Issue 636

Maelstrom

13 Aug 2009

‘I started DJing,’ says Paul Gordon candidly, ‘by playing some pretty dubious music. Definitely nothing I’d admit to! You know, all the usual under-18s discos when I was about 13 or 14, then I started to get a few decent gigs as I got older. I played…

Festival Insider - Gavin Webster

13 Aug 2009

Here we are from the Toon to Auld Reekie, 100 miles up the ‘road’ (I use the term road loosely, it being almost farm track between the Geordie metropolis and the Scottish capital, yet Portsmouth and Southampton have a three-lane motorway separating…

Susan Calman: The Last Woman on Earth

A warm show from a friendly talent

13 Aug 2009

Susan Calman was once heckled by a guy who said he wouldn’t shag her if she was the last woman on earth. Taking his abuse as a launchpad, the premise of the pocket-sized Weegie’s show is that we’re all stuck in a bunker after a nuclear attack, and she…

Xiaolu Guo

Creating political parables out of flying saucers

12 Aug 2009

After her reading at the Book Festival last year, Chinese author Xiaolu Guo spent a lot of her Q&A session chatting about the literary headaches, not to mention boredom, created by translating from her first language, Chinese, into English. She had gone…

Suhayl Saadi

Spanning the Scottish Highlands and the wilds of Pakistan, his new novel is a weighty affair

12 Aug 2009

‘Epic’ and ‘ambitious’ are adjectives often bandied about in the description of novels that in fact display very little of either. That’s not an accusation you could level at Joseph’s Box, the sprawling, expansive, strange and moving new novel by…

Theatre Hitlist

As the EIF joins the Fringe, we choose our pick of Festival theatre.

12 Aug 2009

Diaspora, Sea Wall, The Tartuffe, Trilogy, The Hotel, Party, White Tea, Optimism, Faust

Chika Unigwe

Learning how much shame there is in luxury

12 Aug 2009

The depiction of prostitutes in fiction can be a one-dimensional affair, but not in Chika Unigwe’s poignant and moving novel On Black Sisters’ Street. Unigwe was raised in Nigeria, but has spent the last decade in Belgium, and it was a culture shock…

James Kelman

Striking deep into the Scottish soul

12 Aug 2009

There can be few Scottish writers as lauded as James Kelman, and rightly so. The Glasgow-born author has spent a career carving out a place as the authentic voice of his generation, his use of stream-of-consciousness prose and vernacular Scots…

Sylvia Plath - Three Women, The First Revival

Rare production of the poet’s play, with fine performances

12 Aug 2009

There’s more than a touch of the poet and playwright herself in each of the three titular characters in Robert Shaw’s production of what was originally a radio play from 1962. The triumvirate of voices are those of a wife (Louisa Clein), a secretary…

Birthing the Crone: The Crone Chronicles

One-woman show proclaiming the menopause as more than the beginning of old age

12 Aug 2009

Lisa Wilson’s battle with the menopause and a number of unforeseen obstacles come together in this one-woman show that takes a refreshing look at ‘the change’. Intelligently written, and performed with honesty and humility, Wilson takes you on a highly…

The State We’re In

The power of protest

12 Aug 2009

A fictionalised account of Brian Haw’s camp in London’s Parliament Square to protest the war in Iraq, foreign policy and threats to our civil liberties. Michael Byrne is compellingly impassioned as a man who has taken on the burden of protesting for the…

The Chronicles of Irania

12 Aug 2009

The pleasantries of tea, sweets and traditional stories are juxtaposed with harrowing tales of violence towards women and homosexuals. The country may be fictional but its real-life inspiration is all too clear, and Maryam Hamidi’s beautiful turn as…

Opening Night of the Living Dead

Zombies - not huge fans of amateur dramatics

12 Aug 2009

Shakespeare and Romero form an unholy alliance in this horror/comedy that depicts a zombie attack on an am-dram production of Romeo and Juliet. Fun, but ultimately predictable, with often repetitive chase sequences, this piece goes for giggles instead…

Top 20 Festival Shows

12 Aug 2009

Emmanuel Jal There are few people who could even imagine the terrors of being a child made to fight in a war-torn homeland. This guy has lived it and come through the other side. Jen Hadfield In a year of poetry shocks, this Shetlands-based…

Profile: Aly Michalka

Bandslam

12 Aug 2009

Name Aly Michalka Born 1989 Torrance, California Background Having already had top 20 singles in the UK and UK with her sister Amanda as AJ and Aly, and opened for Hannah Montana/Miles Cyrus, rising star Michalka has got the right qualifications…

Bargain DVDs

12 Aug 2009

Inglorious Bastards, Pirates of the Caribbean, Rocky, Planet of the Apes, Die Hard, Dollars trilogy, Powell and Pressburger anthology, Watchmen, Let The Right One In, O Lucky Man!, Repo Man, Harold and Maude, Donnie Darko

Profile: Gianni Di Gregorio

12 Aug 2009

Name Gianni Di Gregorio Born 1949, Rome Background Having grown up in the Trastevere district of Rome, di Gregorio studied acting and directing in the Italian capital, before becoming a screenwriter. From 1996 he began collaborating with the…

Mid-August Lunch

The subtle drama of an Italian village

12 Aug 2009

Hitherto best known for co-writing Gomorrah, 60-year-old Gianni di Gregorio makes his directorial debut with this charming tale, which beautifully illustrates Tolstoy’s dictum that ‘To speak to the world, one should write about one’s village’. The…

Alexander McCall Smith's Scotland at Night

Candlelit concert of music and poetry

12 Aug 2009

For a composer contemplating setting some songs but needing advice from a writer as to who might be an interesting collaborator, No 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency author Alexander McCall Smith would seem a reliable choice as a font of knowledge on the…

Geoff Dyer

Merrily spinning a Thomas Mann-inflected yarn

12 Aug 2009

The main man in Geoff Dyer’s smartly-penned fourth novel Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi has a pretty devilish sense of humour. And it would seem that the same can be said for the character’s creator. So what does he have in store for us with his…

5 Questions: Tony Mills

The breakdancer, takes time out from his TV-inspired show, Watch It! to answer our 5 Questions

12 Aug 2009

Give five reasons why people should see your show It’s a real visual feast – it’s not just dance but a performance with integrated film, animation and a wee bit of theatre; It’s not aloof, so there should be something in there for everyone to relate…

High flyers

12 Aug 2009

We head out on the High Street to find the best flyers in town A severe looking fellow in military uniform ordered us smartly to ‘move along there, move along now please,’ when we stopped to stare at the body sprawled across the pavement. The corpse…

French Film

12 Aug 2009

Fresh from a spot of miracle working in Ken Loach’s feelgood melodrama Looking for Eric, Eric Cantona returns in this damp squib of a British romantic comedy, the debut feature of Jackie Oudney. He plays Thierry Grimandi, a chain-smoking French auteur…

Music: also released

12 Aug 2009

The Xcerts: Live at King Tut’s. James Yorkston & the Big Eyes Family Players: Folk Songs, Squarepusher: Solo Electric Bass, The Crystal Method: Divided By Night. Richard Thompson: Walking on Wire.

Bandslam

Todd Graff's take on the teenage rock star dream

12 Aug 2009

‘This is sick!’ says budding impresario Will Burton (Gaelan Connell) as he constructs a rock’n’roll band from his fellow high school students to take part in a battle-of-the-bands competition. The description ‘sick’, obviously meaning, that his band are…

Viva

12 Aug 2009

LA based artist and filmmaker Anne Biller’s deliciously diverting sexploitation flick spoof revisits the cautionary sex and drugs melodramas of the late 60s and early 1970s best exemplified by Herschell Gordon Lewis’ 1968 Suburban Roulette, Radley…

5 paperback thrillers

12 Aug 2009

Burial by Neil Cross, Geezer Girls by Dreda Say Mitchell, Death Trip by Lee Weeks, Hit and Run by Lawrence Block, The Clayton Account by Bill Vidal.

The Fireman's Ball

12 Aug 2009

(PG) 73min (Arrow Films DVD retail) COMEDY/DRAMA Milos Amadeus Forman’s much loved 1967 Czech New Wave lynchpin has the honour of being one of only four films to be ‘banned forever’ by the Czech/Soviet authorities of the day who presumed it was…

Watcher In The Attic

12 Aug 2009

Noboru Tanaka’s bizarre and perverse 1974 adaptation of one of Edgowa Rampo’s celebrated horror stories (the Japanese Edgar Allan Poe) has long been unavailable on any format in the west so this release is great news for fans of the Japanese Nikkatsu…

News in brief

12 Aug 2009

The Leader of Glasgow City Council and Chair of Glasgow City Marketing Bureau is set to launch Glasgow’s Style Mile. Perthshire writer Mark Robertson hoping to take Broadway by storm. McFly, Pixie Lott, Sneaky Sound System and Asher Roth on V Festival…

The Amazing Spider-Man 600

Dan Slott, John Romita Jr & Various

12 Aug 2009

The 600th issue of any title is cause for celebration, particularly as iconic a character as Marvel’s mascot Spider-Man. The lead story from Dan Slott, with art by John Romita Jr, re-introduces arch villain Doctor Octopus (plus another big return, but…

Foodie fun

12 Aug 2009

As part of the Gourmet Glasgow dining festival, local food critics are getting a view from the other side as they become maitre d’ for the evening at various city restaurants over the month of August. The List’s food and drink editor Donald Reid will…

Maria Tecce – Viva!

12 Aug 2009

You could probably throw a Liza Minnelli biography down the High Street and you’d hit someone who’s starred in a Broadway show – such are the numbers of Yank showtune belters here, fighting for an audience to bellow at in August. Thankfully the cream…

In the frame

12 Aug 2009

Is it just us who think the Arches really can do no wrong? Adding to their to-do list, is a collaboration with next year’s Glasgow Film Festival. Titled ‘The Music Video,’ the GFF is accepting submissions for next year’s festival, in a bid to encourage…

Funny

An inability to see the potential in a great idea

12 Aug 2009

There’s a great idea behind Tim Nunn’s new play for Glasgow’s Reeling & Writhing about the army’s use of humour to interrogate suspects. Instead of tackling the clash of comedy and combat head on, however, the playwright gets distracted by his…

The Montana Ranch

Conscience infected con-men lack real hustle

12 Aug 2009

A pair of con-men take advantage of President Obama’s green initiative to relieve the environmentally concerned public of a cool $2 million, but come unstuck when one of them gets a conscience after spending a month up a tree with a sexy activist. It’s…

Maggie Service

12 Aug 2009

Service’s background as a trained actor gives her valuable comic versatility in this one-woman sketch show. But while her characters – ranging from an overly-chatty 24-hour medical emergency helpline assistant to an Australian drama teacher whose mantra…

Paddy Lennox

Tackling this family tree isn't as interesting as Who Do You Think You Are?

12 Aug 2009

Lennox is tackling his ancestry, using it as a springboard for a gentle hour musing his genetic make-up. Poignancy points are awarded for the worthy message and sweet home movies, but the fuzzy warmth far outweighs the laughs. He’s a charming, highly…

Bloodbath: the Musical

12 Aug 2009

The bad taste musical has become a mainstay of late evening fringe entertainment, and if this piece isn’t any more than a standard example, it shows enough gusto to keep you tapping your feet and groaning pleasurably at its acidic American style wit and…

The Stronger

Two women in one

12 Aug 2009

From time to time the American accent goes awol, and sometimes this monologue feels a little too LAMDA to really grip the audience, but overall Laura Pradelska carries off her one-woman version of Strindberg’s two-woman play convincingly. Sustained by a…

The Sunday Defensive

Unfulfilled geek potential

12 Aug 2009

They say bad things come in threes, but two can be just as terrible if this woefully unfunny double act is anything to go by. Phil Gilbert and Jacob Edwards are both geekily handsome and deliver every line with enthusiastic intensity. But it seems clear…

Tiffany Stevenson

Promising stand-up debut from the one-time wannabe actress

12 Aug 2009

Stevenson has gone from modelling work to small-time acting but right now her role is as new stand-up hopeful. The London-born comic exudes confidence and has plenty of stories from her more celeb obsessed and ‘vacuous’ days. More impressive is the high…

Yianni Agisilaou: MP3some

Nick Hornby influenced trawl through the soundtrack of romance

12 Aug 2009

Setting the story of past romances to music, Agisilaou is the centre of his own high fidelity. Yet with a one-way conversation about his likes and dislikes, hobbies, friends and family, Mp3some comes across as an idle description of his myspace page.

King Ubu

Playfully robust take on power and its outrageous (mis)fortunes

12 Aug 2009

Runaground theatre adapts Alfred Jarry’s absurdist masterpiece, setting the scene for the rise and fall of their greedy protagonist against the inspired backdrop of a vaudeville theatre. A talented ensemble cast shamelessly over-plays it, capturing with…

Long Tooth

Comedy that proves both outrageous and dark

12 Aug 2009

One of the true oddball sketch affairs on the Fringe this year comes from Viv Gibbs and Trudi Jackson as they re-enact bits and bobs of ancient history, conduct a book programme with serial killers and jump in the laps of male folks in the crowd. An…

Pete Firman

Jaw-dropping tricks with fast and furious gags

12 Aug 2009

Firman may archly raise an eyebrow when he describes his act as ‘magic and gags, gags and magic: a killer combo’, but many a true word remains spoken in jest. Fusing jaw-dropping tricks with a fast and furious delivery of gags, he combines old school…

Snatch Paradise

Satire on plastic surgery proves skin deep

12 Aug 2009

This deliberately obnoxious satire on surgically-enhanced sleb culture, in which vacuous magazine-fodder pop tarts are manoeuvred to serve the depravity of a pantomime Svengali manager, contains the odd well-aimed joke. Overall, though, the targets are…

Neil Delamere

Hilarious on and off his script

12 Aug 2009

Breathless Irish comedian Delamere flits about the stage like a genial dervish, his quick-fire delivery and razor-sharp mind taking no prisoners. Quickly building a supreme rapport with his audience, his masterful control allows him to stray a little…

Matt Harvey

Love poems for household objects, and other unusual ideas

12 Aug 2009

Like the subject of one of his poems, Harvey’s show is low key. There’s a quirky charm in love poems to homely subjects such as Ibuprofen, tea bags and the potato while the Radio 4 contributor’s proposals for a harmonious society include ‘uncertainty…

The Yellow Wallpaper

A Goth story that lacks in menace

12 Aug 2009

Enthusiastic production of Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s early feminist Gothic story that never quite coheres. A brilliant, sensual central performance by Helen Foster as the creative woman trapped by Victorian gender mores is not enough to paper over…