The art of distraction

Annabel, my Annabel!

2008-04-24T12:39:00.002+10:00

I found her!

Short confessions of a Summit Cynic

2008-04-23T16:19:00.003+10:00

It's been challenging trying to keep my dinner down while I've been surfing the internet lately. I've read more 'motherhood statements' and 'aspirational' messages over the past couple of days than I have ever seen in my life. My saving grace was Annabel Crabb—whose hilarious blog about the proceedings mysteriously disappeared. Overnight. Every search for it on theage.com.au resulted in a confounding "lack of search results". But at least there is now a new voice in the Australian media who makes me laugh and with whom, on many points, I strongly agree.

What I strongly disagree with is these people, the self-proclaimed "chosen ones", who have motherhooded themselves into some tardis of sociopolitical relevance that seems to have eluded every one whose opinions I value. "The Chosen Ones" have taken refuge behind the most convenient of barricades: that anyone who has an opinion about the summit and its outcome(s) that is not wrapped up in divine love is a "cynic". A Naysayer. "You're either with us ... or agin us." That we're all suffering from some hideous plague of Summit Envy Syndrome (SES) ... or Acquired Idealism Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS).

The critical point to surface for me out of the proceedings over recent days is that—even with all the protestations about "robust democracy" and "fresh air"—that people who have not found worthy and meaningful ways of contributing to society and justifying the amount of oxygen they steal from everyone else have suddenly been recognised as having some immense societal worth. In their own minds, at least.

I 'worked' for the ALP last year. I 'worked' for A Candidate in an unwinnable seat. I learned many, many, many things. And chief among those is that Politics is a grubby, nasty, toxic business. It's the absolute manifestation of self-interest. Absolute. That this Summit was anything more than a fancy 'Thank You' card to the personal attention of some hard-working campaigners ... or a PR event of national significance is really, I'm sorry to say, idle conceit. You'll see what I mean when your well-intentioned emails start bouncing back. And people stop remembering and/or using your name. And the extent to which you supported them becomes irrelevant in their continued pursuit of their own selfish agendas.

I have worked with women who rocked their new-born babies to sleep in the bottom drawer of the filing cabinet because they couldn't afford child care. That Cate Blanchett seems to be celebrated beyond the boundaries of good taste for turning up offends the sense and sensibility of working mothers everywhere. The Unchosen Ones it would seem. And that Kevin (07) Rudd missed the great John Button's funeral to drop off what I imagine were Osh Kosh B'Gosh overalls to the newest Upton/Blanchett, is an astonishing lack of judgement and political sympatico.

I feel like I've just spent the last couple of days at somebody else's cast party. I wish Annabel Crabb had been there.

Wise counsel

2008-04-22T15:22:00.001+10:00

I had dinner with an old friend the other night. Charming. Lovely. Nostalgic. She cross-examined me about why I hadn't continued writing plays. Or writing anything. I proudly discussed my blog, this blog, with her ... and encouraged her to log on when she felt like reading some of my musings. Our evening ended with a sudden and somewhat hostile disagreement about the value of looking back into the past ... of not "moving on", as she put it. And as she dropped me home, I wondered what she would make of theartofdistraction.

It didn't take long for me to find out.

The next day, she called me on my mobile and told me she thought my blog was probably the primary reason why I hadn't "moved on", as she put it. She was greatly concerned that I was about to embark on another toxic regurgitation of people, places and experiences that were, collectively, hardly worth the time.

"What did you learn from these revolting experiences?" she challenged.

"To never consider anything like them again", I replied.

"You said it yourself last night," she snapped ... "Gay is so fucking OVER that it's hardly even worth mentioning! And as I've said time and time again Geoffrey, you're too fucking NICE all the time and yet you're obsessed with making some kind of meaningful contribution to some fucking imaginary Gay Community that simply don't deserve it darling!"

I was speechless.

"Did you do the Sydney Film Festival last year? I thought it was 2006!?" she wondered.

"It ... yes, it was 2006," I confirmed.

"SO WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING WASTING YOUR TIME WRITING ABOUT SOME FUCKING NIGHTMARE FROM ALMOST THREE YEARS AGO!?" she bawled into the phone. "Get over it darling! MOVE ON!"

***

Great advice ... possibly one of the most sensible things anyone has said to me in the past twelve months.

Liberating. Forgiving. Wiser. Determined. Looking toward tomorrow.

In the Pink: Part 1

2008-04-12T20:04:00.005+10:00

It all started harmlessly enough, as life-changing experiences often do. Ambushed, wooed, flattered and ultimately seduced with promises of great wealth and opportunity, creative autonomy, a supportive team and life-long friendship, associations and success. Who could resist? And who would ever have guessed that a little over eighteen months later, I would be standing, homeless and stranded on the wrong side of Sydney Harbour with my life in tatters?

Bear with me. Withhold your judgment. Resist the temptation to know where this was all going to end ... if only because we do.

***

Making things happen

My single greatest blessing and my single greatest curse is simple: I make things happen. From the days of my childhood when I used to mount entire puppet productions of the great musicals in the loungeroom of our family home, I have always made things. Happen. People who, in my presence, have dared wonder how an idea or a vision might be brought to life have usually either ended up running from it as it materialises right before their eyes, or (on the rarest of occasions) embracing it.

Burnt almost beyond recognition by the penury associated with being an independent theatre maker, and desperately needing a handsome and reliable income to pay off the accrued debts of my creative fancies, I established a small communications company ... a desktop publishing company, actually. It was actually always just clever me with an Apple Macintosh and a couple of clients who needed my skills. Nothing grand ... business cards, letterheads ... the occasional brochure here ... flyers, posters ... you know. Junk mail. Clever, neat, pretty and fancy, maybe, but junk mail nonetheless.

Over the years—ten of them in fact—I actually became quite good at junk mail. My designer's eye developed and my instinct for balance and a visual imperative translated almost effortlessly into graphic and typographic design. Slowly, my little business grew and a steady (if not always reliable) income ensued. Sure, it had its ups and downs ... but mostly, I could pay my bills and live the kind of life where I could do pretty much what I pleased. When I pleased. And it pleased me, often.

My move to Sydney in 1999 was an impulsive, spontaneous and entirely irresponsible leap of faith. I had grown tired and bored in Melbourne and the pre-2000 Sydney Olympic Games was abuzz with all sorts of mysterious possibilities (none of which, I should add at this point, ever materialised ... for anybody). Perched in Utopia on the rooftop of a daggy old apartment block in Potts Point, I fell in love with Sydney and her dazzling physical environment. The sky. The lights. The water. The constant activity. The new sights, sounds and smells. The impulsive recklessness and the determination. And the greed. My little business bubbled along ... and courtesy of Marcus O'Donnell, who I had known from the tiny and insular world of gay publishing in Melbourne, I started a regular job as Production Coordinator at Sydney's leading weekly gay and lesbian newspaper – The Sydney Star Observer.

This contract was the beginning of many, many wonderful Sydney stories. Guy, who was the designer and person who put The Sydney Star Observer together, would become a great, inspirational friend ... and a significant aspect of my salvation from the rigors of penury and homelessness would, months later, be in no small way directly attributed to his care and generosity.

It was also at The Star that I would befriend a young advertising salesman who would, in the months that followed, become my dear friend. And I would become his mentor. We would sail the harbour on his boat and I would bask in the glow of his companionship, friendship and irascible nature. Months later, he would become one of many who have mistaken my generosity and capacity for friendship for a seemingly never-ending supply of energy to be relentlessly drained. Exhausted. Our friendship capsized on an immutable point of contention: that I was in love with him and he was not in love with me. Whatever it was, I had actually became fatigued by his constant need, hunger and demand for every ounce of energy I had. On one memorable occasion, even his sister saw fit to warn me that I was being used up.

One night, as I was on my way to the boat with takeway dinner for the two of us, he called my mobile and suggested that it might not be a good time for me to come over—even though I was responding to his call for my company (and takeaway food delivery services). He had someone coming over who he would, er, prefer to spend time with. And at that moment, I burnt him off ... like a leech. I never saw or spoke to him again ... and even now, his attempts to re-establish contact with me are met with a perfunctory and entirely necessary resentful silence.

homo

One of the greatest achievements of my life was the little magazine I published in Sydney called homo. The concept and the look of homo had come to me while I was wandering dazed, confused and dehydrated around the base of Uluru for the second time that day. He had leapt into my mind with such fierce and determined visual clarity that he was impossible to ignore.

Upon my return to Sydney, I immediately made him happen ... and after eleven issues (one every month), homo and my business collapsed under massive debts and my complete inability to continue to service the vision in real and meaningful ways. homo was to have been my future. In his short life, he had made an enormous impact. I had been celebrated as 'Homo Man' at ritzy Elizabeth Bay rooftop parties ... and he had gathered a tiny but loyal band of subscribers. But yet again, the grand theme of my life so far, continued to play out: that with two exceptions, no-one knew how to help me. They knew what they needed from me, and rarely hesitated to ask. But when I was capable of struggling to find the words and to ask for help ... or power with suggestion ... or even on one occasion, plead for support, nothing was forthcoming. And everything that might have been done by others to help me was conditional. Or absent. And homo vanished ... and with him, went my pride, my sense of achievement ... and my perception of a future.

It was a spectacular failure that even those closest to me have no concept whatsoever of the extent to which I was (and remain) incredibly damaged by it.

I've never understood conditions ... but I am beginning to like the idea of further exploring the concept. At least.

Inbox delights

2008-04-12T18:22:00.004+10:00

This arrived in my Inbox this afternoon ... and given my current theme, it's a timely addition. Thank you Lisa!

"This little animal really exists! It's called a Naked Mole-Rat, from Africa. So if you are having a bad day and feeling sorry for yourself, just imagine going through life looking like a dick with buck teeth!"

Bless its heart!

Selfishness: The context

2008-04-09T13:51:00.016+10:00

Definitions of selfishness:
1. stinginess resulting from a concern for your own welfare and a disregard of others;
2. Selfishness is, at base, the concept and/or practice of concern with one's own interests in some sort of priority to the interests of others; it is often used to refer to a self-interest that comes in a particular form, or above a certain level; and
3. … is devotion to or concern with one’s own advantage or welfare to the exclusion of regard for others. Science and religion both teach selfishness: That the first rule of life is self preservation, which results in "me first" and the creed of materialism.

Quotes about selfishness:
1. He who lives only to benefit himself confers on the world a benefit when he dies. — Tertullian
2. Selfishness is the greatest curse of the human race. — William E. Gladstone
3. That man who lives for self alone, lives for the meanest mortal known. — Joaquin Miller

It's difficult to remember when the concept of selfishness first entered my orbit ... but it is not difficult to remember the many occasions when it had an incredibly destructive impact on my life. I am also not entirely sure what and when has triggered another's selfishness ... and how, in whatever way, I have been responsible for their action—their flagrant disregard for my feelings.

I have written about the selfishness of a past partner/lover/boyfriend. His constant, reckless and selfish pursuit of sexual intimacy with, well, anyone else—in much the same way as most fags I have known ... the sad, lonely, cock-obsessed tragics who think that finding themselves perched on the end of a stranger's cock in some way makes them far more worthwhile to society than they truly are. Or to themselves. Or to those who really care about them. The great misappropriation of esteem and value, suddenly and brutally equated to the length and breadth of a stranger's dick. Is this what the value of sexuality is? Does the sexual act—or perhaps sexual greed and need—trigger innate selfishness?

Or to be less (or perhaps more) specific: does the lack of emotional honesty in our lives gradually (or suddenly) instill in us faith in a belief that all else of real value and worth suddenly becomes expendable?

Does the crippling betrayal of one's unconditional trust and belief in the wholesome good and potential of a shared experience destroy our ability to be selfish? Are we so damaged by the experience that we move on and away ... silent, forever, about our needs in case someone destroys us again because we dare to allow ourselves to be open, accepting and vulnerable to them? Pathologically both naked and selfless for fear of being hurt to that extent ever again?

Is that the trigger? Is this the point at where one might feel incredibly alive and worthwhile ... even at the expense of another's needs, value and meaning in their life? And then, like some grotesque masquerade, buoyed with the ballast of this vain and fleeting conceit, they sail on—blissfully unaware that their worth is actually afloat on the decimation of another's.

Is this what 'learning selfishness' is?

In what circumstance and at what point do we decide that our needs have more priority to the needs of others? In my case, the quandaries and conflicts in my life have arisen because of the very opposite of selfishness ... selflessness: "having, exhibiting, or motivated by no concern for oneself; unselfish." (www.thefreedictionary.com). I don't want this to read as though I have a Jesus Complex, but somewhere along the line, my priorities have become incredibly skewed … I've bundled myself off in a corner somewhere ... to watch the paint dry.

Are we taught to be selfish? Do we learn to be selfless? Is there a point in our journey through life where we finally realise that, apart from only the good dying young, that those who pursue their goals and aspirations with dogged, selfish self-determination are the ones that get 'there'? I will be able to discount this possibility entirely in a future post ... but it doesn't change the overall challenge to the context of these qualities in the way we present to the world. Or ourselves, in the quiet, fearful hours of lonely contemplation.

Selfishness and selflessness are equally powerful and destructive forces. Selfishness, by its very definition, can't exist in isolation ... one needs the other. So is the act of one's selfishness made more potent by the extent to which it is matched by another's selflessness? Have I, in some way, added fuel to the fire by matching people's incredible selfishness with my own peculiar selflessness? Is it, perhaps, that one's selfishness is dramatically inflamed, and possibly even dragged into existence, by another's selflessness?

So what then happens when two equally selfish people meet? An explosion of need? And what happens when two equally selfless people meet? An implosion of equal velocity? A great spontaneous nothingness?

Or is selflessness simply Fear underwritten by Weakness? If I look at any number of the unhappy circumstances present in my life at the moment, I could take a completely different approach to each of them. I could say what I really think about how I really feel ... or I could do as I do—which is respect the other person's situation … a complicit and unholy alliance between a person who might have known better and a person who does, but is too afraid of confrontation that they silence the solution. Well, one of the solutions anyway.

Creating Theatre trained me to be selfless. My scripts would arrive in the rehearsal room, and from that point onwards, you value the contribution made by everyone who comes in contact with it, before handing the (un)true realisation of it over to the ensemble and releasing it to the many relationships it is to go on and experience: the actors, the technicians, the audience ...

Creating Theatre, in a way, drills the capacity for honest reaction out of you. It creates the circumstances and the environment in which your once perfect vision exists in hybrid form … possessed by others ... spoken, felt, watched, and listened to by people often not of your choosing. And yet as the creator you are silent. Immune.

It is a precious and rare exchange, and one that does not necessarily belong in the domain of business ... or even life generally. That, I think, demands the very personification of the Law of the Jungle:

Can I fuck it? Will it fuck me?
Can I kill it? Will it kill me?
Can I eat it? Will it eat me?

And when the Australian actress Leah Purcell warned me that I "had bad magic happening on that stage" only hours before my Opening Night of the Sydney Film Festival, I should have handled my response differently. Very differently. But that is another story ... and one it is time we shared.

UPDATE: The Candidates: Part 1

2008-04-08T15:50:00.001+10:00

... and then there are stories like this one.

I'm almost inclined to rest to my case … if it weren't for the fact that even though there are amazing people on the planet like this young man, there are The Others. Sinister, self-serving … and, especially by comparison, entirely worthy of a different kind of attack.

The Candidates: Part 1

2008-04-08T14:18:00.010+10:00

Sometimes, in fact many times, I have been known to seek revenge. The desperate need for vindication and the unmistakable feeling that, yet again, someone has misinterpreted my genuine gifts of skill, support, caring and goodwill as weakness ... things to be fingered—sharply and abruptly. Abused.

There's a theme peddling furiously along the bicycle path that is my journey through life at the moment ... and it's called Self Interest. Selfishness. "Me! Me! Me! Me at all costs! ... including yours." The "Fuck your needs! What about ME!" Broadway-esque showtune in G Major, performed with almost monotonous regularity by people I always imagined might have known better.

At the many and various times my feet have slipped off the pedals, I have always slowly regained my balance ... accompanied by that familiar voice in my head, howling me down for being "so fucking nice and understanding and helpful and generous ALL THE TIME": reminding me cursorily that people really only ever really care about themselves ... that when push comes to shove, black to white, Labor to Liberal, gay to straight, and broke to flush ... people will put their needs first. Always.

So why haven't (and can't) I?

It's a complex equation. It's symptomatic of being a nice, well-meaning, genuine, caring kind of a guy. I was brought up to be. There was always plenty of everything in our home ... and apart from the occasional religion-inspired fracas, the ebb and flow of daily life throughout my childhood was practically effortless. Simple. And fair. Incredibly fair.

The further you depart from valuing and holding to fairness and equality in your life, the greater the perils you face. As systematically, people placed their own needs somewhere much higher on the hierarchy of needs than mine (or the needs of those I represented) I began to realise that there was a fatal flaw in my persona. I became, almost by default, persona non-grata. I blindingly assumed that it would all work out in the end ... that they would see the error of their ways and embrace my contribution and meaning with respect and appreciation. That they would stop using my seemingly never-ending supply of capability. My skills. My Goodwill. My Support. My Cash. And My Creativity.

The mind fuck has always been in the wash-up. On a number of occasions over recent years, the actuality of an experience has been devastated as a direct result of the actions of almost impossibly selfish and self-interested people. Their power over me has always been what they offer(ed): knowledge, experience, adventure, achievement, excitement, a contribution to our society and our culture, validation ... and the payment of a modest invoice at the end of it all. Or not.

Over the past two years I have walked away from a number of experiences completely fucked over. Ruthlessly and rigorously bruised. Insulted. Offended. And almost broke. There has been the kindness of near-perfect strangers who have helped me up and set me right. They, too, will get theirs.

Am I bitter? Quite possibly ... I will let you be the judge. But in the meantime ... there's a couple of stories I would like to share with you.

The power of ...

2008-01-08T14:01:00.000+11:00

One. After. Another.

They are the minute breathes of personified or objectified real creative thought ... the pulses and impulses littering the soundscape. They are pollution, clarity, obscurity and mystery – as much as they are confounding, confronting, instructionist and obligatory. They are history, present and future. They are gifts and they are returns. They are the wrong size and the wrong colour. They are inappropriate, hateful, racist, sexist and politically opportunistic.

They are doors or windows slamming shut and shattering glass. And silence. Or both.

They are wind, rain, fire and dancing. They are laughter and tears, resolve and dispute, common and uncommon ... they are the sun, the moon, the planets and they are the way we know how to get there – and what it looks like and feels like when we do.

They are coming home. And leaving again.

They are a look. A sound. A scent.

They are fear, apprehension, joy and derision.

They are life and they are death.

They are what it looks like and feels like.

They are what it tastes like. What it's made of. What colour it is ... how long it takes ... where it happens, why it happens, how it happens, who knows it's happening, happened, about to happen.

They are where they are and with whom. They are why. When. How.

They are what if, what was, what might be, what could be, should be and they are what can never be.

Maybe. Maybe not.

They are characterful and characterless. They are charming and abusive, seductive and repulsive. They find themselves aligned in long-winded paragraphs of exposition and they also find themselves ejaculated into being within short sharp rounds of gun fire or argument. They argue and forgive. They expect and they resist creating expectations. They are barren and furtile. They hate and they love, cloud and clear, close and near, rain, sleet, snow and desert.

They eat and regurgitate, skate, ski and turn keys – opening locked doors, chests, firing engines of cars, motorbikes and triggering deadlocks. And guns.

They are safe and unsafe. They arouse and ignore, they save and they fail. They shoot to kill and they run for their lives. They explore and explode. They walk, ride and ramble.

They fly ... and they hurtle toward the ground. Crashing and burning. They start fires and cheat death by seconds. Or not.

They burn buildings, capsize ocean liners and pluck rotten fruit from the desiccated earth. They exercise and exorcise. They have faith, a little or none. They believe in everything, something or nothing.

They are more than the sounds that come out of Actors' mouths. They are everything we see, hear, feel, experience, understand, misunderstand, loathe, love, admire and detest about the world of sound and vision on screen. Any screen. Any poster. Any trailer. Anywhere.

I, for one, won't miss The Golden Globe Awards this year. The worth of one is the value of many.

Reincarnation

2008-01-07T16:02:00.000+11:00

Happy New Year!

It's been too long since I paid my blog any attention. Since September of last year, I have looked at it every now and then ... and on one occasion when sleep was my worst enemy, I read it all from start to finish. It helped me consider the constants of my life (apart from my cigarettes) ... and it made me realise that there is much to be said for living an interesting life – free from traps (of ours or anothers making). It also made me consider a myriad of experiences I am yet to write about ... and it made me wonder whether I should. Or can.

Distracted by the pressures associated with keeping my little communications company afloat, I have begun to neglect the stories of my past. I think I have done this because documenting the experiences of my past has served to highlight the inadequacies of my present ... and the undercurrent of doom that bubbles away below that vision I have of my future. And the future of others.

I haven't made any New Year's Resolutions this year. I have floated peacefully and without expectations into 2008. I have enjoyed conversation, contemplation and watching the cricket on the TV. I've slept and relaxed and caught up with special friends ... people for whom 2008 holds a promise of travel, adventure and debt-reduction.

There are many common tones and higlights in the colours of my life when I compare them to the colours of the lives of some of my friends – and it's time to consider a colour revolution. Something other than pink.

What colours will your 2008 consist of?

Angels on pinheads

2007-09-19T12:49:00.000+10:00

I've been living and working back in Melbourne now for four months. It was going to be three ... but then I've never been especially good at estimating the amount of time something will take.

Since I have been back, I have interrupted the lives of some wonderful, dear friends. We have sung and danced around the messy details of our mid-life crises and I have often wondered where in the journey of my life I would 'be' now if it hadn't been for the Fag, Interrupted-esque sojourn in the harbour city for seven years. But as James Goldman, in his The Lion In Winter script, puts it: "'What if ...' is a game for scholars. What if Angels sat on pinheads?"

I am constantly moved and provoked by the (in)different circumstances of many of the people I knew almost a decade ago. One of my dearest (and most reliable) co-bar-propper-upper-ers is now on heart medication and rarely drinks. For he and I, it's recently become something like an arduous garden-path kind of a walk to our local for two ... or more. I think about calling him and asking him out to the pub a little less often - especially now that it appears to be a matter of life or death. For him, in any case.

And some of the people I have known in this lifetime are achieving truly wonderful things ... and like a ratty little mongrel puppy, I yap and nip at their heels - celebrating their deserved success: like this extraordinarily beautiful work.

DVD Review: United 93

2007-09-12T16:14:00.000+10:00

My introduction to United Airlines Flight 93 was in the early hours of September 12, 2001. Not owning a television, I was following the unfurling, hypnotic spectacle on the internet. ('September 11' would later be acknowledged as being the first major international event to have been communicated to the world in real time via the 'net.) I was plugged in to a large number of websites - one of which belonged to United Airlines. At some point during the fiasco, having refreshed their site in my browser, there was a stark, simple message on the company's homepage: "United Airlines regret to announce that we appear to have lost another aircraft." (United Airlines Flight 175, the second plane hijacked, had already been flown into the World Trade Center's South Tower.)

My introduction to the Paul Greengrass film - United 93 - was as a result of the, then, Sydney Film Festival Artistic Director Lynden Barber's decision to include it in his program for the 2006 festival. I was the Events Manager for Barber's final festival (an hypnotic and terrifying ordeal in its own right) and I had taken the opportunity to sneak in and watch this film. About 15 minutes into it, my mobile phone, silently, announced that I was needed somewhere. We had a huge number of Festival Sponsor post-screening functions immediately following the film - and there was the entirely necessary corporate sponsorship banner positioning to be attended to. Almost gratefully, I slid from the theatre. I had missed the beginning and I was going to miss the end ... and until the other night when I saw the film for the first time, I didn't realise just how grateful I should have been.

The post-United 93 screening functions were, as you might imagine, dire affairs. Ghostly white and subdued, corporate Sydney wandered dazed and undone into their little roped-off exclusion zones - truly stunned by what they had witnessed. I had imagined they would be, and had arranged for the lights to be dimmed in the holding pens I had any control over and encouraged the event staff who bothered to listen to be mindful of what our cheque-signers had just witnessed. I adored Lynden Barber's festival ... and especially his inclusion of this film. The State Theatre, where it screened, had just had a new 'rock concert' sound rig installed ... and United 93's momentous and almost impossibly layered soundtrack (Martin Cantwell's Sound Editing and John Powell's Original Score) gave it a paint-and-wall-paper stripping run for its money.

****

One of Greengrass's masterstrokes is the casting. John Frankenheimer (The Manchurian Candidate) once said that "casting is 65 percent of directing", and in the case of United 93 I would, possibly rather magnaminously suggest, that the casting is almost 90 percent of the work's cinematic torque. The flight crew (pilots and cabin attendants) are all played by real crew - some of whom work for United Airlines. On the ground, the Civilian and US Military Air Traffic Controllers are played by real air traffic controllers – and in some cases, the people who were actually working on the morning of September 11. The passengers are played by relative unknowns, and it is this choice that ensures the film demands an immediate and instinctive respect. There is, not at any time, any "Acting" going on. Yes, there is knowledge and technique … there is commitment and passion … but ultimately, it is the anonymity of these actors that powers their presence in this work in precious and commanding ways. Many Directors and Casting Directors choose this casting path to walk – but very few have succeeded in matching the power of the unreservedly adventurous and uncluttered energy with the material that Greengrass manages to inspire in this work and from his brilliant cast.

The editing by Clare Douglas, Richard Pearson and Christopher Rouse is astonishing and entirely worthy of their Oscar™ nomination … even though they lost - inexplicably - to Thelma Schoonmaker's work on Martin Scorsese's chronically over-rated, sentimental favourite The Departed. Greengrass, too, was nominated for the Oscar™ for Best Achievement in Directing, capitulating too, to Mr Scorsese.

I have always been greedy for detail - and Barry Ackroyd's Cinematography re-defines the possibilities of the hand-held camera and strikes the perfect aviation-clinical look throughout the 'inflight' interiors. His colours and tones are bone-bearingly real, and his and Greengrass's camera becomes almost lascivious as it prowls the darkest and most unlikely corners of the entire, unravelling horror. From the chaos on the ground to the habitual inflight prattle, Greengrass is everywhere. He pins each and every minute detail of his formidable narrative to your every breath ... choking you with his drive, intention and pace. His virtuoso camera angles are a lesson in themselves and the camera's battle for stability and equilibrium in the post-hijack cabin of United Airlines Flight 93 is unrelentingly painful. That there is even the slightest semblance of hope for a different denoument is the mark of a truly great storyteller ... and a water-tight and skillful ensemble and crew.

From its simple, eerily familiar and almost routine beginning to the blistering mid-point where the tension can no longer be contained, United 93 is a masterful cinematic ante-mortem examination … and even though forensic investigators have contradicted the popular myth that the passengers managed to make it into the cockpit, the final few minutes of United 93 will connect so brutally with your heart that it may be almost impossible for you to stand it.

It was only through the wide-eyed wonder at what real and raw courage and determination looks like, that I could.

****

Donate to, and view, the Honour Flight 93 National Memorial and buy the DVD.

Image courtesy United 93.

Careful, it might not be about you

2007-09-11T00:48:00.000+10:00

I had a telephone call from a very concerned friend tonight ... someone who thought I was being more than a little indiscreet writing about their relationship. The funny thing, from my point of view in any case, was that they had not even entered my mind when I was writing about the kinds of dysfunctional relationships others have in their lives.

It reminded me of a friend who asked me out to lunch when the relationship I was referring to with, let's call him W, was in its death-throes. I said I would see what W was doing (as one of a couple almost annoyingly does when you invite them to do something), and she said that the invitation to lunch was not actually being extended to him ... but to me and only me. My friend was not interested in having lunch with my boyfriend and I. He, I assumed, was to be the topic of conversation.

And I was right. My friend, let's call her B, had decided to cross the invisible line in the sand we all negotiate in our relationships with our friends. What right do we have to express an opinion about how healthy or otherwise we believe our loved ones' relationships to be? How can we be sure we know what we're talking about? After all, the only two people who 'live' a relationship are the ones who spend the majority of time together in it. Aren't they?

So what are we do with the uneasy feelings and observations we have about the lives of others who are dear to us? B decided it was time to tell me how uneasy she felt about my relationship. She felt that it was changing me in a negative way and that I had become unhealthily obsessed with keeping the relationship going, even though it was apparently obvious to everyone but me that it was doomed. The lunch was awkward and I remember defending my relationship, not only to her but to myself as well. The lunch achieved several things - one of which was for me to return to our home and reinvest ... in some kind of wonderfully noble attempt to prove her wrong. She wasn't 'wrong', of course. She was actually articulating something that I feared myself ... and for that reason, it changed our friendship forever.

****

Some years later I took the same risk with a very, very dear friend. I had information about her partner that made me feel incredibly uneasy. Our 'dinner' turned into her terrible, tearful flight from me. Years later, the honesty of my perception of the flaw in her relationship and the increased toll the dilemma was to take on her life were both acknowledged. It certainly didn't make me feel any better about having been the harbinger of doom ... but it did make me realise that we occasionally rely on our friends to tell us when we're dancing with the potential for great sadness and disillusionment. We also risk a significantly more sinister betrayal: that moment when a friend asks "Why didn't you tell me sooner?" or "Why didn't anyone warn me?" ... or "say something".

One of my friends who had actually fucked my boyfriend (with his partner ... yes, two of them at the same time) took it upon himself to confess their indiscretion to me. I was, strangely, extremely grateful for his honesty. I remember the wall building itself around my heart as he spoke.

Trust is loaded. Perhaps I don't trust easily. Perhaps I don't trust at all. Not even myself.

But that is another story.

Evolutionarily speaking

2007-09-10T14:23:00.000+10:00

How do we evolve? Not as a species ... but as individuals? ... and how do we measure the extent to which we have evolved? If, in fact, we have. Or ever do. The habits of our lives are fascinating paradigms - within and without which, we know and sometimes observe ourselves. Living. Or not living. Existing. Or subsisting.

I am preparing myself for a major change in the habit of my life. My collision with the concept of mortality was extremely interesting. Punishing, in fact. I bought myself a little spiral notepad to write down all the aspects of my life that I want to examine in more detail ... and possibly change. Or not. The important thing is that I am going to rigorously interrogate every aspect of my life and its value (or lack of value) to me.

The first topic, interestingly enough, is the lack of a relationship in my life. Love. Skin-tingling intimacy ... and a perpetual state of arousal. Days in bed fucking. Kissing. Touching. Wanting for nothing ... except maybe the possibility to disappear further into each other than is biologically possible.

I started with this topic because it is the one by which most people judge me most harshly. Apparently, because I am a single man, I am "lonely" ... "sad and lonely" ... "bitter" ... "fat, sad, lonely and bitter" ... "lacking in self-esteem" ... chronically. But other people's judgment of me is almost entirely lame conceit in the face of the extent to which I am capable of judging myself. And have been, mercilessly, for a number of years.

Now it is time to change a few things.

*****

I had a boyfriend once. He lived in Elsternwick and I lived in Balaclava. We met at a gay men's sauna. We fucked all night. And exchanged telephone numbers. I remember the beginning of this relationship as though it were yesterday. He, or I, would call ... and then we would both leave our homes at the same time and meet on Hotham Street. We would practically race the final few hundred metres of this hallowed turf towards each other. When I could be sure it was him walking toward me, my heart would skip a beat. A smile so wide and so wondrous would form of its own free will on my lips. In the distance, his body would change shape. As would mine. He would start running ... so would I. My visions of our embrace, our intimacy and our sex would force tempo changes in my pace and direction like nothing else ever could. Or ever has. I would find myself opening my arms to him ... collecting him, embracing him ... sweeping him and all his wonderful huggable, kissable, edible and almost impossibly desirable energy into my arms. We would overflow with joy ... and at the time, I was strong enough to experience it. Trust it ... and believe in the honesty and fairness of it. We exchanged the energy of love and we were both much stronger for it. This feeling, more than anything, is the one I miss more than any other.

Of course we moved in together. Of course it was lovely ... as you would expect having as much of everything good about someone and something is lovely. Right? Complete. Yes?

Over the years we share a beautiful apartment on Brighton Road, go on holidays together and bury his older brother. We would also acknowledge the anniversary of the death of his younger brother who had died before I had come onto the scene. He would mourn and I would hold him. He would lash out at the empty space around him and I would manage to fill some of it ... when appropriate, and nurse him into a sobbing almost-stillness. And eventually peace and silence ... where the mutual lack of understanding about the depth and extent of his pain and my share of it succumbed to something of another world - altogether.

*****

I have always believed that relationships end the way they begin ... in fact, I guarantee it. The one thing I have observed about the end of relationships is that where they begin (in my case, a gay men's sauna) is where they will end. And one thing is certain ... they will end. I lost my boyfriend in the mist ... somewhere near, I have always imagined, where I had found him. One night, some weeks after our hideously acrimonious separation, he fronted up to a local pub where my friends and I were drinking and dancing. He professed undying love and remorse for his actions (fucking any of our mutual friends had been the final rule I had dared to make ... which he had, of course, broken). He was forcefully escorted out of the bar and on to the street (by a couple of my friends and the security staff) and warned to stay away from me. He did. And always has - ever since.

*****

Coming back to Melbourne has, in the way similar to that of a sudden breeze flipping the pages of your newspaper over as you read it, ensured that certain chapters of my development ... my evolution ... have been held up for cheery reminiscence. I have scooted past our old apartment building on a couple of occasions in taxis, cars and on trams. I, like I am sure most of us do, select the happy memories to consider first. Our balcony garden and our huge, real Christmas Tree. Our holidays to Broken Hill, Rutherglen and Millawa. The Alpaca Farm.

But ultimately it is the pain of betrayal and loss which slowly rises to the surface ... and it is my conscious and worthwhile choice to never offer so much of my self, my time, my energy, support and love to any one ever again. Except possibly myself. I know people who are bound in loveless knots masquerading as relationships. I see compromised potential and sense discomfort that makes my heart sad and my head spin with boredom generated by the relentless saga of their sadness and frustration. I see rules being made and broken ... and I see expectations fallen short of - well short of. I hear tension and sadness in their voices and their life rhythms are corrupted by futile attempts to accept what others of us refuse to even acknowledge - the consolation prize. I watch dark clouds, not of their making or intention, hover over too much laughter and delight. I watch them defending themselves from their fears of lonliness by barricading themselves behind a wall of toilet-paper feebleness - built of false hopes and unrealistic expectations. Lies, fantasies and delusions.

Aloneness ... and the incomparable joy of individual freedom is the thing I value more than anything in the world. I always have. And I always will. I have known love ... and it was life-changing. So is compromise, but for entirely different reasons. I, for one, would prefer to live without one than to have to suffer the other.

There is, after all, a world of difference between being lonely and being alone.

Image The evolution of man

Dag Pride

2007-08-28T22:55:00.000+10:00

Today I was walking back to my office having bought my lunch and coffee. It was a beautiful Melbourne Autumn day. I glanced across Chapel Street because something - or should I say someone - caught my eye ...

Yes! One of my Sainters! Nick Riewoldt! In the flesh!

I walked into a bin and spilt my coffee everywhere. But the public humiliation was worth it. Sometimes I'm just so proud to be a Big Dag at heart.

Death's Door: Part 2

2007-08-22T00:04:00.000+10:00

It's quite incredible the way you consider the presence and company of strangers who share nothing more with you than the foothpath when you believe that, at any minute, you may be gasping for air at their feet. Would they look the other way? Would they, by association, be too afraid to come to your aid? Would they know what to do? It's a strikingly theatrical and filmic concept. I recommend it.

My first thoughts are that there is every possibility that I am not going to make to Emergency. The sun is impossibly bright and my skin is coated in an almost icy layer of sweat. My left leg is numb, and my left foot drags ... causing me to stumble over my own toes. My mobile phone crashes to the ground and my wallet glides effortlessly a foot or two away. The vision of a fat poof sprawling chaotically over this trissy South Yarra side-street makes me laugh ... but it hurts to laugh.

A young girl walking in the same direction as me on the opposite side of the road pauses. Her instinct is obviously to be sure I intend to do her no harm. She glances, briefly, in my direction and then resumes the urgent rhythm of her own life ... as, I suspect, we all do when we have ascertained that the result of another's sudden erratic jolt in our discernible collective rhythms is a return to the status quo.

It's all about direction. My senses are incredibly finely attuned to the direction the people around me are heading. I am, at once, calculating both their distance from me and their proximity to each other. It is like I have just directed a scene in a film and all the carefully choreographed 'background action' is being run through before the first take ... when the star falls helplessly to the ground, clutching his bragging, thumping heart ... and being silenced by his humility in the face of a painful death.

On my knees, I collect my mobile and my wallet ... dragging them back to me like precious icons. My eyes hurt and water. My wallet falls from my hand because there is no sensation in the fingers of my hand. I watch it fall and bounce off my knee and onto the ground.

It feels as though someone is behind me, holding me ... their arms wrapped tightly around my chest. I flex the fingers of my right hand ... the tips of which are white. Like marble. Like playing the piano in mid-air. I reach out for my wallet again and slide it toward me. Gripping it tightly, I slide it up my leg and into my coat pocket. It's like sliding a brick along the ground with cotton wool.

I am alert enough to know that I should not make any strenuous movement ... like standing up. My heart is thumping. I slide my hand inside my jacket and place the palm of my hand over my heart. It's like someone is trying to wake the household up at 3am because they've lost their keys and can't get in.

I look down toward Chapel Street and see pedestrians. But they are no longer anonymous bodies and faces ... they are like the people who may come to my aid. Or not. But these particular people will have long passed by the time I get down there. They'll read about it in the newspaper, possibly. Or they'll hear the ambulance. Maybe they'll go into a shop and come out ten or fifteen minutes later and see the crowd gathered around my relieved and grateful barely breathing body. Maybe one of them will ask a shopkeeper for a blanket ...

They are not doctors or nurses these people. Nor are the people who are yet to arrive at ground zero. I imagine them fifteen minutes or so further up Chapel Street ... wandering aimlessly along the footpath without any knowledge of the extent to which the heart attack victim is about to really spice up their dinner table conversation tonight.

****

It's an almost impossibly intimate concept - dying. I'm 43 years old. I'm a poof. I've smoked since I was seventeen. I have a bad heart. I'm carrying too much extra weight. I don't exercise. I eat meat pies and chocolate for lunch - in that order. I love fried food and I drink coffee to Olympic Gold Medal haul standards every day. Of course I am not going to survive this!

****

I decide to try standing up. The circulation in my fingers has returned and my fingers now ache because I am clenching my wallet so tightly. Slowly, I stand ... and the pain in my chest gradually begins to subside. I can almost see it leaving. I lift my head ... higher than it has been for the past few hours. I slowly inhale ... deeper. The pain has a weaker grasp of my chest. No intention. No control. I dare to breathe ... inhaling ... carefully. I take a couple of cautious steps toward Chapel Street and then stop. The pain in my chest is gone. Not entirely ... but almost. Now, it feels like a ill-fitting jumper. Polyester. Tingling. Nylon. Tight.

I have so much work to do. My little creative agency is literally bursting at the seams. I have nineteen 'live' jobs and, for the first time in the life of my small business, so many of the processes associated with the success of a small business are in place. I love my little office. I have a whiteboard with no more room on it. There are three jobs waiting to be dispatched ... which means invoices ... which means paying bills - and tax - the square root of the delay I have enforced on my life for at least five years. Maybe more.

Since I have come back to Melbourne, I have learned more about how important the success of my little business is than I ever imagined. I do good work. Sometimes I do great work. And right now, I'm doing really good work. I have new clients that I can nurture into major ongoing workflow.

I am not going to drop. Not today.

****

I turn the corner into the street that runs parallel to Chapel Street. There's a car detailing place on the corner, littered with jobbers polishing BMWs and ridiculously big artless cartrucks. I decide to walk around the block and go back to work. I slowly increase the pace of my strides ... not pushing it, not showing off to myself. I am determined to get back to my office and continue to work. I have deadlines to meet. People are relying on me. I love it that they do ... almost as much as I love it that they can.

It would seem that I am going to spare My Strangers their little bit of death today.

****

By the time I get back to my office, the pain in my chest has entirely subsided. Just the occasional stab ... one or two teeth-clenching bursts. I imagine that when it finally does happen, like it is bound to, it will be so immensely painful that death will be the only relief.

But no more of a relief than the DO NOT RESUSCITATE card I now have in that pesky little wallet of mine.

Death's Door: Part 1

2007-08-21T00:09:00.000+10:00

Last Thursday was one of the most interesting days of my life. No, truly. Fascinating. Confronting. Frightening. Over-whelming ... in fact, awe-inspiring.

I had spent the better part of the day at a press approval with my associate James. It had been a long and ultimately fruitless exercise. Never in the life of my small business have I been unable to approve a job on the press. On some occasions it has been necessary to slightly alter the balance of the inks ... but on this occasion, there were significant problems with the job and it was with considerable reluctance that I (un)happily agreed to compromise the considerable value of my eye for detail in defining flaws in a print job ... and let it go. The Press Manager guaranteed me that my little list of flaws would be corrected, but apparently I was not to see the fruit of this particular promise. To his credit (and perhaps mine as the Designer and Finished Artist) he rather humbly acknowledged that I had set them a complex and difficult task. I was challenging the press (and the people who operate it) to deliver a brochure of such technical superiority that it would be some hours before they were happy to press the 'Go' button on the job.

James dropped me back at my office and I sat down at my computer to look through a dazzling array of emails that had flooded my inbox in my absence.

The chest pain started almost immediately ... a clamping, cramping pain of such immense, polarising discomfort that I thought I was going to pass out where I sat. My computer monitor was suddenly blurry and I was almost completely thrown by the thin layer of persperation almost bubbling to the surface of my forearms, my chest and - somewhat unusually I thought, my neck. My breathing was short and shallow and the tips of my fingers were tingling. The immediate fear was brain-numbing ... and my first instinct was to lie down on the floor of my office and relax. Breathe. Relax. The usefulness of years and years of breathing classes (I trained to be an opera singer for a long time ... and an actor for longer) evaporated. Try as I may, I could not 'send my breath' any further into my body than the top of my lungs, which were now aching and contracting ... as if someone else was doing my breathing for me.

The temptation to yield to the panic was overcome by my immense proclavity for common sense. I knew I was in a danger zone because, since I was about ten, I have known that I have "a heart problem". An irregular heart-beat. A semi-blocked left ventricle - the ventricle (valve) which is responsible for pumping oxygenated blood from the heart on its journey through my body. I have never been able to over-exert myself physically ... and at the risk of being considered weak and ineffectual (two attributes I despise in people of my sexual inclination), I have always managed a show of strength.

But not on this occasion ... which, unlike previous 'chest pain dramas', was rendering me totally and utterly inert. And afraid for my life.

My breathing was becoming shallower and shallower ... to the point where I thought I was, shortly, not going to be able to inhale at all. I prised myself from the floor and, gripping the edge of my desk, dragged myself up from the floor (which had provided no respite whatsoever from the pain) and fell back into my chair.

I've heard and read many descriptions of an episode of chest pain ... and every one of them fled my mind and my consciousness with record-breaking speed and alacrity: "concrete slab" ... "knives" ... "squeezing the air out of me" ... "such immense pressure" ... "unable to control the depth of my breathing" ...

Hunched over like a man 20 years my senior, I walked up the corridor to the stairwell at the back of my office building and did what I always do when I feel stressed and out of my depth ... not to mention my comfort zone: I had a ciggie.

Well, the tiniest bit of a ciggie ... because inhaling was impossible. My lips and my mouth were willing, but my chest and my lungs were not. I gagged on the smoke and immediately stubbed the cigarette out in my full to over-flowing ashcan. I sat on my 'smoking step' and wondered if this, in fact, was going to be the end of my life. Laughingly, I thought first and foremost about the amount of work I have on at the moment. Deadlines for this job ... and that. Concepts and ideas to be submitted. "Typical!" I remember thinking. "Here I am ... as busy as I have ever been - and now I have to go and have a fucking heart attack!"

I was amazingly unsentimental. Fear of what was happening overrode every other mental capability. I immediately wondered who in the building I would ask (and want) to help me. I pondered how to ask ... when to ask ... and, rather innocuously, decided that if I was going to shit myself (as people apparently do when their bodies go into death-throes) whose life did I have the right to change to that extent? In whose arms and at whose feet was I going to writhe in pain. And cry. And beg.

It pained me to discover that there was no-one within my immediate surrounds who I could turn to. I was on my own. It's the way I like it.

I knew the extent of this pain - not to mention the time it had gone on for - was a bad sign. A very bad sign.

I staggered back to my office and closed the door. I sat in my chair and Goggled 'heart attack symptoms'. I devoured every syllable of every piece of information like a vulture ... at the same time, buying myself great swathes of relief in the realisation that even though I was in such complete agony, nothing else like what was being described was happening to me. There was no pain in my head or my arms. Yes, the pain was immense and uncomfortable, but it wasn't like what was being described on the two or three websites that trumpeted information about the possibility of my impending and immediate demise.

And then it hit me. A stab of sheer eye-watering and mouth-drying pain in my heart like I have never experienced. I groaned from the intensity of it ... and with one hand to my chest, I grabbed my keys, my wallet and my mobile phone and decided to walk the four or five blocks to the Alfred Hospital.

I considered my options for company and support as I left the office ... and as I shuffled, blindly bound with pain along the footpath outside our building on my way to Emergency ... I wondered who in the world I would chose to die in the arms of.

And to what I imagine will be my unending surprise, I decided I wanted that person to be A Complete Stranger.

Table manners

2007-08-18T17:21:00.000+10:00

This is a fabulous image emailed to me from my friend Salli in the UK.

The photo was posted on ebay where this man was hoping to sell his dining setting. How do we know it's a man? Clue: the mirror on the wall.

Madness

2007-08-06T17:48:00.000+10:00

David Walliams plays a character in the television series Little Britain who walks through scenes making 'boock boock' noises ... clucking noises ... like a chicken. 'She' is one of the least sentimental characters in what is most certainly one of the bleakest of scenarios in the show ... and I have always been curious about the likely motivations for her inclusion - but no more so than this afternoon, when, on my way to the office with my takeaway coffee, a woman was walking along behind me making identical sounds. I glanced over my shoulder to see whether someone was taking the piss, as it were ... but no. Here, on Chapel Street (the very epicentre of Melbourne's Fashionista set and an almost impossibly ironic choice of location), was a woman as mad as the day is long, clucking away while strolling along the footpath.

Our little gaggle of pedestrians arrived at a set a traffic lights and a Little Red Walking Man. Others, perhaps as bemused and bewildered as I, moved out of her way. Some struck a pose of airhead aloofness ... others giggled. I looked on with a sanctimonious, self-rightedness pity. As the Little Red Walking Man was replaced by a Little Green Walking Man, we all stood completely still. Mad Woman glanced briefly from the middle-distance surrounding her to the ground and said "I hate going first". As I stepped from the footpath onto the road, Mad Woman followed and began to cluck away again.

My thought, as I wandered down a side-street toward my office was: "There, but for the grace of God, go I."

****

Madness has always fascinated me. A large number of characters in plays I have written could quite easily, if not a little too lazily, be described as 'Mad'. I wrote a play many years ago called Memories, Melodies and Madness which enjoyed a world premiere in London (and great reviews!) and a season in Melbourne.

In the play, four dead women relive the final night of their lives and, guided and encouraged by a Virgil character, are given the opportunity to take responsibility for each of their roles in their shared tragedy and cross over to the Afterlife. One of the characters succeeds. The others do not ... and for them, their fate is to continue to re-live the final night until they are at peace with their responsibility for what occurred. As the character who was finally at peace began to cross-over into her new life, the play began again - playing identically to the way the performance had started. It was my interpretation of the Catholic 'Purgatory' ... the Christians' 'Hell'.

In London, it received rave reviews and played to packed houses. In Melbourne, at the height of an unseasonal Melbourne heatwave (such is my fucking luck!) we had to cancel several performances due to the fact that the old theatre we were performing in had no air-conditioning which resulted in a temperature in the back few rows of raked seating of close to 40°C.

At the conclusion of one performance, as the play 'began again', a woman in the audience suddenly realised what was happening. She let loose with an audible gasp of recognition and an almost painful whimper of realisation ... as the lights snapped to black. She sat in her seat in the theatre for almost half an hour after the performance had ended ... staring at the stage. The rest of the audience had long since left and she remained - at one with the work and her experience of it.

I have been incredibly fortunate to experience a number of moments like this throughout the many years I spent making theatre. There was the young man who, upon seeing my play The World ... According to Timothy Cross promptly returned to another performance with his Mum, having gone home and 'come out' to her. He brought his Mum to see my play because he believed that the experience of it would be something that would inform her understanding of who her son was ... and what he was going through.

****

At some point in the not too distant past, something else came to mean something more to me than the collection of these experiences I was proudly gathering to keep my heart and soul fed and at peace.

I wish I knew what it was.

Vale Tammy Faye

2007-07-22T15:30:00.000+10:00

Tamara "Tammy" Faye Messner.

March 7, 1942 – July 20, 2007.

Thank you Tammy. I loved every minute of it!

The Struggles

2007-07-22T12:57:00.000+10:00

I have a nickname for the last five years of my life. It's 'The Struggles'. I adopted it, in style at least, from a land (the memory of which) lies percolating in my heart and soul - Ireland. The Irish, with their characteristic mastery of understatement, referred to their seemingly interminable conflict with the English as "The Troubles". Sometimes it is the accuracy and economy of understatement that results in the very essence of the issue being pinned to a floating speck of dust ... the kind that is visible only in the brightest, almost paint-strippable ray of light. And as a bomb (courtesy of the IRA) exploded only 100 metres from me in London's Victoria Station in 1990 - I knew we were, indeed in trouble.

I remember my first visit to Ireland vividly. I had met an Irish woman - Annie O'Brien - in London when we were both cast in a season of the Stephen Sondheim musical The Frogs. Annie and I instantly bonded ... and many of my special memories of the time I spent in Europe were as a direct result of our vast and wonderful friendship. It was Annie who rented me a room in her beautiful house in West Ealing ... and when the advertising agency I was working for went bust overnight, she guaranteed a roof over my head until I found another job. It was Annie who raced to The Green near our home in Ealing one fateful morning to help me up from the grass. It was Annie who found the perfect space for a season of another play of mine in London ... and it was Annie's brother who, being an Aer Lingus pilot, flew us from Heathrow to Dublin - with me perched wide-eyed, stunned and amazed in the jump seat!

Upon our arrival in Dublin, we went to Annie's brother's favourite pub for lunch. We sat in a beautiful courtyard and drank Guinness. I realised I was in trouble when I started to notice that people were smiling. Real, genuine almost heart-felt smiles. It made me feel uncomfortable ... and Annie laughed at the increasing level of my discomfort. I remember ordering a chicken sandwich for lunch ... and minutes later, when it appeared in front of me on the table - I promptly burst into tears. There, sitting on a serviette within a small woven basket was a fresh roast chicken sandwich. I touched it gently, and the bread sprung back from the small indent the tips of my fingers had made in it. For the first time in what, at the time, seemed like a lifetime, I was about to eat a fresh roast chicken sandwich ... not the thin, salmonella-prone slices of processed and compressed 'pretend' chicken I had become used to in London - the taste of which was always one of life's little, unsolved mysteries.

Touring Ireland was one of the highlights of my years in Europe. I hope to do it again as soon as possible. Images and experiences of my time there haunt me still. The Hill of Tara, Newgrange, theatre at The Abbey, wandering through the grounds of Dublin University, spotting bullet holes in buildings and ranging far south to the wilds of incomparable coastline ... epic, romantic, sweeping grandeur. A magnificent collision of the elements that can only be written about by people who - possibly innately - understand the power, scope and range of the cultural and historical significance of the perfect meeting of time and place.

****

Last night, in the time and place I occupy for the time being, I finally realised why my life has turned out the way it has. It's because the one I lived prior to the one I am now living was better! Much better! So much fucking better it almost defies description! Almost. You see, in my previous life, I was a Pharaoh! I was! I may very well have been the Pharaoh! How good is that?!

I have to be honest. It's not the first time I've been confronted with this fact. But prior to having this sacred vessel (see?) with which to record my every second rumination, it's only ever been a little-known fact of ... whatever the word is that means the opposite of motivation. Yes, that's it - consolation. When everything I've achieved has eventually ended, I have religiously consoled myself with the knowledge that everything I achieve in this lifetime is intended to be the very anithesis of everything I achieved when - to monstrously wonderful effect - I was The King of Egypt!

Bonfire of my vanity

2007-07-16T12:38:00.000+10:00

I love fire. There is a primal energy about making heat ... and light ... possibly even the manifestation of a Baby God Complex. "Let there be light!" Certainly! Get out of the way and thy will be done, in Northcote as it is in Adelaide.

The occasion was a dear but distant acquaintance's house-warming party ... and having trundled deep into the wilds of Melbourne's northern suburbs with JD and her husband CS, we were ready to enjoy a lovely afternoon soaking up the last of the winter sunshine. As the sun started to disappear, an instantly recognisable chill began to descend - at which point I realised that, unbeknownst even to myself I fear, Firestarter had already selected the patch of back yard that would become his mini inferno: a concrete slab in the middle of a stricken vege garden ... well enough away from the house to ensure no lives (or aspects of new weatherboard rental property were compromised), no overhanging branches ... and enough ground surrounding the soon-to-be fire for people to stand, or sit, and warm themselves.

Firestarter's choice is usually pallets, but on this occasion, there were none to be found. Anywhere. Scouring the surrounds, with able-bodied support from CS, the only objects de burn to be found were sticks. We had found our kindling. CS suggested we go to the service station and buy a bag of firewood ... but Firestarter believes in the classic sport and spirit of Hunter-Gatherer, and promptly slid down a damp embankment behind the Northcote Plaza to find ... yes! dead branches! Armfuls of beautiful, lifeless timber.

Clutching my bounty to my chest, CS and Firestarter began their walk back to the house ... with more than a few bemused looks from passers-by who had, quite possibly, not ever witnessed the pagan ritual of firewood gathering. My biggest branch (well, I should probably call it a bough) was about six feet long ... and other than the briefest moment when it appeared as though one end of it was going to take out the entire passenger side of a passing car, our fuel was returned to the house without incident.

Fire hypnotises me ... instantly. Over the years I have enjoyed countless fires: campfires, bonfires and quaint little open fires. A good fire will calm its attendees. They will focus on it ... sometimes in child-like wonder ... and they will contemplate. Many, many things. They will warm their hands and congratulate Firestarter. Fires connect us to something like another world ... another frame of mind and state of being. Considered silence will descend. Cares will, momentarily, be banished. A hushed melancholia will pervade ... and honest conversation will inevitably ensue. The crackle and hiss will punctuate the silence ... and faces will glow and eyes will sparkle. People look different by firelight ... because we feel different. Fire cannot be bought ... not can its spell be manufactured. Romance and intimacy are almost always accentuated by the side of a fire. A fire demands honesty ... circumspection ... and truth. It is as though when faced with the simplicity of heat and light, our this-worldly concerns attach to the sparks and soar, quite suddenly, high above our heads ... racing into the night sky and away.

*****

Two of the little girls at the party had become Firestarter's earnest and devoted apprentices. They brought sticks and twigs to the fire and, carefully and respectfully, their little sacrifices were placed in the flames. I showed them how to be careful around fire, and ensured they understood that in order for a fire to warm us, it didn't need to be big. When we had enough sticks on the fire, I helped them start a wood pile. Some of the sticks were very wet, and I explained that if wood for the fire is wet, we place it near the fire to dry. One of the little girls asked if one of her pieces of wood was dry enough to go on the fire yet ... and as I pointed out the fact that it was starting to steam, her eyes glowed with the joy of understanding. We lit the end of small twigs and sang Happy Birthday. She blew out the small flame. We did this at least twenty times. She was delighted ... laughing, giggling, singing ...

But someone else was not.

The Alpha Male had been prowling around in the darkness on the fringe of our glowing wonderland. He was, in some way, 'related' to the little girl. (JD later said she thought that he was not the little girl's father, but - rather - her mother's partner ... so perhaps the approval stakes were a little too high? I will never know.) What I did know, was that I was in trouble when he started to squeeze lemon rind onto my fire to make tiny flames leap out. My apprentice was not interested. She was far more interested in blowing out our 'Birthday Candle Twigs' and waiting patiently for her sticks to dry. Failed lemon rind pieces were carelessly dumped in the fire ... followed shortly afterwards by entire lemons.

For his next trick, he brought a dandelion to the fire. For years, we have blown the dandelion seeds into the air and made a wish. On this occasion, he wondered whether 'the fairies' (the dandelion seeds) should be blown into the fire. The little girl shouted 'No!' ... and luckily for him - having already determinedly blown the seeds - the 'fairies' floated up and away from their scorched death potential at the hands of our Hero.

His coup-d'Etat, was to pick up a reasonably sizeable branch and start to beat it against the burning wood. Sparks flew into the sky ... "fireworks" ... "fairies" ... yet more beating ... until the fire started to die - beaten into submission against the concrete slab on which it had joyfully crackled.

My little apprentice was perplexed. Where had her Birthday Candle Twigs gone? Why was it suddenly so cold. And dark.

Alpha Male then went about rebuilding the fire ... prodding, poking and fanning the tiny flames. He grabbed all of the wood I had collected and put it onto the fire ... fanning the flames with an increasing air of desperation. The little girl kept asking him why he had made our fire go out ... and as he fussed about with this stick and that, she encouraged him to leave it alone in case it went out again. But I had ensured a bed of hot, glowing embers - so his endeavour would never have failed. And as the fire began to crackle and hiss once again, he decided it was time for them to go.

Fires connect us to another part of ourselves. In some, it is to nurture ... listen ... see ... understand. In some, it is conquest and control. In others it is to use the wondrous power of a fire to divide and destroy. To eliminate.

And by the side of every new fire, perhaps somehow we begin something. Again.

The majesty of shadows

2007-07-13T15:54:00.000+10:00

I've been contemplating colour a great deal lately. It must be the season ... not to mention a primary element of my job description - or at the very least the Graphic Designer element.

My housemate and great friend - JG - has a state-of-the-art home entertainment set-up: a projector, an (almost cinema width) screen on the living room wall, an AppleTV, a DVD player, an amp and a digital TV box ... thingy. It is an astonishing set-up which has, in a matter of days, resulted in me scampering home through the brittle darkness of a Melbourne winter to bask in the wonders of what I call 'Maxi Vision'. Everything is bigger! From the Footy to the South Park movie, our giant screen presides, magestically, over our every move ... or lack of the ability to move ... showering us with more colour and movement than I would normally expect to find gracing my nights at home.

JG is also an avid collector of movies. He has hundreds of them. He has eclectic taste, but he most certainly does have taste. And knowledge. And curiosity. A dazzlingly engaging mix.

With the rise in the value of the Australian Dollar against the Greenback, JG's been frantically emptying out his Amazon Shopping Cart ... and almost every day, I have arrived home to be proudly presented with a couple more gems who have winged their way from the dark and dusty corners of Amazon's warehouse. This week alone, I have watched Jane Eyre, Reflections in a Golden Eye (curiously, the only movie Elizabeth Taylor and Marlon Brando made together), The Fountainhead, Citizen Kane, Blade Runner, The Hustler, Bad Day at Black Rock and Paint Your Wagon! We're talking serious cinema.

Watching anything on Maxi Vision is a splendid experience ... but it has been the black and white movies that have had the most startling effect on my levels of appreciation. On a standard domestic television (let's call it Mini Vision), they're practically decimated to become hapless clusters of black, whites and a couple of shades of grey pixels - pinched, grotesquely, into a convenient size and shape to be beamed, almost apologetically by comparison, into our homes.

On Maxi Vision, they are amazing sights (and sounds) to behold. Unfurling as operatic creations of black and white and everything - and I mean everything - in between. We do these creations a great disservice by calling them "Black and white movies". Nothing in them - or about them - is black and white. There are too many kinds of black and too many kinds of white and literally millions of tones of grey. Do yourself a favour. Hunt down a cinema near you that's showing a film that's not in colour. Marvel at the the artistry ... and the majesty of shadows.

Ravings of a Truly Horrible Bastard

2007-07-12T16:39:00.000+10:00

Not all that long ago, I went out to dinner with one of my best friends, his boyfriend, some mutual friends, and a couple of colleagues of my best friend's boyfriend. One of them was English, so he was rather impolitely ignored. The other was Canadian ... and he didn't even bother to introduce himself to me. Apparently, because I was from Sydney, it didn't matter what I thought. About anything. Which is just as well, because the heady mix of pre-party cocktails and an assortment of party-starters had (fortuitously or not) all managed to kick-in as I was waiting for one of the more hapless poofs to order the entreés. And unbeknownst to the rest of the table, I had turned into a Truly Horrible Bastard (THB).

I have to admit that I am a really formidable THB. It's not a role I play very often these days, but when 'he' is on, then it is either truly horrendous or truly entertaining. Everyone else really has no choice but to make their selection regarding how they feel about it.

The problem started upon our arrival. The table that had been reserved for us was too small. There were now to be nine, as opposed to six. Our girlfriend - let's call her Suzy - had announced that she was bringing two friends - both, like her, Personal Trainers. We were, it would appear, about to be graced by three (as opposed to one) world class physiques. "Perfect!" I thought (or maybe said) to myself ... "there's not much else to perve at around this humble, too-little table of ours!"

I had spent a small part of Thursday evening with Suzy. Our friend, and her soul mate - let's call him Shane - has slipped into the depths of an Ice addiction. I have always admired the way that elephants go off to die. Noble. Elegant. Respectful. Drug addicts, on the other hand, seem to think that they have some pre-ordained right to fuck up as many people in as many circumstances as they possibly can ... as if their tragic hopelessness was some kind of busking routine in a busy, busy shopping centre. But the money's usually taken out of your wallet when you're not looking, as opposed to gifted in grateful and meaningful ways. I hadn't seen Suzy for a long time, and I was astonished at her powers of denial. "Shane was still a good person underneath." If I was an Ice addict, I'd want Suzy to be my soul mate. Everything I suggested she had already done. Three or more times. She is still holding out her hand to be bitten, punched and stolen from. It's a masterful betrayal of good common sense. But, perhaps quite perversely, she's absolutely right to hope. Shane is a divine creature ... and like any abusive relationship, as bad as it is is as good as it is. I had a relationship with an alcoholic once. I know. One minute you're ducking their fists in public and the next you're the greatest, most meaningful and significant person in the entire world. Extremes of affection and intimacy present difficult and complex boundaries ... and we ignore them at our peril. But we do ignore them ... hoping that, eventually 'the bad' will pass and there will be 'the good'.

Back in the restaurant, I snatch the menu from the hands of one of my unsuspecting dinner companions and beckon the waitress. I order the entreés for the table (once an Event Manager, always an Event Manager) and banish her to the kitchen. In the meantime, someone who doesn't know the first thing about wine chooses to order the wine. Which arrives. Corked. Fucking hideously corked ... like cat's piss. I ask for it to be taken away and another bottle brought to the table. Which happens. And again ... corked. Suzy is almost beyond hysterical! She's been at the table for nearly twenty minutes and hasn't yet had a sip of wine! I rest my hand on her jack-hammering, table-thumping arm and ask to see The Wine List. Apparently, the person who had ordered the wine in the first place is the reason we are going to be saddled with the cost of the second bottle of wine. Sadly, for them, THB is not having any of it.

THB: "I can tell you now that that's not going to happen. This is the worst wine I have ever tasted, ever, anywhere ..."

" ... in the world!" Suzy pipes in.

THB: "Please can you bring us a bottle of this ... a glass of which I will try. If it is to my liking, you will pour glasses for the rest of the table ... "

SUZY: "Starting with me!"

THB: "Can you do that?"

The wine waiter shuffles off to the bar. Seconds later we are joined at the table by The Manager. Now 'Managers' of any variety are always interesting sparring parties for me when I am in THB mode. Just because they hold a position of "manage"ment, doesn't mean they should. One of the reasons I have never been able to consider working for a company other than my own is that there are some truly hopeless people masquerading as Managers out there ... and I have met more than my fair share of them (and worked with, and for, more than a couple). And on the subject of shit-house wine, THB is immovable ... and needless to say, we finally had the opportunity to enjoy a large number of bottles of much nicer wine.

As we staggered out of the restaurant and off to a nightclub, I couldn't help but imagine how grateful the staff of this particular restaurant were to see the back of us. Which is fine ... because I won't be going back there. After all, life is hard enough without having to drink bad wine OR having to justify why it is that you shouldn't be expected to pay for it.

See? Seven years in Sydney did teach me something!

Bouncing balls of distraction

2007-06-28T11:16:00.000+10:00

Sometimes it's as though time has stood still. Sometimes it's as though I never went away. The resistance to change is something that, deep in the database of my experiences in this lifetime, I am fighting to reject. Sometimes I feel as though I am winning ... but then that snide little voice that patrols the filing cabinet of my memory reminds me that I am, in fact, losing. Hopelessly. The shackles of habit and the fatigue of getting up in the morning and expecting it all to be different are wearing me down. Thank the Universe for Wimbledon!

I went to Wimbledon when I lived in London. As you do. I used to go to The Australian Open as well when I lived in Melbourne in my previous incarnation. I love the tennis. And apart from the excellent perve value, it provides me with the opportunity to stretch my spectator muscles ... those particular muscles certain people possess that ensures they never compete in a sporting arena of any kind. We watch. And cheer. Criticise and cajole. We are attached to the sport in a unique way. We are the energy that makes it possible for those playing whichever game it happens to be to indulge in the spirit of a true, honest and fair contest. We are the atmosphere. We represent a share of the prize money (and if you've ever been to Wimbledon you'll know what I mean!) We are the reason. We are what makes it all worthwhile. Sport in the absence of spectators is, well, training.

Much like much of the last ten years of my life.

I love Tim Henman. He's a cute little English tennis player who, now 32 years old, is nearing the end of his career. I've always related to Timmy, in a strange kind of way. He's the one who has never been quite good enough. Good, yes, but not quite good enough. He's never won Wimbledon ... in fact, I'm not sure that he's ever won a Grand Slam anywhere in the world. But he shows up and gives it his best shot. It's just that there is always, eventually, someone on the opposite side of the net whose shot(s) are better than Timmy's best.

Two nights (AEST) ago, his match against Carlos Moya (an outstanding 9.5 on the perve value scale) was stopped due to bad light. It resumed the night before last at two sets all and 5 games a piece in the final set. There was not an empty seat in the fabulous 2,000 extra seats stadium when Timmy and Carlos resumed their battle. I was, literally, on the edge of my seat. The usually subdued and polite English crowd were almost rowdy ... as rowdy as they know how to be in any case. Timmy was giving it his all ... and Carlos was face down on my pillow ... oh, sorry ... giving it his all too. The final set went with perve ... oh shit, sorry ... serve – until Carlos served a double fault and handed over the match. Timmy had won! ... and in a split second, the perennial loser had become a winner. A big winner!

It was a sensational match ... and a moving occasion. As the camera prowled around Timmy, I could tell that this win was especially important to him. There was no knee-bending ... no artful and indulgent collapses onto the grass ... no crass, grand winner-takes-it-all gestures ... no racquet gymnastics. Just an almost quaint smile and humble acknowledgement of the support of the capacity crowd. Each one of those spectators a force of will and determination ... that when combined, quite possibly gave Timmy something of the force he needed to conquer his opponent.

I couldn't sleep for hours that night. The Universe dropped a concept into my mind. "Geoffrey", she whispered ... "are you intending to reach the end of your life and be prepared to accept that, even though you were good, you were just never good enough"?

Last night I started watching Roger Federer play. I didn't last long. Quite suddenly, something made complete sense.

My umbrella

2007-06-12T17:11:00.000+10:00

There is an sequence from a film that has been playing in my imagination over the past few days. It is from a short film I produced and directed in 2006. It is one of my favourite sequences. The story was about an umbrella that had been recklessly discarded by one person, only to wash up on a beach many miles away at the feet of someone else. The sequence involved our damaged hero (the umbrella) tumbling around on the beach at the will of the waves crashing into the sand. It was a complex and interesting sequence to film ... primarily because our hero was - as required - entirely at the will of the sea. Occasionally, a large wave would crash into the beach and he would tumble off camera. At one point, one of the crew had to wade, waist-deep, into the ocean to retrieve him ... but when we finally 'got the shot', it was perfect. I was so proud of my hero.

The other morning I was waiting to cross Chapel Street to my favourite coffee shop where, every morning, I buy two strong café lattés on my way to my office. This sequence played in my mind. Just once ... as clear as the water that had buffeted my damaged little hero. We had a cast of four umbrellas (the new one, the damaged one, and two as stand-bys). I remembered that we had painted our damaged one with gold paint (rust) and covered him with dirt. We had torn his fabric artfully. We had twisted his structure and snapped his thin wire strands ... poking one or two out through the fabric. Our hero had been through the adventure of his life ... from the quiet riverside location of his heart-breaking abandonment to the busy, over-populated, inner-city beachfront.

Uninterrupted water views. But still in peril. Ultimately at risk.

Until a kind, homeless stranger rescued him from the water and took him home to rest with the other members of his ramshackle collection of umbrellas, nestled together under the overpass.

It feels great to be back in Melbourne. Under the overpass. For now.

Old friends

2007-05-31T00:53:00.000+10:00

Too much pressure! The time since my arrival home, yes, home, has been extraordinary. The clash of the cliches has kept me thinking about what this blog will mean to me in the long term. In Sydney, it became the megaphone for my inner voice ... the pleading for reason and understanding of a person inhabiting a city - both of whom are somewhat renowned for ultimately lacking both.

Since I have returned to Melbourne, I have slept. I have relaxed in the company of my wonderful, dear friends. Familiarity has washed over me like bubble-bath foam ... and I have breathed in the unmistakable aroma of something I think I recognise. I have wanted to write, but I have not been able to. All of my senses are startled by death (the suicide of someone I knew in the heady days of my previous life in Melbourne) and whatever it is that happens when old friends sit down to a glass of wine at midday and are still at it at 1am!

Some of my friends have aged. Apparently I have not. Melbourne has grown up into a startling city of greater depth - primarily through the risks that have been taken with her architecturally. I have found myself saying "It's amazing how some things don't change."

It has been seven years.

I look forward to writing about it all.

The Wheel of Fortune

2007-05-10T14:27:00.000+10:00

Well, my plastic tubs are almost packed. The wardrobe is full of the detritus of various imaginings of a personal environment. And I'm awaiting a call from the removalists which will confirm my uplift time from Sydney tomorrow.

Over at Nash's blog, I discovered an interesting Tarot Card link. I do the occasional Tarot Card reading, and I was interested to discover which of the cards in the deck I might be - at least according to this little Q&A. I am apparently "The Wheel of Fortune". In JD's deck, I've always been the "Page of Wands".

Whichever it is, it's time to say 'toot toot' Sydney, for now. The computers have to be cold when they get packed and picked up tomorrow morning, so I'm logging off and turning off until some time next week when I will pop up down south ... where Wheels, Wands and Pages will meet, once again, in the city of great hope, excitement and truth.

You are The Wheel of Fortune

Good fortune and happiness but sometimes a species of
intoxication with success

The Wheel of Fortune is all about big things, luck, change, fortune. Almost always good fortune. You are lucky in all things that you do and happy with the things that come to you. Be careful that success does not go to your head however. Sometimes luck can change.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

R.I.P 10BA and 10B

2007-05-09T02:44:00.000+10:00

The 2007-08 Federal Budget has delivered many things for many people. Tax cuts, additional superannuation contributions, an increase in child care assistance packages, one-off payments of this and that to the elderly ... and on it went. About half way through Peter Costello's speech, I had the distinct impression that I was being force-fed Prosperity. I was having it shoved down my throat ... and I found myself gagging on the veritable length and breadth of the package. Of bribes. Of course, whether my fellow Australians are as gullible as all that remains to be seen. I didn't, however, feel entirely compelled to swallow Mr Costello's load. What was missing for me was a reference to 'Culture' (other than the culture of war and defence) or 'The Arts' (other than the art of shovelling dollars down our throats). But the devil, as they say, is in the detail ... and it was a disastrous night for Australian Arts and Culture (unless you happen to think that the Australian Ballet School's Southbank HQ deserves renovation).

Hardly! I used to work for The Australian Ballet, and every time I have been to see them in action since, especially at the Sydney Opera House during the last seven years, I've had to leave. Had too ... as in, no other choice but to. As a company, they are at the lowest ebb of their creative ebb and flow. In Mr Costello's budget, however: "The Government will provide $4.6 million in 2007-08 to the Australian Ballet School, including $2.9 million to address occupational health and safety issues in its current facility, and $1.7 million to undertake a detailed business plan and functional design for possible construction of expanded facilities." Yes, you read that correctly: " ... $1.7 million ... for [a] possible construction of expanded facilities." "Possible"? I'm going to send him an email. I'm going to suggest that for "$1.7 million, I'll write them a "detailed business plan" and get some fucking nancy twit to sketch up a "functional design" AND construct the fucking thing! Jesus! They're fucking baby ballet dancers for fuck's sake! It's a barre, a mirror and a sprung floor!

Subtextual pointe ... sorry, point 1: Reward hapless mediocrity.

But it is the Business of Film Investment (everyone knows there is no such thing as a Film "Industry" in Australia) that received a nasty jolt last night. Perhaps it's a good thing ... but it's impossible at this early stage of analysis to be even remotely optimistic about how the Federal Government have changed the rules of engagement for film investment in this country.

So what is, sorry, was the '10BA'? The 10BA was a piece of paper ... a form. With '10BA' in the top right hand corner. I've filled a couple out ... I know what they look like. What it represented was a 100% tax concession in investment in film for the financial year after the one in which the investment took place. For example, in the financial year 2005-06, someone invests $100,000 in a film. At the end of the following financial year, in this case 2006-07, they would be able to claim a concession of the $100,000 they had invested in the film. Let's be clear about this ... 100% - whether you got a return on your investment or not. Which would never eventuate in most cases - and not be expected to. Hence, the tax concession.

Of course there were conditions. In order to qualify for the mighty 10BA incentive, every single aspect of the film had to be undertaken in Australia. You couldn't think about your film while farting in LA without compromising your film's eligibility. Baz Luhrmann's Bazmark Films' Moulin Rouge investors were involved with a rather ignominious association with the 10BA when it was revealed that Luhrmann had actually completed some post-production offshore (in either Spain or LA I think). And lo and behold, come the end of the following financial year, the Moulin Rouge investors were denied their 10BA eligibility. The Sydney media went mad, with The Daily Telegraph (ironically, or not, published by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation who also own Twentieth Century Fox - the film's distributor) ran with a big, black, bold headline: "Moulin Scrooge!" What was peculiar about this particular tabloid outrage was that The Daily Telegraph was (and is) not renowned for it's concern for the business of Arts and Culture. This particular fuck-up was, however, impossible to let pass unnoticed. To the best of my knowledge, I believe it even ended up on page 1!

There have been rumours for years that the Howard-led Federal Government have wanted to bury the 10BA. There may, in fact, be wise and beneficial reasons for doing so. But I seriously doubt it. Why? Because of this statement in the Budget Papers, clearly stating that the "phasing out" of the "current investor tax incentives available through Division 10BA and Division 10B of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 ... will increase estimated taxation revenue by $55.0 million over three years from 2008-09."

So there you have it in black and white: investments in Australian films under the 10BA and 10B are estimated to have a nett worth of $55.0 million dollars over three years.

Also to go is The Film Licensed Investment Company (FLIC) scheme, which according to the Budget Papers: "... will not be renewed beyond its current expiry date of 30 June 2007." The FLIC scheme was a radical plan to test new methods for the Federal Government and the "Australian film and television industry" to work collaboratively to raise investment for local film production. A single licence was awarded to Mullis Capital Film Licensed Investment Company who were apparently " ... able to raise up to $10 million in each of the years 2005–06 and 2006–07." Under the FLIC scheme, the 100% tax concession was payable up-front, instead of having to wait until the end of the following financial year (as investors would need to under the 10BA system). At this point, I have not seen any evidence of the success (or failure) of the FLIC scheme ... but it would be reasonably safe to assume that it has not worked.

So what is replacing the 10BA, the 10B and the FLIC scheme?

This, from the Budget Papers: " ... a new producer tax rebate, by which Australian producers will be eligible for a 40 per cent refundable rebate on feature films and a 20 per cent refundable rebate on other media productions, including television series, documentaries, and mini-series. To be eligible for the rebate, productions will be required to meet criteria, including creative control by Australians, and minimum qualifying expenditure thresholds depending on the type of production."

And this: "The producer tax rebate will also include a component for international producers, incorporating the previous refundable film tax offset (RFTO). This will provide a 15.0 per cent rebate for eligible expenditure, compared to the RFTO’s current 12.5 per cent. Eligibility for international producers will be extended beyond the criteria for the RFTO to include post, digital and visual effects production in Australia, where the film itself is not made in Australia and qualifying expenditure exceeds $5.0 million."

And this: "The Australian Film Commission (AFC), Film Finance Corporation Australia (FFC) and Film Australia Limited (FAL) will be merged into a new, single agency – the Australian Screen Authority (ASA), scheduled to commence operations from 1 July 2008." Jesus! Can you imagine what kind of a hideous, protectionist, mutant bureaucracy the ASA will be(come)?!

So 100% becomes 40%. And the Australian Ballet School might get a new roomful of new barres.

What was in The Budget for you?

Tusculum Street

2007-05-08T18:11:00.000+10:00

Fate? Circumstance? Coincidence? Universal Guidance? Chance? Synchronicity? Are they all the same thing? Does it matter? Is it our Earthly responsibility to question? Ponder? Understand? Know? Regardless, the outcome of this particular not so insignificant Universally-guided (and determined) exchange in my Sydney story was to become the standard by which I set all of my expectations for what this magnificent city would teach my about myself.

I had undertaken a quick reconnaissance of rental property availability in the Potts Point area. In detail, it had involved a visit to the Raine & Horne office in Macleay Street, Potts Point. Having introduced myself, I explained that I was considering a move to Sydney from Melbourne and that I was interested in what various amounts of money could 'buy' in the Potts Point rental market. The very helpful Property Manager handed me a set of keys and a hand-written list of four apartment numbers. The building was 'Serena' - 5 Tusculum Street. Perfect location. Quiet street. Altogether ideal. The four different apartments, on three floors, each had a different price. It all depended on just how much of the Harbour you could "glimpse". The price range was $180 (no glimpse - of anything) to $280 (glimpse of, possibly, water through trees from a narrow bathroom window).

By Melbourne standards, this was, well, excessive. My top floor apartment in The Ritz Mansions building on Fitzroy Street, St Kilda, was a veritable palace by comparison. I had so much space in The Ritz that I often exhausted myself walking from my bedroom to the bathroom! Space in Sydney was, by all appearances, worth more than space in Melbourne ... or was it the other way around? Regardless, as I stood outside 'Serena' checking out the building's exterior, my eyes were drawn toward the sky. There, if I was not mistaken, were apartments on the roof! The views from these apartments would have been sensational, I imagined. And I marched back to my new friend at Raine & Horne to return the keys.

"The apartments on the roof," I said.

"There are four, two at the front and two at the back. The tenants in the two front ones have been there for about ten and fifteen years respectively," was my new friend's response.

"As you would imagine", I conceded ... realising that my best bet was to move into one of the other apartments in this building and wait, patiently, for my turn in either of the two west-facing roof-top apartments. I thanked my new friend for showing me what was available, and told her I would come back the moment I landed in Sydney to live. She was distracted with I wasn't to know what ... but she managed one of those classic "Yes, lovely ... piss off now" smiles I am sure they learn in Real Estate School.

****

In September I returned. Melbourne had been departed from with grace and alacrity ... the details of which I will write about another time. My gorgeous friends AK and DH collected me from Kingsford Smith Airport in their silver Saab, and I was to spend a few glorious weeks sleeping on their couch while I settled in to my new domain. The morning I flooded the bathroom, we all knew it was time for me to go. AK said as much.

I walked in to the Raine & Horne office as my friend was finishing a telephone conversation. As she hung up, she looked at me as though she had seen a ghost. 'Yes' I was the guy who had come in late last year and asked about 'Serena's' rooftop apartments ... and more completely astonishingly, 'yes', she had just hung up from the tenant of one of them who, after fifteen years, had just given notice. "So it's mine then!" I confirmed ... at which point she, still staring at me in a wildly perplexed manner, slid a rental application form onto the counter between us. I must have been a Warlock. It was obviously meant to be. Fortunately for me, she was just as convinced of this fact as I was.

Real Estate Agent negotiations have always been a piece of cake for me. It's where the Great White Pointer in me glides effortlessly and silently to the surface. I always know there are going to be any number of rental crises for us both to endure in the months ahead, and it's important that I employ the charm imperative to its full and maximum effect - right from the start. Charm is a greatly under-valued human characteristic. I have used it variously throughout the years to drop prices (and occasionally prized pairs of pants) - but never standards. It's the one thing about Charm, it doesn't require a compromising of standards, in quite the same way as downright deceit, collusion or dishonesty does. Charm is a gift - from one person (in this case me) to another (in this case someone who, in the not too distant future, would need to chose between being patient or evicting me without delay). Needless to say, I would eventually leave 'Serena' in circumstances of (something like) my own choosing.

My ally behind the counter is quite literally gob-smacked. We engage the pointless little Receptionist with details of how I had enquired last year about the possibility of one of the roof-top apartments, and that here I was, walking back in the door on the very day that one of them was being vacated. After fifteen years!

I filled out the application form as my new friend picked up the telephone.

"I'll just call the tenant back and tell her that you'd like to have a look ..."

"No," I said. "That won't be necessary."

I explained that if the tenant had lived in the apartment for fifteen years, then she would be very sad to be leaving it. (Just how sad I was to find out myself, a few years later!) I would prefer to respect her privacy and her timetable and would be happy to view the apartment once she had vacated. I flipped my cheque book onto the counter and wrote a cheque for $500.

"Hold this as a deposit ... and call me when she's moved out."

And I was smiled out the door. Never underestimate the value of a strategically-placed and enacted charm offensive. Ever.

****

Two weeks later, my girlfriend at Raine & Horne called. The tenant had vacated and if I wanted to pop around this afternoon, I would be taken and shown through the apartment. I dressed up (the concept of which escapes the vast majority of Sydney-siders in an almost compelling fashion) and walked from Surry Hills to Potts Point. My new friend's male colleague would take me to the apartment - and as we walked around the corner to 'Serena', I chatted idly about how excited I was to be living in Sydney. Security gate. Check. Security front door. Check. Tacky lift. Check. Fifth floor. Perfect. Key in the door. Door open.

I walked in to ...

... heaven. Without a word of a lie.

A third of the apartment was a partly covered rooftop terrace from where, on hundreds of nights, I and anyone who was with me, would watch the sun set behind the city skyline. New Year's Eve ... the Closing Ceremony of the Olympic Games ... more firework displays than I care to remember ... BBQs ... an unforgettable bonfire ... parties ... fuck, we lived this little space well!

There are many more wonderful photos of this apartment - but they are all prints. (MP, who would later take over the lease from me, has a wonderful collection here and here.) My photos don't belong here, because to be perfectly honest, I really don't want too many reminders of just how perfect this little apartment was. Or just how wonderfully well I lived it. It was to be my oasis. My Utopia. My Magic Balcony. My window on the world ... and the city which was my new home. In it, I would experience the most extraordinary times. The boldest, most sweeping, grand and enduring memories of arriving - and living - in Sydney in style. I miss it every day. Still. I was to exchange it for a different kind of magic and wonder on the banks of the Woronora River ... an experience that took me into the darkest corners of all my failings.

Where, one night, with one sentence, my housemate Michael would pierce me to the bone.

Sydney: The Beginning

2007-05-05T13:21:00.000+10:00

It was always going to be Potts Point. I never really pretended to understand why. I still don't. I just knew. Maybe I was Mr Potts in another life? Or Mrs Potts? ... but that's all beside the point. I knew where I wanted to live, and even in spite of a brief and entirely unsatisfying half-hour fling with Waterloo, there was nowhere else in Sydney I was prepared to live.

I remember the moment I made the decision to come and live in Sydney vividly ... as though it were yesterday.

I was happily entrenched in a strangely alluring apartment-share with an ex-Sydney girl - MW* - in St Kilda. She decided to go to Sydney for a couple of weeks to catch up with old friends and re-imagine everything this city had meant to her. She left Melbourne and drove up in her red MX-5. As Sydney Girls do ... or rather, did. (Sydney-dwellers should try it sometime - counting them. I bet you won't see one. It's the Peugot 206CC now, in case you're even remotely interested.) One night, she called me. The collision with her past had been slightly more intense than she had been fully prepared for, and my sensible, sturdy, reliable and trustworthy presence was requested. She would fly me up, and we could drive back to Melbourne together. There were places to stay and people to meet. It was an offer I found impossible to refuse. Such is the continuing lead role of Fate in the drama series of my life.

I, and we, had a fucking ball! M was well-connected in this town. We couldn't walk down Oxford Street without bumping in to primed, buffed and gorgeous porn-star quality fags - to whom M was a long lost girlfriend ... sister. The kinship between certain faggots and certain women is a powerful, undeniable force of (un)nature. I will write about it more one day. M's girlfriends were all classic Sydney Girls: size 8 with a powerful (if not life and sanity threatening) determination to be size 6. They all spoke with record-threatening speed and haunted the domains of Kirribilli, Double Bay, Surry Hills and (by fag-default) Darlinghurst. They all had awesome jobs, fabulous cars, brilliant friends ... and a life-expectancy of 40 years. They loved me because M did. I was a well-connected, professional Melbourne fag. I was educated and sociable. I was also tall, dark and (apparently) handsome. That's the thing about Sydney: as long as you fit the grid and don't threaten the status-quo, you're welcomed with open arms - and occasionally legs. Have a contradictory opinion, a (different) world view, a belief in something other than instant gratification, a distinct lack of selfishness, or be able to differentiate (and dissect) Healthy Ego from Fragile Ego, and your days will be numbered. You'll become an Alexander Downer. People will find it difficult (and ultimately refuse) to acknowledge your existence. It's a situation faithful readers of this blog of mine will know I am intimately familiar with. It's like farting loudly in Church ... or a lift. There's really no point trying to redeem yourself.

In the (mid '90s) days since my heady $500 a week Speed addiction, I'd stacked on the weight. Then there was the horse-riding accident which 'crippled' me for six months (8 weeks in hospital) and finally put an end to my three-times-a-week workout routine. Needless to say, I would rapidly descend down the Sydney Fuck Chain once I was living here ... but for the time being, at least, I was Top of the Pops. I snorted cocaine through each nostril (like a true professional) and I could tell entertaining stories (especially while coked off my fuckin' head! I mean, who can't manage that?). I adored M ... and protected and defended her. I told her friends about our wonderful life together in "Melboring" ... convincing them that the city was, indeed, a consolation prize: where damaged souls who had paid the Sydney price of sacrifice, soul-less-ness, suspicion and loneliness came to heal. Or learn to love again. Or step out of the ring for a moment to consider what it is they were fighting for. Or against. Ultimately, it was ourselves ... but I'm getting ahead of myself a bit. Whack that dinner plate in the microwave and rack up another line guys! After all, we ain't gonna be eating anything off it!

It was a beautiful summer day. I was having some 'time out'. By The Harbour. I adore Sydney's sensational Harbour. It has dominated so many moments in my time here. Entirely. The best fun. The best feeling. Without fail. And one day this week, I will go back to where it all began to say goodbye. For now.

I was sitting on a rock in front of Mrs Macquarie's Chair with my shoes off and my jean-legs rolled up. The water of Sydney's monstrously hypnotic Harbour lapped at my ankles. I looked to my left and glimpsed the sight of the sun setting behind the sails of The Opera House. The Bridge was glittering. A little ferry was departing and the bigger Manly Ferry was streaming seaward. A plane was coming in to land and the entire vista was shimmering and shivering. I decided, at that moment, to come and live in Sydney. I said as much to myself. Aloud. I breathed it all in ... and felt like I had taken the first breath of my new life. I was overcome with optimism and excitement. Potential. A dream. A direction and a focus. A new beginning.

A couple of days later, after having done a quick reconnaissance of rental property availability (and cost) in Potts Point, M and I said farewell to Sydney and I drove her (and me) home to Melbourne. M slept almost the whole way ... waking only when we were about an hour or two out of Melbourne. The MX-5 held the road like the race car it truly is. I was at the wheel. I could return to Melbourne at speed because I knew that I would be packing up and leaving. Not straight away, but soon.

In the meantime, there was work to be done. Money to be made. Boxes to be packed. Truths to be denied. Friends to farewell. It was all so final. It was all so possible.

Fantasy versus reality would, yet again, be my downfall. There would be more than a couple of scrapes on the knee ... and there would be a sudden, frightening and ignominious collision with my sanity. But in the meantime, there was the open road and the MX-5.

And an exit clause.

*Initials have been used to protect the identity of particular individuals ... the details of whose lives, even though they are essential to the telling of my story, do not really belong in the public domain without their consent. I will, of course, feature this respectful consideration at my discretion.

Going home

2007-05-05T10:44:00.000+10:00

Apparently I have "failed to make an impact on this town". I won't tell you who said this about me because they don't deserve our disdain ... or our contempt. It was, actually and metaphorically, a stab in the dark. But the comment certainly kept me up last night - pondering whether there was, in fact, anything more I could do to secure my footing in Sydney. I'm sure I'll contemplate it continuously (as I have a rather monotonous tendency to do) as I pack my bags, boxes and plastic tubs in preparation for a move back to Melbourne next week. Thank The Universe for my blog. Here, over the coming days (and I am sure, weeks) I will contemplate and consider the move and its implications. A real journal of record. A record at least.

I have always been an independent spirit. I value my independence more than anything and everything else that litters my landscape. Past, present and future. I'm not a loner - I love the company of certain people. Very particular people. JD, DD, JG especially - people who the pathway through the garden of my life has provided for me ... and I hope, us. They are people I want to speak to every day, and they represent the metaphorical anchor in the stormy sea which has been the relationship with myself during my seven years in Sydney. I am looking forward, more than anything else, to having the integrity of real friendship around me again ... to share the language of knowledge through meaningful exchanges - the kind that are only possible because of personal History. Understanding. The 'heart and soul connection' we seek and yearn for all our lives. Where silence sometimes sounds louder than noise.

To some extent, I have "failed to make an impact on this town". But not entirely because of what I have chosen to do (and not do as the case may be), but (principally) rather because of the people I have chosen to try and make an impact with ... and for.

I need to understand the implications of this move - more than I think I realise. I have been encouraged not to return to Melbourne and I respect the tutelage. I have been challenged to consider the (im)possibility of staying here in Sydney. It is not an option. It's a change of perspective I seek. I need. That is my only expectation.

Can you go "back"? Yes, of course you can. Sometimes, you must. I have been "back" many times in my life. For safety. Security. Confidence. Clarity. The last two times I have visited a dear friend's parents' farm in the Hunter Valley, I have taken the wrong turn off the freeway. I was never certain ... it was always dark. I love driving at night. I interview myself on the radio ... I win Oscars® ... I have fascinating opinions about all sorts of things and I interview myself the entire trip. It's the way single people learn about what they're really thinking ... they talk to themselves about it. I was so sure of how fabulously interesting I was, I took the wrong turn. Twice. The road I took led nowhere ... just further into the darkness. No matter how much I tried to convince myself otherwise, I was not going to arrive where I had intended. I had to turn back.

There is a persistent alone-ness about my life in Sydney. A nagging doubt about the quality of my life here. The collection of extreme highs and lows that have punctuated my time here are vast and interesting ... and I will document them here. As I consider each of the culprits, there will only be one rule: no prisoners. If I am going to set myself free from this chronic perception of what the end (and requisite failure to meet certain expectations) of this chapter in my life means, then everyone and everything responsible - including, especially, me - will need to be held to account.

As Bette Davis's Margo Channing famously chimed in All About Eve: "Fasten your seatbelts. It's gonna be a bumpy night!"

Image: Unfinished Business - J D and Flicka, the Fearless Firefly.

And The Webby goes to ...

2007-05-02T00:13:00.000+10:00

The winners of The 11th Annual Webby Awards will be saluted alongside a remarkable slate of special achievement honorees, including rock legend David Bowie, eBay President and CEO Meg Whitman on behalf of the eBay community, and the co-founders of YouTube, at a gala in New York City on the 5th of June, Webby organisers announced today.

Hailed as the "Oscars of the Internet” by The New York Times, The Webby Awards are the leading international awards honoring excellence on the Internet, including websites, interactive advertising, online film and video, and mobile websites. Established in 1996, the 11th Annual Webby Awards received a record 8,000 entries from 50 states in the USA and over 60 countries. The Webby Awards are presented by The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, a 550-person judging academy whose members include The Simpsons creator Matt Groening and film mogul Harvey Weinstein. In addition, over 400,000 votes were cast by people around the world for their favorite sites, videos, and ads in The Webby People’s Voice Awards.

Organisers also announced recipients of this year’s Webby Special Achievement awards, including:

Webby Lifetime Achievement – David Bowie: The rock icon will be honored for a career that has pushed the boundaries of art and technology - from BowieNet, the seminal Internet service provider he launched in 1998, to UltraStar, his digital media company that creates cutting edge online content for artists like The Rolling Stones, The Police, and Mariah Carey, to BowieArt, an innovative website that connects emerging visual artists with collectors worldwide.

Webby Lifetime Achievement – The eBay Community: eBay President and CEO Meg Whitman will accept the award on behalf of the 233 million registered buyers and sellers who have made eBay a cultural phenomenon and permanently changed the way people connect, discover and interact with each other.

Webby People of the Year- YouTube Co-Founders Steve Chen and Chad Hurley: The co-founders of the video-sharing sensation will be saluted for YouTube’s role in transforming the media landscape and reshaping everything from politics to pop culture.

Best Actor and Actress – “Ninja” from “Ask a Ninja” and Jessica Lee Rose from “lonelygirl15”: “Ninja,” from the breakout online comedy series “Ask a Ninja,” and Jessica Lee Rose, who became an overnight sensation as the enigmatic star of the acclaimed fictional video diary “lonelygirl15,” will be honored at the first-ever Webby Film and Video Awards.

Webby Award winners range from powerhouses such as Nike (Retail), Sony (Home Page), and The New York Times' "Dealbook" (Business Blog) to independent sites like Blip.tv (Broadband), “we make money not art” (Cultural Blog), Last.fm (Music), and Wikitravel (Travel). Webby People’s Voice winners include Facebook (Social/Networking), Save the Internet (Activism), Dream it Do it (Associations), Best Week Ever (Celebrity/Fan), FabSugar (Fashion), Treehugger (Cultural Blog), Gifts.com (Services), and TripAdvisor (Travel). Multiple Webby Awards winners include: Flickr (5), Adobe (5), HowStuffWorks (4), Jonathan Yuen (3), BBC (3), and LinkedIn (2).

“The Webby winners and special achievement honorees represent the very best in online creativity and innovation,” said Webby Awards executive director David-Michel Davies. “We’re proud to salute the people and organisations whose ideas and vision are transforming how we experience the world.” The 11th Annual Webby Awards will feature Webby Award winners from the USA, United Kingdom, Sweden, The Netherlands, Singapore, Brazil, Italy, Australia, Canada, Czech Republic, Germany, India, Japan, and South Korea.

More information about the Webby Awards is here.

As for me, after Round 5, I have risen to equal sixteenth (up from equal twenty-fifth!) on gayfooty.com.au's Tipping Competition!

Review: Sunshine

2007-04-28T16:37:00.000+10:00

As a genre, Science-fiction has contributed to the cinema in a host of, often, quite inspirational ways. It is a complex and demanding genre, especially given that it deals with a vast range of psychological aspects, all underwritten by the great wonder and fascination we have for the mysteries of The Universe that lie beyond our Earth-bound human comprehension. In order for it to succeed, it must plug into our imaginations and our curiosity, our belief and our hope. In this increasingly cynical day and age, it's a significant task.

Ultimately, like so much of the real dramatic and cinematic torque in the world of Science-fiction, it all comes down to Fear, Faith, Fate, and Trust ... great big emotional states and frames of mind which underpin the truly great work in the genre (think Scott, Kubrick, Lucas, Spielberg).

In Sunshine, the year is 2057 and the sun is dying. Earth's (and our) last hope lies with a spacecraft, Icarus II, and her crew of eight who are sent on a mission to deliver a nuclear device into the core of the sun which, when detonated, will re-ignite it.

In the accompanying propaganda, the film makers admit to having taken some creative licence in resolving the issues relating, particularly, to the science. It's an odd apology, especially given that the word that follows the word 'science' in the case of this particular genre is 'fiction'. Unlike most genres (with the possible exception of some Horror films), Science-fiction offers the film makers unrestricted parameters within (and without) which to challenge and delight our well-reasoned understanding of all that is possible. In skilled hands, our notions of impossibility are discarded ... and we enter a world where dreams make sense, objects float, time is immeasurable by Earth-bound reason and standards, doors open and close with a hiss, and the atmospheric pressure outside will crush you in nano-seconds. In the world of Science-fiction, an audience's desire for an indefatigable raft of creative possibilities is the currency. Sense and meaning are exchanged for adventure and vision. Reality ceases to matter. It is the single greatest attraction the genre offers, and it is the standard by which we measure its effectiveness.

The screenplay for Sunshine is by Alex Garland - a writer in whom I have a great deal of interest. His novel The Beach was a rip-snorting, popularist, page-turner. A Gen X Lord of the flies. I was a back-packer once, and Garland faithfully (and most entertainingly) drew on the spirit of this particular mode of exploration: no care, no responsibility ... "I'm only this young and this carefree once so I'm going to do whatever I fucking well want". We've all met them: noisy, brattish, rude, obstreperous and inconsiderate. His dissection of the cult of commune was equally razor-sharp, and his study of the politics of power and how it impacts on our primal instinct for joy, carelessness and irresponsibility in our lives was quite brilliantly observed.

His novel The Tesseract was a marvellous, if not especially memorable, read. Cryptic and obscure, it was an intense study in the 'something evil this way comes' narrative. The way Garland's striking force intersected, interrupted and divided the characters in his book was thrilling and inventive. He discarded chronology and went for a splintering of time and place which he admirably sustained. Sure, it stumbled occasionally, but it is a compelling work from a young writer determined to take risks. A loud and original voice - a British version of (his mentor) Brett Easton Ellis (American Psycho). It was only a matter of time before he ended up writing science-fiction.

Garland's great skill (albeit still in development) is his disregard for conventional narrative. His is an ode to the unknown ... the questions as opposed to the answers - and his script for Sunshine is at its best when he is true to form. It's when the film demands the answers that we end up in a place beyond repair - textually and cinematically. There are flashes of his brilliance, especially in the wordless apology scene which is certainly the script's highpoint, but the way in which the script disintegrates into derivation (play name the source), conceit (a cynical reference to Ridley Scott's Alien about twenty minutes before the film makes several doomed attempts to mimic it), a stereotypical body-count cliché (with none of the Horror genre's nerve-shattering tension), and a messy and needlessly chaotic denoument is ultimately disappointing.

Director Danny Boyle (Trainspotting with Irvine Welsh's novel adapted for the screen by John Hodge, The Beach for which Hodge adapted Garland's novel, and 28 days later for which Garland wrote the screenplay) provides the film with an skillfully assured pace but Boyle is not yet quite as adept at handling the dynamics of an ensemble as he is with the journeys of one or two key players. His camera is, at times, quite obtrusive - which only lends weight to the sense of almost pedestrian contrivance as opposed to the (un)natural order and consequence of events as they unravel. The majority of his points of view ultimately rest uneasily as mute observer, resulting in a chronic lack of engagement with the action. It's all happening and we're there ... it just doesn't mean anything.

The performances by a stellar cast of young over-achievers (including Rose Byrne, Cillian Murphy, Chris Evans, and Jane Fonda's son Troy Garity), are similarly un(in)formed ... the over-riding sense being that they're going through their paces without a greater understanding of why. The roles (and the casting of them) owe a debt to Ridley Scott and Alien that is impossible to ignore. Apart from the fact that, early on, the ensemble appear in a 'dining room' identically lit from within the 'table' (as famously resolved by Alien's Cinematographer Derek Vanlint and Director Ridley Scott), the concept of ordinary people doing extraordinary tasks served Alien in ways that Boyle and his cast and crew can only try and hope to emulate. Byrnes' 'Cassie' is no Ripley, that's for sure ... and from that point onward, the casting and playing, almost inevitably, falter.

Production Designer Mark Tildesley (The Constant Gardener) delivers a stunning design for the spacecraft - the highlight of the film. Devotees of the genre will be captivated by the craft's design concept and will find the way the first ten minutes of the film unfolds quite mesmerising. Cinematographer Alwin H Kuchler (One day in September) has a ball with the exposure to life-threatening light (heat) and life-saving shade (cool) inherent in our crew's proximity to the sun.

The editing, by Chris Gill (28 days later), keeps the film moving briskly and really only suffers as a result of structural weak points in the action (which I am unable to write about in any detail here because they will reveal the plot). The original music (Karl Hyde, John Murphy and Rick Smith) is instantly forgettable.

Interestingly, having been released in the UK and Oceania, the film is not due for release in North America until September this year - presumably to ensure it qualifies for Academy Award® consideration. I am looking forward to the project where Boyle and Garland unite - true to their distinctive and unique forms and gifts.

Sunshine isn't it.

*****

Sunshine is in general release.
Director Danny Boyle; Screenplay Alex Garland; Cast Hiroyuki Sanada, Michelle Yeoh, Rose Byrne, Chris Evans, Troy Garity, Mark Strong and Cillian Murphy, Cliff Curtis; Co-producer Bernard Bellew; Producer Andrew Macdonald; Original Music by: Karl Hyde, John Murphy, Rick Smith; Cinematography by Alwin H Kuchler; Film Editing by Chris Gill; Casting by Donna Isaacson, Gail Stevens; Production Design by Mark Tildesley; Art Direction by Gary Freeman, Stephen Morahan. Denis Schnegg and David Warren (Senior Art Director); Distributed by 20th Century Fox.

Back to basics

2007-04-25T18:12:00.000+10:00

I started this blog to serve me in my relentless pursuit of distraction ... a record of all of those hours spent clicking, Googling, oggling, surfing, reading ... and then, almost overnight, I was plunged back into the darkest recesses of the haunted house in which my memories of my time on the planet (so far) dwell.

I stopped writing because I had nothing to say. A large part of me still believes that. Plays are nasty bastards. One or two of mine have fallen onto the page almost effortlessly, where the penultimate challenge was keeping up with the conversations my characters were having with each other in my head. Others have simply stopped stone cold dead. Too complex. Too boring. Too much like something - and everything - else.

Simply too much.

They say that the hardest part about writing is the re-writing. And whoever "they" happen to be, are right. But a boy's gotta do what a boy's gotta do ... so I'm going to take a leave of absence from my beloved blog and get back to a script I abandonded late last year. I think it has potential. And I am grateful to the discipline of this funny little blog of mine ... and to my band of readers who have made all the difference to how confident I feel about opening up the Word file and trying again.

Thank you.

Best we forget

2007-04-24T15:58:00.000+10:00

There are several times of the year when I am utterly embarrassed and ashamed to be Gay ... and right up there at the top of the list is Anzac Day.

I've actually never identified with "Gay" as a label. When people ask me if I am "Gay", I always tell them that I am not: I am Homosexual. They protest, like most ignorant people, about there not really being a difference. "There certainly is!" I usually sneer, before falling back on the old "There's nothing gay about being a homosexual" quote ... and besides, I prefer Poof to Gay ... and Faggot above all else.

After all, it's my misery ... and I'm entitled to identify with it and call it whatever I fucking well like.

Every year on Anzac Day, some blindly opportunistic promoter or two will seize the, well, opportunity, to promote a "Gay Dance Party" on, yes, you guessed it, a military theme. Like sex in public toilets, it is one event on the otherwise glittering and character-building "Gay" calendar that is bound to lose the "Gay Community" friends. And respect.

I, for one, always hang my head in shame.

As a pacifist and the child of a generation who lost too many throughout the years of conflict, I find the rituals surrounding the remembrance of our war dead a little complex to even pretend to understand. I've never been up in time to attend a Dawn Service. I don't buy the stick-pins, but I have been known to pin the odd poppy on my lapel. One of the many unfinished plays of mine is one about the Second World War. I spent many years researching, but when it came time to write the play, I realised that I needed to find a way to reach a greater understanding about what we lost in the process ... or perhaps what we gained. All that I had in its place was purple prose and borrowed observation.

War was always a 'male thing' when I was growing up. Men, men, men ... so many men. Brothers, Fathers, Sons ... and it wasn't until I met Greta, who had been a Driver for the Australian Defence Forces in Singapore that I was introduced to something other than my, previously, naively considered total sum of the catastrophe. Greta urged me to read about the stories that were told from the female perspective ... so I did. It fried my brain.

This year, there is a dance party somewhere in Sydney. I saw the full page ad in a "gay newspaper". Front, centre in the foreground is a muscled, shirtless stud in his camouflage pants - his jocks strategically peeking out over the top of his waste, sorry, waistband. Around his neck are the standard gay fantasia "Dog Tags". His smug, self-satisfied "Come fuck me/be fucked by me ... no, not you fatty" eyes, peering down at us. Behind him, in the distance, the whirring helicopters. And the sunset. The promise of a new day ... off. The drugs ... the pecs ... the muscles ... the abs ... the booze ... and the sex. Oh, yes! With him. Be my fuck-pig! Grunting, sleazy, stinking, sweaty, cum-soaked sex.

Call me old-fashioned, but I find it impossible to reconcile the great sense of loss and epic tragedy that are these wars and their dead we remember tomorrow, with this base, unacceptable and entirely disrespectful display of narcissistic, soul-less, cock-obsessed and ultimately meaningless pursuit.

I wonder if these people have any idea of what "Dog Tags" were/are used for, once the wearer of them had/has been killed. Now that's a dance party ticket seller of a snapshot if ever there was one! Or just how well a dance party might sell with an image I have firmly imbedded in my mind from a particular memoir I read: the soldiers who found a group of about six Australian nurses on a beach somewhere in Asia-Pacific who had been gunned down on the spot, and whose breasts had been severed and placed strategically on their heads, where their eyes had been.

I wonder.

Changing places

2007-04-23T23:41:00.000+10:00

Melbourne? Sydney? Melbourne? Sydney? Melbourne? Sydney? Melbourne? Sydney?

I have a dilemma. I've just returned from a(nother) weekend in Melbourne where, among other things, I went in search of a new client or two for my communications company. The good news is, I found some. The bad news is, I really need to be Melbourne-based to fully capitalise on the potential they represent. Or is that "good" news?

I missed my blog for two whole days! I made a promise to myself to write something every day, but the business and social demands of a quick trip 'home' prevented me from giving it the attention it deserves. And now I have a choice to make: Melbourne or Sydney?

Anyway, the cute boy jogging in his Speedos is - surprise, surprise - Nick dal Santo from my beloved St Kilda Football Club ... and after Round 4, I'm equal twenty-fifth on gayfooty.com.au's Tipping Competition!

Scraps of distraction: Part 7

2007-04-20T15:59:00.000+10:00

The new end

The thing about about abuse of any kind - emotional, physical, psychological, verbal, sexual - is that it stiffles and retards growth and development. On both sides of the act. The act of critical review is essentially no different. Whether they shove their hand down your pants and express like - or dislike - for what they feel, they've still shoved their hand down your pants. In life, it can be many things: rude, pleasureable, invasive, arousing, invited, uninvited, unexpected and a catalyst for many many things.

In the Theatre, it's the same. Ultimately though, it depends entirely on whose hand it is and how much you enjoy it down there. And where it leads ... and how soon after the initial mystery of the exchange, the mutual respect and consideration is lost to selfishness and greed. Savagery. The primal instinct for conquest. The hunger and appetite of the abuser at the expense of the curious consent of the person who might have continued to let them get off on the privacy of their desire.

In reflection, the saddest aspect of this entire journey for me was that yes, I did care about what the reviewers in London had said. Too much? At 25 years old, with your hand down your own pants and on the edge of the rest of your life, just how are you expected to comprehend, let alone know how to maintain and sustain that magical thing called "perspective"? ... not to mention know how to measure - precisely - what is "too much" of anything? It's futile ... pointless ... not unlike trying to measure what is "too long". Admirable sentiments I am sure, but the power of Perspective (not unlike the power of Denial) is not something that belongs in the domain of the young and adventurous. They come later. Like Regret.

Melodrama is drama without truth. And truth is that rare and fleeting almost instinctive breath of a moment in the theatre that is utterly and entirely impossible to capture. But it does exist. It's just very, very difficult to manufacture. You find it ... sometimes where you least expect it. It will sometimes chose to reveal itself in the perfect measure of time and place. But more often than not, it will elude you ... as was the case with many, if not most, of the performances of Tunnels without end I sat through in London.

You strive for it but it constantly eludes you. And the times in the theatre where truth has revealed itself, even fleetingly, remain my most memorable. I understand that now. And I seek it in everything I do.

Ireland's Brian Friel is my Master. William Shakespeare is too ... some of the time. So is Christopher Marlowe - all of the time. Arthur Miller most certainly delved deeply and often for the truth, but the truth of his writing was ultimately sabotaged by the truth of his significance to the lives of others and the turbulent times in which he lived. You need to look harder to find it in his writing. But it is there, especially in All My Sons - a magnificent, monster of play. And Timebends, his utterly compelling autobiography. Alan Bennett betrays truth with circumstance and his finely pleated structure. His becomes a convenient truth and he makes me uneasy. He is the very Englishness of contemporary English dramatists. Right up there with Alan Aychbourn. Aychbourn's truth is entirely of his own making which, in my mind, is akin to admitting that you'll never expect or allow it to appear in the work ... that it shall remain forever ellusive. It's a dangerous claim to stake ... because Theatre without Truth - or at the very least the eternal hope for its appearance - is Dead Theatre.

Tom Stoppard, a writer to whom I would be compared in a London review, is far too clever to be obviously seen to be truth-spotting.
David

Mamet

knows

(Beat)

it

will

(Beat)

appear

(Beat)

and

it

(Beat)

inevitably

(Beat)

does.

Because we imagine it has. Something this cleverly written and structured has to eventually reveal truth in one form or another.

****

I have tried many ways to deal with the what Alistair McCauley took from me. I have accepted - and resolved - my responsibility for it. I revisited the script, rewrote it, and staged a production of it in Melbourne which was fantastic. I learned. I developed. I changed. And I am grateful for the lessons.

Today I understand and accept that Alistair McCauley is - essentially - a thief. I often read his reviews (I read one today) and marvel at how he consistently uses the creative energy of others to write - essentially - about hate. And I still marvel at just how much hate he is truly - no, truth-fully - capable of. How bitter and miserable must he be, recognising how incapable he is of taking the kind of creative risks he is forced to endure in the dark with the less hate-filled. He mistakes fleeting Truth for wit, observation and cleverness. His. At least the blood of mine he spilled that day on The Green was bright red. Not black, toxic, poisoned, and oxygen-less - like his. I have gone on to make a great deal more theatre. He has, quite obviously, not gone on. I relish that fact.

Every act of critical review is like a kabob. There's onion, red capsicum, lamb, green capsicum, tomato and you. Having written an inestimable number of reviews since, I know a truth about McCauley - and myself - I wish more than anything I'd known on my knees on the grass in the middle of The Green all those years ago. Because everything that occured after it would have been different. I would have ensured that the responses to him were entirely different. I would not have allowed him to castrate me in the way I allowed him to then. I would not have allowed him to punish me for daring in quite the same way as I did then. I would, instead, have responded with the full strength and weight of my passion, and courage, and the sheer unbridled determination that had placed my magnificent attempt at his feet in the first place. All the saved-up-for way from Glen Waverley, Australia. In short, I would have cut off his fondling fingers - and the hand they were attached to.

His was a position of great privilege to that point in my life that we shared and I will hate - and I really mean Hate - him and his like forever for not deciding, instead, to find what there was to admire about my sprawling passionate ode to Fate and despair - as opposed to finding what there was to hate about both himself and me, as he gazed at his ugly and twisted reflection in the cracked mirror I was holding up to his face.

My solace, if you like, is to know that at the end of my life, I will at least have imagined what was possible. McCauley, and his like, will only be able to look back at how much they truly were beneath it ... and how, ultimately worthlessly, they instead, take anothers' creativity, passion and ability prisoner - captive in their own unenviable, lonely and creation-less cell of complete theatrical and literary insignificance.

They signify only The Reactionary my insightful and quite brilliant Mother dared to hope I would not become. I understand her fear of that happening for me in its entirety now: 'Where," she was asking "is the courage and originality in that?"

And it makes the act of making uncompromising theatre again in my life almost compulsory.

****

My journey through the memory of this life-altering experience abroad has been immensely painful. That much is probably obvious. What is perhaps not quite so obvious is the way I feel today, right now, about where the rest of my life will take me. And I will close this final chapter of a most remarkable reminiscence with this exchange which somehow, quite magically, The Universe delivered to me late last night.

It is an edited transcript from the ABC Radio's PM program in 2005 - and the interviewee, Michael Billington, is a reviewer for London's The Guardian newspaper.

MICHAEL BILLINGTON: I suppose what makes Pinter interesting as a writer and as a man, is that the plays themselves defy analysis. You can offer an interpretation, but you can never quite fully say what The Homecoming is about, what No Man's Land is about, what Landscape is about. I think that's partly what makes Pinter interesting and what links him with the great dramatists of the past – that there is a quality in his plays that is beyond rational explanation. And one of my colleagues ... I think brilliantly said, part of the pleasure of watching a Pinter play is not fully understanding what it is about.

Really, Mr Billington? Well touché.

And the "colleague" in question? Here, and I hope this will give you as great a thrilling and gut-busting laugh as it did me, is the unedited version:

MICHAEL BILLINGTON: ... And one of my colleagues, Alistair McCauley, I think brilliantly said, part of the pleasure of watching a Pinter play is not fully understanding what it is about.

If "brilliance" is defined by "not fully understanding" then I feel terribly sad and sorry for both you and your colleague. And terribly proud of myself and the literally hundreds of people who came to my play in London and loved and understood it - in spite of him.

Truthfully.

Thank you, Masters of Nothing ... and fuck you!

Scraps of distraction: Part 6

2007-04-19T15:50:00.000+10:00

Ordinary miracles

Tunnels without end was a disaster. That much was obvious. A couple of the actors, who had been taken by complete surprise by the savagery of the attack, responded accordingly and began acting it as though it were some embarrassingly hideous C-grade drama. There was constant talk of it closing, but Sonia was maintaining the last semblance of her belief in herself, it, and me by keeping it running.

One night, Robert (Piotr) hit Billy (who was playing Valsa, one the maestro's lovers) and almost fractured his jaw. (Undisciplined actors in this particular play of mine would become synonymous with productions of it. In the Melbourne production, Nicholas, who was playing Piotr, would be hospitalised during a performance after a wayward punch to the side of his head from Josephine, the actress playing Sasha, his sister. Discuss.) Billy was refusing to go back on and had demanded that I be summoned to the theatre by management. I raced to the theatre and Billy and I sat in his dressing room while the interval was extended from twenty to almost 45 minutes. Thank God that The Tube runs 24 hours I can remember thinking. This poor audience aren't going to be out until well after midnight!

One night, when I actually happened to be in the audience, the sound system blew up about five minutes into the performance. "Bring it on!" I think I shouted aloud to the three other people that were there. The performance continued and I watched, in complete wonder and every-increasing astonishment, as a pair of impossibly small speakers were lowered from the bio-box window at the top of the right-hand side wall of the stage. They were slowly lowered only when people would have been looking at the opposite side of the stage. I know this, because I couldn't take my eyes off them! And the music duly returned. At interval, I learned that the Assistant Stage Manager had taken over calling the show while Helen had raced outside and up the road a little to rip the stereo system out of her car! The speakers that were being lowered to just above the heads of the actors were the ones from her fucking car! Bless her precious and inspirational heart!

Sadly, we had to let the ASM go. Not only couldn't the production afford him anymore, but he got the offer of another job in another show. I remember him trying to justify his departure to me. He needn't have bothered. The part of me that truly cared about everything that could possibly still happen had departed this production a long time ago.

One matinee afternoon, there was an audience of one (a disturbing fact that would also become synonymous with future productions of this play of mine. In fact, it is so synonymous with this play that I hope it happens again - and fully expect it to - in Sydney next year. I will actually be very disappointed if it doesn't). This charming man was on his way home to New York and he had read about Tunnels without end in the London Theatre Guide and thought he might like to see it. I walked in to the foyer while the staff were informing him that, given that he was the only audience member, the performance might not be going ahead ... and would he mind waiting to see if anyone else turned up. The Union's ruling was (and still is I understand) that if there were more people in the cast than in the audience, then by default, the performance could be cancelled.

The actors were ready. Our audience was ready. The bar was ready. Where was the problem? I asked the cast if they would agree to perform for two - the charming man and me - if he was prepared to become an audience of one. He confirmed that he was. I jokingly made him promise not to walk out (which is ironic really, because that's precisely what would happen in Melbourne.) We sat next to each other and the performance was fantastic ... and our audience member loved it. He cried at the end and apologised for having to rush off to the airport to catch his flight home.

A few nights later, I was at an open air Luciano Pavarotti concert with my friends from the Royal Opera. (We were seated in the row behind Princess Diana.) The concert was fantastic and when it ended, my friends suggested we head to the New End Theatre and have a drink with the actors. The axe was about to fall, and I should stop by and begin preparing myself to finally farewell the theatre which had become my home for the most amazing number of weeks of my life. How soon would it be, they joked, affectionately, before I could again take my friends to a theatre in London where a play of mine was being staged?

It was a wonderful suggestion and we piled into a cab. I immediately knew something was up the second we turned into New End. There wasn't a carspace to be seen. I joked to my friend Ian (who was the Royal Opera's Marketing Manager), that maybe they'd closed Tunnels ... without telling me and put something else on in its place. Our cab dropped us at the front door, and as I marched up to it, it opened from the inside. The front of house manager beamed at me.

"Where have you been all day and all night!" she screamed.

I saw Sonia appear behind her and I was dragged into the foyer. The doors into the auditorium opened and people - not person - slowly started to leave the theatre. Five ... ten ... surely that's got to be it! ... twenty ... thirty. I looked at Sonia who had her hands to her mouth. I felt Ian's hand on my shoulder. Forty ... fifty ... sixty ... I didn't know where to look.

My audience were shattered and many were wiping away tears. Some looked as though they'd just been bored out of their brain, but most of them looked as though they'd seen something. Sonia took my hand and dragged me up the stairs to the bar.

"I've been leaving messages for you at home all day and all night! Where have you been?"

She didn't wait for an answer before placing a large newspaper clipping in one of my hands and a glass of champagne in the other. With my friends peering over my shoulder, I read something I barely recognised: our first good review. Not a great review, but a positive one all the same. Sure, the "destination of the journey" was "a little vague" ... but the drama was "Magnetic!" Magnetic! ... and the costumes were "stunning!"

The review had come out in one of the local Hampstead newspapers and apparently, the reviewer - a woman - was notorious for determining the success or the failure of productions in the local area: and "the journey" with Tunnels ... was, apparently for her, "certainly worth it!" The bar slowly filled up with people who toasted me and applauded. My friends hugged me and, as the actors got news that I was in the house, they too came up and celebrated. It is Helen's hug I will remember as long as I live. It said "This is actually what you deserve! This is what we all fucking deserve!"

And Tunnels without end played to almost capacity audiences for the rest of his run home. I know, because every night, I would stand outside and watch - in complete wonder and with great pride - the audiences pour out of the theatre. The conversations at the bar were epic, intense and incredibly rewarding for me - as they often are when you are among friends.

One day shortly before the end of the run, Sonia called me and told me to come to the theatre. Something else quite amazing had just happened.

I dashed to the theatre and raced up to her office. She handed me a fax: a request for fifteen tickets. The 'charming' man who had dropped by and watched the play on his own was bringing fourteen of his friends all the way from New York for the closing night performance. Not only had this never occurred at the New End Theatre before, but this booking for fifteen plus the bookings already made on the day - in person and on the telephone - meant that I had broken the New End Theatre's record for the most number of tickets sold in one day!

My dribbling, snotty-nosed little spastic had found his home ... and, more importantly, his audience.

****

The final performance was one I can barely remember. I knew it would be over and a great part of me desperately wanted it to be. Still. And as it came to its conclusion, I felt more overwhelmed than I had ever felt before ... and possibly since. As the actors came out onto the stage for the first time to take their final bows, fifteen people stood up and threw red roses onto the stage. I was actually quite unsentimental about the occasion until I saw Michaela in tears. She bent over and collected a rose and held it up, high in the air and looked at me like I have never been looked at in the theatre since. Everyone but me was on their feet. I couldn't stand up.

I managed one final look at the image that I had created on stage and buried my head in my hands.

It was the first time since I had left my beautiful dog Kimberley with my friends in Australia all those months ago that I had actually been able to cry.

Scraps of distraction: Part 5

2007-04-18T01:55:00.000+10:00

The Reviews

The telephone at home started ringing uncommonly early. It woke me, but - as Fate would have it - not in time to answer it. I threw on some clothes and raced out the door to the newsagent. I knew there would be at least one review this morning. A dash through the park and then across The Green, one of those quaint little parks and gardens that try, valiantly, to save London from turning in on, and suffocating, herself.

The fatigue of the weeks beforehand had coloured the production a rather pleasing rich shade of chocolate-pink grey - almost as though it was happening in spite of everyone associated with it. And the bookings were strong. I had had many glorious conversations with members of the audience, some of whom had once sat with me at the bar until sunrise.

Later today there was also to be a meeting at the theatre with a couple of Producers who wanted to mount a touring production of it. A Number One Touring Company - whatever that meant. In the meantime, my heart, my ambition and I rushed to confirm that we were a success. I grabbed copies of all the morning newspapers (no mean feat in London) and started my return, bubbling with nerves and anticipation, to the house. My landlady (and great friend), Annie, would have the coffee going and together, we would pour over the reviews: "An important new voice in the theatre ... " ... "Brilliant! Stunning!" ... "Don't miss this amazing production before it transfers - as it inevitably will - to the West End!"

I am halfway across The Green. A review! The Financial Times! A quarter trademark pale orange page, right across the bottom! "Wow! Geoffrey! Look at you!" I scream, guiltily and silently, to myself ... "look at all that space they've dedicated to a review of my ... "

"Poor Tchaikovsky! His life was sad enough and one would have liked to spared him some of the rubbish that has been made of it since - of which Ken Russell's The Music Lovers and this play, are, alas, prime examples."

It is like someone has suddenly removed both my legs. I can't feel them ... and I drop to the ground like a wing-less bird. Hard. Thud. I try and keep a hold of all of my newspapers but they slide from my arms onto the damp grass around me. I grapple with The Financial Times and read the opening paragraph again ... and again ... and again. To be sure it actually says what I have just read. My heart is beating so impossibly fast. There must be some terrible mistake!

There is ... and apparently it's me.

The review is by Alistair McCauley and his review is as painful to imagine as it is to read. He slices the actors, my play, my production, my dialogue, my direction, my ambition and my imagination - my everything and my all.

My mind flashes back to many years earlier. I was working as a stock controller for an abbatoir when 'the boys' thought it might be fun to take me on a tour of the slaughterhouse. I remember watching, helplessly mute, as a wide-eyed and terrified bull was clamped into place on his muddy death row. Seconds later, the bull-bolt penetrates one side of his quivering head and appears out the other side. How do you describe that look on his face? The bull-bolt retracts, and with an unbearable shudder, the beast crumples to its knees. Staring balefully. Twitching. Its jaw hits the ground. And eventually dead.

There is no way for the heart and soul of an artist to know how to respond to the slaughter of everything they imagined they were. It is a complete annihilation of everything I have held so near and dear to my heart for months. And everything that was to be my future. McCauley ridicules the emotion and relentlessly eye-gouges every aspect of the thing I have dared to put before him. He picks "particularly awful" lines of dialogue with which to misquote me. I can't sort out the array of nauseous reaction I am having. It's like a fatal internal hard-disk error. Irretrievable. My memory is erased and I only have this damning evidence of my complete and utter worthlessness as a risk-taking creative being. (People often ask me why I don't get a chest x-ray. It's actually quite simple. I've already had the worst news of my life.) Here, on my knees, pathetically surrounded by my newspapers and fighting to contain a sound I don't recognise - my creative being has been hacked to bloodless pieces. And I am not actually sure how I am going to survive my reaction to it.

Of course! I'm not supposed to.

I don't see Annie running across The Green toward me. She has answered the telephone to someone from the theatre telling her to keep me away from the newspapers. It's been a wholesale slaughter of the highest order and they're concerned about the effect it will have on me. She has jumped in her car and driven around toward the newsagent to find me.

I choke on my breath as Annie drops to the ground beside me, collecting my newspapers and encouraging me to stand up.

There's nothing to say and there's no way to say it.

I am suddenly a long way from home. I think of my Mother and Father in Glen Waverley and how shattered and sad they will be. I think of my Sister who will be equally as embarrassed by - and a little for - me. I think of the actors and the sudden and unexpected shock of realisation that they were right all along not to trust me entirely. I think of the script, and the actual versions of the lines misquoted by McCauley - wishing I had not given up on my right to cut them from the script while the actors still had time to adjust and re-learn. Fuck their precious Egos! Look where it got them! Fuck them! Look where it got me! I thought of Sonia and her dreams and expectations for this marvellous play and the wonderfully talented fucked-up dreamer of a boy who had written it. She had plucked him from obscurity for their crazy mad dash onto a mainstage in the Theatre Capital of the English Speaking World.

The shame and the horror of it changed me forever in a split second.

****

Over the coming days the bad reviews continued to appear. Shockers. I can't quote them. I don't have them anymore. Once, not that many years ago, I burnt them all. Including McCauley's (which is actually quoted from memory here). They were like seeping, angry herpes blisters: every time I caught sight of them, all the fun had to stop.

Tunnels ... limped along. The Number One Touring Company, which ended up being the consolation prize to a West End transfer, never eventuated. At the meeting later that day, they informed me that they wanted me to write two characters out of the script. I responded with "Which two? Tchaikovsky and ... ?" I was merciless. They were fools. There was no other way I could even begin to defend myself from the events of the morning. As far as they were concerned I was no longer the boy with the goose that laid the golden eggs tucked under my arm. Instead, I had somehow miraculously morphed into the parent of a dribbling, snotty-nosed, spastic baby - who was desperately trying to find it a good home. But I have always believed in life after death, and I scoffed at their ridiculous suggestion. Sonia was finally convinced I was utterly mad.

The box office telephone stopped ringing ... almost overnight. A Jewish critic in a Jewish magazine loaded the final bullet into the chamber by referring to the play as "... roast pig's ear ..." - which, when you think about it, is actually quite astonishing in its brutality. People stopped turning up to collect their tickets. The length of the play did, in fact, come back to haunt me - with one critic writing something along the lines of: " ... never mind the tunnels, this terrible piece of theatre is positively interminable!" Or something witty and droll like that.

Regardless, they had achieved their end. The public and private humiliation of me and my beloved, spastic child, was complete. And I was grateful for the silence in my life.

It is impossible to know how to behave in these circumstances. People suddenly stop acknowledging your existence. For my front of house friends, I metamorphisised from someone who had single-handedly guaranteed their rent for weeks, maybe months, into someone who had just kicked a puppy to death on the footpath out the front. Sonia is suddenly, not so sure. She knows we share the responsibility for the crime - but it's quite obviously proving a little too complicated for her to resolve her guilt by association. Box office staff are instantly laid off - I know, because I watch them gather their belongings and leave.

It was like the award winning Child Care Centre I had left my child at had suddenly burned to the ground - and I was the parent of the only child inside who hadn't managed to get out. Everywhere I turned, there was nothing but suspicion, shame, embarrassment and resentment. I wanted - and needed - to defend my play but I needed people around me who believed it was worth defending. None of those people were here. Anywhere. I had been tipped upside down and exposed as a fraud. A cheat. I had coloured their worlds with great hope, passion and inspiration, only to now be the cause of their creative poverty and actual penury. And it had all come as a complete surprise. We were in shock ... not the shock of a somewhat high telephone bill, but the heart-stopping shock of someone facing what they innately recognise as their impending, and instant, demise.

There was really only one thing to do. I left the theatre and decided, in spite of the distance and myself, to walk somewhere ... anywhere ... home. I had been introduced to the concept of Damage Control.

And as suddenly as it had ended, several quite extraordinary things happened. Unexpected miracles which, to this very day - somewhat astonishingly - make me grateful I dared.

There was, after all, still one more New End Theatre record to smash.

Image: The park near my home in Ealing, London.

Scraps of distraction: Part 4

2007-04-17T00:26:00.000+10:00

Opening Night

How should a boy from Bairnsdale feel about the fact that his play is opening in London? And what should he spend the day doing? He can't go to the theatre because they are painting the entire inside of it black. By lunchtime, the paint will be drying and the dry-cleaned costumes will arrive shortly thereafter. Cleaners will be going through the place from top to bottom. Instead, he messes around at home and fields phone calls from Australia and from all his friends in London. He will get to the theatre in time for a drink or two and sit down with Sonia to go through his schedule of formalities, including a brief meet and greet with some local dignitaries, the West End producers and a couple of directors from the RSC.

I had been 'seeing' a wonderful boy - whose name escapes me completely. He worked for some kind of impossibly secret service agency in the United States. The first time we had a dinner party at his place, there were five of us. I was the star, of course, and I held court with due aplomb. I was still a very different person then. I had performed in musicals and plays all over London. I had sung Sondheim for Sondheim. I had trained as an actor, writer and director there and had visited Mel Gibson on the set of the film version of Hamlet he was making somewhere or other. I had flown in more jump-seats than I care to remember (including one especially memorable and delightful experience with Aer Lingus, which I will write about in more detail another time). I had spent a week in Luxembourg wandering about, wide-eyed, in the Ardennes. I had flown to Paris for dinner.

Life was grand. Impossibly.

My boy always offered our guests a wonderful cocktail at the end of the evening. It was called a "Security Leak" ... and within minutes of consuming it, you would be unconscious wherever it was you were sitting ... or reclining. Nothing, and no-one, else has ever managed to stop me mid-sentence. Except Alistair McCauley. But we'll deal with him shortly. And when you woke up, some half an hour later, you would be unable to remember a single thing about the entire night. He and another friend of ours - a colleague of his - were to be my guests at Opening Night.

I don't recall much about the day at all. My mind was totally preoccupied with the night ahead. There were still a couple of flat sections in the performance ... and an especially messy transition into the final scene in Act One. But the music took over. Tchaikovsky was my fallback. How could I fail?

The theatre foyer and office was full to bursting with flowers and cards. The bar was being stocked and I collided with the caterers who were delivering the Opening Night Finger Food. Sonia was buzzing. She looked gorgeous! She had mirrored my blanket enthusiam and love for this difficult child of mine from the start. I had sent it to her as soon as it was finished. To the best of my knowledge, there were two 'transfer' theatres in London: The Hampstead Theatre and The New End. Fatefully, I picked hers.

****

Sonia had rung me some days after receiving it and told me she thought it an amazing script ... but that her theatre was full until the end of the year. There were weeks of pre-Edinburgh try-outs and something else was currently limping toward the finishing line. I thanked her for liking it and we wished each other 'all the best'.

My problems actually all stem from one simple fact: I had never really expected anything to come of this play. I had written it in three days after months of research and hours and hours of intense and illuminating discussions with several renowned Musicologists - each of them a Tchaikovsky 'expert'. They had guided me through the canon in prayerful and awe-inspiring ways, highlighting the journeys of particular instruments within each score. Tchaikovsky, unlike almost all of his peers - past, present and future (his and ours) - wrote for the entire orchestra. Every single instrument. Most composers write for the instrument of their expertise (generally piano) and work with someone else on the orchestra parts - or hand the responsibility for the orchestrations over to someone else entirely. Not Tchaikovsky. The journey of every single instrument through every single one of his compositions was mapped out by him. I first became captivated by him for this reason: what the fuck must this have sounded like in his mind?

This is also why he is the greatest composer to have ever lived - and I also believe that this little known aspect of his powers of creation go most of the way in explaining why he was, and still is, so popular. Even if the lay-person really has no definitive idea of why his music moves them in the way that it does. My understanding of Tchaikovsky's music literature is something that, to this very day, gives me great pleasure. An example, perhaps, is to find a really great recording of his Fifth Symphony and listen to the journey of the trumpet. It was once affectionately described to me as 'a symphony for the trumpet and orchestra'. In a really really great recording, it's actually quite easy to hear why.

If a ballet company anywhere in the world is struggling financially, they'll whip on Swan Lake. You might like to listen to the flute in the maelstrom that follows Siegfried's realisation that he has been deceived by Odile. The manner in which the orchestra drowns out the flute is utterly heart-breaking in a great recording. And Swan Lake gets 'em in every time. Without fail. (Within the space of six months this year, there are two Swan Lakes in Australia: Matthew Bourne's and The Paris Opera Ballet's.) A mind-bogglingly high percentage (something like seventy-eight) of people who have ever attended a live orchestral concert have chosen to attend for the first time because Tchaikovsky was on the programme.

I have certainly picked an incredibly popular subject with which to plummet to the very depths of unpopularity. Ken Russell would end up looking like David Lean by the time Geoffrey Williams was through with Maestro Piotr Tchaikovsky!

Less than a week later, Sonia called me again and told me that she could not get my play out of her head ... and would I come to her theatre and see a play. And have a meeting. Of course I would! A couple of days later I danced into the New End and met with Sonia for the first time. She had a problem. The play that was on at the moment was playing to almost empty houses (a concept of Sonia's I would help to utterly redefine for her in the weeks ahead). So ... if she closed this current catastrophe early and brought one or two of the pre-Edinburgh try-outs forward, would I be interested in bringing Tunnels ... into her theatre (she pointed to a date in her diary) here?

What I should have said - and very nearly did say - was said "No." "Thank you."

It is very, very clear to me now. In the lush embrace of hindsight. "No" was the right answer ... as it so often should have been - and only occasionally has been - ever since.

"Thank you anyway, Sonia," I should have said, "but are you out of your God-damned fucking mind? It's a play about the greatest composer that ever lived, to be staged in the city of his greatest fulfilments ... not to mention his most ardent admirers and defenders!? Tchaikovsky himself said that English musicians performed his music better than anyone else in the world! I'm Australian you Stupid Woman! The English press HATE Australians! In their gruesome, post-colonial paranoia they still thought that there were wooden ships sporting the Union Jack conquering great, previously unchartered continents for the acquisition of King or Queen and Country! Most of the sad little perpetually soft cocks still do! Sorry guys, but your Piotr The Great is actually Piotr The Great Big Pillow-biting Shirt-lifting Turd-burgling Arse Bandit! ... and if you don't believe me, I'm gonna show you because he's going to spend - what is it now? - at least three pages of somebody else's artless and ultimately pointless fucking dialogue in bed with a Russian Prince who didn't even fucking exist! There are monologues in this crap that run for four pages. That's four A4 pages Sonia. Jesus Christ! There's one monologue in there that's so fucking long and verbose it's practically a short fucking play of its very own!"

What was this woman thinking? What was I thinking when, instead, my Ego said "Yes".

****

Tonight she was on fire. Her theatre was glittering with artistic, creative and theatrical potential ... and the bar was doing great business. As a Director, I don't interact with actors before a performance. I acknowledged their arrival with a smile and a wave ... or a kiss ... and watched on proudly as they gathered up their flowers and took them down in the direction of their respective dressing rooms. They were certainly nervous, but I was already well on the way to complete sensory obliteration at the bar. My friends had started arriving with flowers and gifts and as early as the half hour call, I was already propping myself up on the bar.

The foyer bell suddenly started ringing ... and the second I heard it I had to excuse myself and go into the office toilet where I promptly threw up. I have had many deep, meaningful and lasting relationships with any number of repositories of my turgid and tormented fear, but this one was unique. "This one will go down in theatre history!" I remember thinking, somewhat obliquely. I tried to stand up, but couldn't. Every flaw, doubt and anxiety about what all these people were about to witness punched hard at my eyeballs - from the inside of my head. I tried to get up, but slipped on the tiles and cracked my lower jaw so hard on the toilet bowl I thought I was going to slide into a technicolour coma on the spot. Vomit stained rented tuxedo and all.

It would have been preferable.

My boy was finally sent in to get me and - for what would turn out to be the final time - he looked at me with so much love for my pain. He couldn't comprehend why I wasn't going to watch the performance ... no matter how much I tried to convince him I knew what was going to happen ... better than the people who were about to make it happen.

Once he finally had me on my feet, he doused me with breath-freshener and we walked together out into the nearly empty foyer. He reluctantly let go of my hand and disappeared into the auditorium. The doors shut and the moments between then and the music starting were laced with an indescribable panic, mixed with hope and fear. I stood by the door and listened. It had started. There was no stopping it now. And I walked up the stairs to the bar.

"The horror." "The horror."

I sat at the bar drinking vodka and orange juice. It's hard to remember precisely what I was thinking. I could see it unfolding and falling over ... dazed and confused ... a scratch on his knee. Bandaids. More bandaids. OK, this is serious ... we need to get him to a hospital. The bar staff and front of house staff eventually started to busily prepare for the interval. Covers came off the finger-food and champagne started to be poured into glasses. Ooops! Here we go! The end of Act One. Is there still anyone awake in there? Alive? The barman looked at me and then looked at the back door to the very top of the auditorium. Ha! I remember thinking. Wouldn't it be funny if I snuck in to watch, only to discover that the audience had all walked out an hour ago and were up the road at the pub? Or gallantly throwing themselves in front of oncoming traffic ... anything but this! Anything but this terrible, terrible play!

I nodded ... and he quickly and quietly opened door into the auditorium. I poked my head in and looked at the stage. There he was, Robert's and my version of Piotr Tchaikovsky, supporting his chin with the back of his hand, and fiercely conducting the end of the Fifth Symphony. Antonina was stage left in her 'cell', madly scribbling a slogan in chalk on the jet-black wall. Nadia von Meck, his patron, was tearing up music and letters on the opposite side of the stage before collapsing onto the floor in a fit of jealousy, hatred and rage. Act One was certainly ending.

And Blackout.

Silence.

Polite applause. The worst kind. Sustained for an almost impolite amount of time. Maybe, I thought, they would refuse to stop clapping in the hope that they may prevent - or prohibit - what was to come. Were they demanding the curtain calls? I know I wasn't ... and I ducked back out to the bar to be met with the concerned frowns of the entire theatre staff. They had heard rapture all week. This was something they didn't recognise. But The Universe stepped in and made sure I did. She wanted to soften the blow. Immediately, and instinctively, I knew it had failed to lift off the ground.

I tried to lift my spirits as the foyer bar filled with punters ... but the buzz was hopelessly subdued. Act 2 was lighter, and shorter ... the fruits of the labour which was Act One were waiting to be harvested. Drama is tough on Act Ones. Audiences often conveniently ignore the fact that there's still much more of the story to come. Act Ones do the hard yards. Act Twos get to stand on the podium. (I remember a conversation with a theatre manager at another production of a play in mine in Melbourne who thought my Act One was "a dog", but he adored Act Two ... so much so that every night he was on duty, he would sneak in to watch it and sob quietly to himself in a curtained off alcove. After many conversations, he finally agreed that Act Two was only as good as it was because of the work that Act One had done to set it up.)

Sonia made a point of coming up to me and gripping me a little too tightly on the shoulder. My boy and his colleague left and I never saw or heard from either of them again. I picked at least two notebook-wielding critics, stealing food and engaged in quiet, almost catatonic, conversation. They didn't dare look at me. But sitting here today, I recognise the expressions they wore. I've worn one like it myself on those nights when you curse the obligation that prevails over your right to run as far and as fast away from this travesty of what some people think is theatre.

My friends from the Royal Opera were fighting with all their might to increase the buzz in the room. One of them called it 'compelling' ... a little too loudly. I just wanted it all to be over.

It would be. And it was. The only thing I was less certain of was the extent of the damage. Not yet anyway.

****

Following the performance, the company were invited to an extravagant supper at a nearby restaurant which Sonia and Roy had booked out for the purposes of our Opening Night Party. Forced jovial congratulations punctuated tense, deprived silences until Sonia made a speech about how proud she was to have my play in her theatre. She was actually quite convincing. I made a speech about how wonderful it was to have made it to Opening Night ... and how proud and grateful I was for everyone's efforts to get us here. I was genuinely moved by the impression this rancid beast of a play of mine had made on everyone. There may not have been plaudits galore, but there was creative and spiritual exhaustion ... the best kind.

In the days that followed, Sonia and my relationship would crumble underneath the most painful layers of betrayal, legal threats and toxic, unspoken blame that neither of us - in that blind passion-fuelled meeting so many, many weeks ago - ever imagined possible. In the meantime, I went home in a cab and lay awake all night ... hoping, against hope, that my instincts were, in fact, wrong. Until I fell asleep - dreaming of The Reviews.

Scraps of distraction: Part 3

2007-04-16T01:02:00.000+10:00

In order to even begin to take on The Theatre, you need to believe yourself to be endowed with the greatest and most dazzling array of capabilities and understanding. It's a marvellous conceit. Time and timing, space, reason, science, poetry, mathematics, fantasy, chemistry, reality, character, purpose, illusion, angles, shapes, psychology, darkness, light, half-light, habits, shade, patterns, distance, sound, beats, silence, phrasing, pace, tempo, relationships, juxtaposition, the myriad beginnings, middles, and ends, punctuation, breath, vowels, consonants, entire sentences, past, present, future, archetype, stereotype, cliché, conversation, dialogue, monologue, duologue, design, technique, swoops, drops, holds, tastes - and silent stillness, the master of all. Each and every seen and unseen element of a work in the theatre combines to power the communication of a single, precious moment. The honour the theatre provides for us is the opportunity to luxuriate in a shared moment of creation. Of our making. More than one would be implausible ... greedy ... not to mention impossible. More than you could possibly hope for. But it's what you aim for. The power to change lives. To change minds. To challenge. To teach. To entertain. To undeniably Be. Exist.

It's a fair exchange. The nights when the performances of this play were well-received were thrilling and life-enhancing. It should be against the law to feel this enriched and enlivened by what you have achieved. The conversations with audience members at the bar afterwards, if I had been at the performance or had dropped in for a peek and a free drink afterwards, were almost always fascinating. But compliments have always been impossible for me to accept. They still are. I never know how to process them.

But who did I think I was fooling? By the time Tunnels ... closed, I would be so roundly changed and profoundly defeated that the direction of my life would be changed forever.

****

The play is barely breathing. Helen quietly suggests that the "Top and Tail" is actually my new best friend - especially given the fact that the actors are now suddenly wholly suspicious. She gives me a impromptu lesson in shaving. Time. Good Stage Managers are actually the unsung heroines of great theatre. They are mostly women. With good reason. And whenever I work in the theatre, they always are - and always will be. I'm not sure I will ever fully understand why.

We disagree on a tense, ego-challenging detail: precisely how much shorter do I want it to be.

It's a magnificent question. A true mark of her genius. But it is a question I am unable to answer. I am not experienced enough in making theatre and I am still too attached to this thing that is lying, comatose and bleeding, on the greyest of black decks at my feet. The two Geoffreys are are fighting for perspective. Geoffrey The Director wants to keep directing a shorter version, while Geoffrey The Playwright just wants the best view from the best seats. And to get to the foyer bar sooner.

And for a fleeting moment my greatest ally considers abandoning me to my destiny. It's one thing to own your skills and imagination, it's another thing altogether to know how to prove them. And from this moment, our relationship begins to unravel. I have 'handed it over' to her, but I'm still in the way ... fussing around over the fall of the fabric. It's a masterful art, the balancing act of the transition of power in the theatre. Helen - had she held the total (as opposed to to the sub-total) sum of power and influence that was due her - could have saved me in ways I, only now, comprehend. And not even fully. We respect, and need, each other too much. This monstrously passionate play defies and devours our creative intellect and all our previous experience. Her way would be to force Tim to his dressing room wall with an elbow pressed tightly against his throat. Then, she would instruct him, almost cursorily, that there would be no point in him trying to deliver the monologue because the production would have moved on without him. She would ensure that he: a) vanished from sight in the blackout; b) drowned in the music cue; and/or c) was physically moved out of the way by the scene change she would not even bother telling him was now going to be take place around, and instead of, him. Or all three. And if not, a replacement actor can be at the theatre within fifteen minutes. A list of replacements is being drawn up as we speak ... and I can look at it at any time. I think she is joking ... until after we close, when she tucks the list inside her thank you card.

And I have dealt with recalcitrant actors very differently since. Partly to honour Helen, partly myself, but mostly to honour them. Actors become blind to the consequences of their actions. Everything is mapped out for them ... everything they say, think, feel, and do. They adopt. It is never a child of their own. The art of acting is, after all, the art of creative lying. It's why there is so rarely truth in it ... and it is why, when watching truly great actors like Sean Penn, the fact that they have made such unquestionable truth from such obvious deceit is mind-altering.

But loyalty is the Queen of The Whores in the theatre - and when a production is transitioning from rehearsal to sell-out previews in London, there's no knowing who'll swallow.

It will of course, in time, be me.

And, not for the first or last time, this work of mine defeats me.

Helen goes about her business and I suddenly feel like a paedophile in a playground. Watched. The first indiscretion will result in my banishment. Until Anna Scheer, the only Australian in the cast, braves the intimate distance between me and the not even one-year-old object of my affection. (Anna has since gone on to a career in performance art in Berlin. I hope, more than anything, that one day I can meet her again and talk. She was a wonderful, intuitive energy. And she didn't give a fuck about the length of anything.) She kept a barely respectable distance, but told me that there was still much work to be done. That 'length' was a purely subjective consideration. That my play was steadfastly refusing to run to somebody else's schedule. That good storytelling takes time.

And Helen called the Act One beginners to the stage.

****

Chaos.

Tim's little revolution has broadsided the ensemble and damaged it in ways I was not even aware of. They knew I wasn't happy and yet, it was only me they lived to please. It was only me who would take them with me when my play transferred to the West End as it was hotly tipped to do.

And they started walking into the furniture - AS it was being brought on stage. They didn't even have the good grace to wait until it was there.

A note was whisked into the theatre: would I do a publicity call this afternoon in the foyer and a photo out the front? No, I wouldn't. Buy another ad instead. They used to mean the same thing to me.

The "Top and Tails" eventually ended and Helen called another in fifteen minutes. I asked her how long I had before I no longer had the option of canceling this evening's preview. Given the fact that she ignored me, I assumed that she didn't think it was an option.

Tim was like the leper in a beauty pageant and the fat, ugly, tiny-dicked queen in a porn film all rolled into one. Robert (who was playing Piotr) couldn't look at him ... which was incredibly useful for an hour of the time they spent on stage together, but entirely and utterly inappropriate for the other two and half hours of stage time they shared. He had committed the cardinal sin of an ensemble: putting his own selfish, ego-centric opinions and vanity ahead of the needs of the group. He had betrayed himself, them, and me ... but ultimately 'us'. I thought momentarily about replacing him. It was, in retrospect, the only thing to have done. A new actor would have had the rest of the week to learn the shortened version of the role and, in the meantime, his isolation from the ensemble would suit the character perfectly. And I could have had the pick of the crop. This play, after all, was transferring to the West End. Sonia, unbeknownst to me, already had her lawyers drawing up the contracts.

But there was something about Tim's performance - like everyone's performance - that I truly, truly adored. We had travelled a long and incredibly difficult road together. I had cast him, from the nearly 200 actors who turned up to audition. The first time he had to strip in the rehearsal room was so painful and confronting for him that I still remember the look on his face as he demanded I order him to disrobe. It was like he was peeling off a layer of skin and I was astonished by - and grateful for - his vulnerability to the work (and to me) more than anything else. The scene was never rehearsed again. He was rivetting in it. (One night during the season, under the covers with Robert, he would not be able to contain an erection and, by midday the following day, we would be dealing with the first major legal challenge to the season - a 'Closing Order'. Ironic, really, in the country responsible for Fred and Rosemary West ... not to mention Myra Hindley.) And with only one or two exceptions, I despise the English to this day.

The Previews were, however, fantastic and the audience exit polls were incredibly positive. I poured over the feedback every night ... into the early hours of the morning. The red and black costumes (except for Antonina's asylum 'dress'): superb. Yvonne Kower's artful and inspired freeze-frame choreography for the opening party scene - where Antonina and Piotr's marriage collapses: brilliant. Much of the work was amazing ... yes, it was long ... but that was fine. It was getting shorter and faster. Security and confidence were nestling in amongst the fear and apprehension. There had not been one, single walk-out. The audiences were staying the distance.

As I heard the thunderous conclusion of Swan Lake followed by the rapturous applause following the end of the final preview, I slipped - pissed - from my bar stool upstairs and walked, haltingly, down the stairs to the foyer. The applause was still going ... my retarded child was being sent off into his season with great enthusiasm. It is apparently a theatre tradition in countries where theatre actually really matters. The final preview audience know they are witnessing a work in a state in which it will never exist again. A pen and ink study of the huge, sweeping canvas it is to become.

I stand and watch as the audience file out to a quiet and reflective section of the maestro's Piano Concerto No.1. Many are in tears. Most are fatigued. An elderly woman is the last to leave by a good fifteen minutes. I hope she hasn't died in her chair from boredom, but she stands slowly and reluctantly walks out of the auditorium. She stands at the door - moved beyond measure. I am concerned she is going to collapse. I glance nervously at one of the front of house staff who immediately comes over and supports her arm.

"Where is the writer?" she asks.

I am inclined - almost instinctively - to deny my role in the fiasco. Maybe she hated it so much that she wants to hit me ... and the front of house staff are trained to not identify anyone associated with the production without that person's consent.

"He's upstairs", I say.

The woman glances at the stairs and contemplates taking them on, but thinks better of it.

"His great, great suffering."

"Whose? The writer's?" I ask.

"No, you fool. The Maestro's! This writer ... the play ... has captured the weight ... the truth of his pain and suffering which was his music. His greatness."

"It's three hours! Don't you think it's a bit too long?" I ask.

"Pffft!" she discards, with tired contempt. "Of course not! What a ridiculous thing to say! You don't know what you're talking about. The time it takes is the time it needs to tell the story of such great pain and accomplishment. I hope you never have to suffer to the extent he did."

And with that, my Muse is supported out the door and into her waiting taxi.

"Suffer"? You ain't seen nothing yet old girl! But in the meantime, I bound up the stairs to the packed theatre bar to a spontaneous, heart-felt round of applause. I am touched, hugged, kissed and cajoled. The actors gradually appear and there is a great sense of unity, hope, expectation and a dream-like air of a monumental success.

Tomorrow, there is our sold out black-tie Opening Night. There will be flowers and telegrams.

And in the days that are to follow, the slaughter of the innocence.

Image: The Suffering, from the 'XBox' image library.

Scraps of distraction: Part 2

2007-04-15T11:46:00.000+10:00

There's to be a week of previews. I arrive at the theatre early every morning. The actors are called at midday. They need to sleep. The play runs for three and a half hours and they are exhausted. I check in with the theatre staff and look at the bookings sheet for the next preview. Sonia is ecstatic! The Previews are all nearly sold out ... and there is a buzz about "the Tchaikovsky play". Glenda Jackson (who played Piotr's wife - Antonina - in Ken Russell's Tchaikovsky film The Music Lovers) has been invited to opening night. So has Ken Russell. Jackson sends an autographed photo and Russell sends a note: 'Thank you for your invitation, but I am unable to support someone who appears to be making the same dreadful mistake as I did.' Or something like that. I left Russell's note at the theatre. By the time it was all over, I would hate more than anything how insightful he would turn out to have been. In the meantime, he can't be right: there's a waiting list for the black-tie opening night and the box office staff are fielding telephone calls all day.

Helen, our Stage Manager, is devoted to me and our play. She's always at the theatre before me, and over strong coffees, like neurosrugeons, we go through my notes. One morning, Sonia's husband Roy brings Jane Torvill and Christopher Dean into the operating room. They are clients of his and the three of them are off to a media call somewhere. They are looking forward to seeing the play tonight and glance excitedly around the space. I'm annoyed that they're there. A Director and Stage Manager's time together is sacred. Personal. Private. Sensing my impatience, Helen fluffs and giddies them out the door.

"Who were they?" I ask.

She ruffles my hair. "They're ice-skaters darling."

A note goes up to the office: we are not to be disturbed.

The stage is tiny and the rehearsal room was huge. That's my dilemma. The drama has shrunk from an horizon-less vista of possibility to a pinhead of reason. And it's no longer working. The ocean currents of air, space and 'room' around any creative work - both for spectators and practitioners - has vanished. The whole thing is feeling - and looking - pinched. My rehearsal process has failed us. Permission, safety, passion and consideration - by their very nature - lack economy.

The play exists around the music - not the other way around, so the music cues are analysed first. If Tchaikovsky's not onboard, this ship doesn't sail. We re-mark the beats.

Set changes are taking up far too much time. The crew will just need to get faster. The actors will need to get offstage quicker. We re-plot the scene changes. The actors won't exit ... they'll merge with the change. More needs to happen onstage in the blackout than off. Blackouts become cross-fades and I ignore the collisions and confusion that instantly appear in my mind. The morning is getting away and the actors will shortly start to arrive.

The cuts. To the script. Helen is concerned. The actors won't like it. We talk through them and she frowns. The whole time.

The actors start to arrive. Like excited children at a new playground. They are all early, which I like ... and as they all settle in the auditorium with their scripts on their knees, I wait on the stage for their attention.

"We need to make some cuts."

Lips purse. The steaming fresh turd in their sand-pit is obviously mine.

"It's too long."

The actors haven't yet mastered the art of disobeying or ignoring me, and the scripts are dutifully - if not reluctantly - marked. Tim, who is playing the Russian Prince Alexei, looks away. Tim trained as a ballet dancer and handles the physical vocabulary of Alexei magnificently. His painful and compulsive strip to nakedness in Act 2 is pure instinct and all courage. But he hasn't the actor's skill to deliver Alexei's bad poetry as subtext. He is playing it as cure, when it is actually disease.

The cuts are harsh ... and the general consensus is that they should have been made days - if not weeks - ago. I refuse to blame them for taking three of the eight week rehearsal period to even begin to connect to the passion of the piece. That would come later ... when I would find myself limb-less, gripping my steadily deflating life-raft with my teeth, alone at sea, at the height of a perfect and terrifying storm.

Bits and pieces here and there go. I justify each cut with extreme precision. I talk about tempo, pace, clarity and over-writing. I praise their abilities as an ensemble and remark that all of the dialogue we are losing is simply because they are acting so well. It might sound like a flabby embellishment, but it's true. I had simply written too much emotion. I still do.

The shark takes a huge bite out of one of Alexei's monologues. Tim rises out of his seat, throws his script to the ground and storms out of the theatre. I let him go. (There had been tantrums galore in the rehearsal room and there were some gob-smackingly memorable tantrums to come.) He needed to react. He was very good at it. And I knew he had met his match.

We continued the vivisection. Nobody argued.

Until the doors to the theatre were flung open and Tim stormed back in.

"I thought you were stronger than this". He was trying not to let me know he had been crying. "I think we all did."

I looked at Michaela, who was playing Antonina. Michaela was my anchor in the cast. She had secured the role at the auditions in the final showdown with Madonna's understudy in David Mamet's Speed The Plough on Broadway. If I had made a mistake, it would show in her eyes. Tim, it appeared, was telling the truth ... or at least part of it.

I faced him.

"Go on."

"Your ... beautiful words ..."

"The Playwright is not in the room, Tim." This had been a device I used, and would always use at work in the theatre everywhere, to differentiate between Geoffrey 'The Playwright' and Geoffrey 'The Director'. A safety-valve. A necessary mind-set. A creative schizophrenia ... which would also, years later, fracture the Melbourne production of Maestro ... but I digress.

"Well, I want him here. Because I, for one, am not going to cut one word."

The Playwright wanted to kiss him. The Director wanted to sack him. I needed stronger medication.

"If there's something you can suggest that might make this speech work more effectively as far as you're concerned, then let's have it. Because that's your only option. I'm going to deliver it, as it is, whether you like it or not!"

Helen wanted to kill him. I'm actually surprised she didn't. She, better than anyone, knew we would read about the length of this play in the reviews. (The extent to which it would bury us - and at the same time save us - was yet to be revealed.)

But the anchor of my theatre-making process was a concept called "Actor Ownership" - and Tim knew it.

"You gave this wonderful work to us. You are not going to take it away from us now."

My medication arrived as Sonia bounced into the theatre and rushed up to hug me. The Previews are now all entirely sold out ... and for the first time in the New End's recent history, the "House Full" sign had been dragged out from the pitch black of storage.

And for the last time in my theatre making experience, I gave up.

I had written the rule book which was now being used to penalise me. Actors in almost complete (as "complete" as it ever is) performance readiness are awesome foes. I had struggled for eight weeks to strip their Englishness away. They had run from the rehearsal room in tears. One of them had disappeared for nearly a week, so confronted had she been. English actors train in cause and effect - not emotional truth. It's all about the way it sounds and the way it looks - not about the way it feels. My ensemble were raw and their power was immense. I had made sure of it.

I looked at Tim, with honest eyes, for the last time. I would never be able to look at him in quite the same way again. (And once the reviews began to appear, he would never be able to look at me in quite the same way either.)

I didn't realise it at the time, but he was to become the last person to ever deny me permission. To my face, at least.

Helen let the company go with a half hour call to the "Top and Tail".

It would now be a matter of tweaking the length in other ways.

But Ego was to have other ideas. And, unbeknownst to me, I was squarely in Her sights.

Image: The New End Theatre Auditorium.

Scraps of distraction: Part 1

2007-04-14T17:06:00.000+10:00

When I was cleaning up 'my room' the other day, I found my Theatre Scrapbook. And with the heart-attack inducing speed and efficiency of Jason Voorhees, it always closes a particular window on my world. It's a point of impact. Hard ... and I always have to prepare myself to consider it again. Like a surgeon considering the length of the first cut.

The detritus of my time as an Independent Theatre Maker occupies lots of little nooks in my environment. Like landmines. I'll be searching for something else and suddenly find myself at the knuckle-whitening climax of a rollercoaster ride before idling in the company of familiar ghosts - back in the musty and haunted old Carlton Courthouse.

And beyond.

I also found this quote:
"It is the nature of the artist to mind excessively what is said about him. Literature is strewn with the wreckage of men who have minded beyond reason the opinions of others." – Virginia Woolf

My relationship with reviewers and reviews is complex. I have known many critics. I am one of them. And as an Independent Theatre Maker I have endured more than my fair share (which is actually a lie - on both counts). The questions that are often raised about how a critic should respond to a work constantly fascinate me. What is their purpose? Is anyone else ever really guaranteed to know? Is the act of criticism, much like the act of creation, essentially selfish? The kitchen is closed, but you sit down and read the menu anyway - fully expecting to be served.

I am preparing to make theatre again. It's a more significant statement than it might, at first, appear.

But first, I am going to dissect the single greatest love affair of my life. I am going to do something for myself that I have steadfastly distracted myself from doing up until this point in my life: I am going to remember. I was done with auditioning years ago. I'm done seeking validation and I don't need permission. I never have.

Many, many years ago I lost hold of something.

And now I need - and want - it back.

*****

London. 1991.

My play about maestro Piotr Illyich Tchaikovsky - Tunnels Without End* - is about to preview at the tiny New End Theatre in Hampstead. The owner of the theatre - Sonia Saunders - has taken a huge and significant risk. She loves this play, and has bumped six weeks of pre-Edinburgh try-outs out of the way to make room for it. And 'it' has arrived: costumes, sets, furniture, audio tapes, props, passion and hope. We absorb every particle of the theatre's being into our anticipation.

It is a ridiculous time.

Previewing any play is impossibly fraught - and this one was a breach birth. As a Director, you literally writhe in the agony of internalised (and sometimes externalised) reaction too vast to truly comprehend at the time. Lines are fucked up. Entrances are missed. Lighting cues are late ... or early. Fades don't and pauses extend ... and emotional truth is suddenly sacrificed at the almighty altar of Actor Insecurity. You are helpless as you watch your babies study recall. The light of comprehension in their eyes switches off ... leaving only panic in the light through the window. Meaningless stares into the middle distance. Nuance becomes a noisy hiccup. The carefully plotted interspatial relationships and complex stage patterns look like sloppy guess work. Silk threads become fence palings ... and snap. The tips of your fingers ache as you scribble notes ... veritable cures for cancer ... in the dark. Your internal organs strangle each other while your ankles tango and your knees embrace.

As a Writer, it is - quite simply - a sadomasochistic death-defying stunt of the highest order ... and leaping from The Empire State Building onto a matchbox-sized safety net would be like a walk in the park by comparison. It is not what you wrote ... nor what you heard, remembered, meant or intended.

As a Writer/Director, you want to leap out of your seat! You want to start again and again. "This scene is actually quite wonderful when they do it the way we've spent the last fucking eight weeks rehearsing the fucking thing!" you silence. "I actually do know what I'm doing - it's these lazy fuckwits that don't!" you mutely protest. He's too far downstage, upstage, offstage ... she's not even on the fucking same stage!

And all evidence of every whiff of creative potential is lost in the maelstrom - like a tea-candle in a typhoon. There is no contest. Or hope. But there will be Notes. Lots of them.

Tomorrow.

* Piotr Tchaikovsky once described his life as being "like a tunnel without an end". After seeing the rehearsed reading of the piece at Melbourne's Malthouse Theatre, Joan Harris AM suggested I change the title of the play to Maestro. So I did ... as you would.

Image: Outside The New End Theatre, 27 New End, Hampstead London NW3 1JD

Friday The 13th

2007-04-13T08:57:00.000+10:00

... and after the second round, I'm equal fourteenth (down from fifth) in gayfooty.com.au's Tipping Competition. I think I might go back to bed for the day.

The Others

2007-04-12T21:34:00.000+10:00

Scene: The exterior of a small yellow terrace house, hiding behind an almost overgrown garden in a narrow street. Albert Park, Melbourne. Late on a Sunday afternoon. Autumn.

I had arrived at the offices of my newspaper - Brother Sister - to work on the next edition. I have no idea where I had been, but the ritual of working and sleeping at our quaint little Albert Park terrace was well and truly ingrained. There was no other way it was possible. And I loved it. We had moved from the office in the city to the terrace in Albert Park, partly, to trim our overheads. Inner-city rents were increasingly tough on our new masthead, and our income had started to fluctuate. Quite dramatically. We bought dinners out and take-away coffees in during the Dance Party Season and bought Nescafé and boiled rice in at every other time of the year. The gay communities' obsessions with cocks, sex and dance parties has tortured every one of my titles to a inexorably slow, painful and inevitable death. It's now quite impossible for me to imagine that there is something else. Because there isn't.

But I digress.

I knew, instinctively, that I was in trouble. The man sitting behind the steering wheel of his parked car was trying not to watch what I was doing. Our address was published and public knowledge - and there was something about the look on his face ... and his vain attempt at not to be seen watching me. An abstract study of my every move.

My business partner and I had discussed not publishing our physical address. Just a PO Box. Safe. But we wanted our new masthead to be accessible. Visible. The opposite of anonymous. The edict of the day was: 'Yes we are gay and we exist! Get used to it!' - and the single greatest statement we could make was to stake our claim in the heart of quirky little Albert Park, and be proud of the fact. A perfect and worthy sentiment ... but not when some fag-hating psychopath is parked outside your suddenly not quite so commercially imperative statement of vibrant community pride and visibility.

There was only one way in and out of our tiny little terrace and I considered not going inside. His intention was palpable. A grim cross-examination. I was frightened ... and cautiously glancing over my shoulder, I fussed around in my bag for the keys to the door. The sound of a car door opening would be like a gunshot. I would be off, through the shrubs and - hopefully - out of his reach. I would race to the police station ... which was where? The shops, yes, just around the corner to the shops. Even with a bullet I would make it. Unless he possessed the skills of a marksman, in which case 'it' wouldn't matter.

My keys are in my hand ... fished out of my bag and waved around in full view like a white flag. Why was I making it so easy for him? Was my subconscious engaged in an act of unconditional surrender? Fags always have been, and always will be, easy targets. I would go inside and into my office, I decided. My office was the front room with an almost uninterrupted view of the street through a large window. I would stand by my couch, next the window, with my telephone in my hand. I would establish eye contact with the murderer outside ...

I drop the phone. The man behind the steering wheel has become the man walking along our front verandah to our front door with what appears to be several copies of my newspaper in his hand. I drop to the floor and reach for the receiver with the tips of my fingers. Got it! I pull the receiver toward me and the telephone crashes from my desk onto the floor ... taking my in-trays and out-trays prisoner. Fuck! Make some noise why don't you!?

My Fate (and my impending demise) is punctuated by a tentative knock on the door. Of course serial killers knock! Tentatively. 'It all seemed so ordinary Officer ... like he wanted to be my friend ...'

Another knock.

Silence.

My murderer presses his face to the window. Something akin to a determination not to be seen cowering on the floor like a weak, spineless poof forces me onto my feet. He holds the copies of my newspaper up to the window. I consider, for a moment, denying they're mine. If I hadn't have been so proud I could have pretended to be the cleaner!

"I want to talk to you about these."

He's uncertain ... uncomfortable. Is the desperation his now, not mine? When did that happen? But yes, the power has quite suddenly shifted ... and I instantly forget that glass is breakable.

"What about them?"

"Do you work here?"

"Yes. It's my newspaper."

"Then I need to talk to you."

"About what?"

A confused pause.

"About where I found these."

Cryptic.

Interesting.

"Can I talk to you?"

There is something about his vulnerability that forces me to consider opening the door. Vulnerable men are uncommon in my experience. There is a need to know ... to understand something that lies beyond his comprehension. This man is unique. He hasn't made up his mind about something he knows absolutely nothing about. He has no information. No opinion.

He is grateful when I do, finally, open the door, and he comes into our office - head bowed slightly, as though in reverent observation of my power ... my influence over his dilemma. His is obviously a nagging question built on disturbing doubt.

I gesture to the couch in my office. He slumps into it and rests his copies of my newspaper on his lap. I sit at my desk. There is no time, or reason, for pleasantries.

"I found these ... "

He can't continue. And I can't guess.

"In my son's room."

How do you confirm a father's worst nightmare?

"He's 16."

There is something that connects us - this stranger and I ... a singular indescribable energy I have never experienced since. It remains unique to this moment in my life, and probably his. I don't know if he is going to cry. I don't know if I am going to. He wants to look at me, but can't. I don't want to look at him, but can. I wait while he glances around my office.

Where is your son now?

He's out ... with his friends.

And his mother?

She didn't want to come. She didn't want me to come. She's very upset.

I understand.

He mistakes my youthfully naive attempt at empathy for blatant condescenion.

Do you?

He brandishes his copies of my newspaper ...

You publish this ... stuff! Don't you have any responsibility for where it ends up?

He is looking for a reason to explode. An admission of guilt in the safety of which he can admit his own. He doesn't know why, but someone must be made accountable. (Certain) men and their fear of curiousity. Their wholesale rejection of 'other'. But something about this man is different. I don't recognise it ... and I am suddenly certain that neither does he. Something else is at stake here - and, for me anyway, it is the safety of his son.

Yes.

And?

We publish this newspaper to let people know that there are others who are the same ...

The same? The same as what?

... as them. We publish news and information about ...

I've read what you publish. My son is 16.

And you're worried that your son is gay.

Shouldn't I be?

It's not only gay people who read our newspaper.

A flicker of hope I am wrong to encourage. But I am out of my depth. I've heard stories about the hatred and condemnation that can result in one of 'our' young 'coming out' to their parents. It comes with the territory. I am overwhelmed by statistics and hyperbole about youth suicide. Agit-prop. No-one really knows because dead baby poofs tell no tales. It's supposition, mostly. Riddled with cliché but powered by truth and suspicion. And fact. Michael was ... different ... a loner ... a sensitive boy ... he loved his drama classes ... he was popular with all the girls in his class ... he didn't have many close male friends ... an absent father.

I see this boy. I was this boy. I spat the truth of my own homosexuality into the back of my Father's head on the tip of a poisoned dart. He was in the front seat of our car, driving. My Mother was in the front passenger's seat, grieving. I knew I had to be out of reach. And out of sight. My Father was certainly not a violent man, but like most people, he knew enough to rely almost innately on an act of unquestionable strength and aggression when confronted with something he had no other means of addressing. The last great bastion of defence against an assault on everything he understood. When action hurts harder than words.

And I know how this is going to end.

Why did you come here?

He cannot answer. His lips are tight. He puffs his cheeks. And exhales.

Because ...

I wait. With knowledge.

Because I want to understand what this means.

What do you think it means?

He looks at me for the first time.

I really have no idea.

Do you think I understand what it means?

He suddenly grips his evidence and stands up.

This was a mistake.

He is suddenly as incapable of hurting me as I am capable of hurting him. A few well-chosen words in a tightly knit phrase could disassemble him. I know. I specialise in it. But it is a finely-honed skill that is of absolutely no use to me here.

Your son may or may not be gay.

He looks at me with an un-actable look of evenly matched resentment and gratitude.

But I think he probably is. And what he's found in our newspaper is something that he connects to ... something that tells him that he is not alone. I think it is fantastic that you have taken the trouble to come here, and I wish I could tell you something easier to hear ... but I'm not sure what that might be. But if you look at those newspapers closely, you will see that there is another world ...

I think I've seen all I need to ...

... that for whatever reason, your son has connected with.

Do you have a father?

Yes.

Does he know what you do?

No.

Does he know about this newspaper of yours?

No.

Why not?

Because that whole aspect of who I am doesn't exist for him. He's a Christian. It disgusts him.

And how do you feel about that? That your own father ...

It's not important to me what he thinks. I wouldn't be running this newspaper and having this conversation with you if it did.

Disconnection. He starts to walk toward the front door and I move quickly to open it for him. I'd like him to know that even gay people have manners. I know he wants to stay longer and I know I wish I had the vocabulary to encourage him to.

He walks slowly away, along the verandah.

Don't hurt your son for this.

He stops ... and turns, barely capable of bringing himself to face me again.

"Hurt" him? Do you think I would have gone to all this trouble if I was going to "hurt" my son anymore than you've already hurt him?

How have I managed to do that?

By showing him that all that (he tosses his copies of my newspaper at my feet) is possible.

Image: Sando Botticelli's The Story of Nastagio degli Onesti (First Episode).

The Mother of Distraction

2007-04-11T15:39:00.000+10:00

"Son ... don't just be a Reactionary," my Mother once quietly hoped of me. She caught me off-guard, as she so habitually did with that spooky maternal instinct of hers. I remember being quite taken aback at the time - so much so that I neglected to ask her to detail her apprehension and promptly returned to the baseless, grandiose, sweeping generalisation I was more than likely making at the expense of some poor hapless over-achiever.

It is 1980. The Games of the XXII Olympiad in Moscow. I am 16 ... and I am devoted to the gymnastics. Or to be more precise, the Gymnasts. The male Gymnasts - who are (to borrow a whorey old chestnut) poetry in motion. Beautiful men. Graceful, agile and strong. Focussed. Humble. Determined. Elegant. Our television is my pimp - and no price is too high. I am introduced to Infatuation. I try not to be obvious and (possibly a little too casually) tear myself away to the kitchen for a snack. Commentary connects us. And I am already saturated by their perfection. My Mother's sing-song voice interrupts my reverie:

"Your Gymnast is on!"

Fuck!

*****

It is 1987. I am 23. I have moved out of home and have visited my Mother at our family home. She is walking me to my car.

"Have you got anyone special in your life at the moment, Son?"

"No Mum."

A pause at the end of the driveway.

"Well, when you do, I hope you won't feel uncomfortable about bringing her home to meet us." ... (Beat) ... "Or him."

Jesus!

How the fuck does she know? Not even I know for sure yet!

*****

It is 1992. I am 28. I own a gay newspaper - Brother Sister - and The Australian Opera are staging their brilliant new production of The Mikado in the State Theatre in the Victorian Arts Centre. It is being conducted by a newcomer - Simone Young. My Mother was in a production of The Mikado many years ago, before asthma claimed her ability to sustain her breath in song. I accepted the Australian Opera's invitation to the opening night performance ... and, of course, I took my Mother. We dressed up. I went to the box office to collect our tickets. Which weren't there. Anywhere. My Mother looked on nervously. Embarrassed.

I have embarrassed My Mother ... who is resolutely standing beside me, her now possibly hopelessly deluded son, in the foyer of The State Theatre and my tickets are not there. I don't exist. The foyer is emptying. The final bell is ringing - endlessly. The ushers are cheerfully anticipating their cigarette break. My profound and stomach-churning embarrassment is confused by this newfound murderous capability: if I had had a gun I would have reached for it.

"I'm sorry Mr Williams, but there are no tickets here for you."

Impotency. Failure. I am introduced to a hatred of fatuous poofs.

My Mother can't stand it anymore. Sensibly, as always, she suggests we leave. I see the sadness of resignation in her eyes and my heart breaks. I know, because I hear it. And feel it. We start to walk away, and as soon as we are a respectable distance from the box office, I touch my Mother's arm and ask her to wait a minute. I am introduced to Fury ... and She's demanding Her say. I walk back to the box office and face the tired gaggle of thieving little jobbers behind the counter before I slam my business card down on their shiny black counter.

"I am going to bury this fucking production!" falls from my mouth like an axe.

They scramble for the business card. I cover it with my hand - a slam so intense my hand stings.

"And in less than a week, every faggot in this town is going to despise this fucking tin-pot testimony to artlessness in precisely the same way that I do now - and for precisely the same reason. You see that woman over there you have humiliated this evening? That is my fucking Mother!"

I lift my hand to reveal my business card, turn and walk away. My Mother is desperately searching for that hole in the floor she wished had appeared ten minutes ago.

I stride up to her like a dismemembered knight. Forcing a wan and forlorn smile. How else do you acknowledge this level of defeat?

"Excuse me ... Mr Williams?"

I think about not stopping. I've already composed the opening paragraph of what will be a full page article - page 3 I think - carefully and studiously dissecting The Australian Opera's rampant homophobia. Where, I find myself wondering, would the company be if it weren't for faggots? Would it even exist? Of course not.

My Mother puts her hand on my arm, and together, we turn. Racing across the foyer is a very, very concerned man. And flapping about in his waving hands are what I immediately recognise as theatre tickets. He offers them to me with trembling hands.

"Mr Williams, please accept our apologies."

"Shove your tickets up your arse!" I spit. "I've practically spell-checked this fucking article!"

Almost in spite of herself, my Mother laughs. Here is the boy she imagined she came to the Opera with.

"You're fucked! This whole fucking company is fucked!

His eyes plead. The tickets are offered again. I turn to my Mother.

"Do you want to see it?"

"Has it started?" she asks - with the timing and instinct I've always admired. And tried to emulate.

The poor hapless messenger panics and practically pirouettes back to the box office. Heads shake and bad hair-dos fall further apart. He turns back to us from his safe space, furiously shaking his head ... and as he trips over himself, my Mother and I (less than a little reluctantly) accompany him to Door 1. He escorts us down the stairs. The Houselights are at half. It's H Row. Right in the middle. And knowing as much as I did at the time about ticketing protocol, they were the seats the Director and his vain little sycophantic oxygen thieving partner might have been sitting in.

"It's a female conductor!" my Mother marvels as the domes introduce us to Simone Young for the first time. And we are away.

At interval, the company's publicist spots us and invites us to the VIP Room for champagne. We accent the buzz about the production, which is very good, and more importantly, my Mother is having the time of her life. As she leaves us to go to the bathroom, the publicist seizes her opportunity to apologise, very discreetly, for the "problem" with my tickets. There is no sign of my Mother returning, so I, too, seize my opportunity to, equally as discreetly, respond by saying that the greatest disservice that has been done to my Mother and I this evening is that it has made this sparkling new production of The Mikado rather impossible to truly enjoy. Or review. So I won't be.

And I didn't.

And up until this day, other than my exclusive and wonderfully candid interview with Simone Young for homo, I have never written a word about the Australian Opera. They, in mind - and much like the tickets that were to be under my name - didn't and don't exist.

*****

It is 1993. I am 29. Robert Chuter is seducing Melbourne with his promenade production of Julia Britton's An Indian Summer in the grounds of Rippon Lea. I still own a gay newspaper, but I am now also a Publicist. A well-connected fag about town. I have some clout ... and I also have a group booking: friends, clients, a couple of heavy-hitters ... and my boyfriend. Scattered around my blankets, it's champagne, fresh fruit, names, picnics and faces for days. I invite my Mother. She doesn't think my Father would like to come ... which is just as well, I say ... because he's not invited. He drops her off outside the gates. She has her folding chair, her blanket and her picnic in an all too-familiar tupperware container. I don't recall much about the performance ... but my Mother was entranced and enchanting! As one with her clever son. My friends adored her ... and all night, her eyes sparkled with delight.

It is a sight I will never forget ... and one I have rarely witnessed since. Our tragedy. My responsibility ... but not entirely my fault. It's one of the aspects of being brought up in a trenchantly Christian household I still resent so completely: the subjugation of women. "The Wife and Mother" as sole purpose, not context. Silenced to circumstance.

But that, as they say, is another story. Right now, I think I need to take my Mother to the opera. In Sydney. And pay for the flight, the accommodation and the fucking tickets! The Sheraton on The Park for a night or two I think. Don't you?

Image: Aleksandr Dityatin. Moscow, 24 July 1980. Games of the XXII Olympiad. Aleksandr Dityatin of the Soviet Union, gold medallist of the individual all-round competition, at the medal ceremony.

Waves of distraction

2007-04-10T14:01:00.000+10:00

After a brief but intense conversation with myself yesterday, I've decided that the essential purpose of my blog is to be A Journal. 'What', 'Who', 'Where' and 'When' as opposed to 'Why'. At least some of the time. I'm a little fatigued by the obsession. It's like the beginning of every love-affair, when you disappear into bed for days ... weeks ... 'making' love, kissing, holding, believing again - unquestionably - in the power of intimacy. The whisper of breath on your neck ... and the blissful ignorance of the rest of the world and all the people you knew and loved in it. Quick showers and endless embraces. The stomach is empty ... but the soul is full. And the soundtrack is Mahler. Eating, drinking, and any and every thing else become ad breaks in the 'end-of-season cliffhanger' of So, This Is Love.

Until one day, you realise you've lost the remote and you're stuck 'on' Ten. Seriously. The days of hungry embellishment become minutes of interminable obligation. The breath on your neck stinks. You run out of toothpaste. The voice cracks concrete and comes not only in another language but also from another room. The smile is toothless. The conversation is secondhand. The silence is preferable. The intimacy is acidic and the simplicity is complicated. The soundtrack is Trance. You're on SBS.

My parents called me yesterday ... our annual Easter catch-up. It goes like this: my Father tells me that the Uniting Church has decided to defend itself from the 'pressure of the gay and lesbian lobby'. "Well it's about time Daddy", I say ... without a hint of sarcasm. I am the archetypal son of a Preacher Man. It's the reason I over-react - the fatal flaw in my otherwise hopeful persona. I engage with the sentiment for two reasons: 1) I agree with, and encourage, him completely; and 2) he'll eventually put my Mother on. He and I politely ignore the fact that the chicken's a bit pink. She and I share dessert.

Maternal guidance is a quiet thing. Dads are the song and dance. Mums are the phrasing.

"Hello Geoffrey. Have you been behaving yourself?"

"Yes I have actually ... perfectly."

"Oh, what a shame. Why?"

Phwoomp. Harpooned. Again. She's famous for it ... and it's one of the things I love about her the most. Like the time she put "Cunt" on the Scrabble board and, in response to my seizure, my sister's plain-faced horror and my father's hotpot of shock, adoration and laughter, she brightly - if not somewhat rhetorically - asked: "Well, that's a word, isn't it?"

It was time to play hard. Sydney hard. It's the only way to begin to defy Mother's rather all too-clearly articulated disappointment.

The destination: Tamarama Surf Life Saving Club. The occasion: The world premiere screening of The Inaugural Surf Life Saving Association 2007 Sydney Gay + Lesbian Mardi Gras Float DVD. The relevance: I had participated (and was duly credited) by helping to dispose of 1,000 beachballs into the crowd along the parade route. The reason: Surely it's obvious.

I need to get 'off the grid' more often.

And I will write more about this wonderful evening when I stop catching sight of huge black fourteen legged spiders crawling from all directions toward my keyboard.

In the meantime ...

Blank verse

2007-04-09T12:00:00.000+10:00

I cleaned up 'my office' yesterday.* It's never a good sign. It usually means I imagine I'm going somewhere. Or that my housemate's cat, Miss Sin Sin - who is wandering dazed and confused through the advanced stages of both pussy dementia and renal failure - has managed to find what can only be the tiniest piece of carpet (beneath the plastic storage boxes, cardboard storage boxes and veritable pyramids of papers, yet-to-be-reconciled receipts, yet-to-be-filed file notes, newspapers, books, plastic bags, paper bags, sleeping bag, poster tubes, production samples, incense burners, spiral-bound notepads, yoga mat (!), first proofs, corrected proofs, second proofs, corrected second proofs, envelopes, million dollar ideas scribbled on the back of said - now takeaway coffee cup and cigarette ash stained - proofs, books, CDs, video tapes, shoe-boxes, photos - framed and unframed, press clippings, finished and unfinished scripts, unopened mail, pieces of no-longer-spiral-bound notepad paper, and ring-binders) on which to shit.

I respect her opinion. She's a cat. What choice do I have? That, and the fact that I think I'd have no choice but to respect even a human who, in the advanced stages of both dementia and renal failure, could manage to pull off a feat like that!

And I couldn't write. Oh no, it's not going to be one of those pieces is it? Well, I could ... BORING! ... but not about anything very interesting. Just words ... and writing is? ... Starved of comprehension. Well, it had to happen.

Where's the through-line, I asked myself. Oh dear. What's the point? It was all going so swimmingly! What's the reason? Here we go! Where's the irony? What's the difference? Humourless. Witless. Artless. Shit. Stop taking yourself so seriously! ... too seriously ... don't get too carried away ... don't be so self-indulgent! ... don't self-edit ... wanker! ... stop doubting yourself! ... unless you're right to ... judging yourself ... someone's got to ... why such high expectations? ... think of the reader, your audience ... they don't want to read about how fucking complex it all is ... they want ... who cares what 'they' want? ... I'm not doing this for them ... of course you are! ... it's a journal ... you're a fucking show-off ... a record of my time ... wow! how thrilling! ... so that this time next year ... too optimistic ... I will be able to look back ... not with all those melanomas .... at all I have written ... rivetting as it is ... and not have to wonder ... did I mention 'verbose'? ... what I did ... or didn't do ... all year. Where I was ... and where was that ... what it meant ... here we go ... how it felt ... "meaning" something all the time ... finally comprehending why, all those years ago, you and I stopped writing in the first place.

I beg your pardon?

Fuck off!

Because it's too hard.

Sometimes.

Exhausting.

You literary genius you.

Questions.

Answers.

Thief.

Liar.

Borrowed observations.

It's all been said before.

Possibly.

By people better than you.

Possibly.

Much better than you.

Definitely.

You are a fraud.

Yes.

A liar.

No.

And ultimately, no-one cares.

I know.

So?

So just how responsible should I be feeling for what hasn't become of this little boy's dreams, plans and ambitions?

*See: The Encyclopedia of Distraction, pp 48-56.

Established distraction

2007-04-08T00:47:00.001+10:00

I've always considered myself 'anti-establishment'. To my very core. Homosexual, unfortunately ... sadly even. Single, passionately. Broke, cyclically. Imaginative, cursedly. Independent, determinedly. Creative, habitually. Leftist, necessarily. Anti-establishment ... single-mindedly. And in spite of the feisty arguments and passionate altercations my blind faith in any and every thing anti-establishment may have fueled over the years, it's actually one of the aspects of my character I've never been entirely comfortable with.

Until yesterday ... when Rosemary Neill wrote into my life.

With this - the single most fearless piece of Theatre Arts journalism written for an Australian newspaper since ... for as long as I can remember.

Why has Rosemary Neill's article had such a major impact on me?

Ms Neill has dared to rise above the suspicion that dare not speak its name: that taxpayer funded Arts organisations - their internal processes and procedures - are somehow impervious to media scrutiny. The Sydney Theatre Company - in fact possibly any performing arts company in Australia - has, to my knowledge, never been scrutinised with this much tenacious spirit and clarity. Ms Neill's article is meticulously researched, authoritative, beautifully structured, razor sharp, and written with great detail, style and courage.

And just like the screenplays for Mississippi Burning and Silence of the Lambs, it's something I truly wish I'd written.

Perhaps most critically, it finally bucks the increasingly disturbing trend throughout the Australian media generally of hapless fawning over the insidious nature of both 'minor' and 'major' celebrity ... to the point where you could almost be forgiven for thinking that New Weekly is our national journal of record ... our New Yorker ... our Time, as it were.

Valid Passport? Check.

I mean, really! In the blog-eyed and Google-eyed blur that was my last week, our increasingly story-addled The Sydney Morning Herald, via their almost perfunctory online edition smh.com.au led - yes led - with a huge photo story about Shane and Simone Warne getting back together! Well roll me over and fuck me sideways with a dead dingo's donga - that's news! And what are they 'photo story leading' with this evening? Well might you ask: "Dehydrated Chappell in hospital: Former Australian cricket captain Greg Chappell, who quit as India coach this week, undergoes hospital tests." Give the man a glass of water, not a fucking headline!

Big suitcase? Check.

I love Cate Blanchett as much as the next person, but please - she's not the greatest actress of this or any century. And in case you missed the critical word in that sentence, it was 'actress' ... so can we please all try and keep this thing in perspective? I mean, I've typographically and graphically designed some nice looking shit in my day and I've been nominated for - and won - an award or two, but hello? ... reality check? ... it doesn't automatically qualify me for the Creative/Artistic Director job at Saatchi & Saatchi. Even if the job were to have been advertised - which, perhaps not ironically - the Artistic Director position ... er, positions ... at the Sydney Theatre Company was/were not.

Visas? Check.

I predict that the Sydney Theatre Company's response will be as cynical as it is well-rehearsed. Ms Neill will be accused of subscribing (pardon the pun) to the "Tall Poppy Syndrome". She will probably be called "Un-Australian" and accused of gross unfairness to Ms Blanchett and Mr Upton by daring to pre-empt 'what we're sure will be a dazzling, daring and successful 2009 Sydney Theatre Company Season'. They will probably be referred to as 'easy targets'. She will be accused of parochialism of the highest order by even questioning the decision to import Phillip Seymour Hoffman to direct one of Mr Upton's plays at the expense of a job for a local director. And in an 'industry' where the unemployment rate rarely falls below about 78 percent - that is a shameful ego-centric crime against the creative talent in this country. One almost wonders what the Media and Entertainment Arts Alliance might have to say about it. I doubt we'll ever know.

But it's the penalty for even faintly suggesting that Robyn Nevin is nepotistic that obliterates even my rampant imagination! (If the wind had changed direction this morning, I'm convinced I might have heard the reaction from here!)

Credit card with zero balance? Check.

Rosemary Neill is responsible for the fact that a few things about who I am mean more to me today than they did yesterday. Chief among them is the realisation that we must read - and write - about unpopular truths. They might keep us poor, but they keep us honest ... just as much as they help us to nurture, value, understand, develop and maintain our personal and creative ambition and integrity. That arrogance and conceit are weapons employed, quite strategically and selfishly, by those in privileged positions to keep the less well-connected and more faint-hearted but equally as capable folk at bay. And that 'anti-establishment' sensibilities are, collectively, equal to significantly more than my ever-faithful flame-thrower, habitually tucked under my arm in preparation for what might turn out to be impossibly boring dinner party conversation.

Anti-establishment is a cultural responsibility.

Shit! Wait!

With a bit of 'Googlestraction', it would seem that Rosemary Neill is certainly no stranger to controversy - or the concept of 'unpopular truths'. Here is a link to her book - published in 2002.

Cancel that cab! Let's put on a play! Maestro?

Flights of distraction

2007-04-07T11:18:00.000+10:00

I am an aviation junkie. There. I've said it. "Stricken airliners" litter my dreamscape. "Under the flightpath" is a rental property imperative. The unmistakable smell of an airport sets my nerves and senses alight ... and in the days when I used to have a car, I would often spontaneously drive down to Botany Bay, park my car, and walk along the sandy path to my precious 'plane spotting enclosure' - only metres from runway 16R/34L (Kingsford Smith's main north-south runway). And here, I would spend hours and hours happily high on aviation-fuelled distraction.

There is something utterly compelling about the sight of a Boeing 747 powering up the runway, heavy with fuel, cargo, passengers and crew. It is a majestic and awe-inspiring event. Every time. One jaw-dropping thrill after another. O Fortuna invariably sweeps through my internal stereo system as the gigantic conglomeration of man's mastery of aerodynamics, chemistry, science and design thunders down the runway. The front wheels lift off ... and there is that moment where that peculiar little angle of an aircraft's tail suddenly displays its truth of purpose - gliding, only ever a few thrillingly exact few feet it seems, perfectly parallel to the runway. And then the ultimate show of strength and vision ... the conquest of the point of no return ... as the aircraft leaves the ground, heaving itself with laborious thrust and utter determination into the sky. I always hold my breath. The landing gear folds neatly away into the hold. It's better than sex. I have never been known to wish for it to end. And the experience is always punctuated by a little tinge of sadness and regret when the glittering object of my affection - and undivided attention - is but a speck in the distance. Unlike almost every film I've ever seen, I always want to see it again. I was paying attention but I might have missed something of this utterly hypnotic display. Theatre has rarely been this good ... but unlike Theatre, I have absolutely no idea how this happens. It defies my comprehension, each and every single time.

Plane spotting is a fixation - a hobby that, unlike stamp collecting, gives something back. Absolutely. Even just waiting for an airplane to put in an appearance on the tarmac and taxi past us invokes the rare thrill of anticipation ... and I am rarely alone in my cyclone fenced Utopia. People come with their children, cameras, tripods, and ladders ... and if I am really lucky, radios locked on to the Air Traffic Control Tower frequency are clipped to the fence for the intimate, private pleasure of our merry band of worshippers. It's so much fun I'm surprised there's not a law against it. Or a tax. Or, at the very least, an entry fee.

If plane spotting is my addiction, then actually flying is - surely - a fix as close to heaven as I'm ever going to get ... a silent, illicit thrill that triggers an almost unbearable manifestation of fear, apprehension, delight, and wonder. On my most recent flight to Melbourne, I was sitting behind a father and his two very young daughters, one of whom, like me, had managed to secure the First Prize - A Window Seat. Our push back from the terminal was late. Our wait on the tarmac was interminable. The Pilot informed us, wryly, that it was always like this at Kingsford Smith on a Friday night. His voice immediately went through some kind of internal filter I think we all share in some small, but incredibly significant way: does this sound like the voice of a man who knows what he's doing? Am I prepared to trust this man with my life? Have I done the right thing accepting a window seat at the rear of the aircraft? I did have a choice ... 23C (aisle) or 47A (window) ... I can't get Jane Froman out of my head.

We were running late. Our taxi to take-off is a jolly affair ... and fast ... an added treat! I strain in my seat to glimpse behind us.

"Look Daddy!" the little girl in front of me exclaims. "Look at all the other planes behind us!"

I thought the very words I was thinking had inadvertently escaped. Had I really just shouted? Was my delinquent, internal dialogue unable to help itself? I glanced quickly around to make sure no-one was looking at me ... nervously ... the way I'm sure we all do, almost innately these days, to reassure ourselves that our fellow passengers reveal a complete lack of visible 'hijack' or 'random act of sharpened chop-stick wielding terrorism' potential.

Our 737 turns on her heels and settles at the end of the runway.

"Look Daddy!"

Power. A shift ... my new girlfriend gives me a sexy little shimmy ... and here we go into the sequence that always, for me anyway, more than entirely justifies the cost of a seat on a plane. Every last cent.

"Wow! Daddy! We're going so fast!"

For some reason, it's a longer than anticipated race.

"Get up, get up" I urge, soundlessly.

"When are we going to take-off Daddy?

Shut up little girl.

... and then yes! The magical tilt. I can see what it looks like from inside and I know what we look like from outside. My heart sings.

"Oh Daddy! The buildings are so small ... look at the lights! They are so beautiful! They're beautiful Daddy! Look!"

I'm looking. I'm smiling ... fuck it, beaming. And right there in front of me, the very articulation of my own delight. My odious, adult and silenced joy.

We bank to the right ... and I wonder when it happens, this adult imperative to suppress our innermost squeals of joy and wonder. And when do we learn to accept it? When did silent observance become an acceptable form of expression? Who determined that rule? Certainly not, I would suggest, the people who dreamed that a mass of heaving metal could fly.

Timing is everything

2007-04-06T20:41:00.000+10:00

As a tyro Publicist, I used to angst over my media releases ... I mean, journos are a really tough crowd. I used to wonder if there was ever anything written, at any time, for anyone that had either: as much riding on it (media coverage); or that could be passed over with the same snide, know-it-all, super-critical (these people write for a living after all) glance before illiciting a Publicist-hating, now-you've-fucked-up-my-deadline, fuelled cry: 'What a crock of boring, verbose shit! Who do they think gives a fuck!? Fuck these fucking time-wasting, uneducated, moron fucking Publicists! Jesus!' Sound of media release being violently destroyed and chucked in the bin.

I remember a time I was having a few beers with a journalist in Melbourne. (I actually remember more than a few beers with more than a few journalists ... but that's not the point.) This particular journo told me that most journalists actually like to receive media releases ... and that they find them very useful. But, he cautioned, it's all about when we receive them. Good publicists know media schedules. They also learn when to make that 'follow-up' call ... and trust me, it's really not good when you fuck the timing of those up:

PUBLICIST: "What's that sound I can hear in the background, darl?"
JOURNALIST: "That? Oh, that's just our final copy call deadline bell."
PUBLICIST: "Gorgeous! Now, about that media release ..."
JOURNALIST: "I'm going to hang up the phone now."

(Clunk.)

These days, there's also a fantastic online media release dissemination service called PRWeb. You register, you tick your field(s) of interest, and every day, without fail, they send you lots of media releases. I am registered on PRWeb from the days when I was editing, writing, designing and formatting The Pink Broad), and I receive about 30 media releases every day. Right about now. Some of them are actually very interesting and, yes, very useful. Others - after my interpretation of the infamous 'know-it-all, super-critical glance' - go straight into the trash.

Of the dozen or so that arrived today (Good Friday), there was one which absolutely compelled me to reward such a delightful display of initiative ... and it gives me great pleasure to introduce you to their website.

Which just goes to prove that timing is, in fact, everything. And you've really got to admire theirs.

Bless.

The sound we just heard ...

2007-04-05T18:16:00.000+10:00

... was a hand grenade landing at the feet of our Prime Minister John Howard and our Treasurer Peter Costello. Call me a 'Conspiracy Theorist' ... call me an 'Old Pinko' ... accuse me of being so socio-politically blinkered that I am only capable of using the 'left' hand side of the stove ... categorise me, for your convenience, as you will - but I am tipping that the undeniable thud we heard last night has marked the beginning of the end of John Howard's Prime Ministership.

Here's why.

As reported on ABC News last night, the Commonwealth Government's Treasury Secretary Ken Henry (whose boss is Peter Costello) took it upon himself to fearlessly announce that 'good policy can often fall victim to political opportunity when an election beckons'. The Australian encapsulates it all rather neatly in their Editorial here.

Howard and Costello were, quite obviously, both caught horribly off-guard. It was easy to recognise because they rarely are. As media performers, Howard is especially hard to beat. Costello's hastily convened media call following Ken Henry's announcement was a brief and jittery appearance - with our Crown Prince of the Facetious Smirk looking and sounding noticeably ruffled. Costello is such a veteran of these sorts of pit-stops that it is rare to see him looking off into the middle distance, even for a second or two, trying to ignore the fact that an elephant has just trampled across the garden behind him. By Costello's impervious standards, it was a wholly unconvincing performance.

Then there was Prime Minister Howard's positively sullen interview last night with Kerry O'Brien on ABC TV's 7.30 Report. Was I the only one to notice Howard's nervous tick - the apparently uncontrollable little twitch courtesy of his right shoulder?

But 'the devil' is in the detail, as it were: the "policy" in question. And what was that? Ah, yes. Water. And who is the Parliamentary Secretary for water?

It would appear that someone, somewhere, has decided that the Government stand little chance of winning the Federal election to be held sometime this year with either Howard or Costello as leader of the Liberal Party. Ladies and gentlemen ... start your engines.

Stopping All Stations

2007-04-05T12:41:00.000+10:00

Easter is such a problem. For the small business operator, it's long enough to be a 'shut down' and short enough to be a real nuisance. "We'll be 'looking at', 'thinking about', 'responding to that' after Easter" ... "That invoice won't be paid until after Easter" ... . As a child growing up in an unforgivably Christian household, Easter was a real mind-fuck. It was impossibly bleak. Shops would shut ... and gloom and doom would descend on our, otherwise, perfectly happy household. It was a veritable tsunami of interminable guilt and suffering (Friday), reverent anticipation (Saturday) and strident rejoicing (Sunday). For the Recovering Christian, Easter remains a heady mix of ingrained duty and obligation ... and like many of the rituals I still associate with the practice of Christianity, essentially one of messy contradictions. Well might the rock have been rolled away, but the Easter Eggs were (and still are) always scarce.

My father was, and still is, a preacher in the High Methodist tradition. He was also responsible for the Easter Candlelight Prayer Vigil at our local church ... and every year, my faith-full Dad would draw up a roster of believers who would take it in turns to sit at the altar of our little church to ensure the single candle (symbolising our spiritual accompaniment of Jesus on the journey to his crucifixion - 'The (fourteen) Stations of The Cross') never went out. The vigil would start at 8pm on Thursday evening and end at about 9am on Friday morning when the Minister leading the Good Friday Service would extinguish the candle to symbolise Christ's death ... murder ... passing ... homecoming ... betrayal ... what you will.

My father would spend hours on the phone tending his blueprint. 'So and so' were going away ... 'so and so' were interstate ... 'so and so' would love to, but ... 'so and so' were sorry, but ... and so and so on. One year, he ended up doing four separate shifts at times of the morning that were, for the rest of the congregation, decidedly un-Godly. And while our home was always stressful, tense and complicated for the duration of this thankless task, I envied his devotion.

A short time after I had moved out of home, my mother called to tell me that my father was having great difficulty filling his Candlelight Vigil roster. I was in the thick of therapy and, possibly even writhing around on my bed like Linda Blair's 'Regan', I think I snarled something typically badly-intentioned, blasphemous and entirely lacking in irony like: "Jesus Christ! Is he still peddling that shit?" down the phone. My mother, knowing - as mothers infuriatingly do - that I treated sleeping at night with the same level of contempt as I treated my health generally, thought I may like to offer to help him out by taking the early morning slots ... those times when it was apparently inconvenient for the rest of the congregation to be up. Even though I was in the midst of fanatically despising both of my parents for the dazzling array of sins they had (not, as it turned out) commited throughout my entire childhood, I agreed to call him. After all, 3am was easy for me ... and yes mum, I'll try not to be pissed. Christ!

I rang my Candlelight Prayer Vigil Roster-fatigued father who gratefully accepted my offer to fill in the gaps. I would take over from Him, sorry, him, at 3am and 'accompany Jesus to the cross' until 9am when people would start to arrive for the Good Friday service.

The fourteen 'Stations of the Cross', as documented both in the Christian faith and my father's Easter Candlelight Prayer Vigil Roster, are: 1. Jesus is condemned to death; 2. Jesus receives the cross; 3. Jesus falls the first time; 4. Jesus meets His Mother; 5. Simon of Cyrene carries the cross; 6. Veronica wipes Jesus' face with her veil; 7. Jesus falls the second time; 8. Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem; 9. Jesus falls the third time; 10. Jesus is stripped of His garments; 11. Crucifixion - Jesus is nailed to the cross; 12. Jesus dies on the cross; 13. Jesus' body removed from the cross; and 14. Jesus is laid in the tomb. I was to take over from my father as Jesus fell for the third time and be there in faithful observation until Jesus was laid in the tomb, and the congregation had arrived to worship.

Acts of faith are decidedly loaded undertakings - where that part of the brain that qualifies our actions as meaningful and appropriate to the given circumstances, proves simply incapable of resolving the inverted equations (of which the World Trade Center 2 + 2 = 0 is the quintessential example of our age). But I was acting out my faith for the benefit of my father ... in spite of the fact that the philosophy of John Wesley's Methodism contains more than a generous strain of emotional, psychological and physical child abuse. (Years later, I would include faithfully transcribed details of Wesley's teachings relating to The Child(ren) as material evidence in a submission I was commissioned to write for the Australian Senate Enquiry into the Mandatory Reporting of Child Abuse). And while I certainly do not consider myself an abused child, Mind Fuck Methodism certainly defined the physicalisation and the fractures that will forever mark the complex and demanding relationship I share(d) with the Christian faith in general, and my father specifically.

Arriving at the church remains a striking memory. It was cold. I was early. I was sober. I was drug-free ... and I was rugged up and ready to draw on all of my theatrical reserves and 'do this thing'. It would be easier than television. I thought. My father was very happy to see me ... and for the briefest of moments, as we met at the altar in the flickering candlelight, his faith and my acceptance and understanding of it, was an undeniable reality. The peace and resolve was quite profound. He showed me The Prayer Book, where people had written their requests for prayer. There was the little old lady down the road who was expected to die come the resurrection. And there were others. I was to pray these collective requests ... but more than anything else, I was to be here as keeper of the candle. If it went out, I was to re-light it with a match from the box beside it. I was to be beside Jesus in his hour of need. And with that, my father left ... shortly after which I, of course, immediately fell asleep.

And on this occasion anyway, Christ died on my watch.

I woke only when the lady who had arrived with the floral arrangements was fastidiously (and perhaps intentionally a little too noisly, thank God) attending to her task. Those who know me well will understand how soundly I sleep ... and for how long ... and how hilarious it might have been watching this particular Good Friday service delivered over the prostrate, paralysed, dribbling, snoring and talking body of Geoffrey sprawled - immovable, stranded, inert and unconscious - across the altar. I didn't know where I was and, the momentary disassociation was impacted (with the velocity of an incredibly high speed head on collision between a semi-trailer and a tiny hatchback on a stretch of desolate rural single-lane highway) with fear that I could, for the first time in my life, taste. The candle had gone out.

Pulverised with fear, I very reluctantly looked up. A scattering of people were arriving and there were some already seated. I witnessed this by, not only the almost surgical quality of fluorescent light, but also by the now barely discernible but instantly recognisable flickering light of 'my' candle. Well might I have abandoned Christ in his hour(s) of need, but it would seem that He had chosen not to provide any evidence of it.

In the good Methodist tradition, I expected to be punished when I least expected it. Instead, it would later be confirmed, that the true measure of significance was that I was physically 'there'. 'Popping out to the 7-11 for a late night snack' would have been an indisputable error of Judgement - and consequently impossible to either accept or forgive. Christ's death, on the other hand, was unpreventable - and whether I was asleep or awake, it was the presence of a living (albeit snoring) soul beside the candle that was the quintessential and undeniable truth of this particular ritual. It took me years, however, to get over the embarrassment ... and to be honest, especially writing about it now, I'm not entirely convinced that I have.

In the years since I rejected Christianity and have chosen to live my life, instead, worshipping at the altar of The Almighty Haphazard, there have been moments when it has been impossible to deny the presence of something beyond even the clockwork curiosity of my imagination. There has been more than one occasion when a gentle but determined hand on my shoulder has prevented me from stepping from the footpath into the path of an oncoming car. I have suddenly been inspired to call a friend at the perfect time, and I have spent time on stage buried under dirt in a shallow and very crowded grave.

But my lasting memory of the Easter Candlelight Prayer Vigil is also crowded ... crowded by acceptance, forgiveness, company and precious solitude. And the point at where, while in the tranquil company of Jesus, I was powerless to prevent the most all-consuming, blissfully ignorant and unintentional sleep I have ever had.

Image: Barry Moser's The Crucifixion.

The Patron Saint(s) of Distraction

2007-04-04T12:23:00.000+10:00

The Footy Season has started! And yes, I know I'm supposed to be trying to find Another Client, but - clearly - I didn't name this blog The Art of Distraction for nothing!

Last night I had my gorgeous friends Richard and Julia over for dinner. I first met Richard when he auditioned (successfully) for a role in the Melbourne production of Maestro - my play about Piotr Tchaikovsky. Julia is a wonderful writer, and I have directed two of her plays for the short play festival 'Short and Sweet'. I cooked potato and leek soup, chicken with sage and lemon accompanied by mashed potato and lightly steamed broccoli, carrots and beans ... and for dessert we had poached (in mint and cloves) apple topped with blueberries, raspberries and King Island cream. The fresh fruit platter didn't make it to the table because we were all too full.

Anyway, the cute boy holding the footy is Nick dal Santo .... and after the first round, I'm equal fifth in gayfooty.com.au's Tipping Competition!

A Complicated Business

2007-04-03T00:23:00.000+10:00

My little creative agency lost A Client today. So now we have one ... well actually half of one - given that they're not really what I would call A Client. Sure, they bring in reasonable chunks of work - but not nearly frequently enough. They're lovely people and the work they do makes a real difference in the world (admittedly in small but meaningful ways) ... but they're still not what I'd call A Client. So, "Did Geoffrey have his head buried so far up his own Art Of Distraction he failed to see this coming?" you may well ponder.

Well, I'm afraid it's a great deal more complicated than that. You see there are people who 'do' running a small business well and there are people who don't. There are people who plough through their various and seemingly unending financial reporting tasks in MYOB or Quicken (or both) and there are those who, instead, prefer to plough through a bowl of vanilla ice-cream and Cottee's chocolate topping. There are those people who Excel at spreadsheets, cashflow forecasts and summaries, and there those who purposefully ridicule these concepts by using excel as a proper noun, not a verb. There are people who are masters in the concept of New Business Development and there are those who wonder why the phone's not ringing more often. There are people who grasp the basic value of a 'network' and there are those who loved Peter Finch and, especially, Faye Dunaway in it.

There are those people who use tried and trusted marketing and advertising strategies to prompt business enquiries and there are those who write them for everyone else but who refuse to believe they need one of their own. There are people who are incredibly motivated toward success and there are those who are cynical about the whole 'success' thing ... not to mention more than a little too keenly devoted to anonymity. There are those people who are determined to break out of 'The Poverty Cycle' and those who are not altogether convinced that there is anything even remotely 'cyclic' about it. There are those people who invest in state-of-the-art technology to enhance their business's productivity and competitive edge and there are those who don't even own a cordless telephone ... or an iPod. There are those who master the efficiency and ease of PDAs and Blueberries and there are those who don't know what 'PDA' stands for and who prefer their 'Blueberries' spelled with a lowercase 'b' and in a bowl, preferably served with lots of King Island cream.

There are people who can put those extra little business expenses onto their Credit Cards and there are those for whom the tireless exposure to the word 'Declined' is a source of constant public humiliation - even at the bottle shop. Especially at the bottle shop. There are people who create and monitor budgets and there are those who think they're simply too expensive when compared to Bayswater, even if you factor in their 'unlimited kilometres' deal. There are people who implement strategies to protect their business's 'bottom line' and there are those who think a 'bottom line' is that mark you get on your bum when you've been sitting on a toilet seat reading for too long. There are those people who develop targeted Direct Email Marketing Campaigns and there are those who instantly trash emails from people they don't know. There are people who actively source 'new business leads' and there are those who try and beat their computer at chess ... or themselves at Tetris. Or Solitaire.

There are people who are really good at doing one thing and those who are really good at doing many. Too many. There are people who prefer coffees to complication, eating to equations, fucking to follow-ups, walking to wireless, movies to meetings, laughing to leasing, simplicity to strategising, partying to planning, butterflies to break-evens and practically anything to the curse of ambition.

I hope I'm writing metaphorically when I write that 'the jury is still out' where my little enterprise is concerned ... but just in case I'm not, I'll be re-engaging in the art of distraction when I'm sure I can continue to pay for my internet connection. And that, my friends, is about as close to the 'bottom line' as I'm prepared to go.

Image: The Scream

The Ego Has Landed*

2007-04-02T02:58:00.000+10:00

My housemate had sage words of advice for me about The Art of Distraction yesterday: "Don't disappear too far up your own arse, Doll". Bless him. And fair enough too. The poor boy has to put up with my smelly socks, seemingly endless 'Where's Geoffrey's Rent This Fortnight?' crises, a shoddy time-and-body-clock that malfunctions with a creative irregularity all of its very own, a veritable mushroom cloud of constant cigarette smoke, and my life-threatening allergy to housework.

The issue, you see, is that I am captivated by my humble little blog (which my housemate also suggested I might re-title The Danger of Distraction).

The simple truth of the matter is that many years ago I fancied myself as a bit of a writer. When I sold my (slightly less than majority) shares in Brother Sister, the Melbourne gay newspaper I started with my friend Jeffrey Grad, I spent six months writing a play called The World ... According to Timothy Cross while living off the proceeds. And then the money ran out. The money always runs out ... which is why, ten years ago, I started my little graphic design business - to keep regular money coming in while I kept writing.

It remains the single greatest miscalculation of my life.

Developing as a writer is like breathing. To stop is death. To rush is to create chaos ... a kind of word-weary lightheadedness that gradually severs the connection between the writing and the reason. Words present so many possibilities ... not only which ones and where, but which ones next, and why? Words have an incredible impact on me. There are books I have read that I have not wanted to end ... so much so that I have avoided finishing them - sometimes for days. Words - and the time and space before, after and even during them - harbour potential for unimaginable power. There have been moments in the theatre where words have had the power to literally alter my physical and emotional state. The final line of Brian Friel's Dancing at Lughnasa - impossible to quote here out of its dramatic context - resulted, for me, in a sudden gasp, an equally memorable exhale, and unexpected tears. The best kind. My body changed shape. My hands covered my mouth. Such is the power of words.

I respect words enormously, and for too long now I have used them almost exclusively as weapons to fend off penury ... and intimacy ... and often in trite, meaningless and idle chat of little or no consequence. I have sometimes found the courage to use the right ones at the right time, and occasionally the wrong ones at the wrong time. I am more grateful than I think you know for the comments that have encouraged me to write. It has made me realise that, if we do nothing else once a day, we should say something encouraging, generous, kind, positive and supportive to ourselves ... and possibly to someone else as well. It musn't be that hard.

I have been living here in Randwick for a little over a year now. Immediately prior to moving in here, I had managed to use the wrong words but, incredibly fortuitously as it turned out, at the right time.

But that's another story.

*With apologies to Jack Higgins

Meeting Deborah Kerr: Part Two

2007-04-01T01:32:00.001+10:00

I am still wiping the tears from my cheeks with the back of my hand as I am ushered through the Stage Door into another world. My arrival backstage has caused great consternation, and my father is refusing to trust any of these suspect theatrical types ... or to let anyone within five feet of me. Only after profuse apologies for having caused my distress and embarassment, does he let me into the care of a woman who assures him that Geoffrey is definitely being taken to meet Deborah Kerr.

I am quickly escorted down a very cramped and narrow passageway to a closed door. A rapid knock ... and the door is opened by a kind and attentive woman who, I will come to learn, is Miss Kerr's personal assistant. Understanding a little about protocol, I offer her the flowers and the chocolates, expecting that she will want to do something with them. By now my carnations are desperately in need of some water. "No, no ... it will be much nicer if you give them to Miss Kerr." Her instinctively maternal smile practically sedates me - and a tissue magically appears in her hand for me to use to wipe my cheeks. I explain that I hadn't been expecting to cry tonight so I didn't have a hankie. With great warmth, I am assured that there will not be a need for any more tears ... that there had been a terrible misunderstanding ... and that if I would like to sit down, Miss Kerr will not be too much longer.

I try to be inconspicuous as I glance around the small room. There are two lovely, big Louis XIV chairs - one of which I am sitting on - and a writing desk with a chair of its own against the wall to my left. To my right, next to the now closed door, is a tallboy, made, I imagine, from some kind of exotic timber, and finished in a dark chocolate lacquer. I recall a red, patterned curtain hanging from the ceiling to the floor, behind which I imagine an area where someone could relax in complete privacy ... away, even, from expected and welcome visitors.

And it is from behind this curtain that Deborah Kerr finally appears.

As soon as I see her, my heart feels as though it is going to break free from my chest. I sit glued to my chair in awe, fear, admiration and adoration. Deborah Kerr! - who had first undone me in the final scene of An Affair To Remember ... the Mrs Anna Leonowens who, among other things, had defined the role of dance on film for me in her polka with Yul Brynner in The King and I ... the actress who had more than matched wits with Robert Mitchum in Heaven Knows, Mr Allison and the actress who was in that scene with Burt Lancaster in From Here To Eternity! My mind unexpectedly assails me with stills, scenes, music, titles, costumes, famous faces, famous names - Mitchum, Brynner, Grant, Clift ... directors - Korda, Huston, Zinnemann ... and I think I am going to be sick. Or pass out.

The Deborah Kerr that is actually standing barely three feet from me, instantly comes back into stark relief. She is wearing an elegant pale blue robe and her magnificent red hair is casually bunched up on top of her head. The greasepaint is gone, and her skin is radiant ... positively luminous. How simply, sublimely beautiful she is ... and even though hers is a face I have seen in literally hundreds of thousands of celluloid frames - nothing could ever have prepared me for how magnificent it is to see her in person. She has, quite literally, taken my breath away.

I find myself on my feet, holding out my bunch of flowers and the box of chocolates ... and she melts. "They're blue!" I exclaim, slightly perplexed that, as much as she has made such an impression on me, this wide-eyed young man with blue flowers and chocolates has apparently made something of an impression on her. "Yes, yes they are!" she replies. "I didn't know you could get blue carnations." "You can't," I declare proudly. "They're actually white, but because blue is your favourite colour, the florist sprayed them with a can of blue dye!" She offers me her left cheek, which I nervously kiss - as though it were made of the rarest and most precious porcelain. She hands the chocolates and flowers to her assistant who has appeared from behind the curtain - only to vanish again and return a minute later with my flowers in a vase. They are placed on top of the tallboy ... and as her assistant disappears again, Deborah Kerr and I sit down to talk.

I hadn't expected to be speechless. My mind fights itself for a question ... and I feel sick about the fact that I have no idea what to say. She begins by apologising for what had happened to me outside, and I tell her that it didn't really matter. "But it does matter Geoff. It matters to me ... and I am very sorry that you were treated so very, very badly." The phrasing, timbre and accent is unmistakable. "What", my frantic mind taunts me, "do you think you are doing thinking you have something to say to Deborah Kerr?"

We talked about so many people and so many things. She spoke with great fondness, and with more than a hint of a wry smile or two, about the truly great men she had worked with and how there had never really been anyone like them since. She told me how she didn't really like the kinds of movies that were being made 'these days' - or, more generally, the calibre of storytelling on film. Yes, she tells me, the films she and her peers made were not only from different, complex and challenging times - but they explored and encompassed grand themes and difficult details. Audiences came to the movies to most certainly be entertained ... but also to immerse themselves in the world of storytelling - a world in which intimacy and interpersonal relationships were based on something other than the cheap jokes, shallow themes, sex and titillation. Her world of story, and that of her peers, was a vastly different world compared to the one we were living in 'today'.

We talked about how, when she died, she wanted to be buried in Wales ... and how, because of the IRA, she had been prevented from spending as much time as she would have liked in her beloved Ireland. I told her I was going to be an actor and she gave me some valuable tips - an impromptu acting lesson from Deborah Kerr! I have never forgotten the many little details she told me - and as she stood to offer clues to her technique - I was sure that acting classes would never be the same again.

And, like dropping unexpectedly from a great altitude, my time is up. Miss Kerr holds out her right hand, which I take in mine. She offers me her right cheek again, which I kiss - this time with a great deal more enthusiasm than I had managed the first time. Her personal assistant appears again and walks purposefully toward the door. Deborah Kerr looks at the theatre program and record cover I am clutching in my hands and asks me if I would like her to sign them for me. I had forgotten about them entirely. "Yes please!", I reply.

Miss Kerr moves gracefully to the desk and sits down. Her assistant takes the program and record cover from me, and moves to stand beside Miss Kerr at the desk. The record cover is placed on the desk first and Miss Kerr holds up her right hand, into which her assistant places, more precisely than I ever imagined possible, a dark blue felt tip marker. I am transfixed by the expert efficiency of it all. Miss Kerr doesn't need to adjust the position of the marker in her hand before she autographs the record cover - which is then replaced by the theatre program, opened to the full page portrait of her. This too, is signed ... and Deborah Kerr stands up again and faces me. To this day I still have no idea where the marker disappeared to, but her assistant hands me both the theatre program and record cover with a generous smile.

And then she opens the door.

I sneak one last look at Deborah Kerr ... but this time, all and everything I had earlier associated with her is not rampaging through my mind. I see a great woman ... who had taken twenty minutes of her precious time to make this young man's dream come true. Her assistant directs me back up the passageway, and gently closes the door on my adventure.

I find myself back where I came in. There is no-one else but the security guard, who nonchalantly opens the Stage Door and lets me out into reality. It's a heady collision. I float to the car where my father is patiently waiting. He asks me how I had gone and I tell him everything in breath-draining detail. I show him my record cover and I open my theatre program.

There, in simple, unaffected script - with a hint of flourish, is my message to treasure forever: For Geoff, With Affection, Deborah Kerr.

Meeting Deborah Kerr: Part One

2007-03-31T11:04:00.000+10:00

In 1979, one of my favourite actresses - Deborah Kerr - arrived in my hometown of Melbourne to star in Frank Harvey's play The Day After The Fair at the Comedy Theatre. I was fifteen years old ... and it became my mission to meet her.

Based on the short story On The Western Circuit by Thomas Hardy, The Day After The Fair tells the story of Anna (Lynette Curran), a young, servant girl who meets an attractive stranger - Charles (Andrew Macfarlane), a barrister from London, at the local fair. Anna works for Edith (Deborah Kerr) - the unhappy and unfulfilled wife of the local brewery owner. When a letter arrives, to Anna from Charles, the illiterate Anna asks Edith to read it aloud to her. Edith does so, and is immediately captivated by the declarations of love and affection which have been sadly lacking in her own life. Edith, reluctantly, agrees to write a response which Anna dictates ... but as time goes on, Edith adopts the relationship as her own, but continues to sign the letters in Anna's name. Some months later, Anna reveals to Edith that she is pregnant, and the father is Charles. Believing that their unending love and devotion for each other will support them to the end of their days together and beyond, Charles proposes marriage and a wedding is arranged. The final scene of this monumental drama is the confrontation between Charles and Edith - when Edith confirms his worst nightmare: that instead of marrying this hapless, illiterate servant girl, it is in fact Edith that he is really in love with - and her with him.

I will never forget the final heart-beat of this production. Deborah Kerr, alone in the middle of a gargantuan set in a beautiful blue gown. As the love of her life strides out of the room, dragging his distraught new wife behind him, Deborah Kerr drew her hands to her face and threw her head back in utter despair. The stage, with the exception of the precise spot she was occupying, was plunged into darkness ... and Kerr's decimated Edith was alone in a blinding shaft of light from above, which - seconds later - was snapped to black.

I have never forgotten this night in the theatre. It is, I believe, one of my first truly great theatrical experiences.

It's Saturday morning and I make what will become the first of many telephone calls to the Comedy Theatre Box Office. It's the only number listed in the telephone directory. I say that I would like to meet Deborah Kerr. 'Impossible', is the response, and the call is ended. I'm fifteen years old. I don't fully comprehend impossible. I still don't. After waiting five minutes, I call the box office again. The lady on the end of the line politely explains that she is unable to grant my request, and again, the call is ended. Excuse me! I remember thinking ... getting my way with my own mother is never even this much hard work! I wait five minutes and call again. "This is the box office number darling", she tells me ... before recommending I call the Stage Door on the number she reads out to me, and ask to leave a message for someone called the Company Manager. I thank her, and we end our call.

No-one answers the Stage Door telephone. I try several times, but each and every time it rings out. I call my new friend at the Box Office again and explain that no-one is answering at the Stage Door. My friend laughs ... as I confirm that yes, I am going to call the Box Office every five minutes and repeat my request to meet Deborah Kerr. She asks me to wait a moment and, with what I imagine was her hand over the mouthpiece, talks to someone nearby. She takes her hand away from the mouthpiece and asks me if I will be happy to wait for a moment. Of course, I confirm, and I am put on hold.

I contemplate this new word 'impossible' ... and wonder how it can be applied to a young boy's request to meet one of his idols who is, after all, only an hour's drive away on Exhibition Street. We have a car ... the performance ends at some point ... and I have incredibly dutiful and obliging parents who will drive me. Where does this strange new concept of "impossible" figure in all this?

My friend comes back onto the phone. Can I be at the Stage Door after the performance this coming Friday night? Yes, I can be. Good, my friend confirms. You can meet Miss Kerr after the performance. Have I seen the play? Yes, I have ... and I prattle on about how much I loved it. My new friend interrupts me to tell me that she really has to go ... and I thank her for her time and effort. We end our call, and I race off to find the keepers of the car keys.

Friday afternoon finally arrives. I work, after school and sometimes on the weekend, at our local fruit shop and, quite possibly for the only time in my life, I have managed to save some money. My first stop is the florist. Now, you may not know this, but Deborah Kerr's favourite colour is blue ... so I march into the florist shop and ask for a bunch of blue flowers. Apparently, there are no blue flowers in stock. Here's that wretched 'impossible' again. I explain that I need blue flowers because I am going to meet Deborah Kerr tonight and her favourite colour is blue. The florist is immediately impressed, and suggests that we spray a bunch of white carnations with a can of blue dye. Perfect, I proclaim ... and five minutes later I am marching out of the shop with a bunch of, now blue, white carnations, wrapped in blue cellophane with a lovely big blue ribbon tied around them. (I'm only fifteen, after all - and as much as I am yet to fully comprehend 'impossible' ... the concept of "over-kill" is something I fear I will never understand.)

My next stop is the Milk Bar, where I buy a box of Cadbury chocolates in a purple box with a blue ribbon. Aha! A box of Cadbury chocolates in any colour other than purple really is impossible. I race home to get ready. I put on my best suit, shirt and tie ... and with my flowers and chocolates, and my The Day After The Fair theatre program and my The King and I record cover for Miss Kerr to autograph, I sit and wait until it's time for my father to drive me into the city.

With our car parked, my father walks with me to the Stage Door, which of course, is locked. Some time later, the performance ends ... and as the huge crowd disperses, I become increasingly concerned by the number of people who are gathering next to me at the Stage Door. There's at least fifteen people, and as I clutch my gifts and mementos to my chest, I am greatly concerned that I look like I may have over-prepared. Bruce Mansfield (then a very famous newsreader) is there, and it is his smile for me that instantly puts me at ease. I am dressed and ready. There's no going back.

Well, at least I didn't think there could be. Not now ... surely.

The Stage Door opens, and a man forces his way out and onto the periphery of our little group. He apologises ... but Miss Kerr will not be meeting anyone this evening. Every ounce of nervous tension and wondrous expectation escapes my body. My father, in his (on this occasion anyway) thrillingly stentorian fashion, says there must be some mistake. I burst into tears. I can't help it ... but neither, it would appear, can this harbinger of doom and disappointment. Miss Kerr is not feeling well and has requested that her wishes be respected. I now fully comprehend 'impossible'. My father continues to protest, shattered I now understand, by the sight of his proud and determined young son, dressed in a suit and tie and clutching his gifts and souvenirs to his chest, decimated by some prima donna's mild post-performance exhaustion. The man apologises again and disappears behind the closing Stage Door. The sound of the bolt is too final. Bruce Mansfield pats me on the head and tells me not to mind too much ... that there will be another opportunity.

As our vanquished little band disperses ... my father makes every effort to console me. I feel 'impossibly' sad. And foolish. Suddenly, the stage door opens and our harbinger of now utter despair and desolation, practically falls out onto the footpath. "I'm sorry, but is Geoffrey Williams here?" he calls. With reflexes polished by what could only be years of necessary adult reaction, my father turns back and confirms that indeed he is. "Miss Kerr will see you, Geoffrey", he says.

I have two very distinct memories of this moment: my father quickly ushering me back to the Stage Door ... and the look on Bruce Mansfield's face. Even fame, it would appear, still manages to make some things 'impossible'.

Review: The Nightwatchman

2007-03-30T19:15:00.001+10:00

Reunion Dramas, and their close cousins, Memory Plays, have become trustworthy and reliable friends in the world of theatre literature. There is the parable of The Prodigal Son. There is Arthur Miller's The Price and Ernest Thompson's On Golden Pond. There is Catherine Hayes' memorably sardonic Skirmishes, which I saw at La Mama many, many moons ago. There is Brian Friels' Dancing at Lughnasa, the original Abbey Theatre production of which I was fortunate enough to see the night it opened on London's West End. And there is Daniel Keene's The Nightwatchman, commissioned by La Compagnie des Docks, Boulogne, France.

They are complex beasts, these reliable friends of ours. They are prone to sentimentality and over-embellishment. They can, in fact, occasionally be prone toward the very anithesis of reliability ... and sometimes even downright deceitfulness. They can be selfish, pre-possessing friends who are so wrapped up in the wonder of their own recollection that the fact we are bothering to engage with them at all becomes a point of conjecture ... both for them and us. And like any single memory, or catalogue of many, the extent to which another will find it compelling becomes entirely subjective. They sometimes battle to find the balance between necessary exposition and simply too much information ... not to mention the conflict between how we, as individuals, sometimes re-imagine the essential truth of an experience to suit ourselves. To remain, steadfastly within our comfort zones. To honour the truth - as we remember it ... or possibly as we prefer to remember it. My sister and I habitually disagree over details of our shared childhood ... to the point where I have been known to question whether or not we actually spent as much time together as we did experiencing the same things.

As The Nightwatchman begins, we are in the middle of a familiar ritual. A sprightly, elderly, blind patriarch, Bill, is preparing to sell the home in which he was born - a home he would later share with his (now deceased) wife and their children Helen and Michael - who have arrived to help their father prepare for the impending move away from, as far as they're concerned, all he knows and understands. But just how much does Bill really understand about the life he has lived ... and the people he has shared it with?

Listening to Daniel Keene is like watching butter slowly melt in a warm saucepan. It is hopeless to even attempt to try and resist the control he has over our shared destination. Keene is unrelenting in his determination that we shall arrive - not be left wandering and wondering ... and like all great craftsmen, Keene's is not necessarily the shortest route ... or the most scenic. But it will be the most memorable, and you will see, hear and imagine things you never knew existed. And there will be no room left in your heart for regret.

Sadly, this Griffin Theatre Company Australian premiere is rendered, almost painfully inert, humourless, impotent and fatally grounded. The experience of it becomes like watching the survivors of some hideous car accident wandering dazed and confused around what is left of their respective vehicles. It steadfastly refuses to honour the concept of pace ... that memories as contradictory, illusive, illusitory and life-changing as these rarely unfold in such a convenient manner. Memory assaults. The truth of memory - both cerebral and emotional - has the power to turn the strongest will, capable of even the greatest acts of denial, to dust. It has the power to determine the strength of our very ability to go on ... and endure.

Alice Babidge's design powerfully renders a minimalist post-apocolyptic world: the surface of the stage thick with tiny dull, dull grey pebbles ... and jet-black walls. "Once a garden" becomes the motif, but there was no evidence in the text that this garden had been decimated by a bushfire. It's the first of many significant and obtrusive elements that result in near-suffocation of the text ... most notably because the design, unlike the text, insists that the colour of blindness is black ... that simply because we can no longer see, we cannot recall a lifetime of the tones and flashes of light that inform Bill's, and our, experience of it.

It is difficult to know what to say about the actors. Alex Dimitriades (who had rehearsed the role of Michael) was indisposed, and Brett Stiller (fresh from his success in Holding The Man) was giving his third performance in the role. The lack of pace, combined with a veritable array of fussy stage business and quite simply too many unfulfilled comings and goings, constantly ambushes Camilla Ah Kin's otherwise steadfastly noble reading of Helen. Ah Kin's work, I can only imagine, would have been the most exposed to insecurity in Dimitriade's absence - given that they share not only a key relationship, but also a great deal of time together on stage. At first, I found her interpretation too calculated. Cool. Chilled. Later, her silent scream and her one genuine, heartfelt smile, immediately revealed evidence of a great performance struggling to get out. Brett Stiller was a revelation. I know a Michael. I know a Michael very, very well. He is a close friend of mine ... and he too, is a photographer who wears grey t-shirts and doesn't care too much for his hair. Stiller captures Michael's fatigue with life, his art and his character's distance from heart beautifully.

Sadly, given the complete lack of directorial purpose, it is William Zappa (Bill) whose pivotal performance becomes almost impossible to write about. There were certainly moments of the William Zappa who helped to inspire me to attend this production in the first place ... but he, too, is continuously upstaged by some of the more vapid directorial choices. As every one of Bill's senses is being tormented by an almost unearthly collision of time, place, sense and meaning - a heart-beat from the denoument - we are subjected to an embarrassingly fraudulent fall over a mis-placed chair. But nothing remains more difficult to comprehend than the 'miming of smelling the flowers' routine, up one entire side of the tiny Stables stage - only to deliver a beautiful monologue about something and someone to the jet-black back wall. There is sometimes a point in the theatre-going experience where it becomes simply impossible to forgive its flaws. And on this occasion, this was it.

Keene's text still manages to wrap its arms around you with phrases of compelling depth, beauty, clarity, playfulness and insight. It still manages to caress, stroke, massage and choke - even in spite of the treatment it receives here. And that is the mark of a truly great writer. On this point, my memory does not deceive me.

The Nightwatchman by Daniel Keene
Director Lee Lewis; Designer Alice Babidge; Lighting Designer Luiz Pampolha; Composer/Sound Designer Max Lyandvert
With Camilla Ah Kin, Alex Dimitriades & William Zappa.
A Griffin Australian Premiere.

Questionable Distraction: Part One

2007-03-30T00:53:00.000+10:00

Scene: Night-time. Three men - let's call them Brad, Greg and Geoffrey - are perched on stools in a busy inner-city pub drinking beer. Brad and Geoffrey used to work together ... and they love to laugh and share a beer or ten - which, sadly, they do less and less these days. They haven't seen each other for a long time and are engaged in lively, nicotine-fuelled gossip. Greg (who knows Brad well but has only just met Geoffrey) is clearly enjoying their waspish repartee ... and of course Brad and Geoffrey are showing off shamelessly - like tipsy peacocks. In the midst of a veritable torrent of snide put-downs and caustic character assassinations, they pause for breath. Greg, taking the opportunity to participate, leans bravely into the conversation. "So, what do you do Geoffrey - if you don't mind me asking?"

It's an interesting question: "What do you do?" ... and one I find increasingly difficult to answer. Frankly, it's a real conversation stopper. My problem, you see, is that I don't really 'do' anything - at least not by the generally recognisable standards of polite social order and interaction. More for the sake of expediency than anything else, I told Greg* I was a "Fee Slut". I have come to really love and respect the term "Fee Slut". I first heard the term when, perhaps ironically now that I think about it, I had asked a gorgeously interesting woman I had just met at a party what she 'did'. A Fee Slut, as I expect you have already figured out, is someone who does anything for a fee. Fee Sluts are also people who can't be bothered going into what we perceive to be superfluous (not to mention difficult to summarise and justify in a minute or two) details about our lives with someone we've just met ... and are unlikely to ever see again.

One of the problems I have with the whole 'what I do defines who I am' concept, is that it can lead to somewhat premature conclusions about what we're worth ... what we offer to the world, or - at the very least - the conversation. It's as though the mundane, lung-cancer inducing thing(s) I 'do' to keep the roof over my head, the nicotine coursing through my veins and the caffeine coursing through whatever part of my anatomy caffeine courses through, somehow collectively offer a key to a greater understanding of who I am. I 'do' graphic design because my clients pay me to. I 'do' the odd little publicity or public relations gig because my clients pay me to. I write the very occasional Brand Management Discussion Paper because my clients pay me to. I typeset, I write copy, I mess around in Photoshop and Illustrator, I design display advertisements, brochures, catalogues, business cards, websites, letterheads, CD slicks and presentation folders because my clients pay me to. It reveals no more about who I really am than it does about who you really are.

Why do we do it? Why is it that with almost monotonous regularity, people - myself included - always ask this question within minutes of meeting someone ... and in just about any given circumstance? Is it that we expect the answer might put whoever it is we're asking it of in some kind of, I don't know, illuminating context? Does the answer ever really tell us more about the person than if we'd asked, say, "So, tea or coffee - what's your preference?" ... or "So, toilet paper - folder or scruncher?"

I have to be honest. Apart from the fact that I 'do' so many different things (most of which I find too common, ordinary and inane to even bother mentioning), the biggest problem I have with being asked this question is that I always imagined that by this stage of my life, people wouldn't have to ask me what I 'do' ... because they'd already know. You've just been introduced to Al Pacino at a party. What are you going to say? "Hi Al, Geoffrey. So, what do you do?" Or Steven Spielberg ... "Hi Steve. Nice suit. So Steve, what do you do?" You see my problem? I am wracked with pain, guilt, fear and regret about having failed to live up to the expectations I set for myself.

I expected to be famous.

I actually was famous once, albeit in a very suburban fashion. I used to have a career as an actor in television - until a nasty amphetamine habit rendered my eyeballs and my powers of short-term memory entirely useless for the purposes of an actor's requisite proximity to a television camera ... not to mention the messy little details associated with character development and story narrative. I was stumbling through what turned out to be an almost embarrassingly brief contract on a television show called Carson's Law. I was so drug-fucked that I once managed to get from North Dandenong (where I lived in heterosexual bliss) to Collingwood (where we were filming) in eighteen minutes. In morning peak hour.

Perhaps most problematic where my acting for television was concerned, is that I could never remember what I had just 'done'. My vainglorious association with the show came to an abrupt end when, during a scene featuring Lorraine Bailey and some poor hapless guest in the witness stand, my character had apparently 'done' something interesting by way of a reaction to what was going on. Make-up was called ... and as Ms Bailey looked on with thinly veiled impatience, a light metre was held up next to my blood-shot eyes, tape measures assured the cameraman of an appropriate distance between me and the camera, a light - about three metres from me - was inched closer, the large and heavy front panelled section of the jury box was moved out of the way, and the confidence-erradicating beast which is The Television Camera was swung in my direction and floated toward me. "Do that again", said the director. "Rehearsal! ... and, standing by ... and ... action!" "What ... exactly" I asked. "What you just did ... when you looked from Lorraine to (whoever it was in the witness stand)." I gave it a go. A crew member shifted his considerable weight from one foot to the other ... and as anyone who has ever worked as an actor for television will confirm, once you have the crew offside you can quite literally count what remains of your career options in nano-seconds. "No, no," said the director, "do the look ... ". Poor Lorraine, bless her. I still recall her wan smile of encouragement ... her vain hope that I might rise to the occasion. I gave it another go ... and the director looked at me with an expression that, today, I would recognise as a mixture of disdain, disappointment, contempt and bewilderment. Without either further adieu or the shot, he turned his back on me. The light that had been inched closer to me was moved back, the large and heavy front panelled section of the jury box was put back, and the confidence-erradicating beast which is The Television Camera was swung away from me and floated back to where the real actors were.

Some weeks later, an episode of Carson's Law I had been in was on television and the following day, I went with my Mum to Safeway to help with the grocery shopping. I wore my baseball cap and sunglasses ... masquerading as some kind of Glen Waverley-based, lame excuse for television royalty. As we stood in the check-out queue, both Mum and I started to notice that people were looking at me. A woman asked my Mum if it was in fact her son who had been on Carson's Law last night ... and Mum, who has never been more proud, nodded and smiled. As a small audience of admirers began to form around us, we gathered our groceries and left the shopping centre ... my wonderful Mum and her famous son.

Today, I feel Universally blessed to have had so many wonderful opportunities throughout my life to have had a go at 'doing' all sorts of interesting things ... but to what extent they define who we are is a subject I am really looking forward to exploring. Bear with me. This could get interesting.

So, what don't you do?

*Greg, by the way, is an Architect, Photographer and Writer.

More Thursday laughs

2007-03-29T22:02:00.000+10:00

My gorgeous girlfriend in the UK - Salli - is one of those people who loves to send me funny emails ... and given that I am still struggling with an especially recalcitrant blog entry, here - just out of the inbox - are some jokes which made me laugh. I hope they make you laugh too.

A woman came home, screeching her car into the driveway, and ran into the house. She slammed the door and shouted at the top of her lungs: "Honey, pack your bags. I won the lottery!"
The husband said: "Oh my God! What should I pack, beach stuff or mountain stuff?"
"Doesn't matter," said his wife, "just get out!"

A Polish immigrant went to apply for a driver's license. First, of course, he had to take an eye sight test. The optician showed him a card with the letters:
C Z W I X N O S T A C Z
"Can you read this?" the optician asked.
"Read it?" the Polish guy replied, "I know the guy!"

Mother Superior called all the nuns together and said to them: "I must tell you all something. We have a case of gonorrhea in the convent."
"Thank God," said an elderly nun at the back. "I'm so tired of chardonnay."

A wife was making a breakfast of fried eggs for her husband. Suddenly, her husband burst into the kitchen. "Careful!" he said, "CAREFUL! Put in some more butter! Oh my GOD! You're cooking too many at once. TOO MANY! Turn them! TURN THEM NOW! We need more butter. Oh my GOD! WHERE are we going to get MORE BUTTER? They're going to STICK! Careful CAREFUL! I said be CAREFUL! You NEVER listen to me when you're cooking! Never! Turn them! Hurry up! Are you CRAZY? Have you LOST your mind? Don't forget to salt them. You know you always forget to salt them. Use the salt. USE THE SALT! THE SALT!"
His wife stared at him. " What in the world is wrong with you? You think I don't know how to fry a couple of eggs?"
The husband calmly replied, " I just wanted to show you what it feels like when I'm driving."

The last joke reminds me of a time when, while enjoying a holiday in WA's Margaret River with a very dear friend, my ... yes, self-esteem barely survived an especially memorable drive from our hotel to a local restaurant for dinner. The memories, perhaps ominously for the driver on that particular occasion, are flooding back in almost finite detail!

Brand management

2007-03-29T15:03:00.000+10:00

One of the great joys of the email revolution is that every so often, someone (in this case, thank you JD!) will get their hands on an absolute pearler - to be pinged around the globe with breath-taking speed and efficiency. For my distraction dollar, the classic amongst these are those that belong to the 'really well-written Letter of Complaint' genre. I recall sketchy details of an absolute stunner sent to Optus (which I'd really love to get my hands on again - anyone?). So as I wrestle with an especially confronting blog entry of my own, here, for your enjoyment, is a superb example of the genre currently doing the rounds. Wendi - we salute you!

Dear Mr Thatcher,

I have been a loyal user of your Always maxi pads for over 20 years and I appreciate many of their features. Why, without the LeakGuard Core™ or Dri-Weave™ absorbency, I'd probably never go horseback riding or salsa dancing, and I'd certainly steer clear of running up and down the beach in tight, white shorts. But my favourite feature has to be your revolutionary Flexi-Wings. Kudos on being the only company smart enough to realize how crucial it is that maxi pads be aerodynamic. I can't tell you how safe and secure I feel each month knowing there's a little F-16 in my pants.

Have you ever had a menstrual period, Mr Thatcher? Ever suffered from "the curse"? I'm guessing you haven't. Well, my "time of the month" is starting right now. As I type, I can already feel hormonal forces violently surging through my body. Just a few minutes from now, my body will adjust and I'll be transformed into what my husband likes to call "an inbred hillbilly with knife skills." Isn't the human body amazing?

As Brand Manager in the Feminine-hygiene Division, you've no doubt seen quite a bit of research on what exactly happens during your customers' monthly visits from "Aunt Flo". Therefore, you must know about the bloating, puffiness, and cramping we endure, and about our intense mood swings, crying jags, and out-of-control behaviour. You surely realize it's a tough time for most women. In fact, only last week, my friend Jennifer fought the violent urge to shove her boyfriend's testicles into a George Foreman Grill just because he told her he thought Grey's Anatomy was written by drunken chimps. Crazy! The point is, sir, you of all people must realize that America is just crawling with homicidal maniacs in Capri pants ... which brings me to the reason for my letter.

Last month, while in the throes of cramping so painful I wanted to reach inside my body and yank out my uterus, I opened an Always maxi-pad, and there, printed on the adhesive backing, were these words: "Have a Happy Period."

Are you fucking kidding me? What I mean is, does any part of your tiny middle-manager brain really think happiness - actual smiling, laughing happiness - is possible during a menstrual period? Did anything mentioned above sound the least bit pleasurable? Well, did it, James? FYI, unless you're some kind of sick S&M freak girl, there will never be anything "happy" about a day in which you have to jack yourself up on Motrin and Kahlua and lock yourself in your house just so you don't march down to the local Walgreen's armed with a hunting rifle and a sketchy plan to end your life in a blaze of glory. For the love of God, pull your head out, man! If you just have to slap a moronic message on a maxi pad, wouldn't it make more sense to say something that's actually pertinent, like "Put Down the Hammer" or "Vehicular Manslaughter Is Wrong", or are you just picking on us?

Sir, please inform your Accounting Department that, effective immediately, there will be an $8 drop in monthly profits, for I have chosen to take my maxi-pad business elsewhere. And though I will certainly miss your Flex-Wings, I will not for one minute miss your brand of condescending bullshit. And that's a promise I will keep ... Always.

Best,
Wendi Aarons
Austin, TX

Fucking distraction

2007-03-28T11:57:00.000+10:00

Welcome to The Club, Anthony. Your membership card and complimentary set of steak knives are in the male ... ooops, mail. (That's a quaint little bit of faggy misappropriation humour for you ... just to whet your appetite for all that is to follow.) Having been a poof for longer than you have been alive, I feel perfectly justified - and more than a little compelled - to offer you a few words of wisdom about how to negotiate the grossly over-estimated Land of Gaydom.

Self-definition
You will frequently find yourself caught in a net with a random sample of the rest of the 'gay' flotsam and jetsam in Sydney - men with whom you will share nothing more than a common sexual preference. This usually manifests in what you will come to recognise as 'Gay Bars' and 'Sex On Premises Venues' (SOPV). Given the parlous state of the 'gay' brand in Sydney at the moment, it's impossible for me to feel even remotely comfortable using the term 'sexuality'. I recommend that you, too, avoid it all costs. Remember: 'Sexuality' is a noun, not a verb.

Your Mardi Gras Float
I went in the Mardi Gras Parade for the first time this year Anthony ... and it was, in a word, faaaabulous (see also 'Language, vocabulary and terminology'). Personally, I can see you perched next to Clover Moore (she's Sydney's Lord Mayor) in a vintage Chevrolet convertible. The best thing about going in The Parade with Clover is that, unlike the rest of us who have to be 'locked in' to the Parade marshalling area from 6pm for an 8.30pm start, you can just walk quietly, quickly and efficiently up to your car at 8.25pm - and ta-da! (in your key of course), you're on your way!

Your talent
I love your voice Anthony ... and I think you did a beautiful job of The Prayer. It was a beautifully judged rendition, and I listen to it often. I celebrate your technique. The phrasing scans perfectly - even with the little over-reaching flaws in the build which I, personally, find extremely endearing. Now, that's all well and good, but here in the Land of Gaydom, you will find that we have an entirely different interpretation of the term 'talent'. Essentially, it embraces: the size of your cock (encompassing both length and breadth), the cuteness of your arse, your cock-sucking and general cock-handling capabilities, and the tautness and trimness of your body.

Language, vocabulary and terminology
In general, Anthony, the language, vocabulary and terminology most prevalent in Gaydom is the same as that of Australia ... and I am convinced, that as someone who displays great skill in relation to the equal distribution of the weight of vowels and consonants within multiple phrases within the interpretation of songlines, you will have no difficulty mastering the rather contradictory nature of the way vowels, consonants and, generally speaking - entire words - are occasionally slaughtered by poofs in general. As referenced earlier, the word 'fabulous' is a perfect and very simple example. In Australia, people say 'fabulous', and that, almost out of necessity, is that. In Gaydom, we add a few extra 'a's - which are then collectively stretched almost beyond recognition - and thrown in between the 'f' and the 'bulous'. This also works for the word 'darling', which was once a meaningful term of affection. In the Land of Gaydom, it becomes a considerably less meaningful example of affectation, which generally speaking, is the rule of thumb right across the board. In short Anthony, mastery of Gaydom's language will come as a direct result of applying liberal, careless and reckless affectation to just about any word in the English language.

I also recommend you learn a few phrases of what we poofs instantly recognise as 'porn speak' ... and in the meantime, try not to be too alarmed if the boy from Taree you are having casual sex with suddenly says "Oh yeah, suck that cock" in a perfect (if not seemingly a little too incongruous given the circumstances) American accent. This is because most poofs have been psycho-sexually programmed from a young age by an infinite supply of porn, most of which originates in the United States of America. Other examples of 'porn speak' include: "Oh yeah, fuck that ass" and "Oh yeah, you want that cock don't you". A key to the mastery of 'porn speak' is to remember that statements you might have assumed would work more effectively as questions, do not. Take "Oh yeah, you want that cock don't you" for example. This line serves as an excellent example as to how 'porn speak' manages to somehow transcend the basic fundamentals of grammatical structure. The trick here, Anthony, is to remember that statements such as this one are actually communicated with what we call 'fore-knowledge'. Given the extent to which the suckee's cock has almost disappeared from view entirely into the sucker's mouth, it becomes obvious that he does indeed 'want that cock'. In short Anthony, there are three imperatives relating to the mastery of 'porn speak'. They are: every word spoken is delivered with an American accent; every statement is prefaced with the words "Oh" and "Yeah"; and, last but by no means least, statements that might appear to be more grammatically correct if communicated as questions are, instead, delivered as statements of fact.

I have also taken the liberty of highlighting the following terms and their meanings Anthony, just to start you on your way. As a sign of my determination that you should be protected from any potentially career-threatening cross-cultural hazards, I have also included examples of the Australian meaning.
Top Gaydom: someone who takes the active role throughout the sexual act ... the fucker as opposed to the fuckee, as it were. Australia: the highest part (as in the top of a hill), an article of clothing designed for the upper body, a toy of the spinning variety.
Bottom Gaydom: someone who takes the passive role throughout the sexual act ... the fuckee. Australia: the lowest part (as in the bottom of a hill), a polite way of referring to a part of the human body.
Aggressive bottom Gaydom: someone who takes the generally assumed to be passive role throughout the sexual act but re-interprets it as active (aggressive). This simply means that it is possible to top the top from the bottom ... and, as you gain more confidence, from every other direction on both the vertical and horizontal axes and, eventually, a combination of both. Australia: a polite way of referring to the experiences associated with certain conditions (such as gastro) affecting the normal way human beings defecate.
Versatile Gaydom: someone who, depending on the circumstances or level of desperation, is happy to take either the passive or active roles in the sexual act. This can sometimes be indicative of someone who has, in reality, mastered neither role (which may in turn lead to a somewhat lack-lustre and unfulfilling sexual exchange) or someone who is so desperate to have sex with you that they'll invert their desire to express their sexuality in order to achieve said aim. Either way, my advice to you is exercise caution at all times. Australia: capable of being used in a variety of different ways; having a range of different skills.
Pride Gaydom: the sense of elation poofs feel at being a citizen of the Land of Gaydom at the exclusion of all other personal attributes, which in most cases is simply because they have none. Pride can sometimes be expressed in ways that not only threaten their personal safety, but also in ways that a large percentage of the population find revolting; also a now bankrupt community-owned organisation established to celebrate and enhance said elation. Australia: a sense of honour and personal worth.
Cock Gaydom: slang for 'penis' - the size of which will represent the entire measure of your nett worth as a human being in Gaydom. Australia: a male bird; slang for 'penis'.

So, to wrap it up Anthony, welcome! I hope my little guide serves to enlighten you about just some of the many wonders and mysteries of our very, very little land. Good luck ... and be kind.

Loving Aida

2007-03-27T13:55:00.000+10:00

I have decided that if ever a reason was required for opera to exist, Giuseppe Verdi's Aida is it.

My passion for Aida began when I first heard the famous triumphal march from Act 2, Scene 2 - and while carrying a green Tupperware container as my 'trophy' and with a doona wrapped around my shoulders (dragging behind me in a suitably regal, imagined-Eygptian fashion), I found myself swanning around the loungeroom for hours. I remember it vividly, still ... the realisation that grand opera can be a most divine creation - where occasion, in the truest sense, is celebrated so gloriously that it demands some form of physical engagement.

Nearly 18 years ago, I auditioned for Giuseppe Raffa's Melbourne production of Aida which was to be staged at the Carlton Football Ground. There were to be thousands of extras (including me as a Black Priest), an international cast, a huge orchestra and an even huger chorus! It was all going to be performed on a huge set - the centrepiece of which was a huge Sphinx and two huge pyramids. After all, Aida is huge!

Watching the massive production take shape around me was fantastic, and fortunately, the stage directions - masterful in their simplicity of structure and effect - were uncomplicated. And then the animals arrived, and Act 2, Scene 2 would never be the same again! Elephants, camels, tigers, lions, snakes and horses would star as Egypt flaunted the spoils of a triumph at war against the Ethiopians. Now the cynical amongst you might wonder why they nicked everything from the zoo and not the art gallery, but borrowed art is de rigeur on the opera stage these days - and nothing compares to elephants making an entrance. Besides, nothing in the program notes suggested that Ethiopia even had an art gallery ... or a zoo. I digress.

The horses, however, were another matter. After we had made our way on stage for my beloved Act 2, Scene 2, Radames (the hero) made his entrance - on horseback. Now, having grown up with horses I know that they smell fear. I also know that of the 1,499 people on stage with me that night, there were probably one or two (possibly incredibly stupid extras?) who were not apprehensive about what might happen next - which of course it did. The lead horse's nostrils started flaring. He was terrified, and started to panic - as did the other horses on stage ... and for the tiniest moment I thought we were all going to be trampled in an impossibly overdressed stampede. As troopers, we held our ground ... until the horses were almost right on top of us, at which point we started to run. Two things stopped us from disappearing entirely: the first being our fear of the eighteen foot drop from the stage to the ground below, and (a distant second) was our professionalism. Somehow, the horses were calmed down and taken offstage. And in the grandest sense of the cliché, the show went on.

My favourite recording of Aida is Herbert von Karajan's 1980 (digitally remastered in 1988 by EMI) masterstroke. Mirelli Freni (Aida), José Carreras (Radames), Agnes Baltsa (Amneris) and Piero Cappuccilli (Amonasro), the Vienna State Opera Chorus and the Vienna Philharmonic are beyond magnificent. Often criticised for the imbalance between the orchestra and the vocalists, I would posit that von Karajan probably did this one for the orchestra. And perhaps most profound, is the realisation that Aida is, in fact, far from an elephantine spectacle. Sure, it has its moments of epic drama - and each one is captured perfectly on this recording. But at its musical and spiritual heart is the story of two people who love each other so much that they would rather die together than ever be separated.

Ever loved anyone like that?

Comparative distractions

2007-03-26T17:18:00.000+10:00

People often ask me why I left Melbourne, and my answer is "It's personal". Like all of our life-defining relationships, the one we have with where we choose to live - and in what circumstances - is personal ... sometimes very personal.

I love Melbourne. I spent many years there. I made theatre there. I 'came out' (and occasionally wanted to go back in) there. I lost my virginity there. As a schoolboy, I was felt up on the train by a much older man there. My family still live there and so do most of my dearest friends. I made and lost money there. I started smoking there. I learned to drive there and had my first (and so far only) car crash there. I returned there from three years in Europe and I have buried friends there ... and I have swam, danced and sang there. Ultimately, the largest part of the person I am today was found and formed there.

I think it is for that reason that today, I find returning to Melbourne immensely challenging. Certainly, Melbourne is home to my precious friends with whom I can share silence. We sit in cafes and breathe through the pauses in our lives without justification and we laugh ... but Melbourne is also a place where the gutters, streetscapes, routines, sounds and smells all combine to become like a song I used to like ... or a movie I've seen too many times. I know how it ends. Traffic along Punt Road still crawls along at a deadline-threatening pace - and you still only end up in Clifton Hill. Fitzroy Street still ends before it's really begun - and the promise of neurotic little Acland Street is still so palpable. Whenever I re-visit Melbourne, even in my mind, it is Acland Street I need to see first. I was bashed and robbed there, yet it's as though all the difference I was expecting Sydney to make to my life is underwritten by the ease with which I can slip back into my easy Acland Street habits.

Some years ago, I wrote an article (for a little magazine) that drew on various comparisons between Melbourne and Sydney. "Melbourne always has something up her sleeve. Sydney doesn't wear sleeves," I opined. It strikes me, now, as altogether more complex than that. I have often found myself defending Melbourne and, equally as often, defending my choice to leave ... and admittedly, it is only recently that have started going back there to spend Christmas with my family and Saturnalia with my friends. Making the effort, as it were, as opposed to slagging off about the old girl - as though, through no fault of her own, she had outlived her usefulness and purpose. Today, as I sat waiting for my Qantas 747-400 to be pushed back for the race up the runway home, I realised that the reality is quite profoundly different. There is a part of me that will always be a Melbourne boy and there is a part of me that Sydney and I must share the responsibility for. As a complete individual though, I hold the memories and experiences of who I became after two years in London ... and what Paris taught me about myself. Each of these places become geographical points of reference - time and place are only ever two certainties in the equation we live to solve: where do I belong and what do I hope to achieve there.

I understand something today that I didn't understand yesterday. Where I am going - and how I am getting there - has nothing to do with which city has the harbour and the opera house and which city has the MCG and the best shops. It has nothing to do with the comparative amounts of sunshine, humidity or rainfall. Melbourne is a part of who I am. Sydney is a part of who I am. So is everywhere I have ever been ... and everywhere I am yet to go.

I love Melbourne.

Photo: Acland Street (courtesy travelvictoria.com.au)

Spontaneous distraction

2007-03-26T14:19:00.000+10:00

I've always adored spontaneity - one of the great under-valued human characteristics. When I decided to exchange Melbourne for Sydney in 1999, I made the decision at 4.15pm on a Friday night and was roaring up the runway at 7.15pm that same night! This weekend, I did it in reverse and booked at 6.00pm to fly to Melbourne at 7.15pm for a weekend with two of my favourite people in the whole world: Dodie (pictured with the gorgeous Morris) and JD (who will need to send me a photo!)

I missed my blog - and offer belated apologies to those who have text-messaged and commented over the weekend. Was 'The Art of Distraction' to become yet another of Geoffrey's 'projects' vanquished to the 'it seemed like a great idea when I started it' folder? No such luck I'm afraid. There is something about how this blog serves to get me 'out of my head', which I am finding both entirely fascinating and incredibly useful.

More about Melbourne will follow ... but right now, it's back to paying for it!

A must see

2007-03-23T14:44:00.000+11:00

I have been suffering from the advanced stages of Fear Of It Being Appallingly Bad Theatre Syndrome (FOIBABTS) for a number of years now, but there is one writer for the theatre who entices me back into the dark every time. His name is Daniel Keene - and his play "The Nightwatchman" is playing at the SBW Stables Theatre, Kings Cross until April 7.

"Bill has lived a life amongst the rambling beauty of the old family home," the Griffin Theatre Company website informs us. "Now he's gone blind, and children Helen and Michael have returned for a few days to move him to a secure apartment. On the outside Bill is stoic, resigned to his fate, but inside he silently rages against the darkness. Helen feels the weight of responsibility - for both her father and her own family. The fragility of her marriage has her longing for the untroubled days of childhood. Photographer Michael is on the verge of a quiet breakdown, having for years avoided meaningful connection with any human being. Drawn together in a garden full of echoes, the three discover tender memories of the shared past unwilling to release them ... "

One word: Go. Here's how.

"The Nightwatchman" by Daniel Keene
Director Lee Lewis; Designer Alice Babidge; Lighting Designer Luiz Pampolha; Composer/Sound Designer Max Lyandvert
With Camilla Ah Kin, Alex Dimitriades & William Zappa.
A Griffin Australian Premiere. "The Nightwatchman" was commissioned by La Compagnie des Docks, Boulogne, France.

The photograph of William Zappa is by Mark Rogers.