Iota takes on Frank'n'furter- Rocky Horror does Melbourne

Iota tell me about your slant on Franknfurter?

 

It’s important to have a sense of history with this character whilst making him fresh and unique.  Tim Curry is the quintessential “Frank n’furter” but I wanted to bring the character into the new Millennium.  He is more angry- and brattish (with King Kong influences maybe). With ‘rock star’ elements of Tim Curry- a hybrid of Marilyn Manson, Tim Curry, Willy Wonker!

 

 

Your very first encounter with The Rocky Horror Show?

 

I first saw The Rocky Horror Picture Show at a Midnight Drive –in.  It was part of a double feature with the Rocky Horror follow-up Shock Treatment.

 

And have you seen a previous stage version?

 

My first stage encounter of Rocky was at Her Majesty’s Theatre, Perth starring Daniel Albanieri.  I remember how fascinating it was to see the strange mixture of Rock n’Roll meets glamorous theatre.  It showed me that we could enter ‘other worlds” that didn’t exist in our reality.  I think it was a major part in me becoming a performer.

 

 How did you land this role?

Whilst performing in Hedwig and The Angry Inch, the Producers for Rocky Horror came backstage and asked me if I’d consider singing a couple of songs for them during auditions.  I did so, and the rest is history.

 

 How has your role as Hedwig helped with this production?

 

Hedwig gave me my first opportunity to learn stagecraft.  It allowed me to go-through and understand the rehearsal process, the technicalities of musical theatre, acting, directing, walking in high heals!!

 

And- is there a chance that Hedwig will be restaged?

 

No, not really.  It was a wonderful part of my life, which I will treasure, but not re-create.

 

What amazing, strange or new things did you discover while researching The Rocky Horror Show?

 

Nothing really.  I learn new things daily but nothing profound.  I think I’m still waiting for my Eureka moment.

 

 

 

 

 

Did you visit Mary Shelley's Frankenstein or Andy Warhol maybe?

 

No. 

 

What is your funniest encounter so far with this production?

 

Rehearsals were a wonderfully amusing period for the production, full of fun and laughter.  During performances some mistakes happen – beards falling off, general mishaps but I cannot recall anything specifically amusing.

 

 

 Is there one particular moment that gives you goose bumps on goose bumps?

 

Frank n’furter first entrance is a big adrenalin rush but the more you perform a role, the less ‘rush’ you get.  That’s not to say I don’t enjoy playing the part or being in the production.

Your mood “ebbs and flows.”   I think when we open at The Comedy; my adrenaline will be at an all time hight.

 

 

Does this role awaken any childhood memory?

 

I used to listen the Rocky Horror Album at home.  I had a “Kiss” child’s make up kit and used to get made up like Frank n’furter.  Then I would perform the whole show to the album.

 

What makes this story so timeless?

 

Rocky has developed a Cult Status and I think that’s because it contains element from life that we all can identify with and stirs our emotions. Such as, Rock n Roll, Decadence, Sex, titillation.  Further more, it’s an Adam & Eve story which is timeless.  Just like Romeo and Juliet is the quintessential Love Story.

 

 Who inspires you?

 

Anyone who lives his or her life without fear.  The average Joe who dresses their way without confirming to Fashion rules.  People who express themselves without a feeling of judgement.  Artists who stick to their art; Tom Waits, Boy George, Marilyn Manson. These people inspire me because I’m not like them.  I don’t have that confidence, thus I turn to acting, which allows me to express these desires and emotions.

 

What keeps you going strong during a gruelling tour?

 

Friends and sleep

 

And a sneak preview into your indie music future?

 

I have almost completed my fifth album.  I’m not sure if I will have the time to tour but I have recently released an album with a group called Jungle Hammer.  It’s a project I would like to tour and play with but for now I’m concentrating on my Musical Theatre/Acting career so the music has taken a backseat for a while.

 

 

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Monday, 1 September 2008 3:56 PM
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The Last Thing- Interview with Hoy Polloy Theatre

 

 

Thring is Back

 

3RRR and Hoy Polloy Theatre take a look at the Hollywood actor with the monstrous moniker- Thring The Thing. Paul Andrew interviews Director Wayne Pearn and Actor Michael F. Cahill

 

 

Frank Thring- Man or Myth?

 

Wayne: Frank was real, no question, as the play reveals. There are plenty of stories and anecdotes that perhaps over time have taken on mythical even apocryphal proportions!

 

Michael: It is certainly very difficult to separate the two and, given the remarkable lack of biographical detail available, one would have to fall on the side of 'Myth'. Frank clearly created a public persona, which he maintained rigorously, encompassing his coruscating wit, the black wardrobe and the outrageous jewellry. Whether that was the man, part of the man, or a way of shielding the man only those closest to him will ever know.

 

What was Thring really like in life?

 

Wayne: From what I understand Frank did delight in shocking people. His public persona was a potent mix of the flamboyant, the intimidating and, of course the sarcastic. I wouldn’t say mystery shrouded his life he was more what you see is what you get and if it makes you uncomfortable all the better. Iconoclast is an apt description.

 

A generation or two came to know Frank Thring (and his 50's movies) through television appearances on the Mike Walsh show- tell me about this part of his life?

 

Wayne: He was born with a veritable silver spoon in his mouth and resided in his father’s mansion, Rylands, in Toorak. Frank Thring senior was a very wealthy cinema and theatre entrepreneur who died in 1936 when Frank junior was just ten years old. He started performing at an early age and undertook training with the revered Irene Mitchell. He joined the RAAF and was discharged after six weeks. He then threw himself into theatre taking over Middle Park Rep and rebadging it The Arrow. By the mid fifties he was performing alongside Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh in Titus Andronicus directed by the legendary Peter Brook. Kirk Douglas saw Frank in this production and encouraged him to test the Hollywood waters. He cracked a role in The Vikings and made the role of ‘villain’ his own in films including El Cid, Ben Hur and King of Kings. He then walked away from Hollywood and returned to Ryland’s and hooked with the Union Repertory Theatre, which was the precursor to the Melbourne Theatre Company where he performed in many productions. Eventually he moved to his workman’s cottage in Mahoney Street Fitzroy just around the corner from 3RRR where in his later years he became something of a flag bearer for the radio station

 

And his famous friends? 

Wayne: Kirk Douglas, Laurence Olivier, Vivien Leigh, Tony Curtis, Charlton Heston, Sophia Loren, Janet Leigh, William Wyler to name but a few. Put simply I would say why these folk were attracted to Frank in the first instance was he could seriously ACT. Then they discovered what good company he was.

 

 

 

 

Do you have a favourite anecdote about Thring? 

 

Wayne: Um, not printable.

 

Michael: As far as personal anecdotes go I have only heard two. The first I have heard from at least three different people, and it always varies slightly, but revolves around Frank inviting/procuring a young man to come to his Fitzroy digs on a Friday evening. The young man turns up with some unsavoury friends who proceed to tie poor Frank up and rob the place. Come Monday morning the housekeeper arrives to find Frank, still bound to the chair. He looks up and says, "What a weekend!"  The second comes from Bill at Joy FM, who worked for Frank briefly. Bill noticed that there was stain on the dining room carpet at Rylands and, as a conscientious young employee, set about trying to remove it. Frank walked in and bellowed, "What the hell do you think you're doing?? Vivien Leigh spilt that!"  The second is by far my favourite.

 

His sense of camp- was it a generational trait perhaps?

 

Wayne:  Look; I don’t think his sense of camp was generational. It was him and, as touched on earlier, the added bonus was he did delight in shocking people.

 

Michael: No. It's theatre, darling! I have no idea when 'camp' and 'theatre' got together but, in my experience, there is no doubt that where there is one you will always find the other. It's possibly not as common in Theatre now as it was fifty years ago but it is still there. Believe me. What has waned though is the wit; the bon mot and the cutting remark are all too rare these days.

 

And his secret life?

 

Wayne:  Mmmn...Secret. I’m not aware of too many secrets. I think it’s well documented that his fridge was always fully stocked with Ben Ean moselle that was replenished on a weekly basis and he smoked way too much. He liked the interior of his homes to be black, padlocked the doors from the outside apparently. As for his penchant for young men from what I’ve been told they were ‘turned over’ on a regular basis.

 

He was also a very saturnine character- all that black- giant medallions- and his infectious lugubrious ness? 

 

Wayne: His theatricality (don’t we all wear black in theatre), his flamboyancy not to mention the intimidation factor!

 

Michael: I think it goes back to his carefully constructed public face. I think he enjoyed being shocking and, perhaps, regarded as slightly dangerous. But there was also a practical element. Black is slimming and a raised collar does wonders to disguise sagging jowls….

 

 

 

Barry Dickin's script- what circumstances, events or memories inspired this play? 

 

Michael: Barry has clearly used a great deal of biographical and anecdotal sources in the script. Far more than I have been able to find. The play takes us from his birth to his death. There are incidents from his early life at Rylands and meditations on his relationship with his Mother and Father. It covers his life in Theatre, Film and TV. But there is also an exploration of the inner life of the man; an imagining of what was going on inside his head. For me this attempt to understand what it was like to be Frank is by far the most engaging part of the piece.

 

Michael what research have you done to “inhabit”Thring? 

 

Michael: You first need to understand that having spent my entire life in the UK I came into this project with very little idea who Frank Thring was. I remembered him from the "sand & sandals" epics like 'Ben Hur' and 'King of Kings', but had no knowledge of him as a 'personality'. I have read everything I can find about him, I've watched what few clips I can find from TV appearances, and I've rewatched some of the movies. I've also heard from many people what "Frank Thring" was to them. But I quickly came to realise that all of these sources were solely based on the public persona that Frank created. None of it was getting me any closer to the character. I knew what he looked like; I know what he sounded like. But I'm not an impersonator, and I have no intention of attempting to impersonate Frank. So I have done what I always do and gone back to the text. Barry has already done all the research - my job is to deliver the text and bring the Frank that Barry has written to life as best I can.

 

In terms of Direction- what metaphor/nuances are teased out of the script- as focal points, universal themes?

 

Wayne: From my perspective and, this is an important point, it is an exploration of the spirit of Thring. We get to see the inner Thring, reflective and brutally honest with himself. It certainly isn’t an impersonation of him as let’s face it Thring imitators are a dime a dozen in Melbourne and the one thing we set out to avoid was it becoming a caricature. That’s a just a cop out. Michael certainly brings a real Thring flavour and flair to the role but his performance is underpinned by characterisation.

 

How did Frank meet the maker? 

 

Wayne: He was pretty cactus toward the end with regular bouts of ill health and ultimately cancer ripping through him; however, from people I’ve spoken to he was a courageous guy right up until the end.

 

Who do you imagine the audiences to be, what will they yearn for or long for from this production? 

 

Michael: There are a lot of people in Melbourne who knew Frank. There are still more who remember him either professionally or socially, or as a 'local character'. Many of them will come. Others will come because it's a new Barry Dickens play, hopefully quite a few will be there because it's a Hoy Polloy production. There may be one or two who come to see me! 'Yearn' and 'long for' imply pretty strong emotions and, whilst I'm sure there will be some who come  hoping to bask once more in the larger-than-life presence of Frank, I would hope the majority will come with open minds expecting an entertaining evening about a life lived to the full and an insight into what it may have meant to be Frank.

 

Anecdotes again?

 

Michael: In 1985 Frank co-authored a compilation of theatrical anecdotes entitled "The Actor Who Laughed. In his introduction he includes a quote from Glenda Jackson which, I think, gives the nearest thing to an insight into Thring the Actor as we are likely to find: "It's not a life that I like. I find it deeply unnatural to go to work when most people are coming home. The physical conditions are usually painful and unpleasant and cold and draughty. Why do I do it? The only reason for doing it is the work itself, and if that doesn't have some quality, forget it. Every time you start something it's as if you've never acted in your life before. You have to find it in you every time. What's been done is no guarantee that you'll be able to do it again. The minute I say 'Yes I'll do it', I think 'Christ, I can't. I don't know how to do it.'" For the record, I agree wholeheartedly.

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Monday, 1 September 2008 3:54 PM
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Interplayer - Australian Ballet- Preview

 

 

Back Seat Boy

 

Designer Adam Gardnir had to admit there were certain things he didn't know when the Australian Ballet asked him to create a ballet with a Canadian Choreographer.

 

  

God burns beautiful mortal to a crisp. It may not sound like your average classic ballet, but there is nothing average about this classic of Greek Mythology and its archetypal world. Semele is one of three featured works in Interplayer- an Australian ballet producrtion, that has put together three groups consisting of choreographer, composer and designer and asked each group to create a new ballet.  For a young designer like Gardnir this new take on an old myth is a designer’s dream.

 

While the comparison may sound trite, the myth bears an uncanny resemblance to a Sex in The City storyline. Zeus is Mr. Big of the ancients, known for making love with many women including Hera- the street savvy Samantha of Thebes. Mr. Big’s wife Hera gets jealous. Hera plans revenge. Something unfortunate happens when Zeus unfurls his astronomical godhood.

 

“ Semele will probably be one of the most relevant Greek stories for centuries to come simply because its themes are absolutely universal”, reveals Gardnir.“ Love, lust, honour. Essentials of every human being, so the story will probably last as long as we know the human condition as it is today.”

 

Its been a long lead up to Gardnir’s own “ Semele odyssey”, near on a year of design preparations,  “building” costumes that will last for years to come, importing fabrics from the best fashions houses in Europe-“all that lycra from Germany”- and commissioning beautiful hand painting on all of the costumes by Melbourne based artist Vicki Rowell. The whole process is being documented on Interplayer.com.au.

 

“ One of the most challenging aspects of the design process has been learning technology behind contemporary costume construction. Ballet costumes are built in very specific ways. Most of the fabrics and techniques I’ve chosen are foreign to me”, he reveals. Fortunately for Gardnir his collaboration with Canadian Choreographer Matjash, has been luscious, fruitful. “Matjash is a dab hand at what fabric building can do as it swirls around dancers body. I imagine his years as a dancer gives him this unique kinesthetic understanding. “

 

“ Matjash’s approach to the design process, to the choreography, has been both overtly sensual, narrative driven, athletic. He is highly concerned with the nature of this very grand story, on which he bases many unusual movement responses. Matched by an amazing understanding of how the work will feel, and for example, how the fabrics will wrap around dancers, flow, unfold. “

 

While this collaboration has been smooth sailing in terms of sexy costumes and sexy choreography. There have been other challenges. Matjash lives in Canada, and a great deal of this design collaboration happened over the web. Emails from his with visionary ideas flying between the duo for Gardnir to imagine in fabric.  “ I would paint a few designs, scan them and shoot them back, he’d provide feedback and more ideas and we’d go on like this for months and months. It was a strange joy to work this way, surprisingly efficient and clear. A hint of our more international future I think.”

 

“As the new kid in the room, I have been welcomed with open arms from the AB  Principles. Robert Curran’s ‘Zeus’ is the strongest of the gods yet is fooled by his own temptations. Olivia Bell’s ‘Juno’ holds the grace and perfection of the highest order yet is achingly heart broken. And Juliet Burnett’s ‘Semele’, in her first major role for the AB, performs an extraordinary mix of human rawness and heavenly lust. It’s been challenging in many ways but a very easy job to make these dancers look good onstage.”

 

Gardnir is pretty chuffed with his bottom line design challenge” the intersection of the gods with us mere mortals”. “ Any secrets? Well there are a few nice illusions and design tricks awaiting the audience”, Gardnir smiles. He is tight-lipped about just how sexy this myth gets. “ What I will say is that The Australian Ballet has a long list of beautiful dancers on tap, the last thing I wanted to do is cover up their bodies. The most beautiful part of any ballet is the body and often the best thing the costume design can do is take a back seat.”

 

 

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Saturday, 30 August 2008 6:43 PM
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Altar Boyz

Atheneum Theatre- Melbourne

 

Five Boys, One harmony. Love ‘em or loathe ‘em Boy bands. Herr-hum, that is, Christian Boy bands are here to stay- aren’t they?  This Oz incarnation of the much lauded off Broadway hit has all the right stuff  - satire, sex, sin and soul.

 

Its story premise is simple, that’s its charm. The quintet of testosterone-pumped boys destined for megastardom are on the final leg of their uber uplifting,  “Raise the Praise” Tour (pun intended). Their mission, to cast a spell over their audiences with honeyed harmonies, swiveling hips, inspirational spiel- to save the lost souls temporarily in their charge. And when push comes to shove at the penultimate hour, each one of these born agains has a selfish-greed-lust driven egomaniacal secret to share. Bar one. It takes a Jewish perspective to get things into perspective  - "What is a star without its constellation!"

 

In this fast-paced, consumer-overdrive secular age of ours it is no surprise that this musical has captured the popular imagination. Audiences (lapsed pilgrims perhaps) are pretty disenchanted with organised religion and still savour sweet satirical takes on the sacred. At the heart of Altar Boyz lies this very paradox, and at times – the show is having a shekel each way- satire one minute, dogma the next. But the music, the spellbinding funk from Robin Gavin’s quartet and delicious harmonizing from the flirtatious five- Dion Bilios, Jeremy Brennan, Andrew Koblar, Cameron MacDonald and Tim Maddren, propels us through the toe tapping pelvic thrusting ninety minute all singing all dancing show. And fortuitously, also propels us through the dramatic “episodes” that link the songs-as-story or verse-medley concept together.

 

That  these narrative episodes are a little lacklustre, may have something to do five characters being  saccharine sweet, and lacking the presence of a strong onstage antagonist, a bad boy from the wrong side of the tracks. In this play, the conceit is that, we, the audience are the baddies, the antagonisers, wilfully preventing the boys from achieving their soulful quest and raising that praise. We

are clinging tight to deep dark secrets, not fessing up to whatever deeds or auguring well with the sacred spin. It makes for a great, if familiar comic device.

 

Director Kate Gaul has crafted a slick sweet piece of popular entertainment. Perhaps if there is any criticism to be levelled at all,  it is that this antagonising device errs a bit too much on the lightside, its huge potential, just within grasp. Perhaps it needs to be pushed a little further to cater for Australian audiences,  over the edge of sweetness into that wondrous abyss of folly, critique and profane larrikin spirit we know as satire. That said, if  you love the musical zeigeist right now- add this one to your must-see list- each member of the cast truly do have a wow-factor about them, and the  voices of angels.

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Friday, 15 August 2008 4:06 PM
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A Suicide For Winter- Tiger Lilies- North Melbourne Town Hall

Poetics of Suicide

It was Nietzsche who claimed that the very thought of suicide was a great source of comfort across many a bad night. And perhaps too for raffish UK cabaret crew The Tiger Lilies it has been the great source of comfort spanning an entire career.

A Suicide For Winter is the latest mystical instalment from the Brechtian street opera inspired trio. Their poetic moniker refers both to a beautiful fragrant flower and an infamous prostitute, in point of fact the band formed in 1989 after songmeister Martyn Jacques spent near on a decade musing on the scent of a dark demimonde milieu of petty crims, prostitutes and low life, surrounding him during his twenties. Today with 18 albums to their credit with saturnine titles including; Urine Palace, 7 Deadly Sins, Circus Songs and The Brothel to the Cemetery this sinister troika of tragic troubadours has garnered a respectful and cultish following on the festival cabaret burlesque circuit.

Melbourne had the good fortune to experience another enchanting fix of Tiger Lilies mysticism last night. Exacting falsettos, surreal gypsy arrangements laced with intoxicating abjectness or the hard tremble of dildoes and hammer repurposed as drumsticks. Jacques haunting vocals evoking the spirits of long dead castrati’s, Adrian Stout on Double Bass, horsehair Bow, a singing saw and Jacques shamanic muse behind the a drum kit, Adrian Huge.

In the dark crypt like space at North Melbourne Town Hall replete with chiaroscuro lighting, the Lilies let loose both new and old material, the mercurial music mayhem madness and melancholy that has made them, ever so delightfully, not a household name. Unleashing songs like the carnivalesque Roll Up, the show stopping and blasphemous Banging In The Nails, to the Faustian pact of spoken word ballads like Lust or I’m Angry. Brooding fare like A Bitter Pill and the brilliant gothic cover of My Funny Valentine. The finale, as close to redemption as the Lilies get, a resounding comic tragic balance of gloom and bloom, The Crack Of Doom is Coming.

While there are some, like Nietzsche, who may have succumbed to the ego’s hubris, flailing in the face a slow syphilitic suicide, there are others like The Tiger Lilies who err on the side of suicide’s poetic nuances, its alchemical treatise. Deep from the mystical, invisible, eternal palette that is the human soul. From the absurd transmuting harmonies melodies and imperfect notes emanating from the larynx, or the bowels to the strange, sanguine and discordant conjunction of vowels tempered with heartfelt percussion, a singing angel saw and a golden squeezebox.

 

 

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Monday, 11 August 2008 4:58 PM
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Axeman Lullaby - Interview with BalletLab Dancer- Carlee Mellow

Paul Andrew Interviews long term BalletLab performer, dancer Carlee Mellow

 

In what time and place does this work unfold?

Axeman Lullaby is fractured and layered when dealing with time and
place. There are often 2 realities being played out simultaneously.
It could be suggested that the woodchopper represents the
contemporary and everyday, never crossing over into the other reality
which shifts from a gothic / pedestrian / installation feel into a
melodramatic, cinematic ballet performed to a high-modernist score of
live piano and violin with costumes that suggest 'early
settlers' (1788 - 1850) and/or 'Victorian' (1837 - 1901).

 

That scene cuts straight into some disjointed dialogue of three women based on an
historical event from 1900, retold by Thomas Keneally in his novel
'The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith'. This sends the work into hysteria,
an emotional and energetic state devoid of time and place culminating
in a scene from Fred Schepisi's film made in 1978 of the same event
from 1900. The resolution of the work feels in the moment. The
audience experiences it as you (the performer) does.

Wow! So as you can see it chops and changes around a lot. You are
asked to stay very active in your navigation of the work as an
audience member. For me, that is a sign of good art.

Tell me a little about the Lullaby concept behind this new work?

When we started working with the axes, we found that the sound of
hitting the wood repeatedly in very simple patterns created a gentle,
rhythmic score - almost like a heartbeat. Add to that the action of
the swing of the axe. Imagine the beautiful arc you see as the
performer lifts the axe behind them, it swings overhead and then
falls to the piece of wood on the floor in front of them or the
sensation you feel when watching a simple sideways swing like a
pendulum or a ride at the Melbourne show (the pirate ship!). The
combination of the sound and swing, suspend, fall action of the axe
creates a visceral experience for the audience, seducing or more
appropriately 'lulling' them into the piece.
.

You have a long and loving involvement with Ballet Lab?

I received a phone call while I was in the Red Rooster drive thru on
Warrigal Rd. I guess my memory of the exact location demonstrates how
excited I was to be invited to work with company. The first time I
was in a studio with Phil, he had us dancing (and partnering) in
sleeping bags in the middle of summer. That was 5 years ago...

 

 

 

 

 

 

And your most memorable BalletLab experience so far?

It is impossible to pick one. Our tour to Transylvania, Romania and
Bulgaria was full of many odd and crazy incidents. The first time the
second cast of Amplification performed at the Arts Market was amazing
which was then followed by a sold out season in New York -that was
very special. But you know...  just being in a studio with Phil and
the amazing dancers he works with is a gift. I really love being
privy to the way Phil's imagination manifests into his work and the
unspoken agreement of generosity and trust between him and us - the
performers.

What are you blessed out by now in this new work?

I love that you can pick up a flier with a 'horror' image on it,
read that it is a work by BalletLab, assume it is a dance show,
enter the venue, see a room full of wood, and eventually a
woodchopper chopping wood! Phillip thinks so far outside the
square. His courage, capacity and tenacity to push the
expectations of live performance is very exciting and refreshing
and should be supported and encouraged.

 And what is challenging about it?

The nature of the performance will be extremely challenging to audiences. It is
difficult to categorise and define. You're not really sure what
you're watching. I hope people engage with the ride of the show, the
visceral and aural experience and don't try to intellectualise it too
much. The world of Axeman Lullaby is surreal, theatrical and
spiritual with a strong sense of fear underpinning it, a fear that is
current and very real in our everyday lives.

Tell me a little about the relationship between the body and the score?

The live music has been written for specific sections of the work.
The violin and piano aren't necessarily played in the traditional
way. David not only challenges the musicians with his complex score
but also challenges the potential of the instruments and the sound
they produce. There is a tension and eeriness in the sound, which
helps create the melodrama with the choreography. There is also a
sense of storytelling, which becomes even more apparent when the
musicians and the woodchopper team up to help accentuate and
punctuate the dialogue of the 3 women. The full and rhythmic sound
during the hysteria supports the choreography and us (performers) in
executing it. The music helps drives the work with strategically
placed silences to emphasis the frenetic activity with superb
dramatic effect.

The last section comes back to the idea of the lullaby. The score and
choreography are completely integrated as we shift numerous pieces of
wood in various patterns along the floor creating a sound similar to
that of gentle waves lapping the shore. It is rhythmic, calming and
hypnotic and sends us into the resolution of the piece.

The indigenous back-story to this production?

 

Phillip's interest in cinema brought the story of 'The Chant of
Jimmie Blacksmith' to the work. The memory and impact of Fred
Schepsi’s film sent Phil into researching the story more thoroughly
and with Jacob Brown's (our indigenous performer) addition to the
cast; its inclusion into the work seemed a natural progression.
Phillip doesn't usually deal with topical or political issues but
including this story as a reference or springboard for the work meant
that images, interpretations and/or abstractions needed to be
portrayed with sensitivity and respect for the indigenous culture. I
mean we've only just apologised THIS year for the atrocities against
the aboriginal people! I think it’s a brave move on Phillip's behalf
to be extending himself as an artist, trying to see where and how his
work sits in our current climate.

Do you have a favourite moment in the production?

 

Mmm. I love my Victorian costume. My favourite costume ever!
Designer Doyle Barrow rocks!

 

 

About Carlee

Carlee Mallow has performed, choreographed and taught nationally and internationally over the last 13 years in dance, film and theatre. She has worked with companies Chunky Move, Dance Works, BalletLab, Stuck Pigs Squealing and NYID.

 

This year Carlee will perform in Kage¹s Appetite for the Melbourne International Arts Festival and will create a work for Lucy Guerin¹s Pieces For Small Spaces in December. Carlee also works as Dancehouse¹s Program Producer.

 

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Monday, 11 August 2008 4:56 PM
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Axeman Lullaby- BalletLab

Axeman Lullaby

Review

 

Choreographer Phillips Adam’s latest work continues a fascination with the Australian landscape. While Brindabella (2007) portends the mystical and enchanting aspects of a mountain range, this new work is loosely inspired by the landscape as represented in 1970’s Australian cinema, films like Fred Schepsi’s The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith (1978), where murder and a monstrous mythic landscape meet, teetering on a fulcrum between indigenous past and uncertain post colonial future.

 

Blood red lighting sets an alchemical mood. A sense of foreboding prevails. Axe wielding dancers, setting to an absurd task. What amounts to tackling, disassembling a large square in the form of a wooden field.  A metaphor perhaps for what transpires in a postcolonial place like Australia. It is a carefully arranged wood field artfully strewn together like a Rosalie Gascoigne collage. Suggesting perhaps that any cultural heritage or belief system needs to be destroyed, obliterated, dissected before it can be rehewn, reconstituted or transformed.

 

Tossing turning the field into a chaotic heap, the dancers bodies inflected with tension, short sharp measured footwork, angst,  violent rage in motion in a chorus of splinters and off cuts.  In the backdrop an Axeman stands like a mythic figure, swinging his axe, keeping meter and rhyme like a human metronome for the unfolding ballad. In the foreground an androgynous youth mimics the heroic image of the Woodchopper. Dancer Stuart Shugg stands tall and slender in contrast to the ad hoc heap and the divine presence of the woodchopper (Laurence O”Toole)

 

In the slow fade up of white light, a Victorian bush setting is revealed, Dancers Joanne White, Claire Peters, Carlee Mellow appear in a white frou frou of Victorian gowns floating, drifting like clouds. Their incessant bantering, chanting cajoling with racial slur, a dire contrast to the deft delicate choreography, circular motion like waltzes suggesting the civility of the English court.

 

Sitting quietly contemplatively in the background, in the shadow of the woodchopper is a dark silhouette of a man. This sitting man (Jacob Brown) moves quietly forward into the white light, striding out slow tribal footwork deep into the black earth. His dance gathers in pace, in striking disarray to the Axeman rhythm, the sitting man as changeling, walking out a different beat, a different story.

 

In the final scene the dancers form an arc, dancing with the strewn wood taking it to their hearts, stretching it skywards, downwards, outwards, ceremoniously making a chorus of circles, sliding and gliding the wood to make a soft chant of flesh and wood that is mesmeric, redemptive, a lulling for the soul.

 

In signature baroque style Ballet lab brings together performance, visual and sound art, a broad lexicon of dance styles, melodrama, film grabs alongside a haunting sound score composed by collaborator David Chisholm. The ensemble ever mercurial. slipping between genres, capably and at times enchantingly, making mystical connections between different sensory worlds.

 

Adams in his idiosyncratic way pays homage to the humanist tradition, this very symbolic fusion, the conjunction of square and circle that fascinated artists and philosophers during the Renaissance. Adams draws different forms, oppositions, cultures to make mystical connections where once there were none, to make poetry at the fulcrum.

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Monday, 11 August 2008 4:54 PM
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Melbourne Art Fair- 30 July- 3 Aug- Exhibition Building

Fair or Foul

 

One of the largest art expos in the Asia Pacific region opened today.  Paul Andrew spoke to two Melbourne artists about the buzz.

 

Today everyone seems to have an opinion about the Melbourne Art Fair. For artists like Neon Parc’s Viv Miller or Uplands Gallerist Matthew Griffin Melbourne’s largest art exposition is an opportunity for fast tracking professional development- that mystical fusion of art and business. 

 

According to Miller the fair makes the art world accessible to more people.  “It’s like pulling back the curtain.  Beyond that - it’s all about Sales”. Griffin admits he doesn’t really have an opinion on the Fair except to say it has very little to do with the sort of art he is interested in. “It’s kind of like the Chadstone for art. Good for businesses, good for shoppers, but I don’t shop there.”

 

Both Miller and Griffin have notched up a following in recent times. Largely from exhibiting at Melbourne’s labyrinth of artist run spaces. Miller is lauded for her mystic seers eye blending east and west. Griffin for his spin on storytelling, his flair for hip hop hopefulness.

 

“Storyteller? No, I’m not really a storyteller”, reveals Miller.  I like to think that my work creates- an aesthetic space. Not creating stories as such, in that narrative sense. Like many artists, initially I was into drawing.  I started taking an interest in this ‘art world’ stuff around the age of 15. Im lucky. My mum gave me the nod. I’ve always had support, into art school straight after high school.”

“ My work picks up on both Western and Asian, particularly Japanese, art histories. It’s fun. It’s not because I’ve had some grand plan. I respond to what I like.  I guess this fact in itself might reveal something of the way various cultural influences surround us. I think there is a tendency towards poetic art today- that art can tap into some kind of mystical insight, albeit handled a little ambivalently by artists. The feeling that some mysticism would be fun but you can’t bring yourself to believe in that sort of crap, so it becomes something fraught with anxiety, doubt and humour.”
 

“ Speaking of crap. My dad is pretty good with stories”, smiles Griffin. When I was about eleven he told me this one. It’s the middle of a very cold winter. A little sparrow is in trouble. Unable to find food, shelter for weeks, the sparrow collapses into snow, exhausted, ready to die. “

 

“As little sparrow lies freezing, taking its last final breath, eyes closed, it feels a shadow pass over. With the last bit of energy left in its body, it raises its head, looks up, just in time to see that a large cow is standing above- delivering a large shit, landing directly on little sparrow. If it wasn’t bad enough that little sparrow was dying, now its final tomb would be a pile of cow dung. “

 

“ While contemplating the situation the sparrow begun to feel something he hadn’t for a long time. Warmth. He was beginning to thaw out from the heat of the cow dung. The warmth from the dung attracted some small worms from below ground. The starving sparrow ate them with glee. In no time at all, the sparrow felt a million dollars. Warm, with a full belly, the joy of life. His head emerged out of the dung, to sing a song of happiness. A passing fox hears the singing and in one bite eats him up.”

 

Griffin laughs. “As Dad finished this story he looked very pleased with himself. I was just confused. To me, it’s this. Just when you think things cant get any worse, they will. Sometimes situations at first seem bad turn out to have advantages. If everything is going well for you, for gods sake- keep your mouth shut.”

 

Maybe the hip-hop humourist does have an opinion after all. Whether it’s drawing back the curtain, or sitting fair in a pile of foul dung, there is something for one and all. 

 

 

 

http://www.vivmiller.com

http://www.neonparc.com.au

http://www.uplandsgallery.com 

http://www.artfair.com.au

 

  

 

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Thursday, 31 July 2008 9:34 PM
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Tartuffe- by Molière- The Malthouse- Review

Tartuffe

 

 

Review

 

ADAPTED BY LOUISE FOX
DIRECTOR MATTHEW LUTTON
SET AND COSTUME DESIGNER ANNA TREGLOAN
LIGHTING DESIGNER PAUL JACKSON
COMPOSER PETER FARNAN
CAST INCLUDES
LAURA BRENT, MARCUS GRAHAM, FRANCIS GREENSLADE, PETER HOUGHTON, REBECCA MASSEY, BARRY OTTO, EZEKIEL OX, LUKE RYAN, ALISON WHYTE

In the Malthouse Theatre poster for a sublimely gaudy adaptation of Moliere’s comedy, Orgon holds Tartuffe just as Mother Mary did while mourning the death of Jesus. Barry Otto sits like a king, part Orgon, part mother- a gender-bending, drag-faring Mary holding Marcus Graham as Tartuffe, as poseur, as gay pin up, as Mephistopheles in aviator sunglasses. And in these androgynous arms, Tartuffe lays in repose, godlike, cheating ageing, cheating the fall of gravity, cheating death.

 

This homoerotic Pieta image, this irreverent icon is a telling appetizer for a delightful makeover of an ageless tale. Moliere’s famous 1664 comedy scandalized the French court, requiring a Kingly intervention to prevent its censorship and landing it as a wry critique of class, piety and aristocracy back in the day. Sinning in private is fare game for theatre in any epoch- and as the Gallic bard himself penned-. To create a public scandal is what's wicked; to sin in private is not a sin.

 

 

In Director Matthew Luton’s production, Moliere’s Paris salons, dripping with aristocracy, patriarchal power and old money get a Kath and Kim makeover, Toorak style. Writer Louis Fox has kept deftly to the heart of Moliere’s wit, somewhat awkwardly to the meter of his rhyme, neatly interwoven contemporary taboos and ably transmuted the play for Melbourne today. Into the burbs of new money where Armani suits, Manolo Blahnicks, crass popular culture rule the day and white wedding dresses look like chiffon meringues.

 

Barry Otto is delectably cast as Orgon, the fumbling head of an extended family, overseer of a wealthy household, king of a tastelessly decorated estate and ruler of improper vested interests. Unlike their faltering patriarch, Orgon’s family is wise to the deceptions of the new age self-appointed prophet impostor with Buddhist leanings, Tartuffe (Marcus Graham). Orgon fails to see the hypocrisy, the ulterior motives. It is Orgon’s myopia, his guileless faith, and his blind zealotry, which undoes him in the end.

 

Tartuffe has his sights set on quick riches, and in his criminal stride he wears a deceptively godlike mask. A respectful protégé, a spiritual confidante, a sharp mind, the compliant loving son Orgon never had, and a muse no less. In this tale, Tartuffe seduces Orgon’s wife, strikes a sharp rift between Orgon and his two children, his son, his daughter and their rightful claim to inheritance and in the process tries to anally abuse his mentor. Graham is perfectly cast as a man on the brink of middle age, an eternal party boy, confused by desire, corrupted by power, bewildered by both masculinity and femininity, bereft of growing older gracefully. It is always a great pleasure to see this magical, nimble, mercurial actor. At times his Graham’s Tartuffe almost reprises the same eroticism as his stage character Franknfurter in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, so many productions ago.

It is Russian House servant Dorine (Rebecca Massey) who brings down both Orgon and Tarfuffe. Two men on a misguided ascendency, two men who really need bringing down, their noses in the earth, their feet on the ground. Dorine is the truthseeker, observing between the lines, observing the lies beneath the mask. It is this humble, though outspoken, hilarious and tempestuous woman of service, brillaintly nuanced in Massey’s gestures and strident performance,  who sees beyond the veils of hypocrisy, is the seer of all private sins, the bon savant forging ever forward.

Orgon’s second wife Elmire,  (Alison Whyte) is a fine match for Tartuffe’s split personna, and the troubled masculinty, the power struggles, that comes with middle age. At first, Elmire, sensously portrayed by Whyte,  is enamoured by Tartufe’s charisma, seduced by his charm, beholden to his calm, beguiled by his compassion, awakend by his libidinal stirrings, all qualities that she craves, qualities that are missing from her marriage to the weak and aging husband Orgon. Ultimately, her intuitions unnerve Tartfuffe, and brings about his demise, his undoing. As Elmire turns self interest, cravings towards the greater good, the welfare and care of her charges and newly acquired, non genetic family, Tartuffe comes unstuck. Whytes performance lingers long after the curtain falls, perhaps it is her part dance, part burlesque, part comic delivery that arouses the memory so.

Peter Houghton rises to the great chartacter roles in Matthew Luton’s production- the pampered pooch, pot smoking pool cleaner and Jesus- hilarious in all three roles.

And this production is a wicked version no less, casting sin - as we once knew it- front and centre into the footlights. Kinky sex, homoeroticism, foul language, foul play, just ripe enough for the very same season when Sydney’s Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras makes it’s annual claim and a timely post script for the recently departed Melbourne Midsumma Festival.  The Malthouse highlight sits well in this context.  Art, artfulness that tempers, transmutes patriarchal power and helped us all pull the rug from beneath the zealots, bigots and “devots” in Australian society, in religious orthodoxies, all old school orthodoxies. Director Matthew Luton has delivered us Moliere’s comedy as immersive, adrenalin pumped baptism of camp. Intelligent. Irreverent. Entertaining. Soulful. Political. Moliere would be chuffed methinks.

 

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Wednesday, 30 July 2008 08:29 AM
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Kransky Sisters – Melbourne Comedy Festival

Kransky Sisters

 

Review

 

Heard It On The Wireless

 

If creepy Boo Radley from that classic novel To Kill a Mockingbird ever did drag he would probably end up an honorary Kransky Sister. Goth Spinster superstars Mourne, Eve and Ava Kransky traveled to Melbourne’s Athenaeum Theatre far from the dusty dry tired old town of Esk (100kms out of Brisbane). Here at the Comedy Festival, safe from their time warped lifestyle, out of Esk reclusion for a terrific journey – an exorcism of Kransky family memories via ye olde sounds of the wireless.

 

The Kransky trio take us back to the days pre I pod, pre bit torrenting. They have been compared with Dame Edna, The Adams Family, The Sugarbabes and even Star Trek. Like one of modern literature’s most famously scary small town reclusives, Boo Radley, these three-cloistered spinsters- are also eccentric, closeted, crow-like. Like Boo they turned their backs on social convention- the magazines, the pop songs, the techno wizardry. They happen live in a ghost ridden place too, just near the Esk cemetery  “ where Mother is buried”.

 

The sisters too, have deep dark secrets- “baggage”.  Unlike Boo, who hid away, fearfully in the dark, these girls take their dour and delightfully dark baggage on the road and into the spotlights of comedy circuits.  The memory of Dad’s alcoholism transformed into a spooky parody of Time in A Bottle, the memory of concreting over a pet bunny rabbit- a ghoulish arrangement of Pyschokiller, or the memory of a parched roadtrip across the Australian desert- a demoic version of Highway To Hell. These Salvation army styled siblings with home “Bob” haircuts, armed with tambourines, a saw, a toilet brush and an old Tuba make merry with menacing melancholy, with dazzling musical arrangements, vocal gymnastics – witty a cappella, cascading melodies, fibrillating falsettos, yodeling and oddball opera, side splitting stuff as the women “without husbands” creepily inhabit the stage, careful not to wake the dead. Maybe the trio really are exorcists masquerading as comedians, helping us get in touch with our inner Boo, letting uniqueness claim the light.  Boo-riffic!

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Tuesday, 29 July 2008 11:44 PM
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Brindabella by BalletLab- Review

Brindabella

 

 

Review

 

Silhouettes of instruments and musicians cast on a ruby red drape. A dissonant string overture. So begins this epic and flamboyant tale of men finding beauty deep in their psyche. Ballet Lab’s new work Brindabella puts a gender-bending slant on a classic myth, Beauty and The Beast. An artistic collaboration between Ballet Lab Director Choreographer Phillip Adam, Brooklyn-based choreographer Miguel Gutierrez and composer David Chisholm. Four Dancers. Three Acts.

 

Set against the backdrop of idyllic mountain range, The Brindabella’s, a dreamy tale jump cuts between fantasies, love, masculinity and femininity as dancers grapple with the beasties within. Directors Adam’s was inspired by Jean Cocteau’s 1946 film, La Belle et la Bete, a surrealist fantasia based on an ancient theme – men coming to accept and embody a beauteous femininity. Adam’s vision is equally surreal; it segues between a renaissance setting, bush land, garage rock performance and fetish club scenarios.

 

In the classic version, a Prince tells a Beautiful woman that he was tricked by a fairy spell, and turned into a beast. And that it is only her love for him, despite his abject ugliness, that can break the spell. In Adam’s vision the Beast is cast as a troika of men, preening princes in the first act (La belle) and then, fumbling, tumbling, grumbling and stumbling with romantic love and ugly inner demons in the following two acts (Lamour and Le bete). The pivotal fairy spell is reimagined as a series of temptations, gay clubbing and the cult of celebrity – everyone wants to be a rock star. And the ugliest factor of all- men coming to terms with the will to grace.

 

The Beauty (Brooke Stamp) plays muse. Brindabella opens with the queenly figure holding court; the embodiment of strident female power. Her three young suitors are too selfish to notice. Dancers Derrick Amanatidis, Luke George and Tim Harvey slither in her presence. The trio, more concerned with obsessing on superficial reflections, dance with mirrors rather than courting their queen.

 

Act Two Lamour witnesses the foursome in a series of love acts. A ritualized strip tease, choreographed as synchronized running, for e brief while- its hypnotic. A metaphor for romantic love. Repetitive. Circling going nowhere, loosing clothing along the way, always ending up in the same place, exhausted at the end, and no closer in meaningful relationship to another.

 

Act Three Le bete. Inner city rock gig, grunge, and BDSM meets performance art, before the final, misty scene of redemption. It is here in a meditative vignette, that the men are touched by darkness, the deep dark shadow of inner beauty, and find inner feminine grace.

 

We have Surrealism to thank, as the visual movement that stripped bare ordinary objects, images and gestures of their mundane significance, to reveal psychological truth and create compelling images deep from within the psyche. Ballet lab Director Adam’s has this dreamy otherworldly lexicon down pat. And Brindabella is as much a visual feast of surrealistic jump cut tableaux, as it is a deep insight into the male psyche. Walking as dance. Running as dance. Ceremonious and ritualized. (If somewhat laboured at times). Trees become dance partners; a bicycle becomes a fetish icon, customized in studded black leather, black dildoes and shiny chrome accoutrements. Feathery plumes become windows towards transcendence. And so it goes.

 

The choreography is boastful, lively, churlish, clumsy, homoerotic and serene, occasionally mesmerizing. As the movements tells the story of male transformation. And Ballet lab’s accomplished dancers find themselves shifting between divergent art forms. Ballet, character acting, a greek chorus, vaudeville, singing, striptease, interpretive dance, yoga assanas and butoh. It is this baroque sensibilty that Adams courts in his directorial lexicon, and is breathtaking to observe in contemporary dance. Though at times falls a little unevenly as the dancers cope with the palette of many genres. Perhaps this was also due to opening night jitters.

 

Composer David Chisholm, has scored haunting string overture, ensembles and reprises, garage Rock band riffs, electro to a xylophone lullabies. (Will make a great CD!!)  Designers Benjamin Cisterne and Ben Cobham set Brindabella as a minimalist fairy grotto, cast against tall treetops, the domains of indie rock and urban kink. Deliciously rendered baroque costuming, fur, flesh, fetish wear conceived by Designer Doyle Barrow.

 

Running, tumbling, falling, wounded, transcendent production.  Brooke Stamp is poetry incarnate. Always adrenalin charged. It is refreshing to see a new take, on an old story. Moreish.

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Tuesday, 29 July 2008 10:39 PM
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Holding The Man - The Malthouse- Review

 

Holding the Man

“Why do we hurt the ones we love? ”.Timothy Conigrave’s heartfelt memoir, Holding The Man (1995)grapples with this great human paradox. This story was written as a death bed confession, an apologia of sorts. Penned by Conigrave, achingly, honestly, lovingly during the two years that followed his lovers death from HIV AIDS related causes, just before Conigrave himself succumbed to the virus.

Today, thanks to Director David Berthold and writer Tommy Murphy’s 2006 stage adaptation there is renewed interest in Conigrave’ s memoir, his activism, his play Soft Targets (Australia’s first full theatrical response to HIV AIDS) and his observational stage texts, including Thieving Boy and Like Stars in His Hands, recently revived at La Mama during Midsumma 2008. After four sell out Sydney seasons, and this extended MTC season at The Malthouse, Murphy’s adaptation looks like it has also captured the hearts of Melbourne audiences as well. Equally as an entertaining stageplay and as a soothing prompt for collective remembrance.

This great teenage love story between an aspirant actor and a dedicated Essendon Footy fan unfolds before and during the HIV AIDs pandemic of the 1980’s and 1990’s. It is a story which resonates so palpably with audiences. Audiences comprising young and old. Most notably, a generation of young gay men who have survived the virus into midlife. And alongside these audience members are the families and female friends who once nursed and cared for the young souls who weren’t so lucky. These many men and women share much in common including the loss of friends lovers brothers and colleagues struck down in the prime of life, leaving address books empty, relationships unfulfilled, great plays (like this one) unwritten, great art never realised, great secrets never shared, gifts never exchanged, slender threads dangling in shreds.

Not that long after man had landed on the moon, Melbourne High School students Conigrave (Guy Edmonds) and John Caleo (Matt Zeremes) fell in love, irrevocably. It was the genderbending 1970’s. It was a time when jeans were flared, men grew their hair long and when pubescent young men shared crushes on pop stars like Bryan Ferry. Crooning along to Ferry’s chartbusting hit, Let’s Stick Together, made perfect sense to a league of boys transitioning to men, boys like Conigrave and Caleo who shared their masturbation fantasies like Fantale wrappers at a weekend movie matinee.

We meet two families, we meet the parents, we meet the mates, we meet the circle jerkers, we meet the Gay soc group at University, we meet Nida teachers, we meet the doctors who dish out the AZT treatments, we meet Conigrave performing Soft Targets at Griffin Theatre in 1986 , we meet Caleo’s alter ego beset with dementia, memory loss and we meet an avalanche of Conigrave’s involuntary memories. We meet the soul of Caleo on his deathbed, we meet the puppet double of Caleo, a desicated pile of skin and bones shed by the spirit that is too great for any mortal vessel. We meet the grief, we meet the loss, we meet the longing, we meet the cursory precious sense of love and belonging where true love resides.

Highly polished ensemble performances, from seasoned performers. Guy Edmonds and Matt Zeremes paint a sublimely subcutaneous portrait of gay lovers Timothy Conigrave and John Caleo, before and during HIV AIDS. Tender, deft and erotically charged.

Actors Jeanette Cronin, Nicholas Eadie, Eve Morey, Brett Stiller take on a mercurial chorus of supporting roles, with great accomplishment. Adding equal parts comedy and pathos to the production, delivering nuanced performances. With several sell out seasons under their belts and this recently extended season at The Malthouse, the cast demonstrates they have built extraordinary momentum, extraordinary grace.

Holding The Man’s “inaugural” cast ensemble, under the careful vision of Director David Berthold is set to earn a rare and sacred place in Australian Theatre heritage. This is magical realism at it’s finest, ghostly spectres, metaphysical muses, eternal souls and ultimately mortals who learn to love, learn forgiveness and learn to never forget.

Arguably, what is most significant about Murphy’s loving adaptation is not simply that he has breathed new life into Connigave’s life story. But, maybe unwittingly, this stageplay, for so many audiences, has also allowed new breath, new life and vigour into much of the unfinished business between past friends. Renewing interest in the great unrealised works of art by departed friends. Maybe Holding The Man acts as a kind of metonym for that wondrous invisible repertoire of unwritten plays, unstaged dance spectacles, unpainted paintings, unpenned lyrics and unsung songs now forever lost. And that the slender threads remaining, are not forgotten. These lingering souls who visit this play, lap up this theatre, tapping once again into the wellspring of great dreams, visions, fantasies, enthusiasms and hopes of the spirits ever among us, can once again pick up the threads.  Great stuff.

Filed under: None | Posted by Paul Andrew at Tuesday, 29 July 2008 10:35 PM
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