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Peter

No Cherry for Cheri

Based on the 1920s novel by French writer Colette, Cheri is a tragic comedy love story set in Paris in the early 20th Century. A time considered the twilight of the ‘Belle Époque’, literally the ‘beautiful era’.

Directed by Stephen Frears, (The Queen), screenplay by Christopher Hampton, (Atonement) and starring, Michelle Pfeiffer, (Hairspray), Kathy Bates, (Fried Green Tomatoes) and Rupert Friend, (The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas).

So it’s a cast and crew with lots of talent, in fact Frears, Hampton and Pfeiffer all worked together on 'Dangerous Liaisons' in 1988. Unfortunately they do not recreate the magic in this offering, somewhere in the mix things get a little lost.

The film is beautifully shot and sumptuously dressed but doesn’t quite work as the tragedy/comedy it sets out to be. Sure there are some awfully good individual moments but too few of them to make an entire film.

The plot is simple enough; aging courtesan Lea de Lonval, (Pfeiffer), is considering retirement she agrees to help her former colleague and sometime rival Madame Peloux, (Bates), by taking Peloux’s 19 year old son Fred aka Cheri, (Friend), under her wing and save him from a life of louche hedonism. For six years Lea teaches Cheri the art of love and life and they settle into a life of easy domesticity. Just as Lea seems prepared to make a commitment Cheri is married off to the daughter of another courtesan. Cheri and Lea who have unwittingly fallen for each other must now come to terms with their lives being lived apart.

Pfeiffer handles the role of Lea with a sense of style and class, allowing us, every now and then, to peak through the veneer of world weariness and see the vulnerability beneath as she confronts her lost love and lost youth.

Bates, as Peloux, is conniving, manipulative, vengeful and petty, her performance is both over the top and larger than life. Aware that her looks and figure have long since departed she has retreated into a world of venality. Clearly she must have been a hit as a courtesan because she looks as if she has eaten her way through many a fortune.

Friend, (Cheri), is the weakest character. Frears has chosen one of those mop top almost androgenous man/boys that England seems to produce by the bucket load, think ‘Twilight’ and ‘Four Weddings and a Funeral’, to play the part of the ‘beautiful youth’ who has seen it all, done it all and been bored by most of it. Friend doesn’t excite, in fact he is so wet and annoying that I found it hard to understand why Lea, a sophisticated woman in need of intellectual stimulation would have put up with him for so long. Leaving aside this one major flaw, it’s an easy film to watch and luxuriate in.

One unkind critic, not me, summed it as, “A cougar catches a twink, loses a twink and then tries to catch him again.”

There are some extremely camp moments and if awards are ever handed out for ‘chewing the scenery’ then surely the two older ‘women’ playing cards will win hands down.

The voiceover that moves the story forward and then wraps up the rather tragic and unseen ending is spoken by an uncredited Stephen Frears.

Cheri will be in general release from July 23.

Poor Boy

Seven years ago on the night that ‘Jem Glass’, (Jed Rosenberg/ Nicholas Bakopoulos-Cooke), was born something happened; an event that would link two families through time, ‘Danny Prior’ (Mathew Newton), died. He was run down as he crossed a pedestrian crossing and left to die. His mother, (Sarah Peirse) and his wife, (Abi Tucker), have never really moved on from that night.

Jem Glass is about to celebrate his seventh birthday, the cake is made the candles are lit but Jem passes out before the family can celebrate. When he comes to he’s not who he once was. Jem arrives at the Prior family home claiming to be their long dead son, Danny. He knows all there is to know about his ‘new’ family and nothing about his ‘old’.

One family has to let go while the other has to embrace someone they thought they had lost forever.

What happens when one soul needs to complete with the family left behind? What is a soul? These are just two of the really big questions that ‘Poor Boy’ attempts to answer. Pretty heady stuff you would imagine, questions that some of the great minds have been struggling with for centuries.

Strong performances across the board from the cast with the standouts being Linda Cropper as ‘Viv Glass’ and Sarah Peirse as ‘Ruth Prior’.

It’s the staging that grabs your attention, on a multi level set designed by Iain Aitken the players of this family drama try to come to terms with reincarnation and excise the demons of deeds past.

To use an old fashioned term, this is a lavish production. It’s theatrical, expertly staged and what a luxury to have the band on stage, on hydraulics, and what a cracking band it is, directed by Ian McDonald.

But here’s the rub; does the ‘work’ stand up as well as the staging? There are some really great moments in this production but there are some truly cringe worthy bits as well – the rebirth of the Flame tree made me groan, the affectation of the zebra head, as much as I loved the head, in the end, how much did it really move the story forward?

The author, Matt Cameron, describes ‘Poor Boy’ as a play with music by Tim Finn, (pictured). Sure new songs have been written for the production but other songs most noticeably, ‘I Hope I Never’, have been worked into the script, not always successfully.

The show doesn’t quite live up to the staging.

Having said all of that at the end of the performance the audience was very vocal and energetic in its approval.

It’s at times like that, when I’m seeing a play or a piece of theatre and everyone around me is so entranced and taken up by the whole experience that I start to wonder, “Why am I not as moved or involved as the others. What is it about me that stops me from experiencing the same amount of joy that everyone else seems to be.” I sat in the theatre and listened to the cheers and the applause for the show and thought, “Have we all just seen the same piece? Sure it was good but it wasn’t great.” Immediately I began to doubt my own critical abilities.

I have prepared myself to be shot down in flames by the rest of the audience.

‘Poor Boy’ opened July 9, at the Sydney Theatre and runs until August 1.

'Every Little Step' - stumbles but it's worth the trip

May 21st, 1975, off Broadway, at The Public Theatre the first professional performance of ‘A Chorus Line’ was staged; Michael Bennett’s Pulitzer Prize winning show about the dancers, (Gypsies), who perform behind the star.

After a year of taped workshops in which dancers told their stories the format for the show was set. From all the diverse characters that gathered together for Bennett’s workshop a theatrical event was born. A show that proved to be the forerunner for the reality TV shows that fill screens today: ‘So You Think You Can Dance, Australian Idol’ to name just a couple.

The plot for the show is simple; seventeen dancers audition for eight roles, four male and four female, in an upcoming Broadway show. Through the audition process the audience learn that the dancers are not just distractions to keep you entertained while the star changes into yet another, brighter and bigger costume, but that each one of these ‘Gypsies’ has a story and that these stories deserves to be told.

‘A Chorus Line’ grabbed the heart of New York and indeed the world. It transferred from Off Broadway to the Schubert Theatre. It went on to be the longest running show on Broadway running for 6,137 performances. A record since broken by 'Cats' and 'The Phantom of the Opera'.

‘Every Little Step’ is a documentary about the restaging of the show in 2006 on Broadway. Using flashbacks of the original cast and sound clips from that first workshop the filmmakers attempt to link the two audition processes together.

Unfortunately, while the documentary is hugely entertaining, thanks mainly to a superb audition piece by Jason Tam that had the Producers and the audience in tears, and the hunt for Sheila, the film misses, not by much, but enough to leave you wanting something a little more organic from the film makers.

The main problem for me is that there is not enough reference to the past and not enough engagement with the present.

We’re all used to the ‘Reality’ format of such TV shows as the previously mentioned ‘So You Think You Can Dance’ and ‘Idol’, shows that encourage you to become emotionally attached to particular performers throughout the competition. 'Every Little Step' for the most part leaves you feeling slightly distanced from those auditioning.

Don’t get me wrong by the end of the film I was an emotional wreck but still left with a feeling that something was missing.

The show ‘A Chorus Line’ succeeds because the audience is invited in to the world of the dancer and we experience the struggle, pain and heartache that they go through to try and achieve their goal. We are seduced by their stories.
‘Every Little Step’ misses because we're not as invested in the people auditioning.

However with all those reservations it’s well worth spending 90 minutes in a darkened theatre and allow this piece of American musical history to take you away.


‘Every Little Step’ is playing at Palace Cinemas – check your local paper for session times.

When Shi Isn't She

In other news today, July 6th, Shi Pei Pu passed away possibly aged 71.

Shi, (pronounced Shuh), was a Chinese national who taught the French diplomats wives Chinese in Beijing. Shi may or may not have been a singer with the Chinese Opera. Shi also had an affair with a very minor French diplomat named Bernard Boursicot.

Boursicot believed Shi was a singer with the Chinese Opera and female.

They met in Beijing and the affair continued on and off for almost twenty years. Shi convinced Boursicot that their union had produced a male child, Shi Du Lu, (Bertrand). Believing that Shi’s safety was in jeopardy Boursicot agreed to pass documents to the Chinese secret service.

Boursicot was instrumental in getting Shi and the child out of China to Paris in 1982, where they lived as a family until their arrest in 1983.
The affair, when it was discovered ruined Boursicot and he became a laughing stock in France. He and Shi were tried for treason in 1986, both receiving six year sentences and both being pardoned a year later.

Boursicot never knew that Shi was male until they were arrested in 1982. He explained that their sex had always been rather hurried, frantic and always in the dark. When he found out the truth he tried to commit suicide by slicing his throat with a razor blade.

The affair between Shi and Boursicot spawned the Broadway show and movie M. Butterfly.

Boursicot now lives happily with his longtime partner, (male).

Shi is survived by his son Bertrand who also lives in Paris, but has no contact with Boursicot.

1969 was a VERY big year!

1969 it was a very big year for change. A lot happened in 1969 - not all of it good.

It was the year that Richard Milhous Nixon was first elected President of the United States of America, the year of the last ever public performance by The Beatles, on top of Apple Records, the year of the first flight of the Boeing 747, the Jumbo jet that would revolutionise air travel, Judy Garland died from an accidental drug overdose, Prince Charles was invested as Prince of Wales, Apollo 11 was launched and the lunar module Eagle landed on the lunar surface, Charles Manson and members of his cult murdered a pregnant Sharon Tate, the Woodstock Festival was held in upstate New York, The Brady Bunch premiered on American television, Sesame Street started, the first GAP store opened. It was a busy year.

Two other events were reported for 1969, events that have changed the life of every gay man and woman.

1969 is reported as being the first year that the HIV virus was documented as migrating to the USA from Haiti.

1969 was also the year of the Stonewall Riots in New York.

These two events would continue to colour our lives for the next four decades and probably for many more to come.

In Greenwich Village on Christopher St. there was a small, rather seedy bar run by the Genovese Mafia Family. It served watered down drinks, paid off the police and was frequented by transvestites, lesbians, gay men and homeless kids. On the night of June 28 the New York Police raided the club. This type of event was reasonably common in the 50s and 60s but for some reason on this particular night, people had decided that they had had enough and refused to go quietly.

No one is really sure who was first to say “Not this time”, was it a butch dyke dressed as a man or a transvestite who first resisted arrest and started to rally the crowd?

It started with the throwing of coins, a symbol of the graft that the Mafia were paying the police, (gayola) and quickly escalated to bottles, rocks and anything handy being hurled at the law. The normally meek ‘fags’ decided that now was the time for ‘Gay Power’.

Word spread through the Village and across the city; hundreds of gay men, lesbians and other minority groups converged on Christopher St. to join the protest.

The Police were woefully outnumbered and had to use the pay phone inside Stonewall to call for reinforcements. Bolstered by the Tactical Patrol Force, (TPF), riot police specially trained to deal with anti Vietnam War protesters, New York’s finest tried to regain control of the streets but every time the protesters were dispersed they would reform and challenge the TPF by forming a ‘kick line’, like a crowd of angry Rockettes, singing and mocking the police. This was a different style of protest, a protest never seen before but soon to become familiar throughout the world. A protest with panache, that would one day become the mainstay of Gay Pride marches throughout the world, proving that you could get your message across and achieve change with wit and humour.

For the next five nights the crowds, in varying numbers, would regather to hammer home the message, “We’re here, we’re queer, get used to it.”

In July, the week after the riots, a new organisation was born in New York, the ‘Gay Liberation Front’, (GLF), whose sole purpose was to promote equality and force change on an unwilling government. During the next year lesbians and gay men, through out the world formed their own version of the GLF and took their fight to their streets.


In Australia as news of the riots filtered through, Sydney’s first political group, ‘Campaign Against Moral Persecution’, (CAMP), was formed in 1970. The first national Gay Pride march happened on 15 September 1973, with 18 arrests. In 1975 Rod Stringer with Bill McElvie launched ‘Campaign’ a national gay men’s magazine. On the night of Saturday, 24 June, 1978 the first major protest rally to demand equal rights for homosexuals was held in Sydney and from that march the ‘Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras’ was born.

Meanwhile, back in 1969 that little known virus that had migrated from Haiti to America was marshalling its own troops and by the 80’s was ready to mount its own attack on an unsuspecting populace.

1969 was for a lot of reasons a very BIG year.

From Motown to Tehran - Before Breakfast

Here is where I started: I woke this morning checked my laptop for emails and logged on to my Facebook account and ended up asking...

How did you hear about The Princess of Wales’s death? Did you read about it in newspapers, hear it on the radio or perhaps you watched the reports on television as the events unfolded. It was a story that was slowly played out through the media as the world’s journalists gathered information and wrote their pieces.

How did you hear about Michael Jackson’s death? Chances are it was either on Facebook or Twitter. The message was spread virally. Rumour was written as fact before it was confirmed by either the doctors or the family. People all over the world knew that Michael Jackson was dead before his body was cold.

Who controls the information that we are fed, on a minute by minute basis? It seems like just yesterday it was Rupert Murdoch and Kerry Packer but now more often that not it is the new breed of ‘citizen’ journalist, the blogger and the man or woman with the mobile phone or camcorder who is on the spot as things happen. There is no censoring or verification of most of this news unless the story is later taken up by one of the ‘old media’ organisations. Yet we believe it and take it as gospel.

Factual reporting is a dying art form. Opinion pieces, like this one, are the new way of disseminating news. The Internet gives people who live in countries less liberal than ours the ability to create change. It is no wonder that all through the world governments both elected and non-elected are nervously trying to limit the amount of damage that this freedom can cause by creating new laws to enforce censorship.

From pondering I started to wander and then went in this direction…

Censorship has always been an issue that arouses strong feelings on both sides of the debate. Does anyone have a right to restrict anyone else’s ability to access information? If we lived in a perfect world, which clearly we don’t, then there would be no need for any form of censorship. Fairness and equality for all would be one of the underpinning bulwarks of our Utopia. However people being people this is not how our ‘real’ world works. We live in a world filled with deception and manipulation with self interest and selfishness. So somewhere, someone decided that we could not be trusted to monitor our own reading, viewing or web surfing activities; but the world has changed. The old argument of “if you don’t like it turn it off” has lost some of its power. Today it is almost impossible to turn off information. Information is the constant white noise that continuously wraps us in its warm embrace.

People and more importantly governments are scared. They are scared because they are losing control and the more they tighten their noose of censorship the more people are demanding their right to freedom of thought.

In Iran the message of revolution is being carried to the populace and the outside world by the Internet, mainly Twitter, as the Government tries to control every other foreign news source. Images of a beautiful young girl lying, dying, in the street from an assassin's bullet are carried on to Youtube. Her eyes stare at the camera as her blood stains the road as her life force leaves her.

Similarly in China the ruling elite censor and distort reports from inside Tibet or indeed any of their ‘spheres of interest’ throughout the country. Computers are now being sold with inbuilt filters to block sites that the Chinese describe as ‘unsuitable’. China is now trying to construct 'The Great Fire-Wall' to keep their population 'safe'. They have asked, (demanded) that new software should be designed by Hewlett Packard, Dell and even Apple to allow each keystroke entered on your computer to be tracked. This would allow the Central Government to effectively control exactly which computer user is accessing what sites and then take ‘appropriate’ action.

The Australian Labor Party is proposing to expand an already existing censorship system that allows the government of the day to block sites that it considers to be unsuitable, or worse sites that are not in line with the ‘public morality’. 'The Black List'. The examples used to justify such a move are always sites that promote, propagate or groom young children for sex or sites that associate violence and sex. Of course there is a case to be made for censoring web sites that seek to exploit young children for sexual gratification but who will be setting the limits, who will decide what is acceptable? We all remember what happened to Bill Henson’s photographs.

Senator Conroy the Labor Senator in charge of the implementation of the filter says that there will be an ‘opt out’ option, so you can contact your provider and advise them that you would like to have the filters lifted from your computer, with the exception of ‘kiddie porn’ and ‘R-rated’ sites.

The three major ISP’s in Australia all claim that the proposed system is unworkable and will slow Internet access down by as much as 80%. However as technology improves and the Chinese Government’s demands for greater control over its citizenry increase, then surely Prime Minister Rudd’s ideal moral, Christian, right society is only a mouse click away.

Now at the end I am here; worried about freedom, gossip disguised as news and the Nanny Rudd state we are all about to live in. Who would have thought that the death of Michael Jackson would cause me so much concern?

World War Bob

It’s winter in The Blue Mountains, it’s cold but if you look carefully near the first of The Three Sisters you can make out the silhouette of a lonely bugler as he raises his horn to his lips to send out the clarion call. The Empire is in need. All fit soldiers of the Queen are being asked to do their bit and Private Bob has never been one to shirk ‘doing his bits.’ Like a good Christian soldier he’s marching off to war, with a song in his heart and a can of Ultra Clutch hairspray in his knapsack, our Prince of Polyester, Private Bob Downe with his favourite femme fatale, Ms. Jane Markey, are off to entertain and amuse our boys overseas, giving new meaning to the term, ‘camp show.’

A quick digression: in Sydney there once was a club that was a restaurant that was a bar that was a theatre that once was a funeral parlour and it was wonderful. It was called Kinselas and it functioned as the unofficial Green Room for Sydney. This is where I first saw Mr. Trevorrow and Ms. Markey when they were performing as ‘The Globos’, the year was 1982; I have patiently waited twenty five years to see Ms. Markey, live, on stage again.

Ms. Markey is one of the great comic talents of Australia and it was mostly for her that I travelled the two hours to the Mountains. Did she disappoint – no siree Bob she did not. With a crooked smile and a knowing glance at the audience Ms. Markey had me – in fact she had me at Hello. As ‘Ida Downe’, she led us in a sing-a-long, that from now on every good show must have, just think how much more enjoyable ‘Sweeney Todd’ would be with a little audience participation.

What can one say that hasn’t already been said better by others about Bob Downe? He has the comic genius and timing of Humphries, he has the wit of Kennedy, (Graham not JFK), and the classic good looks of Barry Crocker… with better hair. If John Waters, (Hairspray), had been born in Australia then Bob Downe would have been his muse.

To dismiss Bob Downe as merely a spoof of every bad club performer you’ve ever seen is to miss the point. Bob is an over the top tribute to a time and era when things were simpler, when a holiday away was a trip in a caravan with Mum, Dad and Aunty Merle, or when ‘el dente’ was an Italian comic appearing, third on the bill, at the Murwillumbah RSL. Bob is to entertainment what Bakelite is to radio.

From the Crimea to Iraq in 75 minutes the publicity blurb said and it didn’t lie. No war is too small for this band of military minstrels. Armed only with an Oral B toothbrush and his very own special WMD’s, (Words of Musical Distraction), Private Bob and chanteuse Markey embark on an epic journey through the music of the wars. Pro war – anti war you name it they sing it and boy do they sing it well. It’s exhausting; from the sexually charged ‘Dance of the Seven Veils’, performed with great subtlety by Ms. Markey, to the soulful ‘Lilli Marlene’, sung by the very sweet Jeremy Hopkins, World War Bob is a hoot. An old fashioned cabaret/revue that’s proud of its roots.

This is the out of town tryout before WWB hits the big smoke of Adelaide. Sure there were problems; lighting cues that didn’t work and a microphone on the fritz but Mr. Trevorrow’s incredible professionalism and determination kept us laughing until the very last minute.

Conceived, written and directed by Mark Trevorrow, with Bill Harding, musical arrangements by John Thorn and choreography by Jack Webster. WWB is indeed the campest of camp shows.

‘World War Bob’ will be playing in Adelaide at The Playhouse, June 17 through June 20.

In Memoriam - 'Our Dan'

Danny La Rue passed away on Sunday after a short battle with Prostate Cancer. Born: Daniel Patrick Carroll in 1927 in County Cork, Ireland, his father was a soldier in the IRA who also worked as a cabinet maker. After the death of his father, when Danny was 18 months old, he and his mother moved to Soho, in London. As he famously said when doing a show in Cork, “I left in shorts and came back in a frock.”

Danny was a successful club owner, cabaret performer, TV and movie actor who became one of the highest paid and most popular performers in the UK during the 1970’s. His career spanned 60 years. He made a fortune and he lost a fortune but the one thing he never lost was the love and respect of his audience. Danny was frequent and always popular visitor to Australia, accompanied most times by his pianist, Wayne King, a name that always got a laugh from the audience.

Danny who preferred to be known as a ‘comic in a frock’ considered himself an actor rather than ‘just a drag queen.’ La Rue was the first man to play ‘Dolly Levi’ in ‘Hello Dolly’ and the first female impersonator to perform in drag before the Queen during a Royal Variety Performance.

Danny got his stage name indirectly from his friend Harry Secombe, (The Goon Show). After seeing him perform Secombe advised Danny not to give up his day job, a few months later Danny was to perform at a theatre in London and not wanting Secombe to know, he decided to call himself Danny Street but the name was already taken; so Danny La Rue was born.

As La Rue’s fame grew he opened his own nightclub in Mayfair in the 1960’s and of course it was a hit, attracting the A-List at the time: The Snowden’s, Barbara Windsor, and Shirley Bassey to name just a few.

When Danny’s long time partner and manager, Jack Hanson died in 1984, Danny sank into a deep depression and drank heavily for almost a year, finally snapping out of it and getting back on the stage when it looked as if he was about to lose everything.

Danny died in Kent, aged 81, at the home he shared with his dress fitter of 30 years, Annie Galbraith, who had taken him in when he was once again in financial strife.

Samson and Delilah

‘Samson and Delilah’; a primeval movie made in a primeval land. The movie is billed as a love story, in the same way ‘Sid and Nancy’ was a love story; bleak and raw.

What is there to do in Warlpiri? Wake up sniff petrol, eat, go to bed – this is Samson’s life, day after day after day after relentless day. The only sunshine in his life is his attraction to Delilah, a girl who lives with, and cares for, her grandmother; a grandmother who paints the dot pictures for the ‘white fella’ to sell to the tourists and art dealers of the big city for thousands of dollars but returns to the artist less than a token, just enough to keep them in paint a little amount of food. As the one telephone in that is in community is left to ring unanswered, how does Samson express his growing feelings for Delilah? The only ways he knows how; by throwing rocks at her, or drawing ‘S4D’ in permanent marker on the wall of the only store, or by moving in, unasked, with her and her nanna.

When nanna dies both Samson and Delilah are cast out, they steal a car and head to the big city only to discover that the isolation they are fleeing is magnified by the loneliness of living in the white man’s world. Through all this the one thing that holds them together is their unspoken love. As Samson slides further into his petrol induced haze, Delilah endures the violence, starvation and addiction that are heaped upon her with a quiet dignity that defies her age.

The strength of this film lies not only in the ability of Director/Writer, Warwick Thornton, to convey in image rather than word the bleakness of this world but also in the talent of his two lead actors, Rowan McNamara and Marissa Gibson to effectively portray that image for us in a way that doesn’t just alienate us but allows us to still feel empathy for them. At no stage does Thornton allow the film to wallow in cheap sentimentality.

This film could not be made by anyone other than an Aboriginal film maker. No Aboriginal community could open up and allow their story to be told by anyone else, possibly because they have been used and misrepresented more often than not by well meaning white men looking to do the ‘right thing.’ Hopefully enough people will see ‘Samson and Delilah’ to dispel the image of the ‘noble savage’ as portrayed in Baz Luhrmann’s, ‘Australia.’

The disturbing thing for me as I watched the film, I realised; I was to a large extent untouched by it. This is not to say I wasn’t moved because I was, deeply; but the world that Samson and Delilah inhabit is as far away from my reality as mine is from theirs and I couldn’t integrate that world with my own, and I guess that really is the point – I can’t for one minute believe that this world exists, yet it does. To live in the outback in a ‘black fella’ community, as presented in this film, is a life sentence without possibility of parole.

In ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ I was horrified by the filth and the abject poverty but this is my own country, how can we allow this to continue? But we do … but I do. It’s easier for me because I rationalise it; it happens out there, in the Outback, yet if I went two suburbs over from my safe haven in Darlinghurst I would be in Everleigh St., Redfern a suburb where the lives of the Warlpiri are alive and not so well.

We pride ourselves by saying how far we have come as a country, our Prime Minister has said ‘Sorry’, but in reality what has actually changed for Australia’s Aboriginals – nothing. The white man is still making good capital from the black man’s plight, both politically and financially.

Russell Crowe Gives Good Head(line)

Here is the gag line – “Russell Crowe gives good head(line).”

After sitting through the forgettable ‘Angels and Demons’, I was beginning to think that Hollywood had lost the art of story telling; ‘State of Play” reminded me that when Hollywood gets it right, they get it right brilliantly. This is a movie for adults; ‘State of Play’ directed by Kevin MacDonald (The Last King of Scotland), starring Russell Crowe (A Beautiful Mind), Ben Affleck (Good Will Hunting), Rachel McAdams (The Notebook), Helen Mirren (Gosford Park) and Jason Bateman (Arrested Development) has enough talent both on screen and off to guarantee that you that you are in for a treat.

Without giving away all of the tricks; it’s set in Washington, Cal McAffrey (Crowe) a hard drinking, hard assed, old school newspaper reporter teams up with a young blogger/reporter Della Frye (McAdams), to investigate the death of one of Congressman Collins’, (Affleck), aides. The seemingly unrelated death of a bag snatcher proves that there is more going on here than just a random act of violence. Collins was having an affair and making some very powerful people extremely nervous. That’s just the start; throw in Homeland Security, mercenaries, corruption and conspiracy and you have the makings of a really good yarn with enough twists, turns and last minute surprises to keep you guessing right through to the end credits, and stay for the credits they are worth seeing. Director MacDonald, who also made ‘One Day in September’, keeps the movie ticking along and just when you think you have it worked out you realise that … well see the movie.

Whether you like him or loathe him Crowe delivers, he never just phones in a performance. From ‘The Insider’ to ‘The Gladiator’, he commits. Sometimes it becomes hard to tell where the character ends and Crowe begins. He really is one of the great talents of the last fifteen years and I’m not even a fan.

Ben Affleck, who seems to have had a hit and miss approach to acting since ‘Good Will Hunting’ and has made some pretty forgettable movies between then and now, dare I mention ‘Gigli’. His Congressman Collins, decorated war hero and all around good guy, is one of those roles that fit Mr. Affleck like a well tailored suit.

Rachel McAdams is terrific as the blogger/reporter with aspirations that is mentored by Crowe.

The most surprising performance for me in this film was Jason Bateman, (Dominic Foy), who has a ball as a narcissistic, pill popping sexually gregarious PR consultant.

There is a message in this movie that quietly gnaws away at you as you are taken up by the events on screen. We are becoming so used to people like me, bloggers, people who write without too much research and spew forth opinion as if it is fact. What place does real reporting have in a society of Facebook journalism, a society where Wikipedia is the first and sometimes the last reference tool used. As newspapers begin to close and on-line sites begin to prosper what hope is there for the ‘old fashioned’ investigative journalist of day’s gone bye?

‘State of Play’ is running in wide release at a cinema near you – do yourself a favour go see it.

Get Outta My Face (book)

It’s Friday night, it’s been a shit of a week, so to celebrate I thought I would treat myself to a cup of tea, a normi, (the tablet not the singer although they both achieve the same result) and a good lie down. By 10.45 I was happily, blissfully, asleep. I had survived another week and was looking forward to a relaxed and pressure free weekend. What I didn’t realise was that while I slumbered, somewhere across the globe in hundreds of darkening rooms; a plot was being hatched by faceless, nameless “friends”.

I woke up the next day, groggy, my face forming a perfect relief map of the Blue Mountains, to discover I had 300 new friends! Now I don’t know about you but I have trouble keeping track of the five, okay three, friends I have IRL, (that’s young folk type for “in real life”). So the weight of 297 people demanding my attention hit me like the Liberal Party election loss.

Let’s be honest, I’m too old for Facebook and not nearly “gay” enough; I don’t straighten my hair and I wear my jeans around my waist. God knows why I joined in the first place - but I did. I’m thinking at 50 I’m more a “Get Outta My Face” book type of guy. I’m not a networker, social or otherwise, in fact I don’t really like people much at the best of times, just ask my partner. I went to Stonewall, once, only because I thought it was still the NAB, (National Bank of Australia). I did think it strange how funky the tellers were dressed as I handed over my deposit. (What is the deal with old banks turning into gay bars anyway?) I’ve never sent a Christmas or Birthday card in my life. Even a quick text to say “thanks for dinner” is beyond me but now I’m constantly sending hugs and kisses to these strange friends.

Do I really want to go to Ryan’s farewell drinks in Basingstoke on Trent, do I care that Sally has split up with Fiona but is now partnered for life with Cherie from Lucerne or Jose` is seeing Sweeney Todd in Queens? And just who is David Paris?

My time is being co-opted by these pals, demanding that I join their clubs, sending me nudges, pokes, winks, pictures and links to YouTube videos that are just NOT funny. Why do I have to write on someone’s Super Funwall, why do I have to take quizzes all to find out I am most like Joan Crawford and not Joan Fontaine? Why do I keep accepting the invite? It’s insidious, addictive, destructive and yet strangely compelling.

I can’t leave my bedroom, I’m forced to eat cold meals delivered by Christine Courier in front of my laptop, I chew coffee beans to keep myself awake, my back is developing a hump. I’m going mad answering every message that hits my intray. I don’t wash, I don’t shave, my hair has become home to a small nest of spiders and my fingernails are heading to Howard Hughes length. I have no me time, no down time, no quiet time.

I’ve never been so popular.

Please, please, please if my name pops up on your screen don’t feel compelled to add me, treat me the way you would if you saw me or any other MAG out. Ignore me! Gotta dash, Andrew’s not coping with Biomechanics, (I mean really, who is), and my two new “best friends forever” from Ghana want me, or at least my account number at Stonewall.

Who Do I Want to Be Today?

Another successful face transplant has been carried out in the United States, this time for a man who was horribly disfigured after falling on electrified train tracks. He is the third person reported to have had this kind of surgery. Isn't it amazing what science can achieve?


Where will it end? If you think about it, knowing the kind of people we are with the vanity we have, at some stage, within the next fifty or so years, this kind of operation will become commonplace and will probably be considered 'elective surgery' and be covered by your health fund. All the bright young things will decide that not only can they change their hair colour and bust size but now they can literally have a new face.

Plastic surgery, as we know it, will be as old hat as the 'rotary dial telephone'. 'Face Shops' will pop up all over the world. The incredibly wealthy from Asia, Russia and America will flick through the fashion magazines of tomorrow and pick out their look for the new season. Impoverished people from the Third World with good genes and incredibly high cheekbones will sacrifice the faces of their children so that the International Jet Setters of tomorrow can look less like Mutton and a lot more like Spring Lamb.

I can already see the ads on Television, "No Visage, No Worry. Have we got a face for you, no wrinkles, one owner. Dial this number for a new dial. If you are not entirely satisfied then we will give you your own face back at no extra charge. All major Credit cards accepted. Why wait, call now - remember the look you want is just a clone away."

I am prepared to wager large sums of money that somewhere, someone is cloning Brad and Jennifer, Leo and Kate look-a-likes for the single purpose of selling their faces to the highest bidder. If they aren't doing it now, trust me they will be by the time the operation is perfected. Imagine a world full of Paris's.

Remember that old Urban Myth where the man wakes up in the ice bath missing a kidney, well the next time you wake up and think to yourself "gee I was off my face last night", check the mirror.

Who would I want to wear on my face - I guess I am leaning towards a George Clooney look but knowing my budget I will probably end up with Bert Newton's old face if and when he is finally done with it.

All in all the whole thing is pretty scary and ... maybe not so pretty either. I might just stick with my own scars and imperfections.

Angels and (miss) demeanors

Dan Brown is to writing what Starbucks is to coffee. If you are on holiday in America and can't find a good cafe` then Starbucks will do - if you are at the Airport and can't find "The Slap" by Christos Tsiolkas then Dan Brown will do.

The good thing about Mr. Brown is that after you have read him you forget him - that is until Ron Howard comes along and forces him down your throat again.

We all sat through the interminable screen version of 'The Da Vinci Code', a movie that did more damage to the art of film making than the Catholic Church has managed to do to Science in it's entire 2000 year history.

You may have noticed I'm not a fan.

What has happened to Tom Hanks? This was the actor who so powerfully portrayed 'Andrew Beckett', a gay man dying of HIV/AIDS in the 1993 film 'Philadelphia', an actor who convinced us that "life was just a box of chocolates" in 'Forrest Gump' and who took us across the beaches of Normandy to save Private Ryan. What has happened - we know he can act, we know he can and will make courageous choices in the the roles he plays - why oh why has he revisited this rather dull character of 'Professor Robert Langdon'? Has the Global Economic Downturn hit the mega rich so hard, that it is robbing them of their talent?

It's a silly plot - The Pope has died, let's elect a new Pope, let's kidnap the favourite candidates, let's resurrect the 'Illuminati', (boy can they hold a grudge), lets drive fast through the streets of Rome, (or a town that could possibly be Rome if we had not been banned from filming in Rome), might as well throw in the 'Hadron Particle Super Collider' and instead of the Anti Christ I know let's have some Anti Matter .

Why did I go and see it - well it was free. Proving once again that old adage, "There's no such thing as a free film in this town".

Now look here Mr Howard, you gave us 'Frost/Nixon', you gave us 'Apollo 13' and you gave us 'A Beautiful Mind' - why oh why are you punishing us with this dross? Perhaps you and Mr. Hanks have made some secret compact to punish all of us who still remember you as 'Opie' and him as 'Kip Wilson', ('Bosom Buddies').

Look go and see it if you want, it's not 'Citizen Cane' and by the time you get back to your car you will have forgotten just how ordinary this movie really is. A much better idea would be to bite the bullet and see 'Samson and Delilah', one of those movies you always say that you should see but always put off because you are never quite in the right frame of mind. It's the difference between artifice and art.

Sometimes YES means NO

A lot has been made about the issue of ‘consensual sex’ over the last few weeks especially with regard to the behaviour of the Cronulla Sharks in New Zealand in 2002. Legally the question comes down to the issue of ‘consent’ - when is consent given, when is it withdrawn? If someone is drunk do they still have the ability to make that kind of decision? This is no cut and dry case.

As far as we know, at this point, Clare willingly went back to a motel room with two men. Once there, other members of the Sharks decided that ‘one in all in’. According to Johns, Clare made no protest and encouraged other players to participate, however according to her she did not. What happened in that room is a matter of conjecture but what does seem clear is that what did happen was immoral. Clare was a teenager, a waitress in a bar, the players a combination of singles, married men and team officials who should have known better.

This side to Australian male culture of regarding alcohol fuelled sex as a rite of passage is a hangover from a time that is best consigned to the dustbin of history.

Public opinion seems to have come down 75% on the side of Mathew Johns for having the courage to stand up and own his actions. Good for him.

However the majority of comment I have read has condemned Clare, saying that she is deserving of what happened to her. Some people believe that the reason she waited so long to bring it to the attention of Four Corners was to ‘grab the cash’, she was in fact approached by Four Corners. She has variously been described as, ‘a money hungry whore’ and ‘a wowser for not taking on the rest of the team’. A few preface their comments with, ‘I’m not in favour of rap (sic) but …’ or ‘if this had happened to a gay guy it would just be considered a dud root’. Those comments were taken from just one discussion on Facebook between a group of twenty something gay males. The comments section of The Daily Telegraph is filled with more vicious bile directed at this girl and the mix is 50/50 female male but almost all of it against her.

The consensus seems to be she got what she deserved.

I am amazed, horrified and frightened that we ‘gays’, along with the rest of society, are so quick to trivialise what has happened to this girl and dismiss those events with that old fashioned line “she had it coming”, this is the same argument that homophobes and racists have been using for years to justify the bashing, rape and even murder of any number of homosexual men and women.
One case in particular comes to mind; Mathew Shepard who was brutally bashed and left for dead on October 8, 1998 aged 21 in Laramie, Wyoming. The argument of the two accused was that he was ‘asking for it, he wanted it, he deserved it because he made sexual advances to us’. This was the birth of the sometimes successful “Gay Panic Defence”.

It is not too much of a stretch to see that if Clare had put up a fight, had resisted, then in the hands of another group of men she too may have been physically, as well as sexually, assaulted or worse.

Are we going to regress to a time when we could be bashed because of what we wear, how we act or who we are? Wasn’t it just a year or two ago when we took to the streets to protest at the violence that is plaguing Oxford St.

What gives any of us the right to judge what has happened to this woman? Was it consensual; possibly … was it moral, no.

The Age of E (lasticity)

As I sat, in the foyer of Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, drinking a cappuccino and scoffing a large pink doughnut after having a small film crew exploring my nether regions looking for polyps, or the Labor Party environmental policy, I got to wondering about “Life”.

My current journey began ten years ago in the uncluttered fabulousness of one of those brilliant new restaurants that everyone wants to be at, a place too loud to make conversation pleasant. Six of us sat hunched on the backless hardwood chairs, jammed cheek by saggy jowl, into a room too darkly lit, trying to order food and more importantly wine, from a menu that might as well be written in Sanskrit. Everything on the menu seemed a blur, one dish melting into another. At first I blamed the lighting, then the ridiculously small font, then the colour of the ink against the papyrus. The waiter, a louche young man with impossibly high cheekbones, a child god, who I instantly recognised from the “my favourites” section of Gaydar, stood over me beaming a 'too white' Brittany Spears smile. All eyes were turned on me, feeling pressured I pointed at something I hoped was Chicken with Pasta. As the “vision” sashayed off to attend to a fusion table of AussieBum models and Arq barmen, my dearest friends turned and squealed, “Goat Lung with Witlof Salad!”

I needed specs - I sensed the beginning of a new chapter in my life.

It started with my eyes and moved rather quickly to my butt. What was once pert and high, with the round firmness of a ripe peach, has now taken on the texture and look of a golf ball that’s been around the sand traps once too often.

Herewith a very personal example of the indignity handed out to the aging.
To add insult to sagging injury I met a very attractive boy on line a year ago - perfect hair, perfect skin and a perfect - he was mighty fine - thirty minutes later he was knocking on my front door. Now, my pics; they may have been taken by Cecil Beaton using the Doris Day filter, but I think you still get the idea that this is who I once was and in the right blackout could be again. We raced upstairs to my loft, where he did something so unexpected that I’m still recovering from it; he pinched my arm and said in his angelic voice, “You lose so much elasticity at your age”. I looked down to see folds of skin hanging loosely, like a deflated party balloon, steadfastly refusing to snap back into place. Funnily enough, I think that was the last time I managed an erection - without the help of a little blue pill.

I now look longingly but I stress, not lustfully, at the perfectly unlined, lightly tanned nape of young men’s necks. At the gym I stare off into the distance as well toned, high butted Adonis’s, strut from bench press to bicep curl their eyes bright with enthusiasm for all that life has to offer.

I’m not bitter, resentful or just another “grumpy old queen”. I’m happy that, against all odds, I’m the age that I am. I’m a survivor in so many ways and I’ve absolutely no desire whatsoever to go back and do any of it again. But I do so miss “the age of elasticity”.

Star Trek

I freely admit to it - I am a ‘trekker’ and proud of it. I have been since the first time Captain James Tiberius Kirk invited me to “boldly go where no man has gone before”. I was there for “The Enemy Within” and I was there for “The Trouble with Tribbles”. I watched religiously through Jean Luke’s captaincy and then the stern neo-modernism of Kathryn Janeway as she nursed her crew back home on Voyager, and even laboured through Captain Archer’s ‘Enterprise’. I saw all movies – I am a ‘trekker’ with street ‘cred’.

I have been looking forward to this next exciting instalment of what can only be described as the best franchise since the bible. Was I disappointed? Not for one minute. This is the Kirk for the next generation; he’s sexy, sassy and seriously good looking.

Star Trek, version 09, is directed by J.J. Abrams and stars Chris Pine as James T Kirk with Zachary Quinto as Spock, the head villain is Australia’s own Romulan, Eric Bana and of course a guest appearance by Ambassador Spock, Leonard Nimoy.

Here’s the set up - James T is a hell-raising, thrill seeking Iowan farm boy. Kirk is taken under the wing of Capt. Pike a friend of Kirk’s deceased father. Pike recognises the conflicts in the boy and challenges him to join Starfleet and be one tenth the man his father was.

Our favourite pointy eared Vulcan, Spock, is another misfit on another planet who has little too much human in him for the Vulcans and little too much Vulcan for the humans. So it’s off to Starfleet with him as well.

Lurking out there in an altered timeline is the villain, the beast, of the movie Australia’s newest favourite son, Eric Bana who wants revenge for the destruction of his home world, Romulous.

Let’s not worry too much about plot; there are all the usual bells and whistles, black holes, space/time continuums, singularities and enough photon torpedos to save a planet. Let’s just kick back and go for the ride with Uhura, Bones, Scotty, Mr. Sulu and an incredibly cute Chekov.

And what a ride it is. If you have no memory of the previous incarnations it doesn’t matter this version takes you in and gives you everything you need to know. Sure some of the effects are a little stretched and some of the dialogue is a bit hokey, but this is a boy’s own adventure story with more than enough eye candy and CGI to keep everyone happy.

I freely admit that at places there were tears in my eyes as the characters I grew up with met for the first time and their friendships were forged. How sad is that?

Star Trek is alive and well and this new crew will be around to live long and prosper for a few years yet.

Star Trek is happening at a cinema near you. Peace, out.

Thoughts From the Bed Pan

‘As we that are left grow old’, there’s a phrase to strike terror into an aging ‘homosexualist’. As I approach my dotage and this recession/depression takes huge chunks out of my superannuation which was never enough anyway, I’m left wondering ‘what the …?’ My entire financial forward planning is now based on a Lotto win.

Was it just two years ago that I sat back thinking, “well if all else fails at least when I turn sixty five I’ll have a small income supplemented by a smaller pension to keep me in lattes and Polident”. Now I’m facing a future of Nescafe` and unstable dentures.
I had my chances; I recklessly spent one large windfall on airfares and cocaine in 1988, and reluctantly spent another on surgeons in 2003. I could’ve bought a house but somehow New York seemed like a much better proposition. I thought that if you’re going to NYC then naturally you fly first class. There was a joke often told by my friends, “How do you make a small fortune?” answer, “Give Peter a large one and wait six months”. We all laughed, some of us louder than others.

I don’t blame anyone for my decisions and god knows I had a blast making them but on reflection they may not have been altogether wise.

I have a much older friend who now lives in a private nursing home, which luckily for him is in the Eastern Suburbs. His main fear when he moved was that he would be forgotten out there in the ‘burbs’, because we Sydney queens are notorious for never travelling far from our comfort zone. You know the old saying, ‘out of sight, where’s what’s his name again?’ Luckily he has enough money to get by rather well. With global warming I’ll be lucky if there is an Ice Flow left to leave me on. I’ll be thrown into some institution in Tempe, possibly the Tip.

So I’ve been pondering my future and what’s to become of me. I’ve always been, as one of my harshest critics described, ‘a survivor’ and I’m sure I’ll get by but I want to more than just survive, I still want to have a ‘life’. I don’t see myself lining up at Mathew Talbot hoping for a bed at night but …

Is this just a problem for us ‘gay folk’? Does our lifestyle promote instant gratification and, pardon the pun, bugger the consequences? Maybe it’s just my generation; a generation that through the eighties wasn’t expected to live much into the nineties so some of us had a tendency to squander our ‘dosh’ and now we’re rather surprised at how old we’ve become.

I worry that the ‘gaylings’ of today seem destined to head down this same path to penury. Perhaps now might be the right time to revisit the wise words of one learned gent by the name of Micawber, “… annual income twenty shillings, annual expenditure twenty one shillings, result misery’.

Old age creeps up on you alarmingly fast. If I was to offer any advice, which is never a good idea because it always has a way of coming back and biting you on the bum, it would be to somehow find the means to occasionally deny yourself that next ‘NEW’ thing and put a little aside because hopefully you will lead a long, long FABULOUS life.

The Devil Made Me Do It

There is a Devil loose in Salem and she is perverting all the citizenry, at least that’s what Abigail Williams would have us believe.
‘The Crucible’, by Arthur Miller, was first performed in 1953 at the Martin Beck Theatre in New York. Mr. Miller wrote this as an allegory for the ‘witch’ hunts happening at the time under the auspices of ‘The House Committee on Un-American Activities’ hearings. Mr. Miller had been questioned by the Committee and had been found in contempt because he refused to ‘name the names’ of people who were suspected Communists. This play was Mr. Miller’s response to that sad period in American history and it has become one of the ‘stand out’ pieces of American Theatre.

‘The Crucible’ has become one of those plays that has a reputation. Most of us have seen good, bad, or indifferent productions; we have been driven to distraction by too much ‘acting’, bad sets and too many words. If the show we saw was good we have high expectations, if it was bad we’re prepared for a long, torturous night. This production will go a long way in restoring your faith; it may not be the best production ever but it is a very good one.

This abridged version is directed by Ms. Tanya Goldberg and designed by Ms. Simone Romaniuk for The Sydney Theatre Company.

This is a production that hits all the right buttons, it’s staged simply and it evokes all the right images from farmhouse to prison, from Hillsong to Abu Ghraib. The Director wisely lets the actors and the words work their magic. The cast for the most part are very good. Some of the performances are standout; special mention must go to Mr. Peter Carroll and Ms. Lynnette Curran, even when she is playing a ‘little’ out of her age range. These actors bring a maturity and sense of solidness that anchor the show. Mr. Joe Manning, as John Proctor, and Ms. Marta Dusseldorp, as his wife Elizabeth, hit their marks from the moment they step on the stage and in the second half their final scene together is electrifying.
The play has lost none of its power or impact, it still serves to remind us that those same fears that were so effectively used by Senator McCarthy are still able to win elections and sway the modern populous, think Bill O’Reilly, or closer to home, Alan Jones. In today’s world the Devil may wear a burkha, or a yarmulke or may be gay or a fundamentalist Christian, but in fact the Devil is anyone who does not believe as we do. The one thing that is certain is just how easily we, the public, can be led into dark places where fear, suspicion and paranoia are king. The message is simple; bad things happen when good men do nothing.

Is it better to live with a lie or die for the truth? The answer to this question gives measure to the character of man.

While the STC have aimed this production squarely at the school’s market, it is well worth a visit by us adults as well.

‘The Crucible’ plays at the STC, Wharf 2, from May 4 until May 30, schools performances day time at 10.30am, evening performances at 7.00pm.

Rules of (dis) Engagement

I don’t care what anyone says; breaking up is hard to do, there’s no good way to do it. Think of the repercussions if it was easy; Tammy Wynette would never have had a career, no chick flicks and Lady Oprah would still be colouring things purple.

Having said that there are a few simple rules that if followed should make it easier for all involved.

Don’t break up with your partner by sending a quick Twitter text, do it face to face. Tweet’ing is the modern equivalent of Carrie Bradshaw’s ‘post-it note’ break up. (When you do split, resist the urge to set up a Facebook group called “I Hate (insert appropriate name), he’s a Fat Skank”, it’s just wrong on so many levels). Consider other options especially if they live overseas or inter-state; a video call, phone call or a good old fashioned hand written letter. There are few things worse than finding out you have been dumped by reading it on a Facebook status line.

Don’t break up when you’re out with a group at dinner or clubbing; remember this should be a private moment between two people who once cared deeply for each other not a cabaret performed in the front Bar of your local watering hole. Think of the consequences and most importantly the availability of retaliatory weapons: the ever popular throwing of the drink to the old fashioned public biatch slap.
‘It’s not you it’s me’. Everyone knows this really means ‘it’s you not me’. Don’t say it ... you can think it, hell you can even write it in your Blog next week but under no circumstances say it.

Try not to stick the ‘knife in’ when you’re breaking up. Take the high road. Telling your ex that the only reason you were with him was to “get through winter” while you waited for someone better to come along next summer, is just plain mean - even if it is true.

Expect to lose friends, this is called collateral damage. Make no mistake battle lines will be drawn, “we never liked him, he was a thief, he was cheating”, and some of them may even be talking about ‘him’.

Picking the right time is essential. Don’t break up on ‘Meth’ Monday or ‘Eckkie’ Tuesday, or his birthday; while it might seem like a good idea to get it over with, do you really want to be the ‘one who ruined birthdays for ever for me’, for the rest of your life?

Honesty tempered with compassion, in the end, is the key. Treat your (ex) partner the way you would wish to be treated. There’s no need to read out a list of all the things that have driven you crazy over the last (insert number of months here) months; the fact that he never stacks the dishwasher, empties the washing machine, takes out the trash or that you caught him in the sling at the Sauna on Buddy night. This isn’t Nuremberg.

Be prepared to move out. I don’t mean have your bags, or his, packed and sitting at the front door, but realistically one of you is going to have to go. You can’t both share a two bedroom flat and survive, while it may seem like a good, economical idea at the time, trust me the first time either of you bring home the next Mr. Right expect to find shredded Armani in the trash and crushed crystal in your porridge.

The splitting up of the assets will actually cause you more pain than the ending of the physical relationship. If you take a few simple, precautionary steps at the start of your journey, some later heartache can be avoided: buy a magic marker and take the time to label your DVD’s, Ipod’s, Laptop’s and most importantly your pets and/or foster children, ownership will be easier to prove. At the very least buy two of everything.

So you’ve done the deed, you’re both ‘okay’ with it and seem to be getting on really well. You’ve become friends, better than you ever were when you were lovers. Now is the most dangerous time - don’t have ‘break up sex’. If you do (and lets face it, you probably will), you will plant a seed at the back of your, or worse his, mind; suddenly memories will blur, and before you know it you will begin to contemplate the possibility of getting back together. All of the good work that you’ve done, the tears, the arguments, the rationalisations and the eventual mutually agreed tolerance will come crumbling down. The past will begin to seem like Camelot and before you know it you’re changing your status on Facebook and the cycle begins again.

So, yes, breaking up is hard to do but it’s the chance you take when you love someone and let’s face it all we want is to be loved.

Metamorphosis

The thing about the theatre is that it never leaves you ambivalent – good or bad it extracts an emotive response, ‘I loved it’ – ‘I hated it’ – ‘I couldn’t have cared less about it’. After seeing the brilliant ‘Kafka’s Monkey’ I was ready and eager to dive back into the wonderful but disturbed world of Franz Kafka.

Kafka wrote the short story ‘The Metamorphosis’ in 1915. In 2005 - 06 Mr. David Farr, with Mr. Gisli Orn Gardarsson, adapted the short story into this intellectually and physically gymnastic production.

The premise is simple, set in Prague, early twentieth century, the Samsa’s, a lower middle class family with pretensions, wake up one morning to find their son Gregor, the breadwinner and provider for the family, hasn’t been to work, hasn’t been down for breakfast in fact hasn’t left his room. Indeed he isn’t quite himself anymore; he has in fact been transformed into a giant bug. What happens next is the guts of the play.

How do we cope, as a family or a society, with someone who stands out as different? How thin is the veneer that binds us all together in an unspoken contract of tolerance and civility? Mr. Farr says that he uses the play, “as an allegory for the Jewish experience in Europe during the twentieth century”, but it could just as easily relate to a family dealing with a son’s homosexuality, or family dealing with an elderly parent’s Alzheimer's Disease, or any number of events that challenge our belief in what is right, wrong or acceptable behaviour.

What should this family do when faced with their son turning into a bug? The simple answer is of course - to understand, love and support him through this trial and nurture him back to health after all that is what is expected of us. The truth is that after a short period of time the family becomes angry, repulsed and resentful of their son, he soils himself, he scares them and he makes demands on their time. The only real solution is to lock him up, throw away the key and hope that he quietly dies so the family can return to a ‘normal’ life. This is pretty much how the Samsa’s cope.

The cast are clearly strong and they know the work intimately but no retelling of this play would be complete without special mention of the incredibly athletic and gymnastic performance by Mr. Bjorn Thors, as Gregor, who clambers and crawls over the set at alarming angles.

With music, composed by Mr. Nick Cave, The Bad Seeds and Mr. Warren Ellis, that sets the tone brilliantly and a set, built over two levels, designed by Mr. Borkur Jonsson, we are transported into another reality that is both horrifying and at times funny. It’s horrifying because of its callousness, yet funny at times, because of the pretence of ‘normality’ that the family struggle to maintain. Did I say funny, well actually it’s not that funny it’s really rather bleak and you certainly don’t walk out ‘humming a show tune’, but it is a piece that speaks as eloquently today as it first did way back in 1915.

Metamorphosis is not for the faint of heart but it is well worth the effort.

Metamorphosis is on at The Sydney Theatre, Hickson Rd. 22 April – 2 May 2009.