I am a camera

"I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording, not thinking. Recording the man shaving at the window opposite and the woman in the kimono washing her hair. Some day, all this will have to be developed, carefully printed, fixed."

This is one of the memorable lines from a fantastic play I saw on friday night by John Van Druten, inspired by Christopher Isherwood's Berlin novel. It is showing at the wonderful small theatre above the Rosemary Branch pub along the canal from my flat. 

still from the film I am a Camera

It was a funny and poignant portrayal of two close friends trying to make sense of being artists in Berlin against the backdrop of the rise in fascism. The lead character who was the inspiration for Sally Bowles in Caberet is a crazy, drunken unsuccessful cabaret singer, jumping from rich guy to richer guys, buzzing with energy and overenthusiastic gushing. She's like a more wild, less good looking Holly Golightly. Someone you'd like to throw a decadent party with.

Cabaret

Catch it before it whirls off the stage. Its a great night out with brilliant performances from the whole cast.

Number 10 Frowning Street

I'm the cockroach Prime Minister of course, and I have to hurry back to Frowning Street....

At the end of the next short play, as our hero's (a mint leaf) friend 'scar' (a skull on top of a ghost) dies in his arms, he cries, "but are you dead or just asleep?"

And in another, the unwittingly funny moment when Sandy Salt (a sea shell) explains how her father, a 'no swimming' sign is trying to stop anyone going into her mother (the sea) as she had already had too many people in her.

Everyone knows children's imagination and insights can be moving and inspiring. But it was the genius idea of Scene and Heard to ask children (aged 10/11) to write short plays that professional adult actors would then perform. None of the words are edited and the actors did an amazing job of bringing trippy obscure characters to life, adding just enough humour but not undermining the children's sentiments.

It was one of the best nights out at the theatre I've ever. Check it out next time. I wish this was done more often. Helping children, particularly those from tougher parts of London, to express themselves, but also helping the audience to remember and enjoy children's unbridled imagination, innocence and wisdom.

green and barren theatreland

The only film I remember walking out of because it was so bad it was winding me up was Woody Allen's Match Point. So I dont know why Gustavo and I didnt both walk out of Greenland, a play he sweetly bought me tickets to as a birthday present, but which we both agreed was the worst play we had ever seen. And that's saying something. On our first date we bonded over some really pretentious physical theatre at one of the V&A's late night events.

Perhaps it was because we were at the National Theatre, it was my birthday, the tickets were expensive and we hadnt mastered a signal that we wanted to get the hell out and go drinking instead.

My heart sunk slightly when I heard it was about climate change. This has been my day job for many years now and I'm aware of the difficulties of making climate change interesting or funny. But I went with an open mind.

Analysing it afterwards we decided the only message, the only point, that it successfully communicated was how hard it is to communicate anything meaningful or interesting about climate change.

What most people have in common is a love of stories. Everyone can relate to emotions and a good tale. Climate change isnt a good story. Its a very complicated, technical science. How we react to it, or not, though can be interesesting. Our relationship with the planet, with nature, with understanding risk - these are all interesting to me..but to make good theatre requires a bit more respect for the audience than imaginative uses of multimedia. The only, tragically few, moments that drew you in were the personal stories of a scientists monitoring the birds in the Arctic and a political advisor and a climate modeller falling in love. But they left you hanging, only superficially skating over, like the birds flying around the theatre, film projections of the real birds.

I'd rather theatre inspired, made me laugh or created heroes. But a earnest attempt to dramatise an issue just because its important? I couldnt help feeling frustrated at the waste of time, talent, money and the audience good will. If anyone else has seen it and disagrees i'd love to know.

When we left the play we came across a fantastic photography exhibition of the beat poets. That made up for the visit. I had no idea Kerouac looked like a film star.