Something Rich And Strange

Sam Mendes's production of The Tempest did not disappoint. It did what a good modern production should do: it gave a sense of being bang up-to-date, with no sense of gimmickry. It felt like a new play, yet stayed true to the spirit of the original.

And isn't that original an odd thing in itself, often disconcertingly so? Several of the big laughs in the theatre yesterday had a distinctly troubled undercurrent to them - especially the one following Caliban's wry observation that being taught language means he knows how to curse.

I found myself, for the first time ever, watching the Ferdinand - Miranda sequences almost entirely from the perspective of Prospero. The fruits of aging, I guess. Their Romeo & Julietishness was as obvious as ever, but so was the truth, yet fragility of their beauty. It was almost unbearably lovely-sad, as is the comedy as a whole.

Art changes nothing. The enchantment will never last. The books are for drowning or burning. And the afternoon in the theatre made it all worthwhile. Perhaps.

Just Messing

One the nice running gags in Bill Forsythe's movie Gregory's Girl is the hapless penguin (human variety, in costume) wandering the corridors of Gregory's school in search of the room in which whatever penguin-oriented activity it/he/she is meant to be involved is, presumably, going on. I was reminded of the wandering bird this morning by a little lad I encountered at work wearing a sort of uniform made out of black bin liners, his face encased in a snorkel, and a colourful cap on his head. He seemed comfortably at home in this outfit, so who was I to ask him whither he was bound?

I must confess, I knew perfectly well he was looking for his team-mates in the rather jolly Odyssey of the Mind competition to which our school annually plays host. But it was nice to imagine he'd done it all of his own accord. Sometimes being daft just for the sake of it is the best way to be. But being daft on a competitive basis also has its rewards, I suppose.

Masterful

Gentleness and charm: not qualities one normally associates with American tv series, particularly those of the crime genre. But the wonderful Monk overflows with them. Plus the viewer gets a master-class in acting from Tony Shaloub.

For reasons too complicated to explain (but which relate to the idiotic scheduling attendant upon excellent programmes of all varieties) I've not really been a regular viewer since the first series, which I watched in its entirety. Having just watched one of the episodes from the final series, in which erstwhile assistant Sharona comes back for a guest appearance, I'm wondering why.

Evensong

I look forward to that time of day here, just after 7.00 pm, when the light Shakespearianly thickens and the birds, the ones on Upper East Coast Road particularly, get together in conference. If I happen to be on the way home with the missus, with a cup of tea and various bits of kueh warming the innards, that time invariably transcends whatever troubles the day has thrown my way.

Such was the case this evening. For which I give thanks.

Tempestuous

I avoided reading the review of Sam Mendes's production of The Tempest in yesterday's paper as we're off to see it on Saturday afternoon. In doing so I was struck by the very obvious fact that so much of what we experience artistically is mediated, one way or another, through the eyes of others. It's hard to see things innocently, as it were. Not that this is a terribly bad thing. I suppose it's the result of the natural development of what we might term artistic communities - in the loosest sense. The important thing is that we develop an independent framework through which we can make our own genuine assessments. If we don't we'll always be at the mercy of the latest artistic fad.

The best artistic community in that respect is the immediate audience of the work. Being in a good audience can be a learning experience in itself; being in a lousy one can be disastrous in all sorts of ways.

My guess is that the first audience for The Tempest, groundlings and all, was as good as you can get in a theatre, and that in itself feeds into Shakespeare's genius. Wouldn't it be wonderful going to the play without a clue of what you were going to experience?

The Freezer

The school in which I teach has a lot more air-conditioned areas (like classrooms) than most schools in Singapore. This was not something which attracted me to apply for a job there as I'm no great fan of air-con - we never switch on the units in our living room and the computer room at home, for example. But some people seem to like it, for reasons that escape me.

One of the reasons those reasons escape me is typified by my experience of the early afternoon: listening to a series of TOK presentations in a lecture theatre whose mean (and I mean, mean) temperature would have put an igloo to shame. The temperature there is controlled (or possibly isn't) centrally so there was nothing to be done about it except to shiver and barely bear it.

Of course, I wasn't dressed for the occasion. But, then, I never am because everywhere else is so hot and clammy. There's an irony in all this somewhere, but I'm still too chilled to bother to tease it out.

Game Over?

I never have been into computer games of any kind. I suppose I was born too early. At university I remember first seeing and playing one of those very simple tennis games in which two players batted a bouncing ball from one side of the screen to the other. But it was never going to supplant the appeal of snooker and the like for us. And then came all those Pac Man machines into the pubs. One or two of my contemporaries took them quite seriously, but I could never figure out how to play them, and could never really afford to.

And when computer gaming really took off it never took me with it, for pretty much that reason. It was way too complicated for me to bend my brain to. And I've always been thankful for that. It's not that I disapprove of such gaming. In fact, I do have at least some small sense of its appeal, especially the historical simulation stuff and role-play games. And that's why I know that if this had been current when I was a lad I'd have been hooked with the best of them. I'm not too sure that many intense hours at the computer screen would have been all that good for me.

That connection of games with a peculiar intensity is an interesting one. There's no point in playing if you don't play to win. But loss is inevitable (as yesterday's grim result usefully reminded me.) It's the balance between the two that creates the space to lose oneself, and, in the process, find oneself in. Learning to get back up to play on for the sake of playing.

Still Playing

Spent most of the day so far watching young people playing on stage, preparing for a real live audience at the end of it all. It's funny how making things up can be so much more intense than the reality of just living. I can understand how some players can become addicted to the rush when you get it all to work.

And just at this moment I'm suffering, sort of enjoyably, the intensity of the United - Chelsea game. About twenty minutes left and a season to save. It doesn't get more real than this!

More Fun And Games

Having posted the little piece yesterday about games, I realised I'd unaccountably forgotten about some pretty intense playing post-university. Usually this took place at times of holiday, celebration or general partying. I'm thinking of quizzes like Trivial Pursuit played with company at Dave Stott's or Tony Steel's. And I recall several sessions of Formula One, a Waddington's board game that became a particular favourite. (I neglected to pay tribute to Waddington's yesterday, a brand name to be trusted in England. I think they were the equivalent of the States's Parker Brothers.)

In fact Tony at one point developed quite a selection of fairly sophisticated games, like a Sherlock Holmes one with Baker Street in the title that I remember as distinctly complicated. But perhaps memory is addled by the fact that reasonably profuse quantities of alcohol accompanied the gaming of that period. It added to the fun, certainly, but detracted from the clarity of it all. I suppose that's why I don't really regard this playing as having quite the same quality as that of my genuine youth.

I also forgot to consider games played with our various nieces and nephews, predominantly Fifi and Fafa. Cadoo springs to mind. And Pictionary at silly Christmasses visiting England. But here the fun took over from the intensity, I think. You really need to passionately want to win, even if you don't mind losing, for games to mean something.

Oh, and what about Scrabble which the missus and I used to play quite often at weekends? And sometimes with Mum when she was visiting Singapore. Gosh, I'd forgotten how good that was. Probably due to the shock of sometimes losing!

Games People Play

On a day for fooling I've been thinking about games. More specifically, I've been considering the joys of escaping into them, and how long it's been since I've done so. At a rough estimate some thirty years.

I'm not counting games of a sporting nature here. I played football for far too long actually, contributing to some of my current aches and pains - but I can't say I've got too many regrets about that. No, I'm thinking of games as in the board games variety - Monopoly and that sort of thing. I last played seriously escapistly at university. Not Monopoly - but we had a thing about the wonderful Diplomacy, which I've not heard spoken of in years. I don't think I've seen a set since then. And I got into chess in a small way, playing a couple of guys who were much better than me - which was not difficult as I've no gift at all in that direction.

I also got interested in war gaming in a fair way, or rather developed an interest sparked by reading H.G. Wells's Little Wars (I think that's the title) as a kid. In fact, all the stuff I played at university was a development of what I'd been doing since being around nine or ten. Monopoly, Totopoly, Mine-A-Million, Scoop, Cluedo, The Battle of the Little Big Horn, Risk. Subbuteo, Scaletric. Elaborate battlefields of those little Airfix soldiers, especially Confederates versus Union in the American Civil War. Blackjack, gin rummy, chase-the-lady. Dominoes.

I must have spent far more time on all that than anything productive. Except that it was productive of a great deal of happiness. Paradise, almost.

I must get to play more.