The week that was #25

Probably the last truly busy week of the year for me: a theatre info night, a film and two concerts.

South Pacific info night

Because I've been assistant webmonkey¹ for the ATG, I've been seeing all the audition notices for upcoming shows; one that I was particularly interested in was for The Met's production of South Pacific.

All of the shows I've involved in recently – as cast or crew – have tended toward the serious (while Arsenic & Old Lace and The Tempest were both comedies, I played the least funny roles in both of them; Jonathan Brewster and Alonso respectively) and I'm thinking that it's time I did something lighter – either a musical or a (proper) comedy.

The week that was #24

One of those weeks where a few things have happened but none of them, alone, warrants a standalone blog post. I saw a film and a couple of plays, saw a lecture by one of the world's leading public intellectuals, and had one of my tweets get retweeted a surprising number of times.

Midnight in Paris

Woody Allen's latest, it is the story of Gil (Owen Wilson), a Hollywood screenwriter on holiday in Paris with his fiancee Inez (Rachel McAdams); he is hoping to switch from script-doctoring to novel-writing, and finds himself nostalgic for the glory days of Paris in the 1920s, when it was a haven for the world's artists and intellectuals.

Soundtrack Albums

Using pop music in films is a great way to establish mood (either on top of or instead of the film's instrumental score) and, for those set in a specific point in time, an easy way to help establish the period. Releasing these for sale to has proven to be a rather handy moneymaking venture, since soundtrack albums sometimes sell very well indeed – The Bodyguard, Dirty Dancing and Saturday Night Fever are in the top ten best-selling albums of all time.

And whether the songs are specifically written for the film or not they often provide very interesting combinations that you wouldn't otherwise find together in one place. I've bought quite a few over the years, and, after some thought, I came up with four albums that I consider my favourites – as well as some notable mentions.

The Pillowman

It's been, as the saying goes, an amazing ride. I came straight from appearing in Macbeth (which I wrote about here) to stage managing this production – almost literally; rehearsals for The Pillowman started before our run finished, and the afternoon following our final night cast party I was back at the Little Theatre for a rehearsal.

Pride and Prejudice

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife."

I've just finished Pride and Prejudice, and I'm very surprised by just how much I enjoyed it. I'd only read one other of Austen's works prior to this: Emma, which I felt I needed to read after being cast¹ as Frank Churchill in a stage adaptation of that story back in 2003. While I didn't hate it, I didn't think it anything special.