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After the rigours of the previous day's show viewing. It was time to be a bit more reserved. I decided to see a play. That's a serious bit of straight theatre. The play had been written by someone I'd met at the C Venue and he had told me it was pretty bad. I wanted to see for myself. So, I went, watched and then had a chat with the fellow afterwards. He defended his work, but took on board some of my constructive criticism. Who the hell am I to be telling people stuff about play writing? Have I achieved greatness in this field? Do I know what I'm talking about? I don't know. I usually point that out too to give my comments an air of honesty. I believe that I know enough about my own reactions and about the structure of writing to be able to give educated, if not slightly misguided, feedback.
In between shows, I was harangued by some people on MadTour 2003. Seemed like a wacky student thing to be doing - I helped them as best I could.
Following the first bit of original writing, I then went to see a new musical called Corpus. This threw me into turmoil and I had to grab a familiar face from the audience to discuss the show with afterwards. The lady in question was Helen, one of the cast of Joe Stalin The Musical - a person who had already witnessed a bout of Ashley's show-dissection and seemed to come out of it both alive and smiling. Indeed, she seems to smile a lot in a sort of pretty young lady with talent and charm sort of a way... there I go again. Since she was a music student from Cambridge, I felt that discussing a musical with her was probably a good way to work out what I thought of it. I knew my reactions individually, but I couldn't see the complete picture. A discussion helped me resolve the principle components of my thoughts.
After Corpus, I went over to see the crowning glory of the 5065 lift's schedule - the Giant Pineapple Boys in their show Mondo Muzak. This is the sort of thing which I'd love to have been involved in myself. Indeed, if I ever ran off to join the circus that is the world of performance art, it's the chance to do this sort of thing that would be the inspiration. Three lads having a laugh with an audience, doing an array of party tricks with silly props... it's a comedy goldmine.
After that, I met up with some friends and we drank drinks and talked words at each other all night. Of course the subject of musicals arose and I discussed such a subject at length with a nice lady. This is the law and it must not be broken. Myself and my other single-male counterpart were left alone by the two couples we'd been with for the evening as they went home to be couples. We decided that it was our job to talk to some girls. Rather than looking for two girls, I suggested we tackle the table of 4 (soon to become 5) nearby. This suggestion was for conversational, rather than sexual reasons. As it happened, it worked out well. I very much enjoyed the company of my friend for the hour Claire (34 days younger than me, so technically a young lady), and we didn't even end the evening talking about musicals - Bolton Wanderers was the subject, so I recall. I'd had a couple of drinks.
We found the C venue, usually open for drinks until 5am to be closed at 3am. Apparently, Friday nights are not a night for late opening there. Odd. Friday night was the first night I went home by cab - purely for practical reasons: I needed the loo and it was the quickest way to get to it.
Show: After Sex All The Animals Are Sad
Performed by: Velocet
When: 14:50
Where: C Main
Cost: £6.50
An original play. It was hard to say what this was exactly about. Some of the performances made the writing seem flat and some of the writing made the progression of the story seem flat. The situation is a woman courting disaster, in a relationship with a fairly rational, but perhaps dull zoologist. His study of apes acts as an analogy for the behaviour of man and, in particular, the behaviour of men of strength versus weaker men, and women in relation to different types of men.
The story does not end at the last scene and so the show seemed unsatisfying. Perhaps the pace of the last scene could have made the final blackout of the piece a climax in itself, rather than an abrupt end, but it's hard to say.
The writer claimed that the leading lady's character did not know her own mind, which was supposed to be an explanation for the way the story didn't really have an ending. However, I think that we perhaps needed to learn something of the progression within the tale that was lacking. In addition, I found some of the behaviour of the couple at the centre of the piece hard to believe. A couple dealing with the increasing lack of sex in their relationship and its atrophy would not behave in such an apparently detached way.
Having criticised it, I found some of the scenes to be exceedingly powerful and intelligently written and I did come out thinking I'd learned something.
Show: Corpus
Performed by: Modify The Van
When: 17:10
Where: C Main
Cost: £9.50
I could write a thesis on this show and still not quite know what to conclude. I'll try to be brief. I'm being honest about everything I write here and it perhaps digs into the core of my questions about how and why I'm co-writing a musical.
This show was inspired by the Bodyworlds exhibition and is based around a similar exhibition and a fictional scientist.
The summary first. I enjoyed the show, thought it was well constructed, had the most consistently talented cast I'd seen to date, and was well executed, yet I found it not to work at all. Sorry. I so wanted to like the show. However, I've taken home nothing of the music. If it were a play with just some nice background music, it would have been better. Sorry. The music was so well constructed and well orchestrated and performed... yet totally uninspiring in itself. It didn't reach out to me. Perhaps I was in the wrong mood.
The show didn't quite seem to know what it wanted to be. Was it a serious question about the meaning of science meddling in life? Or a silly sci-fi romp? Or a question of the futile pursuit of immortality? It had all of these elements, but rather than satisfying my lust for entertainment, it just confused me.
The set, costumes and performances were all excellent. The execution of the dialogue was timed to perfection. I really enjoyed the textures of the sound and vision, especially the orchestration. So, to see all of that and come away feeling like I'd missed the point of the show was a big disappointment. I think that the show didn't have a point and that was the reason I felt the way I did. Even some of the music writing seemed to be formulaic. I could point to certain points and say "this is the marathon song" and so on. This could probably be an excellent show if they edited it well.
They need to go back to the plotline and revise it to be more focussed, some of the plot felt like cheating, which can work in a wacky comedy, but not in a serious and weighty show - if it's meant to be silly, they need to remove some of the bigger issues from it - like the pain of the plastinated corpses. They need to work on dramatic intent behind songs - perhaps have fewer of them. Most of all, the music needs to have more shape to it and more catchiness in the tunes. I felt like the whole thing was in the same key with not too many melodies to latch onto.
I've been wrong before.
Show: Mondo Muzak
Performed by: The Giant Pineapple Boys
When: 20:00
Where: 5065 Lift
Cost: £5
Laugh out loud comedy. Lots of pop culture references. Much music, played on "thumb instruments" i.e. pretending to play music, but using their mouths and hands. Loads of silly impressions and props. Three lads kept a lift full of people happy for a good 45 minutes. It was exceedingly good fun and very charming and I would be happy to audition for their 16 piece thumb-instrument big band.
I particularly enjoyed their swapping instruments between each other.
Spent £21, saw 3 shows. At the day's end:
Total shows seen: 40
Total shows performed: 7
Total spent: £264.50
18 August 2003
Ashley Frieze