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trog

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  1. trog

    Peeping Tom

    A heads up for fans of Moira Shearer. The Horror Channel (Freeview 70) are showing the restored print of "Peeping Tom" again this Wednesday, 13th April 22:50 The colour in this restored print is glorious.
  2. I saw this at the Dudley Showcase and what a mess. They started off with no sound and the picture was projected to fill the entire wall of the cinema. The picture wasn't too much of a problem when they were showing the interviews with the dancers at the start but it was obvious that it would be a problem later. My thanks go to the chap who went to complain. Anyway, they managed to turn the sound on during Novikova's intro, although the picture was still too big. This meant that once the performance started, there was a big black bar (the bottom of the screen) at dancers waist height, and their legs were projected onto the wall below, which is blue and fluted - made for an interesting viewing. God bless the chap went to complain again, and they adjusted the picture. Now they were projected onto the black bar, so we missed out on seeing the dancers feet for the rest of the first act. During the first interval, they finally managed to sort the picture to the correct size. Finally, when it was all over, they forgot to turn the lights on, leaving us to grope our way out. There are never many people at these screenings, so I was in my usual place. Sure enough a group decided to come and sit directly behind me and start munching popcorn and nosily slurping drinks. I thought, this is going to go on throughout, so I moved, Sure enough, in both intervals they went out for more sweets, drinks, ice cream, etc. A happy consequence of this, is that I've identified a better place to sit and nobody can get behind me. As to the actual ballet, I haven't seen Don Q live very often. It's never going to be my favourile ballet. I like the first act, but the second act is bonkers and the third pure circus. It's a story that I don't think translates well into ballet. Still you can't deny the dancers are amazing and inspite of there being a couple of slips, it was extremely well danced. I especially liked Tikhomirova, although it's a shame we couldn't enjoy the dagger dance properly (owing to the cinema's incompetence). The music used in the trailer was annoying.
  3. I saw this in the local paper today Tutu worn by legendary ballerina sells for £2,600 at Stourbridge auction. The auction house is across the road from where I work, and had I known about this sale I would have gone. There were several lots with connections to Markova - the catalogue is here A quick look reveals lots 675 to 706 are the ones of most interest to the readers of the board. This is the same auction house which a couple of years ago sold the tennis dress from the famous Athena poster.
  4. Here's one that I liked Moving the Avebury stones for British Summer Time
  5. You can do aerial at Circus Space in London, Circomedia in Bristol, Greentop in Sheffield, Skylight in Rotherham, and other places (now). The four that I've mentioned are where I personally trained when I used to do it. Back then (15 years ago) it was very difficult to find a venue. Now it seems to be everywhere. Aerial requires a lot of upper body strength and decent flexibility helps immensly. I always had plently of strength and very poor flexibilty, so my positions weren't all that pretty to look to but rock solid and I never fell off or dropped my partner. It's hard on the hands, but they toughen up, and the strength will come if you work at it. When I used to train, we would spend the first 45 minutes doing body conditioning and the second 45 minutes doing aerial. We were also expected to keep up the body conditioning in the week. Those that did had less injury.
  6. I thought the quote Alison referred to was said by Robert Helpman about "Oh! Calcutta". As far as major companies including nudity in dance, The Australian Ballet's "Tivoli" does. The Tiv was a famous club, similar to The Windmill and featured living statues. This is recreated in the ballet. Didn't Deborah Bull (and many others including Sylvie Guillem) dance in a see-through costume in Forsythe's "Hermann Schmerman"?
  7. I agree with Lisa - I think the Beauty improves once the story is out of the way. For me, other bore-fests include anything by Ashton. (Go on, call me a heretic!) I also don't like that silly running about in pyjamas thing, which is known as "In the Upper Room".
  8. Favourite ballet - anything by Balanchine, but especially Agon, Apollo and The Four Temperaments. I also very much like Swan Lake, but since it can be very good, or very bad, depending on which company is doing it, so I don't include it in my top five.
  9. I went a very long time ago. I found buying tickets for the Bolshoi very easy. There was a box office outside, the people spoke enough English to sell you a ticket. They had the seating plan in plain sight and I just pointed to where I'd like to sit. Being a foreigner, I had to buy two tickets - a ticket for the performance and the special "rip-off the foreigners" extra ticket. Hey, it's all fine - they were up front about charging you extra, and it still came to about £10 for a seat in the circle. I think the ROH was charging £60 then. There were plenty of touts selling tickets too, but I didn't bother with them. In St Petersburg, I couldn't see the Kirov (they were in London at the time). I asked the tour guide if there was any ballet on and she booked me tickets at the Alexandrinsky Theatre. I was on a package tour but I booked some extra days, so I had been in Moscow for three days before the tour arrived. I met the tour guide but since i'd done every thing she had planned, I didn't do anything with the group. They knew that there was an extra person on the tour but we only met up on the overnight train from Moscow to St Petersburg. Once in St Petersburg, I did my own thing. On the first day, they went to Peterhof by bus, while I went to the Hermitage. On the next day, they went to the Hermitage and I went to Peterhof on the Meteor hydrofoil, which I arranged myself - front up at the dock and buy a ticket. I think that I had the better deal.
  10. The program is available online at https://issuu.com/wsouthworth/docs/8648_idfb_single_pages_midres_48pp or you can pickup a printed copy at the Birmingham Hippodrome.
  11. Bravo the member of South West staff at Waterloo. Trainy McTrainface. https://twitter.com/hwallop/status/712217330508537856
  12. From what I've read online, I think it's quite common for American ballet companies to sell signed shoes during the interval. Some companies sell shoes via their websites - the Austalian Ballet being one example, although it appears as though it is only shoes worn by the corps. Here is a video about the making and unmaking of pointe shoes - worth watching if only for the end, which explains the thumbnail.
  13. I have a pair of Nao Sakuma's, which I got at a BRB costume event. You can buy a pair through Miko Fogarty's website, with proceeds going to the WWF.
  14. Info here: NERC - Can you name our new ship? If you look at the entries so far, Entries | NERC and click on 'Most Loved Overall', you'll see the current leading entry is 'RRS Boaty McBoatFace'. In the interests of national pride, let's make sure Boaty McBoatFace wins. Get voting! If you fancy something to do with dance, there is the appropriate 'RSS Pole Dancer'.
  15. Maybe a 10 minute walk from New Street station - a walk up New Street, through Fletchers Walk maybe (the library is being demolished and I have no idea as to how you get through that, but I guess there are signs), into Centenary Square and it's at the far end.
  16. Too Naked for the Nazis named oddest book - BBC news (It's a pretty good read too!)
  17. "Symphony Hall’s Resident Orchestra, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, will be joined by three artists who all celebrate their 25ths in 2016: conductor Jamie Phillips was born and raised in Birmingham and is well on his way to becoming a major international success; pianist Lukas Geniušas was one of the winners of the recent XV International Tchaikovsky Competition and makes his Birmingham debut; and the composer Ryan Latimer, a graduate of Birmingham Conservatoire who has already made his mark on the industry, has been commissioned to create a new work to mark the 25th Birthday. At the centre is Stravinsky’s Firebird – the work that was performed at the hall’s official opening (then conducted by a bright young thing by the name of Simon Rattle). This colourful masterpiece, telling of the downfall of a powerful, ogre-like figure of evil, Kastchei the Deathless, through the intervention of a beautiful rare bird, is paired with the product of a 25-year-old Grieg: his much-loved Piano Concerto. Bargain price too - £10! http://www.thsh.co.uk//event/the-next-25/
  18. My Freed ballet shoes are real leather, as are my Capezio tap shoes. I have some canvas ballet shoes too, but they don't feel as nice to dance in.
  19. Here is a website with a list of the events the BRB and other Birmingham organisations are involved with as part of the 400 anniverary of the Bard http://ourshakespeare.co.uk/ If you click on the yellow triangle, you can enter a competion to win a swag of free tickets.
  20. Ballet Cymru are in Basingstoke on 17th June if that helps. http://welshballet.co.uk/whats-on/tour-dates/
  21. My spell would be to uninvent the mobile phone. This means pedestrians would look where they are going, motorists might look past the end of the bonnet and an end to idiots on the train phoning to let somebody know that they are on the train. (What to they expect to happen if you go to a railway station?)
  22. Thanks for the comprehensive info. Yes, I too would like to see it. There are also ballets done to Berlioz R&J. Darius James did one for his company and (IMO) this was superior to the second version done to the familiar Prokofiev score.
  23. There are several things that I think could be done to improve the MacMillan R&J. As Northstar hinted, the ballet is too slow. When Juliette first walks away from Romeo in the balcony pdd, she should just keep going. Mercutio should just cark it rather than writhing around for ever. The same can be said for Tybalt and Lady Capulet, although in the recent performances that I saw Lady C didn't seem to roll around as much. There are some other bits that need speeding up too. When I was watching in Brum, I thought of a new ending. After Romeo takes the poison and dies, Juliette wakes up, sees Romeo dead and so stabs herself. I think at this point, Romeo should wake up, having drunk the same potion as Juliette, so that he has to kill himself all over again (without the rolling around on the floor).
  24. On the whole, I don't think the story translated well into a ballet. I've never read the book or indeed a precis, and I found the storty very difficult to follow. It spite of this, there is no doubt that it is a very stylish production and there was excellent performances. It was well filmed too. Often ballet on TV uses far too many cameras, with too many cuts between short shots, but in this case they got the balance right.
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