2021: West Side Story - 2021 Movie

 

 

West Side Story – the 2021 movie.
Release date: 26 December 2021 (Australia)
Directed by    Steven Spielberg
Screenplay by    Tony Kushner
Based on West Side Story by Jerome Robbins, Leonard Bernstein, Stephen Sondheim,    Arthur Laurents

Starring   

    Ansel Elgort
    Ariana DeBose
    David Alvarez
    Mike Faist
    Rita Moreno
    Rachel Zegler

Cinematography: Janusz Kamiński
Edited by Michael Kahn, Sarah Broshar

Music by Leonard Bernstein

Reviewed by Frank McKone (December 27, 2021)

Photo: westsidestory.com

Photo: Nick Tavernise

Photo:westsidestory.com

This West Side Story is the real thing.  

It is not a romance, but an insightful tragedy.

Just as Shakespeare intended in his story of Romeo and Juliet set in the newly-wealthy upper-class merchant family society in which he grew up in the 1500s; and as Stephen Sondheim intended in his Maria (Rachel Zegler) and Tony (Ansel Elgort) story of social inequality in his America of massive economic ‘development’ in the 1950s; so the story presented by Steven Spielberg is the tragedy of unintended consequences, warning us in the 2020s that human greed ultimately ends in disaster.

It is bad enough that we as a total world-wide community cannot get our act together to properly and fairly manage the current pandemic – whose existence is essentially natural.

Far worse is our belief in our need for continuously growing wealth which not only causes the divisions between the haves and the have-nots, the in-groups and the out-groups, and the impossibility of acceptance – let alone love – across social boundaries which Shakespeare, Sondheim and Spielberg have all recognised; but also that human greed has now taken us beyond dancing against each other with menacing clicking fingers – way beyond Jets and Sharks upsetting social norms – to the point where human induced heating of the earth is likely to end ignominiously in the death of humankind, represented by the killings of the men at the end of West Side Story with no sense of a future for the women.

Spielberg has been careful to set his movie realistically in the New York of the 1950s, adapting the arts of music, photography and dance, and acting – as originally written by Sondheim and directed and choreographed by Jerome Robbins – to show a picture of how and why the street gangs existed as an necessary element of that society.  Spielberg didn’t need to ‘update’, just as Shakespeare didn’t need to ‘update’ Verona.  For us, today, 1950s New York is as far distant as Verona was for Londoners in 1597.

Jerome Robbins’ work on stage transported audiences everywhere into the world of the drama, as all good theatre must.  He made the dance the conduit for our imaginations.  The 1961 movie failed because Ernest Lehman’s screenplay and the directing by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins could not make us believe in the reality of the situation.  The dance, the photography and the acting made the story a mere romance.

Spielberg’s film is of the gritty reality.  The dancing in the streets is integrated into the social life of the have-nots in the streets where their homes are being destroyed by big business ‘re-development’ – and that transports us into that reality.

The result, in my view, is that Spielberg’s West Side Story is a substantial work of art, just as Robbins himself achieved on stage.  Though the advertising describes the 2021 movie as Musical/Romance  2h 36m, I can promise you that after those 2 hours and 36 minutes of Tony’s attempt to believe in himself, after a year’s contemplation in jail for having nearly killed a man in a ‘rumble’ as the previous leader of The Jets, and watching Maria’s realisation that she is left with no option but to do her best for herself despite everything, you will leave the theatre seeing the world around you for what it really is.

You’ll not forget Rita Moreno.  She plays the widow of Doc, still running the drugstore he used to run in the original stage show.  She is the one character who understands the reality and the need for compassion and common sense in an uncertain world.

The Jets and The Sharks
Confrontation in the Dance Hall
Photo: westsidestory.com

Rita Moreno
as Mrs Doc
Photo: westsidestory.com

PS You don't need to know anything about the original stage show or the old movie.  This West Side Story stands alone.  Don't miss it.

© Frank McKone, Canberra

2021: Theatre Network Australia - A National Cultural Plan

 

 Theatre Network Australia provides information and suggestions with the next Federal Election in mind, to be held before the end of May, 2022.

Posted by Frank McKone

December 14, 2021

https://tna.org.au/our-work/advocacy/advocacy-101-national-cultural-plan/

The plan to make a plan

Australia does not have a national policy or plan for arts and culture. We have had two policies in the past, both by Labor; Creative Nation in 1994 under Paul Keating, and Creative Australia in 2013 under Julia Gillard. Both were short lived.

According to arts and culture think tank, A New Approach (ANA), having a national arts and culture plan would:

• Use our rich culture in the recovery from COVID-19, the economic downturn, and recent natural disasters

• Ensure Australia’s unique stories are heard nation-wide as well as internationally

• Build confidence in our creative and cultural industries, allowing for growth and necessary change

• Help ensure every single person in this country has the opportunity for happiness, togetherness and the connectedness offered by cultural participation and contribution

In August 2020 the Federal Government launched a Parliamentary Inquiry into Cultural and Creative Industries and Institutions. In this inquiry the Committee considered the following points in regards to creative and cultural industries, which were provided by Minister Paul Fletcher:

1. How to recognise, measure and grow economic benefits and employment opportunities

2. How to recognise, measure and grow non-economic benefits that enhance community, social wellbeing and promoting Australia's national identity

3. Cooperation and delivery of policy between layers of government

4. The impact of COVID-19

5. Increasing access and opportunities through innovation and the digital environment

The Inquiry collected 352 submissions, conducted a survey, and held a number of hearings, which informed the Committee to write a report and a set of recommendations.

A 205-page report titled Sculpting a National Cultural Plan; Igniting a post-COVID economy for the arts was published in October 2021, and is broken into six sections. They cover the composition of the cultural sector, approaches to evaluating it, the impact of COVID-19 on artists and organisations, and the problem of arts education in schools.

The report makes 22 recommendations, which can be divided into three categories: restorations, bespoke suggestions, and calls for further action. Importantly, the first recommendation is:

"The Committee recommends that, noting the significant short and long-term impacts of the COVID-19 public health emergency on the arts sector, the Commonwealth Government develop a national cultural plan to assess the medium and long term needs of the sector."

Essentially this report is a plan to make a plan.

Importantly, unlike the previous two Labor policies which were lost in changes of government, this report essentially has bipartisan support, with the Committee comprised of Liberal, National and Labor MPs. Although there are additional comments added to the report by Labor, there is no dissenting report. The creation of a national plan as suggested in the report has the potential to be supported by both major parties, and therefore be more likely to survive changes in government. For a long-term strategy, this is vital.

It is worth noting that is currently unclear if Labor will be supporting the creation of such a plan, or pushing ahead with their own policy if elected. You can read Federal Shadow Minister for the Arts Tony Burke’s address to the Arts Industry Council of South Australia where he speaks about the principles that will guide Labor, and the need for a cultural policy.

So, what now?

The Committee recommended that the relevant Commonwealth minister(s) report on the progress of the Committee’s recommendations by December 2022. The Government is under no obligation to implement any of the recommendations from the report, although keep in mind that they are the ones that instigated the inquiry.

In their submission to the Inquiry, ANA said: “Following the Inquiries’ report, ANA recommends the Federal Government establish an independent process to draft a NACC Plan, drawing on both evidence presented to the Inquiry and the formidable body of current data and research that is publicly available.”

The work from here is to advocate for the Government and the Opposition to commit to the development and resourcing of a national plan in their election campaigns, as we head to an election before May 2022. Within this should be a call support the Australia Council for the Arts as a key driver for the development and implementation of the plan.

Following are three more sections for those who wish to advocate for a National Plan:

Some ideas on how to do that

Play your part

What is our vision?

 https://tna.org.au/our-work/advocacy/advocacy-101-national-cultural-plan/

 

2021: Two Twenty Somethings Decide...by Michael Costi

 

 

Two Twenty Somethings Decide Never To Be Stressed About Anything Ever Again.  Ever by Michael Costi.  Canberra Youth Theatre at Canberra Theatre Centre, The Courtyard, December 9-14, 2021.

Reviewed by Frank McKone

Cast:
Boyfriend – Elliot Cleaves
Girlfriend – Martha Russell
New Best Friend – Blue Hyslop

Creatives:
Director – Luke Rogers
Designer – Aislinn King
Lighting Designer – Antony Hateley
Sound Designer – Kimmo Vennonen
Stage Manager – Rhiley Winnett
Assistant Stage Manager – Ashley Pope

The exaggerated title is just about right for this light-hearted absurdist somewhat satirical up-to-date rom com.  The many twenty-somethings near me laughed out loud so much that my hearing aids overloaded.  Even if I had heard every word, I still wouldn’t have understood half the social media references.

The essential message was Never Work in a Chicken Burger Take-away, or you’ll never be able to cross the road again.  Never.  And there was a very serious political point about the treatment of a Syrian refugee Uber driver if you accidentally give him only one star, who cancels you and cancels your account.

The narrow rectangular Courtyard space does not make stage design easy, but Aislinn King, recently selected for the World Stage Design exhibition in Calgary, Canada, next year, has made a see-through set which allows for much more wild action – and occasional moments of reflection – than you might expect.

The three actors have all the skills and timing needed, and a real sense of working with, and off, each other – a great team.

I’m not sure I learned how not to be stressed in today’s world – except that the really important message from this play is that performing for a real audience in real time and space is better than any spurious ‘metaverse’.  And laughing with, not at, each other makes life worth living – and that’s what theatre is all about.

Enjoy!

© Frank McKone, Canberra

2021: The Stranger by Albert Camus

 

 

The Stranger (L’Étranger) by Albert Camus, adapted for stage by Christopher Samuel Carroll.  Bare Witness Theatre Company at Ralph Wilson Theatre, Gorman Arts Centre, Canberra, December 8-11 and 16-17, 2021.

Reviewed by Frank McKone
December 8

Performer: Christopher Samuel Carroll
Designer: Gillian Schwab
Music: Olivia Graham
Operator: Rachel Pengilly
Promotional Photography: Novel Photographic
Production Stills: Andrew Sikorski

Christopher Samuel Carroll as Meursault
in The Stranger by Albert Camus

 

As a psychological study of an alienated young man, Meursault, I prefer the French title L’Étranger to be translated as The Outsider.  In court on trial for what could be judged as an accidental murder, the prosecutor describes Meursault as an abomination, thrusting the words at the jury – “un abîme menaçant d'engloutir la société” – “a menacing abyss about to swallow society”.

But Meursault, as he often says, is not a stranger.  He is just like the rest of us – capable of standing mentally to one side to protect ourselves from taking action which requires accepting responsibility.  Camus’ 1957 story was more prescient than he could ever have known, when we consider the populist politics of today.  Meursault didn’t intend to kill the unnamed stranger, the Arab, in French colonial Algiers; just as, for example, Kevin Rudd didn’t intend to cause the deaths of refugees when he announced that no asylum seeker who arrived by boat would ever be allowed to stay in Australia.

In his day, Meursault, is forced to plead guilty (after all it was true he killed a man), and is guillotined.  Rudd lost an election to Abbott, Turnbull, Morrison and Dutton: no-one has pleaded guilty for the deaths and trauma in off-shore detention or even when finally brought onshore under the short-lived medivac legislation.

So the first thing to say about Christopher Samuel Carroll is that his presentation of this work in Canberra, the nation’s capital, is important for us to see.  It is so much more than an interesting look back at French absurdism and existentialist philosophy in an academic light; it’s about our own abîme menaçant swallowing our society today.  [If you would like an academic read, in French, go to “Albert Camus et L'Absurdité de la Vie” at http://mabdaa.edu.iq/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/36-Albert-Camus-et-LAbsurdit%C3%A9-de-la-Vie.pdf ]

The next thing to say is that the simple in-the-round intimate theatre design, in which Meursault tells us his story, in changing levels of light and dark, engages us directly, not only in the story – as reading the novel does – but even more in the emotions we feel in response.  When reading the novel, I found I could stand off to the side and become involved in intellectual matters, like should the justice system have been more empathetic to the young man when his alienation was caused by a cold society in the first place; and certainly should the death penalty have been abolished, as it now has been increasingly around the world.  

If reading the book as I did when it was first translated helped make me support Amnesty International on intellectual grounds, Carroll’s telling of the story as Meursault makes me feel with and for him – and helps me understand him.

This can only happen because Carroll’s acting skills are exemplary – played straight, from the inside of his being.  This is the quality which I think of as ‘pure’ acting.

I’m pleased to see the short season has already been extended, and I trust that Bare Witness can take The Stranger further afield.

© Frank McKone, Canberra