January Round Up

January is a slow month - it's after Christmas (eat/sleep/repeat) and there were various delays due to dying computers and internet issues.  January featured guest performer Professor Kaos - this wasn't planned, it's just how the month came out in the edit.  So you got... two episodes of The Museum of Tat and a random thing that grew out from the corner of the recording session and which I couldn't kill.  Enjoy if you haven't already - it's all comedy, and we could all do with a laugh.
February will be more story based, with some episodes of Short Shorts, The Other Day... and some other stuff my brain will create given time.  You can always help support my work by becoming a patron - go to www.patreon.com/robertcrighton and pledge from as little as a $1 a month.  Or if you don't want to get tied down, why not buy some one off merchandise in my terrifying shop of random.  Have a good one!

Museum of Tat: Plastic Rubber Duck Special


Say Cheese: A Conversation about Cheese



Museum of Tat: Guess Our Tat!

Live Streaming Again

I've been playing around with the possibilities of live streaming over the years - live in studio, with audience, using different platforms.  I'm desperately waiting for facebook live audio to kick in so I can start there - I've been playing with the live video and it's just a sod with my bandwidth.
For the moment I'm going back to live streaming with ustream - there are adverts, but life's a bitch sometimes.  I'm also going to use it to drive my new storytelling.
Instead of doing new work for my patrons on Wednesday, streaming it Saturday and then releasing it again properly to the world on the following Tuesday, I'm going to use the Saturday live streams to try out works in progress.  They'll be full and proper things, just I might want to change it after the live stream and I'll be actively looking for thoughts and comments from the audience.  You.
Then I'll start work on turning that live stream into something for normal podcast release.  It's a process.
So, this week, Saturday at 1pm I'll be streaming the long promised bit of storytelling The U.N. Special Representative.
You can catch the live stream here, this Saturday at 1pm (BST) and there'll be something streamed every Saturday at the same time, unless advertised otherwise.  I will also start scheduling what will be performed prior to each show.
You're probably going to hear versions of other promised shows on the live stream first. We shall see, I may even do some live streamed drama.

My work couldn't happen without the support of my patrons - if you think you could contribute to the work I create, go to www.patreon.com/robertcrighton and see if you can help - there are bonuses and you can get to listen to my new work before anyone else.
Also, as there's a lot being planned at the moment, if you want to keep up to speed, why not join my mailing list.  I know, so last century. 

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Thinking In Sound, Not Space

I've been making theatre for nearly twenty years. I got quite good at it.  Still lots I want to do, still much to learn, but, by and large, I know what makes theatre tick.  It is a known thing.
I think in theatre.  I think in terms of space and entrances, in light and movement, sound and text.  My move to audio has taken about four years, and has taken this long partly because I still think in theatre.  I've been adapting my stage works, creating things that live somewhere between the theatre and audio universe.  Comedy was good for that.  A live audience for recording, I could do that.
But now I'm, by and large, no longer making theatre.  Theatre is the great love of my life, but it's slightly killing me.  Theatre has rarely loved me back.  Now that I've made that decision to stop actively making theatre (I expect I'll do one proper show a year, plus any live audio recordings I need for the podcast) I'm starting to think ahead, thinking about projects and how they work in this medium.  And I do mean thinking.  Actively sitting and thinking about sound, noises, shapes, waveforms, text, Foley, music, not music, soundscape - the range of possible universes that audio wants.  Can I do something exciting and new and different?  I'm learning to think in terms of sound, not space - which is ironic, as a do want to write a sci-fi series set partly in space.
At the moment I'm doing new versions of old projects and well as readings of other peoples stories - this is partly because it's fun, but also to buy me some thinking time.  And a little time to look at the competition - to see what I like and what I don't.  I already know radio, I've been listening to the BBC all my life, but the new wave of podcasts is a different world.  A wild west of invention and also cliche.  I'm hearing a lot of very similar work, similar quirks of sound, similar design.  Partly this is because these podcasts are of a theme - horror, science fiction, comedy - and that's what they do.  And many do it well.  But my podcast platform is not that.  It's different each week (most weeks), it's shaped around how I think, which is to never do the same thing twice, where possible.  I suspect this is probably why I never make any money.  But what can you do?  This is who I am. 
And I'm happy.  I can create different worlds, no questions asked, no marketing policy, no issues, no drama (beyond the drama I create) - and move on if it doesn't work.  And move on even if it does.
Audio, so far, hasn't tried to kill me.  We shall see.
Visit 'The Worlds of Robert Crighton' by searching it in itunes or whatever podcast app you use - or subscribe by visiting... here.

My work couldn't happen without the support of my patrons - if you think you could contribute to the work I create, go to www.patreon.com/robertcrighton and see if you can help - you get to listen to my new work before anyone else.  It's like audible, just cheaper and with no control over the content of your next listen. But you can download and keep my work forever.
Also, as there's a lot being planned at the moment, if you want to keep up to speed, why not join my mailing list.  I know, so last century. 

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The Wheel of Shame - Available Now!

The Wheel of Shame has dropped this morning - listen to it now for free in the player below. Enjoy!

Of course my patrons have had it for a week now, and as a download that can be kept.
Which is another way of saying, become a patron - it's great.  For only $1 a month (and that's my ideal, preferred amount) you'll get a new audio every week, to download and keep, before everyone else - and there will be special bonus audio drops every month or so.  If I didn't have the support of my patrons, visible and invisible (i.e. those who use the patreon site and those who don't - I don't mean magical creatures), then I wouldn't be able to share my work with the rest of the world.  Do give it a look.

This week: The Wheel of Shame or, The Noises of the Hamster in the Night-time
Classic comic ghost story for everyone who's ever brutally murdered their hamster as a child.  Out now.  For those who listen to audio via a video platform, here's the same on YouTube.


Next week (or tomorrow, if you're a patron!):  Metal Harvest - a reimagined version of the stage show, mixing live and studio recordings for the podcast.

Metal Harvest

Written & performed by Robert Crighton

With Music by Richard Fawcett

“This is the story of a shell...” Throughout the First World War the armaments created passed through many hands – from those in the mines and factories who made them, to those who transported the boxes and those who fired the guns.  This is the story of one shell, the story of those who touched it and whose lives were changed by it.  Told in words, music, image and song, Metal Harvest is the latest work from award-winning theatre producer Robert Crighton, made in collaboration with musician Richard Fawcett.  

My work couldn't happen without the support of my patrons - if you think you could contribute to the work I create, go to www.patreon.com/robertcrighton and see if you can help - you get to listen to my new work before anyone else.
Also, as there's a lot being planned at the moment, if you want to keep up to speed, why not join my mailing list.  I know, so last century. 

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Question or Nominate

Nominate us - go on! Please, please, please...
If you could, take a moment to nominate an audio play I'm rather pleased with - it's a solo play The Project After and features two great performers, but we're hoping for a general production nomination.  Below are the details - it takes literally thirty seconds if you're a fast typer. Obviously, I wouldn't want you to nominate something without listening to it first, so here it is in the player below.  If you like it then follow the instructions underneath.  Any questions, tweet me @RobertCrighton


How to nominate us...
1. Go to - www.audioverseawards.net/site/nominate
2. Enter your name/details
3. Enter nomination for PRODUCTION
4. Click next
5. Add the show name - The Project After
6. Put in the full link - https://audioboom.com/posts/6144050-the-project-after-by-robert-crighton
7. Submit for one lonely episode
8. That it's over twenty minutes
9. That there are no more than 6 actors
10. That it's a Drama
11. And that, Yes, it's new

What I've Been Training For - Possibly

Some people spend their lives training to be fighter pilots, to be doctors or to do other such useful things.  In theory I've spent my life training to be a writer and performer, which I have, to some degree.  I've mostly produced theatre, and I've mostly done quite well.
But I suspect this is not what I've actually spent my life training to do.  I suspect my life has been heading in one direction since I was a child.  Yes, I have finally decided to embrace my destiny.
I'm going to write and produce a science fiction series.  It was inevitable.
Now, I'd love to say I've been handed a budget and a platform to do this, but I haven't.  It'll be on my own time and will, one day, be a podcast.  But it will happen.  Because I was born this way.
I first started my training in science fiction as a child.  I worked my way through all the basic courses - Doctor Who, Star Trek, Star Wars etc. - the low hanging fruit, sci-fi, rather than SF.  I took intermediate courses in SF with the classics - HG Wells, Asimov, Clarke etc. - and second module work on the television sci-fi of higher plains.  I took special courses in the radio dramas, the comedy, the odd.  I still have a lot of catching up to do with modern SF, but, hey, it's a journey, we all take different paths.
I served my apprenticeship in various theatre works, half and half sci-fi shows that hid their colours within other genres.  Theatre and science fiction are slightly uneasy bedfellows.  I was fairly pleased with my version of The Time Machine, but it wasn't without issues.
But now I'm working in audio, full time, and the reasons not to do science fiction disappear.  I want to write something that touches on the influences that matter to me.  Journey into Space, Hitchhikers Guide, Earthsearch, The Foundation Trilogy - all BBC, all radio.  All made a fair while ago now.
So, I made the first step.  I've started my project.  It's stupidly complex, and long.  Actually, I have no idea if there is an end point.  I'm universe building, and it's fun.
And, because good titles can be lost from under you before production begins, I'll declare the title now - even though this show won't happen for a while.

Welcome to The Overnight Empire.

What is 'The Worlds of Robert Crighton' and where can I get one?

What is 'The Worlds of Robert Crighton' and where can I get one?
I'm glad you asked that question.  Many people do.  (At least in my head.  I like the things my head says, so much nicer than the things other heads say.  Though I did get a nice comment below the line on something I posted this morning, which is rare.  Recently I've mostly had either silence or untranslatable nonsense that could be an insult against me, my mother... or canals.)

'The Worlds of Robert Crighton' is my podcasting umbrella title - now that I've moved away from full time theatre production I'm producing new audio every week.  Yes, you read correctly, every week.  Not all of it will be my new work, some of it will be readings of classic texts, and the odd random thing, but it will be stuff that interests me, stuff that orbits the sun of my enormous ego.
I think this simile is running away from me.
The point is that there's a lot of new audio coming your way.  Some of the planned projects were announced earlier in the year, many of them have come to fruition, some will take longer than originally planned - and there's a whole host of new stuff coming your way.
To get this material, you can subscribe to 'The Worlds of Robert Crighton' via any good podcast outlet/app/thing (just type it into the search engine) or you can go to my Audioboom page, my website or my YouTube channel (even though it's audio, some people like audio on video, don't ask).
But - if you do it that way then you can only stream the material.  If you become a patron then, not only do you help pay for all this content (ensuring it continues to happen) but you get if earlier than the rest of the universe and you get access to a downloadable and keepable copy of the podcast.  And that's just for those who give $1 a month, give more and there are more returns for your money.  All you need to do is go to my patreon page and become a patron - it's easy and it makes a huge difference to my work.

Here's my planned weekly 'broadcast' timetable: It will get disrupted as we go along, but that's the basic pattern of activity.
Wednesday - New podcast released to patrons on Patreon
Saturday at 1pm - The podcast 'live' streamed online via Facebook Live (I'm currently using the Live Video app, it's not perfect, I'm waiting for the Live Audio app - one day!)
Tuesday - Podcast then released to general internet platforms
REPEAT

So, what's coming up?
This Week: Saturday live stream of the audio that's already dropped for my patrons - The Wheel of Shame or, the Noises of the Hamster in the Night-time - a storytelling piece that I've been performing for about six years now, a comic ghost story featuring Molly, who appeared in the story Bink!
Next Week: Metal Harvest - based on my stage show, a mix of live and studio recording, featuring the music of Richard Fawcett.  The story of a shell from the First World War, from manufacture to detonation and beyond.
The Weeks Beyond: Martin Hewitt, Investigator by Arthur Morrison.  These are detective mysteries from a contemporary of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - seven readings of this first collection of mysteries.  I may not release one every week, I may break them up with some new material, but I don't know yet.

How Rude?

I'm in the process of recording Cuckold's Fair - it's the longest audio I've done in one block since a very rushed version of The Natural History of Trolls that I recorded in 2013.  In the mundane world of practical things it means I'm rejigging my recording set up so that it's less actively uncomfortable, but in the artistic sphere it raises another issue.
Cuckold's Fair is very rude.  Deliberately.  It uses naughty words.
In a theatre this is fine, because you pay your money and you take your chances - but for something that goes out online... where filters are a little less... active... what is the right thing to do?

How rude do I make the online version?

I will almost certainly create a paywall version that will be as rude as I like - and let's be fair, it's only actively obscene once - but how do I deal with the text?  Do I rewrite?  Do I bleep/fadeout/add birdsong?  That might be even weirder.
What do you think internet?

In the meantime, here's the latest audio - a short little story from 2011.  There maybe a short out next week to bridge the gap before the epic Cuckold week, but I won't promise that.

Countdown to the Other Side - available on YouTube or on this player.


Cuckold's Fair will be released daily from 13th to 18th February online, earlier for my patrons.

My work couldn't happen without the support of my patrons - if you think you could contribute to the work I create, go to www.patreon.com/robertcrighton and see if you can help - you get to listen to my new work before anyone else.

Also, as there's a lot being planned at the moment, if you want to keep up to speed, why not join my mailing list.  I know, so last century. 

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When is a joke not a joke?

When is a joke not a joke?
When it's from a Christmas cracker.
For our Christmas Special of The Museum of Tat we reviewed some Christmas crackers - if you haven't listened yet, skip below and listen before you read the following...

***

The Remains of the Day...

So, the crackers held four jokes in all - and they were not only not very good, some of them weren't really jokes.
Here's the first joke:
What do you get if you cross Father Christmas with a detective?  Santa Clues!

Right... it looks like a joke, it's structured like a joke, and if you don't hang around you might not notice that it isn't.
So, the joke looks like it's a simple bit of wordplay - it should end on a pun...

What do you get if you cross Father Christmas with a detective?  Santa [Insert Pun Here]
Unfortunately, Clues doesn't rhyme with Claus.  I don't think alliteration is enough to provoke a laugh response.  It's a half joke, it's got the right idea, but doesn't actually deliver.

Next joke from the cracker:
What do you call a man who claps at Christmas? Santapplause!

Where to start... well, on the surface this looks like a better joke than the last, because it does contain a functioning pun, justifying the term joke when describing it.
However, dig just a little deeper and you immediately see the joke doesn't function properly.  You see it now?  Of course you do.  The joke is only funny if the man referred to in the joke is Santa, but the set up doesn't really push you in that direction.  Statistically speaking, a man clapping at Christmas is almost certainly not Santa for two reasons.
1. The population of the world is approximately 7.4 billion and the odds that one of those 7.4 billion, who identifies as 'a man', is going to be a specific person (Santa) is so improbable as to be practically impossible.
2.  Santa doesn't exist.
Beyond setting up the approximate timing of the event in question - clapping at Christmas time (somewhere between early December and early January potentially) - the joke doesn't give any clue, even half hidden, that the identified man would be so improbable (nay imaginary) a figure as Father Christmas.  It just refers to him as a man.  So when the punchline turns out to be a pun on Santa Claus, it delivers no punch, no satisfactory payoff.
Additionally, the answer makes no sense.  If you saw Santa Claus clapping, you'd be receiving Santapplause, but you wouldn't call him that.  So, perhaps it should read.

What do you get if Father Christmas is particularly pleased with you? Santapplause.
Not perfect, some additional context, say that you're an Elf in Santa's seasonal Pantomime at the North Pole, might help make the joke function better.
Though, it still isn't really very funny as it's just a basic pun.  There's only so much of a laugh response to be expected from basic joke structures.

Next cracker, next joke:
What do the reindeer sing to Father Christmas on his birthday?  Freeze a jolly good fellow!

This joke is the only one we recognised from a previous Christmas/Life and were happy to move on.  Yes, the manufactor lost points for so unoriginal a joke, at least it functioned, which was something of a relief.  Beyond the improbability of reindeer singing, especially when there are plenty of Elves available, it works well.

We therefore come to the issue of the final joke of the Christmas Cracker set.  Two jokes per cracker, unfortunately the same two joke slips were replicated throughout the set.  Epic fail.

Father Christmas wins a saucepan in a competition.  Now that's what you call pot luck!
The problem with the joke is simple - whilst it does work as a play on words [saucepan - pot luck etc] the connection to Christmas is tenuous in the extreme.  This is an example of a cut and shut joke.  As with cut and shut cars, where the front end of one car is welded to another, this joke has been bodged together by some cracker cowboys.  Who the original joke referred to we may never know, but it almost certainly wasn't Father Christmas.  As my colleague Mr Fouldes said on the show, in the character of Colin, it feels like something from a stand up comic's set performed in a working mans club in the 1970's.  The Mother-in-law won a saucepan in a competition the other day... [pause] Now, that's what I call pot luck.  Which reminds me, I'm next on the snooker table... 
Whilst I'm all for the occasional resurrection of an old joke, this bodged restoration of a not so classic gag has left me flat.
On top of all the other problems with the crackers in question, these jokes really were insult after injury.

The Museum of Tat Christmas Special can be heard below... Enjoy.


My work couldn't happen without the support of my patrons - if you think you could contribute to the work I create, go to www.patreon.com/robertcrighton and see if you can help.

Also, as there's a lot being planned at the moment, if you want to keep up to speed, why not join my mailing list.  I know, so last century. 

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The Missing Bit on the Missing Years

With only a few days to go till my next performance of The Shakespeare Delusion, I'm releasing the DVD extras - i.e. some of the stuff I had to cut due to time and flow issues, but which is still really good material and shouldn't be ignored.
Here is the section of the 'talk' that deals with Shakespeare's so called missing years.  Everything you hear is, obviously, completely true.


If you can help support my work, do go to www.patreon.com/robertcrighton and pledge something.  Even $1 makes a massive difference.

Really Short Shorts

Most my stories are quite long.  Like, something around forty five minutes.  So, I've been working on some short stories, really short stories, to break up what I do.  This is partly because a. even though I've recorded a vast amount of stuff for my lovely patrons, it's going to take ages to edit it and b. because when I tell people I'm a storyteller they always say, tell us a story and I go, well I can, but they're all rather long and this is a bar and someone will come over and it's not going to work... so, these stories are attempts to tell really simple, short stories.  This one is about forty five seconds long.  So, quite a bit shorter.



If you can help support my work, do go to www.patreon.com/robertcrighton and pledge something.  Even $1 makes a massive difference.

A New Sound

New upgrades to the recording studio...

The launch weekend - a wholly artificial time sequence, as the point of Patreon is that it never ends - draws to a close.  Here's why your support is so important.
Up till now I've created sound on the hoof.  I've covered old climbing frames in duvets and climbed inside (which works, but it's BOILING!) and used sub standard equipment.  Over the years I've slowly upgraded.  I've already added acoustic tiles to my sound set up so that I can record and not boil at the same time.  I can still do better, but I don't need to at this time.  But I am going to get something new thanks to the support of you all.  A portable sound recorder.
Nothing too fancy, but a decent spec; not too expensive, but not cheap.
This is for two reasons - one. lugging around laptop, leads, microphones is a sod. This is a fairly minor reason.
Two. Because now I can change the sound universe I create.
I could create radio dramas and storytelling easily enough with the help of some friends, some time and, so long as it were just some people with scripts in front of a microphone in a dead space then that would be fine.
But that not what I want to do for Patreon.  If people are pledging, I want to give them a bigger experience.
Let me talk about a show - working title: Investigate Me?
What's Investigate Me?  It's a show about an investigation.  Think a bit little Kafka's The Trial but in reverse, mixed with Blue Jam.  Helpful?  No?  Good - the problem with telling people too much about the shows in advance is it sort of kills the point of listening to them.
Anyway, I want to record almost all the show on location.  I want to mix in ambient sounds, the noise of the everyday, with some studio stuff.  I want to create drama as documentary as drama.  And, if I do it right, it'll be amazing.
But I can't do it (or the other shows that'll need it) without something portable.  So, based on what's been pledged so far, I've made an investment.  Thank you Patrons - you've already made a difference!  Now, I just need a few more pledges to pay for some actors - otherwise, this might take a while.
If you haven't pledged then please do - it's really easy. Sign up, enter your pledge (which you can change or cancel whenever you like) and enter payment.  That's it.  No different to shopping online.  Just with rewards!

www.patreon.com/robertcrighton