Archive for Category: "Columnists"
NFTU Photo Stories Exhibition
Limited edition prints available here
In 2012, NFTU will be growing the number of typographs in the exhibition and taking it on tour around the country at literary festivals and galleries. You can see all the typographs and read the stories here .
Latest Articles
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Featured Theatre
Quickfire with James Frey
James Frey is the author of – in my opinion – some of the best books written in the last decade: A Million Little Pieces, My friend Leonard, Bright Shiny Morning and The Final Testament of The Holy Bible. I am privileged to have been able to ask him a few questions. Where do you start when you’re writing a book – do you have an outline, or just the germ of an idea and an ending, or something else completely? I know the beginning, the ending, have the entire book, in some abstract way, in head. All I do [...]
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Columnists Crow Featured
The Art of People, by Gillian Wearing
Forever it has been fashionable to profile people. Especially unordinary people who do things to make our simple lives turn. From bee-keepers and embalmers, to burlesque dancers and street artists, they are curious people who will never receive a full biography. The style of editing is dry and sharp. Beginning mundane and chronological: “I’m up every day at 6.20. I shower, dress and drink a Roibos tea. I don’t eat breakfast. I leave at 7 and take the shortcut to the bus stop.” Starkly it then zigzags: “The bodies i prepare smell like brickwork warmed by the sun.” or, “Nipple [...]
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Theatre
Theatre 503
Theatre 503 is one of the most consistently welcoming theatres in London. It’s the home of provocative, fearless and exciting new plays and the next two productions are no exception. Shiverman by James Sheldon (It won best new play) – May 21st On a tiny Pacific island, Roy Turner is on the brink of announcing the discovery of a lifetime. But as American researchers and aid workers land on the island, Roy’s football-mad assistant Tatalau’e faces a choice. Should he play by the ancient rules of his people or should he move with the times, and risk the wrath of [...]
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Theatre
The Yard Theatre
The Yard Theatre in Hackney Wick is open again for another season from now until December. I went to talk to Jay Miller, the director of one of the most exciting places to catch not only the original shows staged there, but also a community of artists that seems to be extracting the sword from the stone, not by yanking at the shiny handle poking out of the top, but by melting the rock into larva and producing new, original pieces with skill and purpose. How you came to dream up such a project, and then make it real? I [...]
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Theatre
OperaUpClose’s Dominic Haddock
OperaUpClose’s executive producer Dominic Haddock must be on cloud 9. Another successful adaptation of a classic opera – Carmen – is on at The Kings Head Theatre until May 12th. I have a chat with the man behind one of the most successful opera companies in the UK. There’s lots of guerilla opera in London at the moment, to what extent was this happening when OperaUpClose started? When we kicked off OperaUpClose with La Boheme in 2009, there were a number of well established small scale companies in London producing excellent work. Tete a Tete for example have been what [...]
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Theatre
All Hail Spymonkey
The Lyric Hammersmith has natural light on the stage. We watch four people sit in a row, discussing a review which they are well-miffed about. It was in The Scotsman and claimed that the show was essentially rubbish. But the actors say they’re going to carry on with it anyway… and they launch into Oedipussy. It’s bloody brilliant. I don’t know whether ‘the review’ ever existed, but judging by the belly laughing from all around me, taking the classic Greek tale and doing a bit of a jog on it, DOES work. My favourite bit was the attempt of the lepers to get out of the door. You [...]
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Architecture Featured
The Architecture of Weather
Wouldn’t it be great if we could control the weather to suit our daily needs? Decide when we want it to be sunny and when we want it to rain? This would certainly save a lot of disappointment on rainy wedding days. Could it be that one day we will have a switch that we flick to turn the sun off, and one to turn the rain on? Will the future purpose of the Met Office be no longer to predict the weather, but to control it instead? These proposals may for now, seem absurd, but in the future, they may not be as far fetched as we may have initially thought.
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Cinematique Featured Stage & Screen
Film Conversations: Realism of Once upon a Time
In collaboration with Sasha S: Once I punched a guy in Hamburg… T: What? What are you talking about? S: Always thought this would be a good opening line for something. T: Come on, tell me. What did you think? S: Well, at the time I hated the film. Now, when I think of it I like it more and more. T: I didn’t hate it, but in a way I was exhausted and somehow disappointed… I don’t know what my expectations were, if I had any… S: Often the expectations can ruin the film, this time it wasn’t the [...]
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