil

All Is True - Sources, Early Performance etc

A Female Heir - Kate Maltby on Women within the Tudor Court (four pages)

For Queen and Country - Will Tosh on ceremony etc from Elizabeth 1 to Elizabeth 11

From Page To Stage - Director Amy Hodge and Designer Georgia Lowe

Biographies and Pictures of the Cast in rehearsal (lots)

A page of the characters in costume

I don't expect new plays to have so much historical stuff, but they should try harder. And that is why I have of late not bought a programme, "Jack Absolute Rides Again" as one example.

There is also some "Key Facts" in my Complete Works which includes something about stylistic studies and how these have allocated certain scenes between William Shakespeare and John Fletcher . If anyone is interested.

The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett

 

Brevity is the soul of wit and Alan Bennett's short novella is a classic of it's type. I had read this book twelve years ago, but I thought it might be appropriate to read it yesterday. It only takes less than a couple of hours. In some ways it is a homage to Queen Elizabeth (The "Uncommon" Reader of the title), it is full of Bennett's wit as it imagines her stumbling across a mobile library in the grounds of Buckingham Palace. Her foray into literature allows Bennett to namecheck some of his favourite writers and I have already noted a couple. A Lauren Bacall autobiography and something by Ivy Compton-Burnett whoever she might be. Last time I noted:

"An expert author of fiction, Alan Bennett is on top form with his short book The Uncommon Reader. An essay on how reading can change a life, this time it is the Queen herself who finds how rewarding it can be, much to the annoyance of those around her. A funny and very enjoyable story with a lovely twist at the end. Outstanding."

"A Pattern For All Princes Living"

 

When our new King Charles 111 addressed the Commons and the Lords of both Houses of Parliament in his speech in Westminster Hall on the 12th September, (on YouTube) and when he was talking about his late mother Queen Elizabeth 11, he quoted from William Shakespeare's Henry V111. He called his mother A Pattern For All Princes Living. In the play, it is Archbishop Cranmer who is talking about Henry's new daughter. Elizabeth1. And here was me, at the Globe Theatre, a few days later, hearing those same words. And in the programme, obviously published before our Queens's death, is an article that discusses this part of the text. Not only that, but in that large volume of Complete Works, the first paragraph of a detailed and long Introduction includes that same A Pattern to all Princes.

Then there was a brilliant article by Camilla Long in the Sunday Times Culture section. She describes herself as "nobody's idea of a Royalist"...."But television during the royal mourning period has been, quite simply, extraordinary". Now I'm often in disagreement over what Camilla says about television programmes in her weekly slot, but here her article is, quite simply, extraordinary. Something to cut out and keep.

My First and Last Shakespeare Plays

 

The first Shakespeare play that I can remember was A Midsummer Night's Dream at a theatre in London when I was maybe nine or ten years old. My father's great aunts would treat us every Christmas to the theatre (Toad of Toad Hall is one memory), a pantomime (even one on ice at Earls Court) or the circus. But the first I can really remember is King Lear starring Paul Schofield. It was a set play for "A" Levels and the sixth form went as a group to London at the beginning of 1963.

There were the plays at Stratford in sixties when Mum and Dad had moved to Kenilworth and bought tickets for the RSC. Then all the recent plays at Stratford over the last twenty odd years. With other performances at odd places. And now, nearly fifty years later, Henry V111 at The Globe Theatre has been the last. So I can update the list I originally published in December 2017. My huge volume of  Complete Works is based on the 1623 First Folio plus Pericles and Two Noble Kinsmen. 

The Merchant of Venice   28th May 1988        The Barbican Theatre, London
                                            20th August 2015    Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

Hamlet   22nd October 1988   The Phoenix Theatre, London
                8th March 1993        The Barbican Theatre, London

Twelfth Night    13th April 1991          The Playhouse Theatre, London
                            30th October 2014     Watford Palace Theatre

Richard 11     15th January 2000        Royal Shakespeare Theatre,  Stratford (The Other Place)
                        7th January 2016         The Barbican Theatre, London

Henry IV Part 1     18th July 2000     Royal Shakespeare Theatre,  Stratford 

Henry IV Part 11   9th August 2000   Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

Henry V          12th September 2000    Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

Henry VI Part 1     30th December 2000   The Swan Theatre, Stratford

Henry VI Part 11   30th December 2000   The Swan Theatre, Stratford

Henry VI Part 111  30th December 2000   The Swan Theatre, Stratford

Richard 111         24th May 2001   The Young Vic, London

Julius Caesar      5th September 2001      Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford
                             10th August 2017          Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

The Tempest       28th January 2003       The Old Vic, London                                                                                                  5th August 1989          The Barbican Theatre, London

Titus Andronicus      8th October 2003     Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

Romeo and Juliet      25th May 2004        Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

Comedy of Errors     4th October 2005    Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

King Lear           6th December 2007        New London Theatre
                             (Also in 1963 - Aldwych Theatre, London)   

Love's Labour's Lost    13th November 2008    Rose Theatre, Kingston-Upon-Thames

Taming of the Shrew     10th July 2008     Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford   

Othello          26th February 2009     Oxford Playhouse

The Winter's Tale         30th Jun 2009     Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford
                                        2nd March 2017    Oxford Playhouse

Troilus and Cressida     26th August 2009       The Globe Theatre, London

Measure for Measure    8th April 2010     The Almeida, London

Antony and Cleopatra      19th August 2010    Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

Merry Wives of Windsor    17th November 2010     Milton Keynes Theatre

All's Well That Ends Well    19th July 2011       The Globe Theatre, London

Macbeth         24th August 2011        Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

Timon of Athens      14th August 2012       The National Theatre, London (Olivier Theatre)

King John       5th September 2012      The Swan Theatre, Stratford

Two Gentlemen of Verona        15th April 2013     Bristol Tobacco Factory

As You Like It     21st August 2013      The Swan Theatre, Stratford

A Midsummer Night's Dream          11th September 2014     Waterside Theatre, Aylesbury

Much Ado About Nothing      20th October 2014      Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

Pericles             14th April 2016     The Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, London

Cymbeline           27th July 2016     The Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

Two Noble Kinsmen         21st September 2016   Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford

Coriolanus        28th September 2017     Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford     

Henry V111     15th September 2022     The Globe Theatre, London

Henry V111 at the Globe Theatre

 

It was appropriate that for my last Shakespeare play I went to the Globe Theatre. Henry V111 (or All Is True) is rarely performed (attributed to William Shakespeare and John  Fletcher) and is probably the weakest in the cannon. Hannah Khalil is the resident writer for the Globe Theatre and she was commissioned to edit the text, bring the female roles to the fore and add bits from other Shakespeare plays (I didn't hear any) to give the text some welly. Did it work? Well, probably to some degree. Director Amy Hodge has jazzed up this irreverent  production with an athletic Henry (Adam Gillen is very watchable, gliding around the stage). 

With an impressive Bea Segura as Katherine. I think she steals the show.

At one point she is joined by all the other wives with a musical accompaniment. Obviously not in the original play but here, quite dramatic.

There is then the playing around with the costumes. From the picture of Henry below, pairing robes with trainers?

Even Chamberlain is in a light purple satin but modern suit, but has a ruff. However Cardinal Wolsey is in traditional scarlet robes, that is until he divests himself later on. Jamie Ballard was superb in that role.

I liked the messing around with race and gender, there is Jonah Russell as Cardinal Campeius above. The programme told me that Debbie Korley below played Elizabeth and I now remember she came on towards the end to deliver a speech (not in the text of the play) as the Queen. In the original Elizabeth is only a baby.

So we had comedy and songs, Genevieve Dawson introduced proceedings with a strong voice and guitar.

A four piece band helped but was never intrusive. Unfortunately the theatre was disappointingly only one third full, maybe not even that. The huge cast in the original version had been pared down, successfully, to eleven players. 

They gave it their all. I had a great view from my front row bench in the middle gallery but I needed that cushion. The Royal Shakespeare Company announced in 2013 that they were going to perform every Shakespeare play. No sign yet of Henry V111 and after the terrible sales for The Globe, maybe that won't happen.

Lastly a note about the queue for the Lying in State of Queen Elizabeth 11 that went past The Globe Theatre. Walking across Millennium Bridge (having taken the Underground to Mansion House) I saw the people queuing rushing past. It was only at the interval that the queue was back to Tate Modern next door to the Globe. That was two and a half miles according to the map below, so not at all bad on Thursday. That would have been the day to go.

How I Remember The Queen

 I have two memories of the Queen. The first was her coronation. This was from an early post:

On the day of the Queen's Coronation in June 1953, Dad had the task of judging the best decorated house in the village. I was with him in the van as we toured the village. Did we have our first television by then? We watched the event on a tiny screen somewhere, so we may well have. I was eight years old.

 Then on the 9th June 2008 I posted the following on this Blog:

The day I met the Queen

Ellis Construction had been the main contractors on the refurbishment of St Luke's Hospital for the Clergy on Fitzroy Square. It was different to a normal refurb, more a reconstruction and fit out. The whole building (originally two town houses in 1920) was gutted and left with the original frame and exterior cladding. We found the remnants of what must have been a very early steel frame instead of the expected concrete. Redesign of the structure and the introduction of numerous steel beams and columns to suit the new layout ( and the new top storey that projects above all the other buildings in the square) meant the programme extended from 26 to 39 weeks.

I had the dubious pleasure of explaining all this to the Rev Paul Thomas, who was the client's representative, at a succession of final account meetings. Having been threatened with the intervention Archdeacon Hayward, and possible excommunication, we agreed on a final sum. And I was still invited to the re-opening by the Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh on 8th March 1995.

Architects, other consultants and representatives of the contractors were distributed throughout the building, some were to be met by the Queen and others by the Duke. There were five of us stationed on the second floor landing of the back staircase. The itinerary reads "3.45pm The Queen's Party moves to the rear staircase to the 2nd Floor. Half way up this staircase will be assembled architects, engineers and contractor's management staff."

Approaching the time, an equerry came up the stairs and told us the Queen was near and reminded us the formalities of how to address her. He left and a few minutes later, a smart little old lady, on her own, wandered up to meet us. She was introduced to each us in turn. When it was my turn to shake the Queen's hand, the only recollection of the question she asked and my reply was something about the number of people employed on the project. By this time her party had caught up and they were off up the stairs.

Fifteen minutes later we were in the marquee erected especially on the hospital gardens in the square for the Queen to unveil a plaque. Tea was served and at 4.30 the royal party left. Mike Ellis (the MD) suggested I join him for drink to celebrate, so we grabbed a taxi to central London and found a bar. It had been some day.

The photos above shows St Lukes Hospital where the brand new top story projects far higher than all the other properties on Fitzroy Square. Amazing how the Church of England obtained planning. Well, not really. A photo below of the Queen arriving.

Then in 2009. I remembered that I had also shaken hands with her sister:

Monday, 10 August 2009

The day I met Princess Margaret

I remembered last night that not only had I shaken the hand of the Queen (see posting 9/6/08) but I had also shaken hands with her sister. Just after we moved to London in 1953, when I was eight years old, Princess Margaret was to visit the Royal Albert Hall to accept charitable donations from schools from all over the country. My old school in Alton in Staffordshire proposed that instead of sending one of their own pupils, I might like to go instead. So it was that I joined a long line of children in the underground corridors of the hall, waiting for our turn to climb the steps up and into the blinding light of the auditorium. There we handed to the Princess our envelopes, shook her hand and made our exit. All over in a flash.

Dahlia Figaro Mixed

 

The tiny plug plants I bought online have been the best so far. This year I chose the Dahlia Figaro Mixed from Suttons Seeds and the sixty have all done well. Seventy pence each including postage. They were planted straight into the border towards the end of May as the photos above.

 

I have already included some photos in previous posts of the Dahlia Figaro Mixed, but here they are in September still flowering well.

Robinia pseudoacacia

 

The tall tree in the middle is a Robinia pseudoacacia or mock acacia. It stands in a piece of waste ground just behind our back fence. So no-one cares for it. However, it occasionally sends seeds to the garden at the very far end and these sometimes take root. Here is the latest next to a compost heap and is just over a metre high. There is also another next to the back fence. Not sure what to do with them. But they look very healthy.

Chelsea and Brighton

 

When it was announced that Brighton and Hove Albion's manager Graham Potter was moving to Chelsea, it reminded me that in the seasons from 1963 to 1966 I used to watch both these clubs; Brighton when I was at college there, and Chelsea when I didn't. It is hard to believe that at that time Brighton were in the fourth tier of the football league, playing at the old Goldstone Ground. I think that one year they won promotion to the third division. Potter has taken them to their highest ever position of ninth in the Premier League for the season 2021/2022, and at the start of this season to the dizzy heights of fourth after six games, higher than Chelsea! No wonder The Blues took him as their new manager.

Udo Jurgens and Don Black

 

I don't know if Don Black ever met Udo Jurgens, he doesn't say so in his "autobiography" The Sanest Man in the Room. So I guess not. Which is strange as Black wrote lyrics to two of the melodies written by Udo. Don Black says that it was Matt Monro who encouraged him to write lyrics. Matt had fallen "in love with an Austrian melody by Udo Jurgens called Warum, nur Warum and Don wrote the lyrics for Walk Away. One of my favourite songs of all time.

Warum, nur Warum was written and performed by Jurgens at the 1964 Eurovision Song Contest,where it came 6th, and is on YouTube. If only Matt had sung, it might have won. Matt's performance at that same contest came second. Although Jurgens did win later in 1966. There are many versions of both songs on YouTube, but it is Matt's version that stands out. The orchestral arrangement is absolutely superb as the strings run a counterpoint to the melody. That's why I love it so much. No wonder it reached number 2 in the charts.

The other Jurgens melody to which Don Black wrote the lyrics is the song If I Never Sing Another Song, originally recorded by Matt Monro and covered by many artists including Connie Francis, who use the song as their closing number. 

The House of Sleep, A Year of Marvellous Ways and Days Without End

 

With Terry Worth, film an obsession. How he survives on so little sleep is a mystery. A cinephile of the first order, he becomes fixated on tracking down a print of the lost movie that is "Latrine Duty". But all this is in 1983/4 which are the odd numbered chapters of Jonathon Coe's "The House of Sleep". the even numbers are twelve years later in 1996. By then Terry has lost his obsession and working as a reporter only to suddenly remember his earlier quest and needs to find that one photo or still that provoked this search in the first place.

But the book is not all about Terry. There is also Sarah, who suffers from narcolepsy. (I did learn quite about about sleep disorders and the various stages of sleep). Then there is Robert whose unrequited love for Sarah affects his whole life. Poor deluded Robert, I found it hard to reconcile that a person could devote their whole life to someone unobtainable.

At the centre of this story is Ashdown, a rambling mansion next to a cliff, that in the 80's is a dormitory for a University, and where our characters first meet, and then in the 90's as a centre for sleep disorders run by the strange Doctor Dudden. I quite liked the changes in time although it did get a little complicated at times although cleverly plotted. Just to say that there is one chapter two thirds through when Sarah ( now a teacher) goes to see Rebecca (the single parent of a pupil Sarah thought was in distress). They find a mutual history (hinted at much earlier) and their conversation is written with devastating brilliance.

This is a book to savor. Marvellous is eighty nine and her memories are told with poetic beauty. But these are mainly limited to the beginning and end of the book. It is young Francis Drake, just returned from WW2 who ends up at the creek near the Falmouth estuary (only hints gave me the place) where the old lady resides. He was late returning from the war, and only having to deliver a letter gets him to London and onto Cornwall.

Marvellous lives in a caravan near a boathouse where Francis is made at home. The two pages when he first visits her caravan are just wonderful. There is a lot of description of the landscape but it never intrudes on the story. There is a lot about feelings and the past. But despite the limited plot, it is all so skillfully told. What we learn about Marvellous and Francis is enough to make an intelligent and satisfying read. "She awoke, not to death, but to the sound of shingle scraping upon the hull, and the anchored stillness of the land".

I'm not sure how I stuck with this award winning book as young Thomas McNulty narrates his story. he swops poverty in Ireland in the 1850's for time in the US army, fighting in both wars with the indigenous Indians and the Civil War. Yes, there is a lot of violence, too much for me. But there is friendship and heroism.

Written in a rough first person, I preferred the times after the army with John Cole as they present a hilarious theatrical demonstration in St Louis in their old Major's entertainment. Then much later I was glad I reached Chapter 19, twelve exceptionally emotional pages. Only to be followed, when back in the army, by a crazy and chaotic tale of revenge orchestrated by the grief stricken man in charge when everyone else had no idea what they were in for, where they were going or what they were meant to do. As we unfortunately do.

The Lawn Recovers

 

The photo above shows the lawn in the middle of June, always at it's best in the spring and early summer. However the drought in July and August created lots of bare patches, especially at the far end. Seven weeks with no rain, blazing sun and often hot.

But a little bit of rain and a late summer treatment by Green Thumb has meant the grass is well on the way to recovery.