All of Us Are In The Gutter ...

Up at the Edinburgh Fringe, star ratings are everything. At least, that’s what we keep being told in opinion pieces like this one. Obviously, they’re useful to plaster on the promotional material when indecisive potential audiences are drowning in flyers on the Royal Mile or panicking outside the Half Price Hut. The problem is, of course, that nobody nowadays seems to listen to – or even have basic respect for – any star rating below four. Which makes the whole thing nonsensical.

 

In all honesty, there’s nothing essentially wrong with star ratings, it’s just that absolutely nobody – with no exceptions whatsoever – knows how to employ them. Three star ratings are now a badge of dishonour, and there isn’t a theatre company who would feel happy using them in its press. This, clearly, is just a little bit silly: it suggests that the absolute baseline of credibility is four stars and above, ignoring anything below. That means we ignore almost 75% of the possible opinion. That’s like saying that nobody under the age of fifty is worth listening to. Yes, I’m well aware that some of you have no problem with that. But we’re missing out here. The very existence of three stars at the end of a review should indicate something of value. Three stars worth of value, in fact. Hell, you don’t even get three stars on your badge in McDonald’s without seriously impressing the management.

 

Let’s look at things in reverse order. Five stars is the easiest to discuss, since, like standing in a line at for a show at the fringe that doesn’t have relatives of members of the company in it, it’s simply near-impossible to achieve. Five stars should be indicative of the very best of someone’s career: literally, it can’t get any better than this. That being said, we’ve all been guilty of throwing away five stars when we probably shouldn’t have. Even I have to confess doing so when overtired, distracted by a pretty face in a supporting role, and jacked up on far too many Tangtastics.

 

Following that then, is Four Stars. Four Stars is what we should be calling unmissable, what a few too many of us actually think is a five star rating. These are the shows that we excitedly tweet about on the way out, of the venue, the ones that we recommend to our friends when the show tours locally. But they are still not five stars. A four star show is merely excellent. Excellent is something to be proud of. What’s happened, of course, is that in recent years, we have got ourselves trapped in a ‘X Factor’ mentality – apparently, things have to be life changingly brilliant, or grimly awful. We’ve become embarrassed by thinking anything in between. We are now bewilderingly shy of being able to rave about something that we find wonderful while at the same time acknowledging that it needs improvement.

 

If all the above is true (cough: it is), this means that Three Stars is not, as we have tricked ourselves into believing, mundane and invisible, a rating to be embarrassed by. No, three stars is – or, in my not so humble opinion, should be – simply a very good show. As I’ve argued before, in any other industry you have to work damn hard to get three stars. Soldiers returning from battle are continually baffled by the amount of young dance troupes petulantly rejecting their three stars at the fringe.

 

If we accept that a three star rating is actually a hard-won compliment rather than a dismissal, then two and one star ratings can begin to make a lot more sense. A two star rating is for a show that is essentially sound, but fatally or near-fatally flawed by a couple of bad choices: perhaps the lead is horrifically miscast, or the dialogue is overwritten. What those two stars tell you however (or, should tell you, in this alternate universe I’ve just made up), particularly in an environment as volatile and cauldron-bubbly as the fringe, is that although this show has some way to go before improvement, it is still worth your time: the company deserves your attention and feedback so that they can continue to grow.

 

Which leaves us with the one star review. In this version of the world, a one star review would be exactly what it should sound like: a show with at least some merit. Yes, a one star show would be undeniably poor. It might be incoherent, or the jokes would be indistinguishable from the twitter feed of that old school friend you keep meaning to delete – but that one star would suggest that there was at least one saving grace: intelligent direction, perhaps, attempting to throw light on a half-baked script, or a clever set design.

 

I understand completely that I’m a lone voice. The star ratings aren’t going anywhere anytime soon unless you write – as I indeed do – for a site like FringeReview, which has adopted a policy of ‘if you can’t beat them, then refuse point blank to join them’, and has eschewed star ratings altogether. Equally, for those sites and publications that are still using star ratings, companies are only ever going to be interested in ratings of four and five, which, as I’ve pointlessly argued is insane. So it’s down to us to argue more eloquently in our reviews. Now, I’ve been known to dismiss myself as an online hack, but what I’m hacking still has some merit. Well, if not merit, certainly weight. Reviews are at their best when they are a discussion, the development of the reviewer’s own reaction to whatever it is they have seen in the theatre. It’s not good that we can have our arguments and thoughts reduced down into what is essentially a very unimaginative line of emojis. If star ratings are like a reviewer’s version of Schrödinger’s Cat – simultaneously meaningless and vital – then what we write below the line needs to be carefully considered. Lest we forget, the reviewers themselves can now punished (or rewarded) with star-style ratings, via sites like FringePig. A few more of those plastered over reviewer’s profiles could do more to change the ratings system than anything else ..

Saturday 13 July 2013

In the past week or so, Brighton had welcomed its annual swelling of the population with the influx of a whole gaggle of foreign language students. Of course, there are lots of such students here all through the year (there's lots of schools in the city for expressly that purpose), but there's a significantly higher proportion from July onwards. The idea of course is that they come over to England so that they can practice speaking English in a country where pretty much everyone else speaks the language as a matter of course (more or less). I think it's a particularly mean joke to drag all these kids over from countries like Italy and Spain, the places that actually have decent weather from time to time, and force them to spend sometime discovering what exactly is meant by a British summer. I suppose if nothing else, it introduces them to the concept of irony, which apparently is one of the trickiest linguistic tricks to pull off when learning English. 

I see a fair amount of foreign language students on the Ghostwalk at this time of year. For the most part, their attempts at English are far, far better than any attempts I could make at any of their languages - indeed, in at least a couple of cases, I'm pretty sure their grasp of English is better than my own. But from time to time, I get a group who clearly have learned only eight words in English (and at least six of those are the kind that the BBC wouldn't be able to transmit before the watershed). In the case of these students, there are a number of different reactions, ranging from shyly smiling incomprehension, to blank indifference. I've heard from several stand-ups who regularly perform at the Edinburgh Fringe who tell horror stories of having to perform a full hour to a room (not) full of about three people, none of whom understand a damn word of English. That's the very definition of a tough gig. At least with the Ghostwalk, it isn't just about the words alone, in the way that can very often be the case with a lot of stand-up. The role (of Jasper, the guide I play on the Ghostwalk) lends itself to being a bit broader, larger, and dare I say, frankly over-acted and hammy. 

All of this means that when I'm doing the Ghostwalk in front of an audience that perhaps only understand 30% of what I'm saying, I have to raise my game. Not exactly in what I say, or even how I say it, because a lot of that dialogue is simply not going to carry over. This requires me to communicate in other ways, not least the way I use my hands. Now, this is a bit of an odd one, because there are times as an actor that I admittedly use my hands far too much (I do tend to over-gesticulate), but it's not often that I consider that I am actually required to do so for my character. Of course, it's all about communication: what you need to do in order to tell the story. After all, that's what it's all about: telling the story. Whether it be on stage, or a guided tour, or a short story or novel. Being clear, direct, and concise. Almost completely unlike this blog, in other words. 

Goodbye To Edinburgh

Yesterday morning was my last in Edinburgh, so I spent some of it in the Elephant House cafe, which I hadn't had a chance to do so previously this year. The cafe gets an extraordinary amount of negative feedback on sites like tripadvisor and foursquare, simply because it trades on the fact that JK Rowling is supposed to have begun writing her Harry Potter books there. This - the negative feedback - is a trifle unfair on the Elephant House, as it's an entirely understandable angle to pull. People who gripe about the cafe celebrating its (admittedly probably quite weak) connection with the world of Harry Potter are like those who'd want to firebomb an old house just because it had a blue plauqe stating that Arthur Conan Doyle once lived there.

Why wouldn't you celebrate the fact that JK Rowling (probably) wrote (some of) the early drafts of Harry Potter there? Frankly, I'm somewhat unconvinced that the story is entirely true as it stands, since popular myth tells us that JKR began writing the books while a young mum, and there doesn't seem to be a great deal of room to get a buggy in there. Although I'll acknowledge that it's probably got a hell of a lot busier in the last ten years.

Of course, that's one of the main reasons people complain on tripadvisor: that it's always so busy, packed with Harry Potter fans (thereby presumably overlooking the resason they were there in the first place). It's probably about as busy as the Black Medicine cafe on the other side of town which is smaller and a lot more awkwardly designed, but has a better system for reducing waiting time and lines at the counter. Plus, it seems slightly cooler than the Elephant House. Well, I once sat next to Will Poulter just before Son Of Rambow came out. I assume that counts for something.

What the Elephant House doesn't have, apart from the sign outside declaring that JK Rowling started writing her books here, is any mention of the boy wizard at all. There are, in respect of the cafe's name, a great deal of ceramic elephants, but Harry Potter appears to be wearing an invisibilty cloak.There's not even any reference to anything vaugely magical - not even a twig repesenting a wand, and you pretty quickly realise that the figure that Must Not Be Named is Warner Bros, doing everything it can to protect its product. That's understandable, but its a shame that its strength is so overeaching that the Elephant House can't even have anything on display like a witches hat, which by and large predate JK Rowling and the films by at least a couple of years.

I'm now wondering if it might not be a little too mean to write a film for Warner Bros that excusively deals with the adventures of a gang of elephants. Who live in a house. See how the cafe and WBs copyright department cope with that ...

What Show Are You Doing?

My last evening at the Edinburgh Fringe. I'm out in about a hour or so to see a couple of shows (and that in itself indicates all that is crazy about the Fringe ... for some performers and audiences, the day only really kicks in at around 6pm). One show that I'm seeing is research, of a kind. I'd meant to do a lot more research in the types of shows that I saw up here. I've got an improv show coming up in May, for the Brighton Festival Fringe, and since it's a long form style show, I thought that it would be instructive to see a few, 'specially as it's a type of improv I only have a bit of experience with.

But here's the thing. There weren't really a great deal of improv shows that leapt out at me. I think improv can be a bit of a tough sell, it's instructive to see how such a show can come across to me, someone who's actively seeking one out. The improv show that I'll be working on, due in May 2013 (since when did my calender start getting booked years in advance? Isn't that supposed to be a sign of success, or something?) won't exactly be an easy ride. Whatever else improvisation is meant to be, it certainly isn't simply making things up as you go along.

Had a lovely chat and coffee with a friend on what was her last day at the Fringe. Almost predictably, we got to lamenting how difficult it is to bring a show up here. Although, if we're being pedantic (which, all of a sudden, we are) she's already brought a show up here,last year. By sheer chance, it was the last show I saw at the Fringe before leaving in 2011, long before I'd met her. It was very good.

To be fair to her, and our shared laments, it was the uni that she was studying with at the time that paid most of the costs, otherwise it's doubtful that she would have been able to afford it. It's a depressing fact that money is a significantly more important factor in getting a show to the fringe than, say, talent. I've spoken to at least two people this year - who I didn't know - who felt trapped in shows that they absolutely hated, being directed by people who they thought were talentless idiots. The reason, then, that the show existed was because these directors had a bit of cash to throw around. And, bizarely, in both cases, because the directors were completing a PHD in Theatre. However, in both cases, the depressed actors involved said that I should really get along to see the show. Presumably after nearly a month, the flyering instinct never leaves you.

Three Kinds Of Me

So, I have a new upcoming project. This one has a bit of a quick turnaround, as the show goes up in October. That doesn't leave a great deal of rehearsal time. I'm not yet sure if the fact that it's a one woman show will make rehearsal more or less difficult. It's by no means a foregone conclusion.

One conclusion you may have correctly drawn from that first paragraph is that I'm not in it. The one woman in question is a good friend Sarah Charlsey (she's such a good friend that I even manage to spell her surname correctly occasionally), and she's written the piece that she will be acting in. It's not precisely the first time I've directed a friend - it's not even the first time I've directed Sarah - but this time, the dymanics are somewhat different.

First of all, I've been asked to direct someone else's creation (we'll pass over the small detail that I wasn't actually first choice. I'll keep that in reserve if things aren't going my way in the third week of rehearsal). Normally as a director, at least at this level, when it's all local, and a compartively small amount of people are watching, you choose your own project. Therefore, I have in my head (as I imagine a great many directors do) a bubbling pot of various images for possible in-the-future productions that may never happen. I have great opening images for both Three Sisters and Twelfth Night, both of which I imagine are far too expensive for any venue I currently have access to. Likewise, I have a whole series of ideas for a show that I tell anyone that will listen that I definetly will write a script for one of these days (it involves Victorian women using silks and Arial skills. I have yet to convince anyone - including myself - that that little detail isn't just for my benefit).

However, the goal posts change somewhat if you are directing your friend in the script they themselves wrote. I'm not exactly expecting to have any arguments regarding costume ('but they have to be wearing a Thomas The Tank Engine jumper, that's what the real David was wearing!'), but you never know. Quite often as a director (and indeed, as actor, designer, or most anything else) you play around with the expectations of the script: you know that such and such a scene is a moment when everyone's royally annoyed with each other, so you see how it will work if each actor plays it really positive and nice. Usually, the audience will pick up on the tension anyway, in a passive aggressive way. I'll let you know how it all goes; the first rehearsal is this week, after I get back from Edinburgh.

A Day Off. Sort Of.

Within the finishing line (for me) of Edinburgh this year, as I'll be leaving in a couple of days. I've enjoyed it more than I did last year, although it feels more like hard work this time round - the reviews I've been writing have felt like more of a struggle, particuarly in the instances where I've attempted to review things that are somewhat outside my 'comfort zone'. There have been a couple of things this year that I knew I was never going to review, simply because I liked the performer too much. I'm thinking specfically here of the likes of Daniel Kitson and Josie Long, who I happened to see on the same day. I knew that I didn't want to review them,  just see them as a punter, because I wanted to simply watch them without the need to make notes, and also (this may the more important point) there comes a time when it's entirely pointless to review performers you already expect to like and be positive about. There are a couple of acts this year that, keeping that in mind, I suspect I have written my last review for.

However, I feel like I've become a true Fringe veteran today because I 'almost' had a day off. In years past, I would feel like I was wasting a day up in Edinburgh if I wasn't seeing five or six shows. Considering it takes about five years to truly get a measure of the city, and there can be less than three minutes between shows, this way madness lies. But today was somewhat relaxed, and I had no desire to complicate matters. I still had one show to review at the end of the night, but the rest of the day was fairly empty. Which is not to say that I didn't fill it with a couple of shows anyway - Richard Herring's Talking Cock (actually the first time I've seen him live), and earlier in the day, Angela Barnes and Matt Richardson on the Free Fringe. Both shows were great fun, and both were crammed to the rafters with punters. It's very delightful to see such huge audiences attend shows headlined by performers you have at least a nodding aquaintance with. I'm sure I'll be boring people with 'I knew them' type anedoctes in less than a year.

The other way I know I'm a Fringe veteran actually started a couple of years ago, but I thought I'd gotten over it. However, it kicked in again today (or was it yesterday? It's the Fringe, I have no idea). It's the point where, as an audience member, you begin to take as keen an interest in the sightlines and lighting rig as you do the act on stage. I get frustrated by this, this niggling hope that at some point I might have the chance to bring a production up to the festival. Of course, at the moment, without recourse to a lottery win, this seems to be pretty much impossible.

These latter days of my Fringe visits are the most cruel - surronded by thousands of creative people, relaxed after a couple of weeks off, my mind begins to start actually having a couple of good ideas that might genuinely work as Fringe ideas, and just today I had an idea how to rewrite my Brighton Fringe play from a couple of years ago to get it to a Edfringe-manageable time of at least a hour and a half. Nobody seems to have told my head that in a very short time, it'll be back at work. It seems a shame to let it know ...

Where Is Everybody?

So, Edinburgh feels odd this year. Actually, that's an entirely meaningless sentence, since I'm pretty sure that someone somewhere is required to say 'Edinburgh feels odd this year' every year, no matter what's going on. I know that it felt odd to me last year, but I also know that was just me, that I wasn't really enjoying it, despite the quailty of the acts. This year, I'm having a better time, although I'm reasonably convinced the acts aren't.

I knew that I'd truly arrived on the Fringe this year when I'd seen a terrible show followed by a really good show (I think that's like, one of the rules or something). The good show was from Belt Up, an adaptation of A Little Princess, a book that I incidentally have never read, and now think that if I ever had a daughter to read it to, I might not be able to get past chapter one without having a massive emotional collaspe.

The really bad show, by the way, I'm not going to name. I feel bizarely lucky that I had to pay for it - I'd much rather wasting some cash on it than having to suffer a headache trying to think of something positive to say something about it in a review. It concerns me that some companies seem not to truly understand what the concept of this 'international' festival really is - you know, the idea that they might be seen by audiences.

Of course, that's what's odd about the fringe this year - audiences, or a seeming lack of them. For as long as I've been coming to the fringe (which isn't that long), the chatter has always been that the audiences are down on the previous year. This is always a claim that ends up getting shot in the throat the following month when the fringe society release their figures, and it's discovered that all manner of records have been broken. But this year, it feels different even when you're not sitting in a poorly attended show. It's out there - or rather, people aren't - in the streets, and in empty Pleasance Courtyards. You almost feel like this is what it's like in the other eleven months of the year.

On the plus side, at least it's easier to go down the Royal Mile. I even managed to get a flyer, and usually only the best people get given flyers. I know, because they told me.

Post Olympics

So, that’s it, then. Two weeks of watching the planet’s athletes doing what they do best are now at anend, and now Great Britain can go back to doing what it does best, namely, returning to a foul mood and not being quite so positive. It must have been quite a strain for the nation’s cynics over the last fortnight, like a middle aged man holding his stomach in when a pretty girl walks past.
Having little or no interest in sport, I ended up seeing little to none of the games. In fact, most of what I did see was essentially the opening and closing ceremonies, both at big screens – one in Brighton, on the beach, and the other, tonight, at the BBC Garden at the Edinburgh Fringe. There were, of course, these big screens in town centres all over the country, allowing people everywhere to soak up that atmosphere of fun, comradeship and support for the nation’s Olympians. Well, except in Worthing, where last week someone nicked the laptop and cable that were needed to transmit the footage from the BBC. Maybe in Worthing they assumed that basic thievery was an Olympic sport, and they were going for Bronze. And by ‘going for Bronze’, I do of course mean simply pinching it from a railway line.
However, the atmosphere at those screens was wonderful. A lot was said about how easy it was to get caught up in a sport that you had no real passion – or, indeed, fundamental knowledge – of, and that’s even more true within a crowd of amenable people on a sunny day getting swept up in all the high drama of, say, dressage.

We’ve learnt a lot from these games. We’ve learned that we’re in dire need of stronger role models than the cast of TOWIE. We’ve learned that despite what we’re continually being told, that actually most people are pretty fond of Great Britain. We’ve learned that an alarming amount of people want to sleep with Tom Daly, regardless of what they thought their sexuality was. And, I don’t know about you, but I’ve learned that every time from now one I use a taxi, I want it to be like the ones the Spice Girls use.