Punk rock

I think Simon Stephens may be stalking me. Every flipping time I go out, there he is.

Ok, to be fair, it is just the times I go to the theatre.

...and see plays that are written by him.

Is it just coincidence or do playwrights all go to every performance of their stuff?

Whatever the answer, it does make it sodding hard to fully critique the play in the bar afterwards with when the tall, affable writer is lolloping around and hugging the cast and generally popping up just at the point you start to loudly discuss all the bits you didn't like.

Now, at Pornography, this wasn't so much of an issue. Had Mr Stephens troubled himself to listen in, he would have heard (almost) nothing but glowing praise and positive comments and gone away quite contented, in the unlikely event he cares what random, picky punters think.

At Punk Rock, however... not so much.

Now, I went on the Lyric website, and apparently the play 'expose[s] the violence simmering under the surface of success'. This is news to me. It's also pretty telling that I had to go and check what the play is saying its supposed to be about because it's not exactly clear from watching it.

Here's what I can tell you: Punk Rock is set in the library of a fee-paying school in the north-west. New girl Lily arrives from Cambridge. Kids hang out. Drama doesn't really ensue. Not for the first hour at least.

A cursory glance at the publicity reveals that this is a play about teenage violence, so I don't think I'm giving too much away by saying it all ends in a hail of bullets. So the first 20 minutes is spent as a kind of exercise in who will do it:

The nervy eloquent one?
The bullied maths geek?
The outwardly confident new girl with self-harm tendencies?

Or one of the other ones.

Frankly, it's hard to care.

It all builds towards the violence with a minimal amount of drama, or tension, or action of any sort. Nervy boy asks new girl out. She's already shagging the sporty one. Twatty bloke is twatty. Maths geek has slightly pointless speech about, well, the pointlessness of it all. Someone spits in someone's face.

I don't know if I caught an off night, but the whole thing felt flat.

There are some decent things about it. The dialogue is sharp, if oddly timeless. Apart from the odd chav'n'climate change references, this could be set at any point in the last 40 years.

Some of the performances are great. Tom Sturridge seems to be getting a lot of love in the reviews, but I found his wandering accent far too distracting to fully appreciate his work. But I did like Katie West and Harry McEntire who gave unshowy performances in difficult roles.

And, er, the set was very atmospheric.

(I think the point at which you start praising the set is probably a barrel-scraping moment for positive things to say).

But the fundamental problem with the whole thing was the complete lack of a point. There was no believable build-up to the act of violence. And in an odd coda, the reasons variously tossed at the audience without any discernible commitment ranged from mental illness to celebrity culture to just because.

It wouldn't be so bad, except one of the characters speechified in a very mouthpiece way about how 99 per cent of the yoof are absolutely fine, it just never gets noticed.

If this is what the playwright really thinks, then I wonder why he decided to write a play where one of the other one per cent shoots a load of people at the end.

But maybe that's just me.

please please please let me get what I want

Something else to add to the list of things I'm learning about myself through the medium of trying to be a writer: if I can leverage in a gratituous Smiths reference in, I will.

(If I can leverage in a Belle and Sebastian reference, I'm flipping ecstatic. But it's a bit more challenging).

And so, with crushing predictability, I'm giving in to the inevitable and rewriting some serious heartfelt words and reworking it all as a laugh every few minutes (I hope) comedy. Honestly, this is an absolutely last ditch attempt to make use of all these sodding scenes I wrote and liked, and tried to make into a play and failed entirely.

So we'll see if it works, or if this writing quite simply belongs down the dumper (copyright Smash Hits circa 1992).

And with a startling lack of imagination, I've been listening to the Smiths as I edit, and so I'm calling it after one of my favourite songs they do.

The fact that I'm sitting in on a Friday evening writing and listening to the Smiths probably tells you everything you need to know about the chances of me ever please please please getting what I want.

But that's another story.

shakespeare round-up

Why do I always end up going to see Shakespeare? Because the productions are so plentiful, and the tickets are cheap, and the theatre-going friends are eminently more persuadable along to these than the experimental site-specific verbatim installations. Ah well.

I went to see half of Romeo and Juliet last Friday at the Globe. It wasn't supposed to be only half, but those standing tickets for a fiver that seemed like such a good idea... well, let's just say after a first half that lasted an hour and three quarters, and a bastard week all round, we hot-tailed it to the pub. As my wise friend said, it's not as if we don't know how it ends...

I should say the first half we saw was on the whole very good. I liked the leads, although I was in a minority of one about Ellie Kendrick as Juliet - the other three-quarters of the group were less impressed, proclaiming her too goofy and annoying. I thought she was charming, and had a real freshness. And hey, I'm a tough crowd. But we all agreed that there wasn't brilliant chemistry between the leads, however, which undermined it rather.

In fact, if I was going to criticise the production, I would say it didn't hang together brilliantly. There were lots of individually good performances - Rawiri Paratene as Friar Laurence and Penny Layden as the nurse particularly charmed - but somehow it didn't gel. Nonetheless, it was an enjoyable enough first act, and I'm sure the second act was equally good, and honestly, if I'd had a less crap week at work and/or a proper seat, I definitely would have stayed. Honestly.

I also went to see All's Well that Ends Well at the National Theatre recently. Now, the sad truth is that I am horribly jaded by 15 years of going to see Twelfth Night and As You Like It and Midsummer Night's Dream (because these are the perennials that always get staged, and because I studied English Literature and so I've been to see them all about a million times and am very over finding the business with the yellow garters very funny).

So I like going to see comedies I don't know very well, and deliberately don't read summaries of the plot to make sure I can still speak Shakespeare without the York Notes. Yes, I am a bit tragic. I know.

Anyway, I really enjoyed the production, with it's fairytale setting and stylised, er, style. I liked the story too. Helena earns Bertram's hand in marriage by curing the king. Bertram buggers off to war, which in ye olden days was quite the lark, apparently. Pretty much an 18-30 holiday. Anyway, Helena pursues her errant hubby, tricks him into having sex with her, and er, all's well that ends well. Sort of. (Yes, I should be doing programme notes. I'm just waiting for the email from the National...)

So anyway: it's good. Sweet and funny, and a little bit saucy. Michelle Terry seems to be the go-to girl for the feisty Shakespearean heroine, and very good she is. George Rainsford is suitably floppy-haired and twittish as Bertram. And the set is fantastic, veering between Edward Scissorhands gothic and sunny Italian orchard.

So there we are. Almost relentless positivity about these productions I'm afraid. The thing is, I know it's much more interesting to write (and read) bad reviews, but what can I say? I keep seeing good stuff. I will aim to see a stinker soon... Well, I won't aim to, that would be foolish, but the law of averages suggests it could happen.... We shall see...

some more random thoughts

I am writing again. Here are some things I am learning about myself through the medium of writing:

a) I don't like men. That is, I don't think I must do, because all my male characters seem to turn out as bumbling idiot-holes or raving tossers or both. Yikes.

b) I'm not very good at writing in southern. All my people seem to turn out a bit northern by default. Not in a 'Ey-up our kid, Ah'm off down t'ferret factory to buy a t'pasty kind of way.' Just generally.

c) Everything is about class. Everything, everything, everything.

That is all. (For now).

Pornography by Simon Stephens

Pornography by Simon Stephens has just come to London for the first time, and I highly recommend you get your ticket now, because I predict (deservedly) good reviews on the strength of tonight’s (first) performance.

This is a difficult play to sum up or reduce to a simple plotline. Suffice to say, the action is set in London in July 2005, and weaves in and around three major events: the 7/7 bombings, the Olympic 2012 annoucement and the Live 8 concert.

It’s not really about any of these things, as such. And it’s not about pornography in the traditional sense of the word, you’ll be disappointed, I mean, ahem, relieved to learn.

(The last time I had such an accidentally exciting time on Google was researching Shopping and F**king by Mark Ravenhill back in uni days. Talk about pop-ups...)

All smut aside, this is a very moving play, with great performances all round. I’d heard good things about this play from a friend who saw it in Edinburgh last year, and despite going in with very high expectations – usually the kiss of death - I wasn’t disappointed. This is a very gripping 90 minutes of theatre.

Oh, and it even has some nudity. (Again, all credit to Anthony Welsh that I was so busy listening to him that I didn’t even notice Sam Spruell stripping off in the background. Well, not at first. There was a point when it became impossible not to notice. In a good way. I think I better stop this tangent now before I get into trouble…)

In short: go see.

Oh, and here are some links about it, although I don't recommend you look at them before you see the play.

(This is just a suggestion - I hate reading too much about stuff before I see it. Also,most of the coverage focuses on one aspect of the play, but I think it's a broader piece than you'd realise if you just looked at advance press. But do look if you want to. I'm not your mum.)

So, here's a typically hysterical headline from the Telegraph in an otherwise quite sensible piece on last year's production. And an interview with the author from the grauniad.

I'm going to tell you some stuff about my writing that may or may not be of interest

So I'm writing some stuff again, which is Good News.

To get started again, I had to give up on some stuff. Namely, this sort-of play I wrote that was aimless and directionless and storyless. Trouble was, I fell in love with some of my clever lines, and forgot to get on with the business of story and dramatic tension and all that stuff. Ahem.

(Yes, rubbish I know, but it was my first attempt at this sort-a thing).

So, there we are.

I do have some other things on the go:

I have a couple of episodes of a sitcom - which, as I've blogged about before, made it through to the finals of the Sitcom Trials no less. Not that I'm boasting. Oh no, hang on, I am boasting. Sorry about that. Anyway, that's kind of in limbo, so I should do something with it but not entirely sure what.

(I normally Know What To Do with these things, and am quite driven and ambitious and get-ahead, but I'm not with this, and I think it's because I loved writing it so much I can't quite bring myself to ruin it with misplaced attempts at Trying To Make It. It's complicated.)

I have a new project, which is something I've been thinking about for a while. It's a play, it's set in an office, it's based on a true event, and it's just starting to emerge. (It's a good sign when the characters turn up, properly turn up that is, and start being arsey and not quite how you first thought. Mind you, I'm all of 5 pages in, so there is some considerable distance left to run.)

And I have an idea for another comedy, if I feel like venturing into the competitive world of the Sitcom Trials again next year. All my comedy ideas are a bit high concept. I'm not sure if this is a good thing or not. I should probably try and write about two people on a sofa and keep it simple, but no, that's not where it all leads me.

Oh, and I have the not inconsiderable demands of a day job too, so this is all going on in my so-called spare time.

So now you know.

oh well never mind bye

I'm an idiot hole. I went to see a great new play recently, and I forgot to blog about it until after the run had finished, which is to say now.

Oh well never mind bye by Steven Lally takes the Stockwell shootings as a starting point, but is really about the state of modern journalism (not great, being the verdict) and the vested interests that shape news coverage and its supposed impartiality.

It manages to be an intelligent, thought-provoking piece that tackles the big topics, without ever feeling worthy. The conclusion is quietly devastating. And I loved the Union theatre, where it was well staged in the round.

So anyway, you can't go and see it because it's finished, but - y'know, for info - it was excellent.