Funny thing happened the other day. I was in town, doing Panto stuff, having a blood test, drinking coffee. The usual. And I get home to a message. Which I didn't believe was true. I was being asked to turn on the Christmas lights in my town. I assumed this was a joke. But no, there was the number, there was the message and after a little phoning/emailing back and forth, yes, I was booked to blow the hooter that cued the activation of the magic light strings.
I've just got home from this little task. It was slightly delayed by an accident with Father Christmas' sleigh (worry not children, Santa was fine) but due to the late arrival of the bouncy castle there was no PA system in place (don't ask) and I had to bellow my little speech to the crowd. And then Father Christmas counted down from 10 and I blew my hooter and (thankfully) the lights all came on and Christmas was saved for another year.
But that wasn't the exciting part of the evening. I then went to B&Q in search of a dustbin lid, which I need for the Panto I'm directing. But I didn't need a bin, just the lid. Which was lucky, because they didn't have any bins, only lids. But there was no price for the lid, just for the bins. So I asked really nicely for a good deal and they sold me the lid on its own for a rock bottom price and I went to get some chips.
So, thank you the lovely staff of B&Q (Sudbury) - you've saved Christmas.
[If you have any feelings of confusion about the content of this blog post or have suffered any emotional distress at its contents, please find a towel and wrap it round your head. It won't help, but at least you won't have to read these words any longer. Ed.]
Showing posts with label pantomime. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pantomime. Show all posts
Friday, 5 December 2014
Wednesday, 3 December 2014
Why Are Panto Posters So Terrible?
It's that time of year where you see in the press, on Twitter, all around town and city centres, millions of truly terrible Panto posters. And I ask myself, how did this come about?
I mean, if it were any other product we would run a fucking mile from them. We wouldn't countenance spending money on something which is sold in such a shoddy manner. And yet, we do.
The Panto poster template is simple.
Step 1: photograph members of the cast six months in advance in front of a blank background in a dodgy hired costume/the stock costume you have set aside every year. Depending on the Panto these cast members will either be: minor celebrities/nameless models who look cute.
Step 2: Photoshop said photos to death, adding a colourful (see eye blindingly painful) background and AS MANY SPARKLY EFFECTS as your computer will allow.
Step 3: Chose a swirly, unreadable font and make it even more unreadable by covering it in AS MANY SPARKLY EFFECTS as your computer will allow.
Step 4: Cry.
And it's not that I'm against glittery posters, or happy smiling pretty plastic people. It's that it never ends - it's the laziness of it all - it's that it's the same poster EVERY YEAR, reproduced across dozens of different Pantos across the WHOLE COUNTRY.
Now, it isn't just that Pantos are often produced centrally by a few big companies - who favour a template and a straightforward marketing package, this is understandable - it's that everyone does it. Even theatres with long histories of making Pantomime and who have a little more time to think of a slightly more original marketing strategy.
So why do it? Because it works. So why bother changing it?
It is assumed that children like glitter, so everything must be glittery. And they're probably right.
But there is, I suspect, another reason. Pantos tend to sell themselves. People just book to see Pantos, like animals migrating to spawn at the same spot every mating season. They don't know why, it's just expected. So long as you do a basic job of putting out posters, doing some press, getting the right star name - then there isn't a great creative job that's needed to sell it. Do the same thing every year, with the odd twist, because it's not going to swing sales more than a few percent. And that includes the poster.
But... but... but... is that an excuse? Is that really enough of an excuse for filling public space with acres and acres of migraine inducing imagery that doesn't just offend the eye, but actively burns the retina? Come on, people of Britain, we can do better! We can create something less plastic, more human, more alive then these never ending walls of glittery laziness.
We just probably won't.
I mean, if it were any other product we would run a fucking mile from them. We wouldn't countenance spending money on something which is sold in such a shoddy manner. And yet, we do.
The Panto poster template is simple.
Step 1: photograph members of the cast six months in advance in front of a blank background in a dodgy hired costume/the stock costume you have set aside every year. Depending on the Panto these cast members will either be: minor celebrities/nameless models who look cute.
Step 2: Photoshop said photos to death, adding a colourful (see eye blindingly painful) background and AS MANY SPARKLY EFFECTS as your computer will allow.
Step 3: Chose a swirly, unreadable font and make it even more unreadable by covering it in AS MANY SPARKLY EFFECTS as your computer will allow.
Step 4: Cry.
And it's not that I'm against glittery posters, or happy smiling pretty plastic people. It's that it never ends - it's the laziness of it all - it's that it's the same poster EVERY YEAR, reproduced across dozens of different Pantos across the WHOLE COUNTRY.
Now, it isn't just that Pantos are often produced centrally by a few big companies - who favour a template and a straightforward marketing package, this is understandable - it's that everyone does it. Even theatres with long histories of making Pantomime and who have a little more time to think of a slightly more original marketing strategy.
So why do it? Because it works. So why bother changing it?
It is assumed that children like glitter, so everything must be glittery. And they're probably right.
But there is, I suspect, another reason. Pantos tend to sell themselves. People just book to see Pantos, like animals migrating to spawn at the same spot every mating season. They don't know why, it's just expected. So long as you do a basic job of putting out posters, doing some press, getting the right star name - then there isn't a great creative job that's needed to sell it. Do the same thing every year, with the odd twist, because it's not going to swing sales more than a few percent. And that includes the poster.
But... but... but... is that an excuse? Is that really enough of an excuse for filling public space with acres and acres of migraine inducing imagery that doesn't just offend the eye, but actively burns the retina? Come on, people of Britain, we can do better! We can create something less plastic, more human, more alive then these never ending walls of glittery laziness.
We just probably won't.
Tuesday, 2 December 2014
Not Writing
I'm not writing at the moment, I'm directing a Pantomime. That isn't to say I can't write or that I'm blocked, I'm directing a Pantomime. I'm more a coiled spring, waiting till I'm no longer (altogether now) directing a Pantomime.
Which should be in about a week. Then I will leap into action. Well I'll have to, I'll only have a couple of weeks to finish off the final part of my Trolls Trilogy and finish my end of the year show. These jobs will be mostly editing or tidying. I've got SOOOOO much material for Trolls, just little idea how to structure it. I've decided it will be released in daily episodes over a week and I suspect it will be more fragmented as a story, rather than a clear forward seeking narrative. We shall see.
But then, then there are the new plays and the old plays which haven't been scheduled for performance and so sit on my computer, lonely. There's a new piece I've sketched out in my mind called Happathy. Which is a happy story about the end of the world - it's fairly short though. And a sketchy one-to-one piece called Just Say Yes which I could probably throw together in an afternoon, if I were so inclined. Then there are the two long format plays I've been toying with for years and probably blogged about previously, so I won't go on about them.
Then there's the play with no story. No logic. There's a play in my head and it's just a scream. That's all I can see, a scream. Lots of screaming. Or, at least, it ends with a scream - because there's no where else to go. I think. I just don't know yet.
But I can't see any work happening on that till after the Pantomime and mundane thoughts about blocking and sound effects and schedules are banished from my brain.
Not that I dislike Pantomime - I really enjoy directing Pantomime, but it does tend to get in the way of my other work and it is, essentially, a commercial product. I've had some success with commercial theatre - one of my happier productions was directing a production of House Guest by Francis Durbridge. It's a bloody awful play, frankly, trapped in the 1950's (despite being set in the 1980's) and full of unhelpful repetitions of character names, to the point where you can't remember anyone's name because every sentence seems to contain a name and you end up with snow blindness. And I chose to do it, rather than Uncle Vanya.
So I cut it. I hacked it. A play that was in danger of running two to two and a half hours was culled down to ninety minutes. If I could have got away with it, I would have cut more and run it without an interval. (This was, it should be added, quite against the license, but no one checked!) It contained three deaths, each of which were staged with care. It had stacks of tension and atmosphere. My only complaint with the production (apart from the odd lighting and set issue) was the ending. The ending of House Guest is terrible. I wish I'd gone a bit further and, rather than just cut down, I'd actively changed the ending. A final shoot out with the villain blasted through the french windows, sugar glass flying, would have been fab. But I didn't. Hey-ho.
Ironically, as a piece of commerce it was a total failure - in that, it didn't actually sell any tickets. But as a fun, thrilling, suspenseful piece of balls - it was great.
So, as I say, I like the odd bit of commercial directing work - but it does stop me from writing much. But I can wait. I can wait.
Which should be in about a week. Then I will leap into action. Well I'll have to, I'll only have a couple of weeks to finish off the final part of my Trolls Trilogy and finish my end of the year show. These jobs will be mostly editing or tidying. I've got SOOOOO much material for Trolls, just little idea how to structure it. I've decided it will be released in daily episodes over a week and I suspect it will be more fragmented as a story, rather than a clear forward seeking narrative. We shall see.
But then, then there are the new plays and the old plays which haven't been scheduled for performance and so sit on my computer, lonely. There's a new piece I've sketched out in my mind called Happathy. Which is a happy story about the end of the world - it's fairly short though. And a sketchy one-to-one piece called Just Say Yes which I could probably throw together in an afternoon, if I were so inclined. Then there are the two long format plays I've been toying with for years and probably blogged about previously, so I won't go on about them.
Then there's the play with no story. No logic. There's a play in my head and it's just a scream. That's all I can see, a scream. Lots of screaming. Or, at least, it ends with a scream - because there's no where else to go. I think. I just don't know yet.
But I can't see any work happening on that till after the Pantomime and mundane thoughts about blocking and sound effects and schedules are banished from my brain.
Not that I dislike Pantomime - I really enjoy directing Pantomime, but it does tend to get in the way of my other work and it is, essentially, a commercial product. I've had some success with commercial theatre - one of my happier productions was directing a production of House Guest by Francis Durbridge. It's a bloody awful play, frankly, trapped in the 1950's (despite being set in the 1980's) and full of unhelpful repetitions of character names, to the point where you can't remember anyone's name because every sentence seems to contain a name and you end up with snow blindness. And I chose to do it, rather than Uncle Vanya.
So I cut it. I hacked it. A play that was in danger of running two to two and a half hours was culled down to ninety minutes. If I could have got away with it, I would have cut more and run it without an interval. (This was, it should be added, quite against the license, but no one checked!) It contained three deaths, each of which were staged with care. It had stacks of tension and atmosphere. My only complaint with the production (apart from the odd lighting and set issue) was the ending. The ending of House Guest is terrible. I wish I'd gone a bit further and, rather than just cut down, I'd actively changed the ending. A final shoot out with the villain blasted through the french windows, sugar glass flying, would have been fab. But I didn't. Hey-ho.
Ironically, as a piece of commerce it was a total failure - in that, it didn't actually sell any tickets. But as a fun, thrilling, suspenseful piece of balls - it was great.
So, as I say, I like the odd bit of commercial directing work - but it does stop me from writing much. But I can wait. I can wait.
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