January 2009 Archives

It only took two years to get here after winning a bunch of Tonys on Broadway, but Spring Awakening is now at the Lyric Hammersmith and you must see it.  You must.  I loved it.  So fresh and young and new, really well-directed (it was only the fifth performance last night, but it was polished and detailed like you wouldn't believe) with great songs and terrific young actors.  A complete breath of fresh air in West End musicals (which, as I've said, tend to feel like wearing heavy clothes on a hot day). 

I have a feeling it might get a bit of stick from sniffy middle-aged critics; I heard definite generational tutting from more than one grey-hair in the audience.  But the young people there loved it, and I think it's a great musical for older teens (bit of rough language which they'll laugh at and sexually frank as well, but nothing a smart teen couldn't handle).  If you don't like it, this is one occasion where you're probably just old.

Book now, it's only on until mid-March and I reckon it'll be a sell-out.

As for me, I've finally updated the Events page because I'm actually going to have rather a busy year ahead...

I did my longest training run of the season so far yesterday morning. 16.01 miles (according to my swanky Garmin), which is the longest I've run since my last marathon, I realise.  Down the London canal through east London and the Hackney Marshes. 

Very muddy.  Very, very muddy.  Cross-country muddy.  But I (and friends) finished all 16 miles and I can still walk today (though with a mildly worrying pain in the shin, but we'll have to see about that).

So, you see, I'm training hard.  So why not sponsor me?  I'm getting tantalisingly close to my fund-raising goal, so why not help?

I then had a good lunch with the aforesaid friends, had a nap, and was then underwhelmed by the season premiere of Lost.  Being 'unstuck in time' isn't really my idea of pleasurable suspense, so here's hoping they get it sorted out soon.

Quick note about how I didn't make it past the interval of Mrs Affleck at the National last night.  Extremely well-acted but turgid beyond belief.  It's based on Ibsen's Little Eyolf, but transplanted in a way that doesn't make moment-by-moment sense.  There's an invasion by a leather-jacketed mod that goes on for ages and isn't remotely plausible, even if we're meant to take it symbolically.

Also, it's set in someone's back kitchen, but there was a special 25-minute interval for a huge set change, which seemed (before I fled) to be little more than mirrors for the seashore.  If they can remodel the underworld in His Dark Materials in 15 minutes, you have to think a kitchen would be less of a challenge.

Instead, go see The Wrestler with Mickey Rourke.  A bit by-the-numbers plotwise, but Darren Aronofsky's a genius, and Mickey Rourke and Marisa Tomei are spectacularly touching.  Good stuff.

I voted for him (absentee), wish him extremely well, felt the touch of history at the whole occasion, but...

Wasn't that inauguration just a teensy bit of a shambles?  Dianne Feinstein (my home state senator) storming through her speech, that completely non-non-denominational and non-inclusive prayer (there are indeed a lot of Christians in America who deserve complete respect, but there are a whole lot of others, too, millions of 'em, kind of the whole point of America, really), and then - god help us - WHAT was Aretha Franklin thinking?  Can we just erase that performance out of our collective memory and remember her for the great singer she was?  And then of course there was the slightly muffed oath (though I gather that was something to do with an unavoidable problem with the Chief Justice?) and a speech telling us we were all doomed. 

Yes, it got better, yes, we'll all re-edit it post mortem into something inspirational and wonderful, and yes, the history of the occasion outweighed the missteps.  But goodness, I'll never be able to listen to "My Country 'Tis of Thee" again...

Been a week of not feeling part of the crowd, cultural-wise.  I saw Slumdog Millionaire, for example, and while I enjoyed it, I did think that the big feelgood rush at the end is kind of muffed by a mistake that could have been easily fixed. 

Spoilers ahead, beware, but if you've got a movie where the whole point is that he's got specific reasons for knowing the answer to each questions, doesn't the movie just throw away all that work when he guesses on the last question?  Isn't it just saying, well, what the hell, we're going to give it to him no matter what, so all that stuff you just spent 2 hours watching didn't really matter?  Surely it wouldn't have been that difficult to give him a good reason to guess A or for Latika to suggest A?  Something magical and moving?  But a pure guess just sort of kills it for me.  A good film, still, but I wished it had made that last leap.

And I felt odd man out at Every Good Boy Deserves Favour at the National yesterday, too.  A pretty much sold-out audience at the National laughing their heads off at the clever-clever Tom Stoppard jokes, while I sat there waiting for something actually funny or to happen.  He gets bums on seats, does our Tom, but it's all brain, no heart, no blood, no piss.  You get the feeling that none of his characters have ever had to fart in their lives.

And finally, I feel way behind in wireless terms because I don't have it at home.  I'm desperate to get away from 10 years of crapola service from AOL, but how do you know you're not going to sign up to something and get equal garbage for the next 18 months of your contract?  That's how I got stuck with this toaster oven of a phone on 3 until Summer 2010.  Ugh.  Suggestions welcome.

I did an enormously enjoyable interview this afternoon with Kim Alexander, host of Fiction Nation on Sirius XM Satellite Radio 163 in the United States.  So all of you good folks in the US who've been wondering what on earth I might sound like, you'll soon get your chance to find out.  When I get the details of airing, I'll post them here.  In the meantime, imagine the tortured mid-Atlantic horror of Madonna when she's being pretentious and you'll get a good idea.  Ex-pats always sound strange.

Actually, I sound exactly like my brother with a slight accent.  Have you met him?  He's quite nice.

Saw A Little Night Music at the estimable Menier Chocolate Factory.  It was excellent, erasing (nearly) all memories of their shockingly horrible last musical (They're Playing Our Song, what were they thinking?). 

But they're back on track.  It's excellent, an atypically melodic Sondheim with lots of big laughs and touching moments (including an unshowy 'Send in the Clowns' that works wonderfully).  It also seems to be 20 minutes shorter than the original reviews had it, so if you get a chance (and you probably won't, it's completely sold out), give it a go.  They've even got reserved seating, which is a bonus.

I'm recording an interview with US digital radio tomorrow, details of broadcast when I know them.  And you can still sponsor me for the Marathon.  Go on, you know you want to.

As I may have mentioned before (and I have), I'm running the London Marathon on 26 April and I'm raising money for the housing and homelessness charity Shelter, a very good cause.

Now, a lot of you visit this site and leave very kind comments, so I now reach out to you good folk to go to my justgiving page and make a donation to help the homeless.  Remembering all the while that I'll be the one doing the hard work (and did today, running outside when it was 0 degrees Celsius, true).

This was going to be an entry on the interview I'll be doing for US digital radio, but the poor host has laryngitis so we're postponing it a week.  It's fate, I tell you, fate that makes me kindly request your donations.  And you don't want to mess with fate, do you?