Perth International Arts Festival 2014

    It was another tremendous festival for PIAF this year. Some offerings were oh so new and others followed a more visible trendy path.  A few of my favorites include:

Stonehenge Bouncy Castle

  Stonehenge Bouncy Castle. Yeah, that needs repeating.  Stonehenge Bouncy Castle.  Officially known as Sacrilege, it is a life-size, inflated art installation modelled after the famous Stonehenge.  Even if it weren't a free event, it still would have been a very popular attraction for people of all ages. Located in the Supreme Court Gardens in the Central Business District, it became a magnet for all the young adults in their business suits who would shed their shoes and run around with with wild abandon during their lunch hour. Private schools in the CBD would schedule their physical education classes on Stonehenge. Shoot, even someone like myself  who has no history with bouncy castles gave it a whirl.  It is made of very heavy rubber canvas which heated up spectacularly in the summer sun. OUCH!  It required frequent cold water hosedowns.

"Sacrilege" at PIAF 2014

     
     Now, something like this could attract as many troublemakers as it would funmakers. So it would be deflated at night and re-inflated in the morning.  Twelve little generators attached to twelve small 'pipes' took exactly three minutes bring back the joy of this rubber wonderland.

Not By Bread Alone post show chat

   Not By Bread Alone.  Step into another world as the Israeli professional theater troupe for deaf-blind, Nalaga'at Deaf-Blind Theatre Ensemble, walks the audience through the stories of their lives, dreams and ambitions while actually baking bread on stage.  Eleven performers with various levels of acute blindness and deafness communicate through carers/translators (except for two who speak clearly) and are kept on pace by the banging of a drum.  Director Adina Tal, a self-professed hard case ("I'm not a nice person.") who doesn't tolerate a 'poor me' attitude,  thought she would be working with this group at its beginning for about two months. Fourteen years later she is still leading this engaging group to international audiences. Their stories are engrossing.  The smell of the bread baking onstage is intoxicating. And the invitation to go on stage after the show to eat some hot bread and chat with the performers through their translators is too tempting to resist. These connecting short and  informal chats are particularly satisfying for both performer and audience member.
    A heightened sense of life without sight and sound could be had at the Blackout Restaurant experience. Forty people per show day (who were very fast with their credit cards at the ticket office) could eat supper in complete darkness served by blind waiters. Not By Bread Alone was a very interesting experience.

Bianco. copyright UWA

    Bianco.  The contemporary image of  a circus is a far cry from the days of yore where lions jump through flaming hoops, elephants dance on their hind legs, bearded ladies flex muscles and men are shot out of cannon.  Replacing this nostalgia  is the example set by Cirque du Soleil and now imitated and altered by many.  Bianco by NoFit State Circus  provided the physical artistry in trapeze, tightrope, man-spoke hoops, gymnastics , contortionism and movement that one expects in a modern circus. The big difference is in the audience. There were no chairs, so the audience stands during the entire performance. And this makes sense as the set design shifted often to accommodate a new act, so the audience needed to shift also. This gave a new point of view with every change and gave a highly immersive feel  to the whole performance. By the end of the show, the audience was entirely the center of the 'stage' and the performance was surrounding them.  It ended with snow shower--real, large flakes blown from snow machines. A rather magical final impression.

J.B. - Man of Action

    I want to change my initials to J.B. Why? Because all the cool guys have those initials.  Popular culture practically insists that all contemporary, super cool, tougher than tough heroes have that monogram on their towels. I'm not sure why this is but the evidence that it is so is overwhelming.
 
    Let's start with James Bond.  Ian Fleming's bloated and booze-soaked has-been was resurrected in the movies into the uber-cool international spy we either wanted to be or to sip Bollinger champagne with.  Add the 007 status (numbers that appear in an extraordinary amount of email addresses, by the way) and he is just hard to beat regardless of who wore the tuxedo.

    The enigmatic Jason Bourne.  Robert Ludlum's man of mystery, played by Matt Damon in the movies, is tough, whip smart and has ice running through his veins.  Although his lack of past bothers him personally, it doesn't slow this lean, mean, black-ops machine.

    It's all there, all the time, for 24's  Jack Bauer.  Played by husky-voiced Kiefer Sutherland, Jack is a tenacious loyal terrier (not rogue agent) who never needs sleep,  food or a bathroom while he almost single-handedly  diverts world disaster and fends off international terrorists in a single day. Every moment is fused with overwrought drama.  Thank goodness for Chloe and her laptop computer or Jack would be doing battle alone.

    How about some 'close enoughs'? Let's see:

    There is Jack (B)Ryan.  Obviously Tom Clancy's typewriter had a problem with the "B" key while he was creating these books but the never-say-never, true-blue character (played by many actors including Harrison Ford) is spot on for an MoA award.
    J.B. Fletcher.  The only female in our crowd, this amateur sleuth was hugely popular despite the fact she could not prevent Cabot Cove's population from being decimated.  Actress Angela Lansbury made being an old widow cool in Murder She Wrote.
    Jeremy Brett.  O.K. this is an actual actor's name, but no one portrayed the steely-intellect of Sherlock Holmes better than he did. 
    Joe Don Baker.  Another actor whose sloppy joe eatin' , hillbilly characters always managed to get the job done, usually in James Bond flicks.
    Opening the Biblical Characters category:  Jesus (born in) Bethlehem  doesn't really need an introduction.  And John the Baptist leading all those weepers on Jordan's banks.

    Am I missing any larger than life action personae?   Sorry,  Jack Black doesn't count.


   

Making Jam on TV

    I don't mean to disillusion anyone but there are many illusions created on/for/by television.  I should know, I worked in television for about 24  years.  Frequently, I made empty rooms look crowded, overweight people look less so,  boring meetings look as if Excitement itself, the malignant look neutral, and people I really didn't care much for look spectacular. But there are limits to the amount of magic one can create.  Have you ever watched a cooking segment on TV? Did you notice how the demonstrator had the same dish in about four different stages of finish?  With each instructional step, the next phase would be presented  instantly in its completed state. A meal that takes one and a half hours to prepare must be presented in this way--if given only 15 minutes to get from start to finish. 
    Recently I was asked, as an award-winning jam maker and competent public speaker, to demonstrate and talk about jam making on a TV program called The Couch - seen on Foxtel in Australia and New Zealand. In a heartbeat, I assessed this flattering request: jam making takes three and a half hours to do, the segment is 10 minutes, there is no hope of making a batch so I would just do a short fruit cutting demonstration and then turn to a finished pot of jam ready to be put into jars.  It's only 10 minutes. Some well placed questions (already written up by me, of course) would fill the gaps. I was confident.

A jam demo on The Couch

    Oh, the best laid plans of mice and men!   I had assembled everything I could possibly need or talk about (oops, forgot the ladle) on the set.  Very expensive apricots were used in this Dried Apricot Jam recipe--$32 a kg/$14.55 lb (this batch is going into show competition after all)--and it turned out beautifully. I liberated two lemons from my neighbors yard and set out.  And got lost. My nerves were rattled and I hoped it wouldn't show on air.
     I am calling Episode 496  a learning lesson.  I remind myself that I am not its producer or host so I don't get to call all the shots. Happy faces are a very good thing but perhaps I look a little manic. I blame the lighting for that. ahem.  And then there was the lemons.  I spent a fortune on dried apricots. Why not spend an additional 50 cents for a store bought lemon?  I silently asked myself this as I attempted to supreme one and then another dried and rotting liberated lemon on 'live' television. Supreming a lemon is an efficient way of extracting valuable citrus while leaving undesirable membrane and pith behind. Yeah, that lesson wasn't as clear as it could be.

Filling jam jars on The Couch

    Ten minutes can be an eternity if one has nothing to say. It is a mere heartbeat if there is much to tell. And this segment included a plug for my radio show, What's On Where. It was over in a flash. In fact, we went over time. I did get to keep my jars in a hot water bath for 10 minutes in the building's kitchen (the set had to be changed for the next guest) and I left a jar for the crew to try after the day's taping. Actually, I intended to leave them a mini-assortment but I forgot to do just that.  The episode went well enough in another's eyes.  Host Fred Mafrica has invited me back for up to five additional appearances of my choice.  The wheels of my mind are turning...

   10 Minute Instructions for Dried Apricot Jam

• Place 4 cups of finely cut-up dried apricots (use kitchen scissors) into a large, nonreactive pot.
• Add 4 cups filtered water and 2 cups of non-sweetened fruit juice, cover and sit overnight.
• In the morning, add more liquid if necessary (liquid should still cover the fruit) and boil pot on medium heat until fruit is soft.
• Mash to desired texture and consistency with a potato masher or hand-held stick blender.
• Add a 1/4 cup lemon juice (additional teaspoon of powdered pectin optional) and bring to boil for a few minutes. Stir often.
• Remove from heat. Add up to 2 cups sugar and bring back to a boil for a few minutes.   Stir constantly using a long-handled wooden spoon. It spits!
• When jam hits jell point (use spoon or cold plate method or check temp to 220F/103C) put into hot, sterile jars and cover with hot lids.
• Put half pint jars into a hot water bath for 10 minutes, pint jars for 15 minutes.

    The instructions may take 10 minutes but preparation and cooking will take closer to three hours. The hot water bath ensures a longer, mold-free shelf life. This can be made year round as it does not depend on seasonal fresh fruit. Feel free to experiment with your favorite fruit juices.


  

Visiting a U.S. Consulate

    I have to give terrorists some credit here.  They must be patient people. How they manage to keep their cool while waiting for the wheels of government bureaucracy to turn and endless protocols to be met, I don't know.  Perhaps this is part of what sends them into such desperate acts.
    I have held permanent residency in three foreign countries, traveled a fair bit, sponsored an immigrant and so on and so forth.  But until today I had never been able to breach  the front door of a U.S. embassy or consulate.  It would be easier to break into Fort Knox than get a toe in some of these heavily guarded fortresses.  Don't think so? Try driving past an American embassy very slowly and then stop near  the entrance.  You'll be greeted by some very surly men carrying seriously regulated firearms growling strong instructions to keep moving.  So it happened to a colleague.  To be fair, there are more people trying to weasel their way into the U.S. than say, Kyrgyzstan  or Burkina Faso, but we Americans  feel a sense of entitlement to our tax-supported government offices. At least I do and when my passport  needed renewing I decided  that Uncle Sam should have the pleasure of doing so personally.
    Not that he wants to.  The website exhorts its beloved citizens to do everything by mail instead of stopping by.  Still want to come in? Book an appointment online through our capitol office 3,000 miles away. Oh, did we mention that our hours are only 8:30a-11:30a, Monday through Thursday? Cool by me as the U.S. Consulate in Perth is in the office building directly behind mine.  Their back windows look into our back windows.  Hey neighbor, I'm coming over for a cup of sugar. Hardly.  Only one person is allowed past the heavy door on the fourth floor at a time where they are screened , their belongings  x-rayed (by a Scotsman) and then tucked into a locker. My cheapy, thin barrettes set off the alarms. The only thing you can retain is your paperwork.   This reception area has about a dozen chairs and some dog-eared National Geographics in it but I am not sure who might using either.
   Next you get escorted by a guard to the 13th floor where a Singaporean  behind thick glass points you to another door leading to a room with more people hiding behind very thick glass. The Australian lady who helps U.S. citizens is nice and extremely efficient.  The other Australian lady who takes your money ($121AUD for a 10-year passport) is also fast and efficient.  The only American accent you'll hear comes from a guy in the middle bullet proof booth who helps non Americans get  visitor visas. All this obscenely thick glass makes private inquiry about your spouse's green card  or your overseas conviction for theft  or your explanation  for letting that passport  get chewed up by your pet bilby difficult. All of this highly secured jockeying  will make you start to think that  those people who choose illegal entry into the U.S. aren't really escaping this bureaucratic noose as much as they are tightening the noose for those who operate above board. I am not impressed.

A happy traveler.

    I was impressed by the speed in which all this happened. I was warned it would take an hour. It took less than 25 minutes.  I was also delighted that my passport photo was accepted by  consular staff.  The American government is starting to join the rest of the world in insisting that passport photos look like tuberculosis patient rolls or recycled gulag IDs.  My photo defies any negative description.  In fact, I was gobsmacked by how good it looks.  I refrain from posting photos of myself but, for the moment, I'll share this one. It's a photograph of a photograph but the poor quality can't hide the "I am happy to be visiting you"  expression.
    All I need now is a plane ticket.
                

An Evening at The Theatre

    Despite the fact I host a radio program that alerts the greater Perth metropolitan area to all the exciting events that are happening or coming soon, I rarely get to see much of it myself.  And that includes media previews. So when Kev, normally a very reluctant escort to even these infrequent opportunities, heard of a play  about political intrigue at the Vatican, he made it a date.

    The Last Confession, starring David Suchet (best known for his portrayal of Agatha Christie's Hercule

Poirot) is about the the extremely short time- 33 days- that Pope John Paul I  served as pontiff and his dubious end at the start of his era of reformation. Many had much to lose. It is not so much a whodunit as a did-anyone-do-it.  A fictional play based on real people and events held at the glorious, velvet-seated His Majesty's Theatre starring no small amount of notable actors.

   Oh boy, my big chance to dress up!  I brush the dust off my black velvet dress (a bit shorter than it should be but lots of Australian mutton dresses like lamb so no one notices) and the archbishop purple cape I wear over it.  I decide against wearing my black velvet with pearl trim Juliet cap (it's not premiere night after all) but don real south sea pearls on my neck. Slip on those patent leather shoes with the one-and-a-quarter inch heel (which is as high as I go anymore), splash on some expensive perfume and grab the crocheted clutch for the finishing touch.  This gal was styling!  So were most of the women there.  The slender females wore impossibly artsy outfits. The less fashion forward put on their best earrings or a very sparkly brooch on their lapel. We know how to dress for an evening at the theater.

   The menfolk were sadly a different matter.  The best you  could say for some of them was that they remembered to wash their hands after the last time they went to the bathroom...and were proud of the accomplishment. A few turtlenecks surfaced and a couple of guys stayed in the business suit they wore during the day. Kev himself didn't get too exhausted in preparation. He wore heavily patched up blue jeans and a rugby top. He did manage to shave four days worth of stubble from his chin...and wash his hands. Perhaps he thought no one would notice as our seats were rather high up and behind two Strand stage lights.

    The last thing that remains is the upsell. Now, a pair of tightwads...er, thrifty people...like us walk on past the merchandising opportunities that exist in such a case.  The program costs $20.  A hardcover book about David Suchet's Hercule Poirot is priced at $40.  And for those who prefer to have the Good Book read to them, David Suchet obliges with a six-CD box set of the NIV version.  I suppose this is a natural tie-in with a price tag of $70.  Missing from the "merch" table was a selection of  papal-approved tee shirts.

    Kind of explains the disappointed look on the faces of several men shaking water off their paws.

Want To Work

    She was strolling along the central business district. Not in a hurry. Not smiling. Not really in focus, actually. Just a middle-aged woman neatly dressed but looking a bit frayed at the edges. She was wearing a homemade sandwich board around her neck. It was made from a brown cardboard box and measured about 12 inches by 15 inches.  She used a ballpoint pen to write on it instead of Magic Marker, so it was rather light. But the top line was unmistakeable. It read:

    "Want to Work."

     Below that was the line "Need Advice On:" followed by a list of several items  unreadable at 15 fifteen paces. Stunned at first, it was several moments before the vision made sense. I turned back to find her and confirm what I thought. But she was nowhere to be found. No matter.  I can tell you her story anyway.

     A woman with lots of work experience, yet too young to retire, finds herself without employment one day. No problem, she says to herself, I have a good resume and the economy in Perth is better than in many places.  I'll find a job in no time. But instant employment does not appear. She goes over to the unemployment office, Centrelink, to apply for her entitlement while making a mental note never to dress like the permanent down-and-outers also in line. She's obliged to prove that she makes at least five applications a week. Piece of cake, she thinks, I won't be doing this long.  But she finds that she gets no response to her applications and little useful feedback from rejectors. Our gal is eventually referred to a government contractor for help. This is an agency charged with  giving people the assistance they need to get employment. But she is deemed to be at the lowest tier of need: literate, educated, previously employed and not disadvantaged in any real way. So all the agent (half her age) can do is offer her the same advice given to the simpletons who also walk through the doors. Frustration mounts. Why am I not getting a job? I'm not even getting many interviews! Is it my resume? Are my cover letters out of date and ineffective? What about this "selection criteria" thing? Am I pre-interviewing myself properly? Why is my network letting me down?  She gets no help, no answers and no job offers.

    A critical mass is now forming.  Her employment gap is starting to get rather long and unexplainable.  Unemployment  benefits are woefully inadequate for anyone paying rent or making mortgage payments and her savings that make up the difference are rapidly being depleted. Panic is rising and her self-esteem is dropping. She is now being obliged by Centrelink to volunteer one day a week at any nonprofit organization that will take her to keep up her puny payments. During the 1980s, there was a phrase being bandied about in this state, "You're too young at 18 and too old at 22."  Could this ghastly maxim still be true? Facing financial ruin and permanent career damage, our desperate woman parks her dignity and reaches out in the only way that seems to remain.  She made a sign.

    I wish I knew what kind of results this lady got from her sandwich sign. She wasn't asking for a job, just effective, real life assessment of her CV presentation materials.  I  wish I could tell you that her case is unusual but that would be an untruth.  I don't bother to find empathy for 25 year-olds who wish 50 year-olds would fall off the perch already and open the top jobs for them.  I wonder how, in the face of this obvious ageism, the federal government can expect people to work until they are 70 to keep the pension demand down. Is this a First World problem? Probably, but this is a First World country. And it shouldn't be a problem.

    I admire your pluck, Lady, regardless of what brought you to it.

Disney's Tinkerbell & the Pirate Fairy

    The invitation came for the latest Disney animated film media preview.  I was looking forward to it. The Mouse was a happy part of my youth--I enjoyed the stories and absorbed the lessons. But the product has changed...one could say evolved...over the years to reflect a different world. 
     Some of the changes are a good thing. Young girls are empowered to use their talents, follow their dreams and that getting rescued by a handsome prince need not be a part every girl's personal history.  And I understand why "Song of the South" might not see the light of day again. But political correctness is starting to swing the pendulum a bit too far in the opposite direction.
      Embarrassingly so.
  
     I previewed the financially successful animated film "Frozen" and found an uncomfortable feeling creeping up.  The award winning song "Let It Go" didn't seem to fit and you could practically smell the politically correct messages coming at you. Men are increasingly being portrayed as insignificant at best or clueless jugheads at worst (so complained the men sitting near me.) Fearing this unnecessary (and potentially unhelpful to young boys' self image) observation had become an obligatory part of every Disney film is what propelled  me to the screening of  "Tinker Bell & the Pirate Fairy". 
    Expectation can be a distraction for general audiences and entertainment reviewers alike. Who has ever been able to completely focus on an Alfred Hitchcock film before his customary cameo is spotted?  Any number of movies will edit in a swear word or superfluous shocking scene to garner the movie rating the producers want in a move so obvious that movie goers are drawn out of the story momentarily.  "Then I'll see you in hell", growls Han Solo defiantly in the Star Wars movie, "The Empire Strikes Back".  The audience responded, "There's the PG rating."  I needn't have been on the lookout for overtly politically correct moments in "Tinker Bell & the Pirate Fairy", I was tied to the mast and flogged with it.  At one point in the film, the fairies seem to have recaptured the all-important blue pixie dust, rescued their friend and are in charge of the pirate ship.  One sailor says, "Wait, are we to be told what to do by a bunch of fairies?"
    CRACKKK!!! 
    Feel the pain of the Mouse's sledgehammer driving home its 'celebrate diversity' message into your skull. The action in the movie actually freezes while you catch the message, rub the growing lump on your head and start to refocus on the movie as the sailor is convinced by a flying knife that the answer is yes. This same lesson is handled correctly and naturally later on when  a guy gives a big effusive hug to another guy he is happy to see survived a sleeping spell.  But the once-bitten, twice-shy audience is now on high alert for another PC blow to the noggin and winces.  This assault on the audience's intelligence so unnecessary and potentially dates the film, keeping it from being the beloved enduring classic we expect from our friend The Mouse.

    A quick review:  When a misunderstood dust-keeper fairy named Zarina steals Pixie Hollow's all-important Blue Pixie Dust, and flies away to join forces with the pirates of Skull Rock, Tinker Bell and her fairy friends embark on a rescue mission to return it to its rightful place. However, in the middle of their pursuit of Zarina, the rescuers' world is turned upside down. Tinker Bell and her friends find that their respective talents have been switched and they have to race against time to retrieve the Blue Pixie Dust and return home to save Pixie Hollow.
    "Tinker Bell & the Pirate Fairy" has all the requisite lessons and action its target audience [girls aged 3-10] could hope for and will be bearable for their 12 year-old brothers quieted by an ice cream cone bribe.  The pirate song sung in chorus is very funny and it is a bit of a prequel for "Peter Pan" as there are many foreshadowing moments for many of its characters. 
    Parents may want to consider bringing a helmet.