I play my grandmother’s memory loss in a game for closeness.
‘Gene Richards,’ she says. ‘I was thinking about him the other day.’
‘He wasn’t at the funeral, was he?’ I say, because we had this conversation …
Original short stories, comedy and poetry from the best writers both old and new
Reviewing film, theatre, comedy, books, music, art and poetry. All that and some interviews too
A showcase of the UK’s brightest and most illustrious illustrative talent
NFTU recommends the best plays, gigs, galleries, readings and films for you to go see this week. We also post relevant news from the world of culture, and competitions that our readers might want to enter.
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Although south of the river, the Old Vic is an establishment theatre, staging top revivals and adding a dazzle of well-funded glamour to the Southbank. But just recently it has branched out into the avant garde, with a new space underneath Waterloo Station.
Next up, three wonderfully talented players comprised the group known as Horse Aquarium (a tag which sounds a little like a Googlewhack and a lot like a great name). They collected three random words from the audience and then based a series of improvised sketches around each. It was remarkable to watch Paul Foxcroft, Briony Redman and Tom Salinsky play together, challenging and daring one another with each turn of the makeshift plot. Each is a superb and competent character comedian, finely portraying trigger-happy prison guards and the Angel Gabriel alike, among many others. Their most hilarious skit featured the men as taxi driver and passenger, with Redman portraying their seatbelt. “I was working in an office as a chair,” she says, wrapping her arms around the others, “but there’s a recession…”
The final group brought to life one of the best pieces of improv theatre available on the circuit. The School of Night began by reading passages from audience members’ books, before the volumes were taken from them and they had to continue, improvising in the same style. This was funny and a mere taster for what was to come. A wholly improvised Shakespeare parody, told in iambic pentameter and rhyming couplets – all in Shakespearean English, of course. The Dwarf of Venice nodded to the Bard and Jacobean revenge tragedy dramatists, and was stuffed with just enough camp Carry On humour. It was an immense achievement, to see the players make up lines on the spot that drove the plot forward and sounded like they had been lifted from the Collected Works. The late founder of this troupe once said, “I don’t understand the worship of writers in this country, since none of them are much good.” When you see these players make up dazzling theatre without a script, it does make you wonder whether writers will one day go out of fashion. Readers of Notes from the Underground may not be comfortable hearing it, but the School of Night puts writers out of work. Fortunately, there are so few performers as talented as the School of Night players, so writers are probably safe for now.
We can only hope that the Old Vic Tunnels are also safe. The licence granted by Lambeth Council gives the Old Vic chance to use the space only until December, but hopefully there will be a reprise or – let’s hope – leave to remain indefinitely. The venue could become a significant player on the fringe scene. Persuading Lambeth Council to let them use these enormous tunnels underneath Waterloo was probably an audacious project itself, but then to transform them into an exciting space for theatre, comedy and improv is a major achievement. Stay tuned for what comes between now and December.
by Adam Smith
More info here.
Christopher Eccleston, the only Doctor Who to sport a shaved head and a shouty Northern demeanour, carries his own baggage. In other words, he is not an actor to disappear within the part, although he …
Andrew Hussey, presenter of BBC Four’s France on a Plate, likes to wear his smart dark suit, whether feasting alone in Parisian brasseries, noseying around restaurant kitchens or careering in an old motor through …
During the introduction of James Corden’s World Cup Live (ITV1), as Corden shouted and paced through his hot, cramped studio, my television reception cut out. For a few seconds, a blank screen hovered, as if …
Friday 30 July – Sunday 1 August 2010
Three-day programme full to the brim with art, music, pop up events
Gavin Turk returns as festival patron in Agile Rabbit show at The Lighthouse Pub
624 studios and …
Have you ever been to a literary festival, or a book festival? They’re different from book fairs – those are industry-only, business affairs where rights deals are struck and conferences are held.
Every once in a while a performance of a play comes along that defines the genre or the playwright for you. It is the measure by which you judge all future productions of the same …
by John Syfret
Miguel Syjuco cuts a trim and dapper figure when I meet him, dressed in light chinos and collared shirt, he is at ease in the sweltering heat of a glass-topped room in King’s …
by Adam E. Smith
The basement at the Leicester Square Theatre has been transformed into a cheap garden centre. Black and white chessboard lino, limp hanging plants and a trickling water feature decorate the tiny space. …
This is the blurb on the upcoming Stoke Newington Literary Festival, which looks well worth checking out this weekend:
It celebrates the area’s long and influential literary history and hopes to keep the spirit of radical …
by Rebecca Lee
When you can buy books from aisle 2 of your weekly supermarket sweep, why bother going into a bookshop? Or why can’t you just go on Amazon?
A regime change at Waterstones is planning …
by Katy Darby
Do you like short stories? Do you remember vinyl? If the answer to both these questions is yes, then you, sir or madam, are the target audience for the quirky, cool and …
Books take time to make. As you will know from all those doomed university essays (why is 2,000 words so many?), word counts are pesky things and books need at least 30,000. We also need …
UNDERWOOD have given us two very cool and beautifully designed vinyl records to give away. Info is below.
For your chance to win, just email
tristan.summerscale@notesfromtheunderground.co.uk
(aka the world’s longest email address) by the end of this week …
What a lovely idea from some lovely people. Every day visitors to their site send them facts, and they pick one to turn into an illustration. Manchester based design agency Young have signed a deal …
Paper rules.
I’m not talking about in books themselves – digital is coming, get used to it – I’m talking about in publishing. In the office. In our daily working lives.
By NFTU Arts Features Editor Michael Amherst
1. There seems to be some disagreement within the frontbench team on which department’s budgets are ring-fenced; Vince Cable has said no departmental budget is ring-fenced whilst David …
2nd February 2010; British GQ magazine and the Norman Mailer Writers Colony announce a new annual competition for non-fiction writing.
The winner will be invited to spend a month at the Norman Mailer Writers Colony, …
Literary Event: May 13th. RedRoaster, Brighton. 7.45pm-10pm.
GritLit does the Brighton Festival…
Following on from previous sold out events, Brighton’s grittiest literary night returns with a Festival fringe event on May 13th forjust a fiver!
The writer’s road from initial idea to book-in-hand-of-reader is long and arduous. But we have come to the end of the beginning of the ‘Inside Publishing’ mini-series on How One Gets Published.