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Friday, December 25th, 2009
Midnight Media Cafe - God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen
Friday, December 25th, 2009 03:53 pm.
A special posting of MMC, for Christmas:
This is the finale from the 1985 nine-hour production of The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby.
God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen - The Royal Shakespeare Company
Now to the Lord sing praises,
All you within this place,
And with true love and brotherhood
Each other do embrace;
The holy tide of Christmas
Is drawing on apace,
And its tidings of comfort and joy,
Comfort and joy
And its tidings of comfort and joy
Download the song in mp3 form here.
This is the most powerful rendition of this old carol that I have ever heard. In the preceding scene, Nicholas has visited Dotheboy's Hall, the hellish Yorkshire school where he witnessed the most wanton cruelty being visited on innocent children, and befriended the crippled boy Smike. The schoolmaster has been imprisoned and his family fled, and Nicholas urges the abused boys to take flight and find new lives. So the figure you see at the beginning of this clip is one of those children, but he is also a symbol for all the downtrodden and destitute.
The tying together of this, probably the most noble and dignified of all Christmas carols, and the play's themes of shattered innocence, hope, good deeds, friendship, suffering, and compassion for the poor and defenseless, make for an incredibly powerful climax to this massive production. It's a perfect example of the majesty of theater, and why the film screen can never replace the stage.
I narrowly missed the chance to see this play when it came on its one and only tour to Los Angeles, and have regretted it ever since. I do hope that someday it will be revived. The performances, especially Roger Rees as Nicholas and John Woodvine as his bitter uncle Ralph, as uniformly excellent, and the energy, expertise and enthusiasm of the company cannot be matched. The whole thing is out on DVD (Netflix has it), and I urge any of you who are interested in theater and/or Dickens to get a hold of it. It's a full match for Dickens' A Christmas Carol as a perfect piece for the holidays.
Be sure to watch it full-screen, and turn your speakers up!
A special posting of MMC, for Christmas:
This is the finale from the 1985 nine-hour production of The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby.
God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen - The Royal Shakespeare Company
Now to the Lord sing praises,
All you within this place,
And with true love and brotherhood
Each other do embrace;
The holy tide of Christmas
Is drawing on apace,
And its tidings of comfort and joy,
Comfort and joy
And its tidings of comfort and joy
Download the song in mp3 form here.
This is the most powerful rendition of this old carol that I have ever heard. In the preceding scene, Nicholas has visited Dotheboy's Hall, the hellish Yorkshire school where he witnessed the most wanton cruelty being visited on innocent children, and befriended the crippled boy Smike. The schoolmaster has been imprisoned and his family fled, and Nicholas urges the abused boys to take flight and find new lives. So the figure you see at the beginning of this clip is one of those children, but he is also a symbol for all the downtrodden and destitute.
The tying together of this, probably the most noble and dignified of all Christmas carols, and the play's themes of shattered innocence, hope, good deeds, friendship, suffering, and compassion for the poor and defenseless, make for an incredibly powerful climax to this massive production. It's a perfect example of the majesty of theater, and why the film screen can never replace the stage.
I narrowly missed the chance to see this play when it came on its one and only tour to Los Angeles, and have regretted it ever since. I do hope that someday it will be revived. The performances, especially Roger Rees as Nicholas and John Woodvine as his bitter uncle Ralph, as uniformly excellent, and the energy, expertise and enthusiasm of the company cannot be matched. The whole thing is out on DVD (Netflix has it), and I urge any of you who are interested in theater and/or Dickens to get a hold of it. It's a full match for Dickens' A Christmas Carol as a perfect piece for the holidays.
Be sure to watch it full-screen, and turn your speakers up!
It's nice to be a lunatic!
Friday, December 25th, 2009 09:51 pm.
Oh, this looks FUCKING EXCELLENT.
Trailer - Sex & Drugs & Rock and Roll
Starring Andy Serkis as 80's rocker Ian Dury
Damn, I remember Ian Dury. He was crazy but fucking brilliant. Apparently he was truly a flaming asshole as well, as you can tell by watching the trailer above. I read an article the other day about this film, in which the filmmakers talked about how nervous they were to present the screenplay to Dury's widow and son. They were relieved of their anxiety when they got the answer "Oh, he was much worse than that."
Andy once again puts in a hell of a performance; it looks like he's done a beautiful job of capturing Dury's bitter, manic, vicious, celebratory lunacy. Quite a good actor, he. Have you checked out his work as Albert Einstein in Einstein and Eddington? Another really grand job. It's going to be interesting watching his career develop. I've got the feeling we'll be seeing many surprising and excellent characters from him.
Oh, this looks FUCKING EXCELLENT.
Trailer - Sex & Drugs & Rock and Roll
Starring Andy Serkis as 80's rocker Ian Dury
Damn, I remember Ian Dury. He was crazy but fucking brilliant. Apparently he was truly a flaming asshole as well, as you can tell by watching the trailer above. I read an article the other day about this film, in which the filmmakers talked about how nervous they were to present the screenplay to Dury's widow and son. They were relieved of their anxiety when they got the answer "Oh, he was much worse than that."
Andy once again puts in a hell of a performance; it looks like he's done a beautiful job of capturing Dury's bitter, manic, vicious, celebratory lunacy. Quite a good actor, he. Have you checked out his work as Albert Einstein in Einstein and Eddington? Another really grand job. It's going to be interesting watching his career develop. I've got the feeling we'll be seeing many surprising and excellent characters from him.