#not including stuff where the setting is in some form of showbiz

[your-average-teenage-mess]

Okay, so... The "she's sexualizing herself on purpose, that's a very deep part of her characterization" line of argument made sense with, like, Faith Lehane. And then maybe like five other characters at most. In the history of cinema.

[pinkiepiebones]

Renfield Interview Info from SCREAM magazine (and a little bit from "L'officiel Hommes")

-Nicholas Hoult taking about Renfield's growth: "...he ends up in a scenario where he sees an interaction between Rebecca and Teddy... Renfield sees someone who is able to stand up for their themselves, risk everything, and stand by their morals. He feels completely inspired by it because he sees her do the exact thing he's been wanting to do for many decades, but hasn't found the voice to be able to say it. So, he's completely awed and inspired, and that feels like his way out. But obviously, he has a big journey to go on in actual change instead of just the idea of it."

-Following Hoult, the movie's idea man, Robert Kirkman, adds: "There's an admiration for Rebecca that forms very early on in the movie, that drives Renfield to emulate her. Rebecca shows Renfield a different way of living, a different way of existing that is possibly going to lead to something that he never in a million years thought he could attain, which is happiness. We meet him at the beginning of the movie when he's at his lowest point. He has nothing but regrets. There was a tremendous amount of sorrow in his life, and (Rebecca) becomes this beacon of hope that drives him to strive to be something more."

-The writer of the article (Bryan Cairns) writes: "Renfield isn't your ordinary mortal" and that phrasing just tickled me. He's not like ~other~ mortals, he's over a hundred and twenty years old!

-Renfield's powerset includes superhuman strength, endurance, and speed. I wish the speed bit had been played with...

-Director Chris McKay about Hoult: "I have never worked with somebody who wants to do as many stunts as possible... If he wasn't working on first unit, he'd want to go over to second unit so he could be part of the stunts and be in the scene as much as possible. We had a dance scene that we ended up cutting from the movie, he learned all the choreography and threw himself into it. It was incredible to work with so many actors that are nice people and so committed to the movie and characters."

The Hoult interview in "L'officiel Hommes" doesn't have much Renfield stuff but here's what I gleaned:

-First off, his The Great costar Elle Fanning interviewed him for this lol

-Elle: "And you're a good dancer! You do some dancing in Renfield."

Hoult: "Cut! Gone. There was a whole dance sequence that we practiced for weeks. It was a dream fantasy sequence. We shot it all in one night, we had these amazing dancers, and then it's not in the film."

Elle: "That"'s showbiz though, isn't it? That happens all the time. Sometimes the things you're most excited about get cut.

Hoult: "It's been a bit of a learning curve for me; when you get really attached to things in the script, and you put in a lot of effort to learn them, or whatever it might be, and then it just doesn't work in the end." (Aww)

-Elle: "What's with your obsession with vampires? Are you one? Is that why?"

Hoult: "(laughs) That's it. I just like leeches and anything that drinks blood, basically. Mosquitoes, all blood-sucking creatures."

-Hoult asserts that the real bugs he did eat on the set of Renfield were all dead and dried, not alive. He says "I wasn't just randomly picking bugs off the floor" to which Elle responds "if you were a real actor, you would've." XD

-Hoult says that for Robert Eggers's NOSFERATU he was "flirting with an accent" and a dialect coach on set said "Don't do that. That's terrible."

-Hoult says Renfield's voice and accent were mostly just his own voice and accent- contrasted with NOSFERATU, where it's set in a different era and is a serious piece.

So there you have it!!!

[ts-2020-olympics]

EPISODE 1 - “My Legs Were Not Qwoperating” - Kathy (Part 2)

no. jk here.

So, it’s morning. I look around at our camp, and see everyone is at work. Karen is painting their flag and using safety scissors to cut out Monty’s head, Kevin is chanting to himself in the corner, Stoner’s been asleep so we buried him in the sand up to his neck and then sculpted a sand castle around him. Tommy is just trying to make eye contact with anyone he can and so I’m...avoiding that. I’d say we are solid but that’s probably not the truth, and so that kind of stinks. I’m hoping the newbies really fuck up, and I know that’s harsh but...that’s showbiz, babe!! Speaking of newbies I still haven’t talked to a few of them.  Emma like zoomed away the first day and I’ve given up on talking to her. Hope she goes first. That’s all I got for now, going to eat breakfast I will continue this rant later.

my truth is that i haven’t played an org game in so long i forgot i was playing and then remembered an hour ago and tried to do this wack qwop game hsksksj! my legs were not qwoperating 

I see there's an arena going on! I might go there first if the rest of the team is okay with it - gives me a chance to scope things out and get a feel for the area. I'm excited!

WE WON THE FUCKING CHALLEEEENGE AAAAA NOT ONLY DID WE WIN BUT WE KILLT IT WE SCORED 12 AND EVERYONE ELSE GOT LIKE 8 AND 5 OHMYGOOOD IM NOT GONNA BE FIRST OUT YALL IM SHAKING I CANT BELIEVE GSJDKDVDSNDBWSKHSD okAy okay so thank god bc my tribe has like no drama so our vote would’ve been really difficult and that gives me more time to think about my possible advantage and the possible bonds here. 

so while I am safe I still have to game a little bit and talk to the people I’ve been talking with who are going to tribal like Sammy and Jordan, funny enough who are on the same tribe.... maybe I can get them to protect each other..... hm

Well we lost because of technicalities, I choose to blame that. This tribe is apparently extremely quiet to each other, so the fact that I messaged everyone hello this morning, nearly 48 hours after the start, I am SOMEHOW one of the best social players here. Challenges are generally my strength, we got last in QWOP, so backup is social game in a social ORG. I can be in some danger here, but I think I have a TRusuT sclusTER to keep myself here. As is necessary. I don't care who goes, I have a preference, but I don't really want to set a goal right now. Flexibility is key.

I'm literally PISSED. I'm fuming right now, like wtf? OK so I haven't confessed anything yet because my tribe has been SO quiet. I've honestly talked a lot more to some of the people from ONE WORLD than I have from some of the people from my own tribe... and I'm not crazy okay? It's NOT my fault. I put in effort with these people... But some of these people are just DRY! Drier than the Sahara Desert! Drier than my chappy ass lips! They can't hold a conversation, and that's obnoxious. I'm not going to respond to you if your message has literally nothing in it worth responding to, that's why most of my messages will either have a follow-up question, or something actually of substance to comment on/reply to... YOU SHOULD DO THE SAME SO WE CAN ACTUALLY SPEAK AND MAINTAIN A CONSISTENT DIALOGUE!!!!!!! But NOOOOOOO, my tribe decides to not speak... MOVING ON! The only people I've had good conversations with really are Juls and Em, and lo and behold, Em does lit rally nothing in this challenge, which sucks because I'm afraid that may put a target on her back. But I'm not sure, I definitely will vote with her and I think Juls will too. I'll move onto that later but I wanna talk about why I'm fucking LIVID RIGHT NOW. I literally made SO many suggestions on how we could tweak who does what in this challenge, or what we do on certain parts. Now I'm going to admit a TINY bit of fault here, in that I didn't say my suggestions on the tribe flag. There are some things I think we could've done to make it better, but I love Juls, and everyone had already told her it was great, so I didn't wanna make her feel that I didn't like it or was over criticizing. So I didn't say anything. That was my bad. BUT EVERYTHING ELSE, LUV? I said We should guess lower than 610... Now granted my even 600 guess still would've been too low to win, BUT AT LEAST IT WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN OVERBOARD! HMPPHH!!!!! Or maybe we could've compromised on 605 if people hadnt IGNORED ME!!!! IDK!??!?!?! Further than that, I asked for different tweaking on the chant and nobody gave any suggestions. I'm not saying we would've won or anything had I taken the lead or that I was doing everything the right way,  obviously I wasn't since my chant got 3rd, but what I'm saying is once it became obvious the challenge was going to be about group participation and suggestion, our tribe needed to unify. Everyone in the tribe needed to have a clearer vision and talk to eachother and actually put in the EFFORT that this stuff requires. Which I'm admitting my own error, in not doing that with the flag. But our tribe was just so quiet and silent before now, which sent me down a paranoid spiral, that I was super fucking worried about my place in the tribe or where things were heading. Now I realize I'm in a good position on the tribe for sure, it's just that our tribe is STRUGGLING. ON THE (Mr.) BRIGHTSIDE!!! We lost by a tiebreaker guess, and only by 4 points.... and I'm pretty close with Juls, and it seems like a target will probably fall pretty easily onto Billy. He had the worst QWOP score, described himself as arrogant in his own intro, and just seems.. critical of others. He gives off a strange vibe. If it's not him, I'm pretty sure it'd end up being Jacob or Em. I feel that me and Juls are safe which is all that I can hope for on a tribe this freaking tiny, I instantly connected with Juls over our love of anime, the fact her name is the same as Euphoria Jules, and other stuff. As far as One World goes, I honestly keep forgetting it exists. I haven't reached out to too many of the others but have talked back to those who talk to me and it's been generally decent. I get along well with other Jacob, the not pie one. Caeleb I already know from before this and so I feel like we'd def work together, and I get good vibes from a lot of these people like Eve, Nicole, Ben, etc. Honestly I'm just so frustrated right now because things have been quiet and nervous and I'm PARANOID, and my tribe was so close to winning but fucked it up over minor things we could've tweaked had we just tried a little harder and communicated a little more. ugh, this SUCKS. now my first legacy in Tumblr Survivor is a mediocre chant (i honestly really like it and i put a LOT OF THOUGHT INTO IT OKAY....) and a trip to tribal council *Sobs* Here's hoping things take a positive turn from here...? It could always be the Bronze before my Gold! ~Hamfisted olympics metaphor~

Love my tribe a lot! However, i still feel on the outside somewhat tho.... Idk this is a lot for me I just hope we win until a swap or whatever its called ahh

Alright, Darcy back here with yet another confessional!   Here is a little update since I last posted confessional, mainly the biggest difference is now I have an ally formed with Ben.   At least, I made a deal with Ben yesterday proposing just the generic looking after one another ordeal, then going to give it some time and maybe question Beck about forming an alliance, since I've been connecting with her even more past bit, but don't want to go too fast and end up asking half my tribe right away to work with me, as I don't want to be seen as playing hard out the gate and make myself a target.   Meanwhile, I decided to give the Olympic Village searching a shot, but alas was no luck in the cafeteria cabinets, so will just have to try my luck again in the future rounds.   Thinking of searching either the South or North end of Village next round, but we shall see.   Anyways, I'm glad my tribe won Immunity, so don't have to go to tribal this round, and this Olympic Arena twist sounds great, essentially one person from each tribe goes to the Arena, I believe for the immune tribes just 1 person is selected to go to the Arena, and for the losing tribes, the two voted out go to arena, where the winner of the voted out people come back in the game, and loser is out of the game for good.   Think I read that all right, but maybe won't hurt to give it another read to double check.   For now though, I shall go, so will see you all with my next confessional.

Fuck having to go to tribal first. I don’t like having to send someone home when I don’t even really know who I’m playing with yet. 

Seems like Billy pulling the "I don't want to make any moves" to me was surprisingly bullshit. Who would've thunk. I think everyone is fine with voting out Billy here, I didn't really want to initially, but yeah, uh no. I could be in danger, but if everyone is honest here, I should be fine. Fingers crossed. "I'm either going to be first boot or win" - Pia Miranda

So, the first tribal is in a bit and we were almost sent there but managed to pull through in the tiebreaker! I hope that opens some of my tribemates eyes (lets be real, just Stoner who hasn’t been doing much of anything!) Being in One World but none of the newbies talking to me is still wild to me, half of them still haven’t even accepted my contact request. Yet they’re plenty active in the chat, so what gives? Anyway, I hope it’s just that they are intimidated by the very fact that I am beauty, and grace, and Miss United States. I hope we can win the next round, hopefully first or second place so we don’t have a close call again. We are trying to get Chris to go to the Arena so he can get us that 20% but he hasn’t answered so...what gives? On the alliance front I’m good with Kevin and Karen tribewise , the bigger picture is Kevin, Jacob and Sammy want to align and then we will have a bigger alliance that includes Beck, Juls and Eve. Eventually I might wanna break off and align with Jules and Eve, but having bigger targets around is essential. Anyway that’s all I got for now. I should start making video confessionals AS THINGS ARE HAPPENING. Ya know? Anyway toodles for now see ya next round. OH, and I’m hoping Jules and Jacob are safe this tribal :( love them and hope we can work together going forward. 

Hiiii, arena results are about to come in so I'm just gonna drop a quickie confessional before that happens. I don't honestly remember how much I talked about the strategy and gameplay that was going on, so I'll give you a quick rebriefing of that. I'm really close with Juls. Em I like, but I want more out of her. Jacob is quiet, but inoffensive. Billy, I actually like him, but there are certain things about him that just.. Rub me (and others) a strange way and that's why we voted him out because certain things he did just didn't quite gel with the rest of the team. If he does return from the arena though, it's possibly I may vouch for him over Jacob because Jacob... HE JUST NEEDS TO TALK!!! But idk. One world still SUCKS and is dragging me through the MUD because nobody wants to do cross-tribe talking me included but that gets me paranoid as FUCK, luv. About the live tribal, it was fun! My camera angle was awkward and I was soo nervous though, but I think I was still able to hold it together relatively well, act normal, and give semi-decent answers. Will definitely be improving my live tribal performance for next time so I can be a bad ass bitch on call, it's GOING to happen... dskfdsf. I love Emma on call/video sooooo much, But on text she's kind of dry. Maybe I need to ask her if I can call her sometime, but I haven't done a call for a game like this in a looong time. I'm a bit nervous about that. But yeah. I'm looking forward to the game... The first tribal just makes everything real, and you realize, oh shit, we're playing Survivor. And I forgot how thrilling it was to play in a live, video environment like that, it just grips you and it feels so much more intense than when wiki results are just posted in chat and you don't have to deal with physically seeing the person you're voting out, talking to them with your actual voice, etc. All that stuff just makes the experience that much more realistic and it's so intense and fun. I'm ready to get this game on (Btw fuck the arena twist)

hey guys im really loving this game so far... keep up the good work!

i didn’t appreciate the attitude billy gave me whenever i tried to help the team out but! i’m willing to get over it because he is a nice guy. i feel fairly comfortable with my team and i’m just hoping we can avoid another tribal! 

Hello! I can not believe I'm back for a 6th time on Tumblr Survivor this is so crazy! Especially for an Olympic season because I vowed to myself that I would never do a season again that was more than 20 people after being in Japan. Now that I'm back I'm ready to play, I haven't really came into this season with a strategy but if I did it would have changed because this is a One World season and now with the arena twist I'm sweating. One World makes the season super social (probably one of my least favorite twists) it's very easy for this season to let pre-mades and majorities take over just like that and let underdogs like me in this season to get taken out especially taken out early. So I have been social not only with me but a few people on different tribes but not too much. I don't want to seem like I'm playing too hard but I wanna build relationships before swaps happen so that people choose to ally with me (A WINNER) over a newbie or a returnee who hasn't won because I already have a big target on my back. With how the tribe divisions are it gives the newbies the biggest advantage with 15 newbies compared to 5 winners and 5 non-winner returnees, which isn't bad in a Fan vs. Favorite season because the ratio is even with returnees and newbies. However, now that I'm in the minority and also labeled a WINNER, I have to do damage control to lower my target but most importantly integrate with other people which is hard because I'm not the best social player and I know that's my weakness but I still have to attempt. In terms of my own tribe I'm closest to Kevin, when I talk to him we have a good conversation I probably already irritate him but I think out of everyone I can put my trust in him the most compared to everyone else. I think having one good ally is how I want to approach this season due to the arena twist I don't want to come across as running the tribe especially the winners tribe incase we do go to tribal because if I vote in the majority and that person stays they are immune and will be mad and spill the beans about the tribe, and I want that person to be the least mad at me so the focus is not on me. So having overall good vibes and 1 strong connection is a good strategy for the long term game. It might put me at risk for being voted out in the short term but I want to play the long-term game. Preferably if it is up to me I'd want Nicole to be the next closest to Kevin and myself without myself having to make an official deal with Nicole so I'm not seen as the ringleader. Kevin says he wants Stoner to be the first one voted out on our tribe but honestly I rather it be Karen. Stoner has the reputation keeps his target bigger than the rest and I think Karen has the better chance of flipping on the winners and succeeding than Stoner does. So my target is Karen if we do lose. I also believe that there may be an alliance with Nicole, Kevin, and Karen which I hope is not an actual alliance because that's bad news for me. I hope we don't go to tribal because I don't wanna go to a tribal with only 5 people. Wish me luck!

Whew it has been one round and i've fucked up so much its not even funny. its a little funny. anyways i start this game on a tribe of 5, i allign with connor who ive never played a game with and find some similar common ground, and with jacob who seems chill. we lose the first challenge sucks and all hell breaks loose, long story short fuck sammy. I'm trying to work my way back in caeleb and jacobs good graces. its gonna be a rocky road, but its one i've driven before

[fussingoverfassbender]

By NST Entertainment - May 24, 2019 @ 10:15am

IT’S been a long ride, 11 movies on, in the X-Men film franchise since the first one hit cinemas back in 2000. But the conflict between humans and mutants continues to grow and the thrilling adventures and dramatic stories endure.

The 12th and latest instalment, titled X-Men: Dark Phoenix, marks the directorial debut of writer and producer Simon Kinberg, who is no stranger to the X-Men screen universe.

A writer for The Last Stand (2006), Days Of Future Past (2014) and Apocalypse (2016), he produced First Class (2011), Deadpool 1 & 2 (2016 & 2018) and Logan (2017) as well.

Kinberg was also executive producer for the TV series The Gifted and Legion, both of which are part of the X-Men film franchise.

In his capable hands and through his astounding vision, the new movie sees the X-Men facing one of their gravest and most personal challenges to date.

Dark Phoenix is set in the 1990s and the team attempts to embrace a newfound heroic status and acceptance within society.

But their close bond is slowly shattered when the extremely powerful mutant with telepathic and telekinetic powers, Jean Grey (played by Sophie Turner of Game Of Thrones fame) merges with a strange, extraterrestrial force, one that boosts her already strong abilities to previously unknown levels.

Years of repression are torn asunder as Jean begins to find herself and master her new powers, even as those around her start to wonder if she’ll be a threat to the world.

It doesn’t help that a mysterious alien with an agenda (Jessica Chastain) is exerting an influence on the already unstable persona of the powerful mutant.

The ensemble cast sees many actors and actresses returning to their previous roles for this movie, including Michael Fassbender, who plays the charismatic mutant Erik Lehnsherr aka Magneto.

Fassbender has been playing the troubled, driven mutant, who can control magnetic fields and manipulate metal, since First Class.

In that time, he’s seen the character develop as a leader in his own right, and struggle with the treatment of mutants by society in general.

Fassbender, nominated for two Oscars in his career to date, has appeared in films such as Macbeth, 12 Years A Slave and the more recent Alien entries.

Below, he talks about the character-based focus of the film, Erik’s development through the years and the comfort level between the actors on set.

WHAT BROUGHT YOU BACK TO THE FILM SERIES?

I loved the journey up to Dark Phoenix and specifically wanted to come back because Simon was directing.

I wanted to lend whatever I could bring to the table for him. He was such a fantastic collaborator and engineer of First Class, Days of Future Past and Apocalypse and to see him get in the director’s chair, I was really excited for him.

THIS IS SIMON’S DIRECTORIAL DEBUT. HOW WAS HE AS A DIRECTOR?

He was very relaxed and very confident. It seemed like he’d been doing it for years. He’s been on so many massive films and been an integral part in so many of them.

He’s also a very smart man, he’s the kind of guy that doesn’t speak unless he’s educated on something or has knowledge on it.

He observes, he listens — all the ingredients to make a great director. I think he bided his time and felt like he was ready to have a go at it.

WHERE DO WE FIND ERIK IN THE NEW MOVIE?

He’s finally become the cult leader that was always alive in him! (laughs) He’s formed Genosha, so he’s managed to create this community, independent state/nation where mutants can live in harmony and without attack. Anyone who agrees to pitch in and do their part are welcome there.

It’s self-sufficient, it’s off the grid, and it’s his struggles through the series, certainly when I was playing it, culminating in this physical place.

Since his family has been ripped away from him, from what happened to him as a child and then, of course, with his wife and child later, well, that sense of death is always with him.

But this is a mature Erik. He’s more at peace and he only leaves this haven out of loyalty. It’s like an old Western. He’s got to go on his mission.

THIS FEELS LIKE SIMON DRIVING IT TO BE MORE CHARACTER-BASED. WAS THAT YOUR FEELING?

I think he wanted to strip everything down, boil it down to the bones… even visually, the way he shot it, a lot of it is handheld, and I’m not wearing any Magneto costumes.

The helmet is there but everything is pared down to be a character exploration.

DID THE OTHERS LOOK ENVIOUSLY AT YOU IN YOUR TURTLENECK AND JEANS?

I don’t know. I certainly was very thankful that it was an easy in and out for me, especially if you look at what Nicholas (Hoult) goes through each day as Beast!

Compared to him, I definitely got an easier route.

THERE’S A LINE IN THE FILM ABOUT THERE ALWAYS BEING A SPEECH FROM XAVIER. DID IT FEEL LIKE SIMON PLAYING WITH THE TROPES OF THE GENRE?

Exactly. We’ve all heard the ideology, whether they’re playing chess together or Charles is talking to him telepathically. There’s this back and forth.

It was a nice little tongue-in-cheek moment in the script, which is kind of like the Indiana Jones moment where he just pulls the pistol and shoots a guy instead of getting into hand-to-hand combat. That was fun!

JESSICA JOINED THE CAST THIS TIME. DID YOU GET TO ACT WITH HER ALL?

It was great to have her join us. We didn’t really have a lot of scenes together, just a few moments together in the final act of the movie.

She’s present with Jean, and so it mainly was acting beats that I had any interaction with her character.

It’s a very technical aspect to it. You’ve got to make sure that the timings are right and knowing that a lot of things are going to be added in later. It’s making sure those rhythms are correct. More than anything else, it’s a very technical exercise.

IS IT SOMETHING THAT YOU’RE USED TO THESE DAYS?

Absolutely. When I started doing effects movies, you had to imagine what they were going to put in later. There was some storyboarding stuff but now they’ve got pre-visualisation stuff that they show you on a laptop, to see what it’s going to look like and the geographical elements.

Of course, you know it’s going to be a lot more fantastical when the team has spent some time on it. I enjoy the technical challenges. It’s another thing that needs to be learned, and it’s something that is fun to explore.

It’s not only being in time with the actors. It’s also being in time with the stunt team, if you’re on wires it’s the riggers… everybody is communicating in the same rhythm. It’s like a dance and I enjoy that.

HOW IS THE FEELING ON SET?

At the beginning, you’re really trying to bond with everyone. You’re getting to know each other and those sorts of silly games, I know they can be a little annoying if people are trying to gather order on set but they’re also very important for the actors to get to a personal level with one another, to be comfortable with one another, and to have that camaraderie.

We trust each other. We depend on each other and we all like each other. So it’s just the maturation of that relationship.

ARE YOU EVER TEMPTED TO SEPARATE YOURSELF, TO GO METHOD WITH MAGNETO’S FEELING OF ISOLATION?

It depends what my mood is on the day. There are times where I’ll just go away and find a corner where I can just be by myself if I need to be in more of a meditative state.

We’re all at ease with one another. We all know each other very well and it’s whatever each of us needs to do.

There’s always a respect there about whatever the other person’s process is and if anyone is ever struggling on camera, or in a moment, we’re all there for each other 100 per cent and we want everyone to be the best on these sets.

WHAT IS THE OVERRIDING THEME OF THE MOVIE THIS TIME?

I think the seed of talking about female characters and power was there from the beginning. Simon had unfinished business after The Last Stand, and you could tell from Apocalypse that he was putting this story in place, setting it up.

So, the germ of that was there and the timing, as it happens at the moment just seems to be in sync with what’s going on in the real world.

But Simon’s always been of that mindset, the equality across the board for both the female and male characters.

WERE YOU GLAD NOT TO BE THE THREAT THIS TIME?

I was a little bit jealous, to be honest. “What? Somebody else is causing trouble?” Apocalypse already stole that from me in the movie before so I was getting used to it!

DO YOU SEE YOU THIS AS A POTENTIAL SWAN SONG FOR THE CURRENT TEAM? WOULD YOU COME BACK AGAIN IF ASKED?

I have no idea! It’s not my issue to deal with, I’ll leave it in the hands of people who’ve got it. I’m not spending much time thinking about it, I’ve had a great journey on these four films, I’m happy.

If something comes up that looks interesting, I’m always willing to read and take a look but I’m perfectly happy.

X-Men: Dark Phoenix opens in cinemas on June 6.

[thewidowstanton]

The Widow’s Best of 2017

To steal the title of a Piano Magic track, The Nightmare Goes On. Well, we remember saying last year had been a bit grim, and, let’s face it, this one has been even worse. But hey, there are always shows to see and find solace in. 2017 has provided some great ones, and thrown up a surprise in our Best Show category. All shows are in London – that’s where we live – and here’s what we think.

CIRCUS ARTIST OF THE YEAR: Hula-hooper and contortionist Emi Vauthey. We’ve been entranced by her since we first saw her in Cirque Eloize’s iD. Now she’s touring with the 7 Fingers’ show Réversible but, lucky London, between runs she appeared in BMT & Friends cabaret at the Albany, so everyone could marvel at her sublime skills close-to.

BEST SHOW: James Thierrée’s The Toad Knew at Sadler’s Wells took us by surprise. Having strayed into tedious territories in his last couple of shows, The Toad – weird title – was a brilliant return to form for La Compagnie du Hanneton and avoided many of Thierrée’s familiar tropes. You can read our interview with one of the performers, waacking pioneer Sonia Bel Hadj Brahim. Did her uncanny resemblance to Thierrée influence her casting in a role formerly played by the contortionist Valérie Doucet? The show also tied for BEST SET, especially for its towering gauzy backdrops and ingenious giant ‘lily pads’, which moved up and down and tilted eerily.

BEST FIRST SHOW: Alula Cyr’s Hyena, seen during the Underbelly Festival at the Southbank. Quite a long time in the making; well worth the wait.

BEST CIRCUS CABARET: BMT & Friends at the Albany. You rarely see a cabaret where every act is top class, but Barely Methodical have some extremely talented friends to add to their own outstanding skills. They also created new duo and trio acts and there was a rare chance to see the startling and chilling Bert & Fred (pictured) in the UK. Pic: Jonah Samyn

BEST SKILLS: Unicylist Sam Goodburn in Dumbstruck at Jacksons Lane.

BEST WORK-IN-PROGRESS: Lumo Company's startling and unusal Lola. Read our interviews with its stars, Hanna Moisala and Heidi Niemi. Can’t wait to see the finished show.

BEST MAGIC TRICK: Anything by veteran close-up magician Bernard Bilis as seen on Le Plus Grand Cabaret du Monde on France 2. After two years at the top, Ali Cook’s Find the Pea is runner-up this year.

BEST AERIALIST: Black Cat Cabaret’s Katharine Arnold/Korri Aulakh.

BEST CABARET: The effortlessly classy Lady Rizo in Red, White and Indigo at Soho Theatre. The voice, the chit-chat, and, most importantly, the gowns! And – you had to be there –  who wouldn’t want to snog this amazing woman?

MOMENT OF WONDER: The glitter shower that fell as Lady Rizo removed her black satin glove; also, the Game of Thrones’ dragons!

BEST NEW ACT: The gorgeously athletic tumbling number – in outsize jumpers – by Alula Cyr’s Fiona Thornhill and Barely Methodical Troupe’s Beren D’Amico in BMT & Friends cabaret.

BEST ACT: Gina and Jacquie of Las Chicas Morales on rolling globes at Gandey's Circus/Lj Marles on his very own ‘Marles’ tension straps in La Soirée.

MOST READ WIDOW INTERVIEW: Romy Bauer from Phillip and Carol Gandey’s charity show Circus Starr.

BEST THEATRE SHOW: Robert Lepage’s 887 at the Barbican, which is our joint winner for BEST SET. All Lepage sets are stellar, and this one was no exception.

BEST TV SHOW: The Handmaid’s Tale on Channel 4/Hey Duggee on CBeebies.

FAVOURITE SQUIRREL: Squirrels, we love you all but it has to be ROLY!! Is he getting his Bubble Badge? Pic: Studio AKA.

BEST SHOWBIZ ROYALTY: The one and only Miss Fenella Fielding reading from her memoirs at the Crazy Coqs/Live at the Zedel.

MOST INNOVATIVE SHOW: Wayne McGregor’s motorised floating spheres in +/- HUMAN, which interacted with dancers from his own company and the Royal Ballet at the Roundhouse.

MOST FUN NIGHT: La Soirée at the Aldwych Theatre. Good to see some new faces this year, including London’s own Lj Marles.

BEST MONOLOGUE: Paul Zenon’s wonderful autobiographical Linking Rings at the Secret Cellar. Attention bookers: This deserves a theatre tour!

OH NO, HE’S DRAGGING ME ONSTAGE… AGAIN!: Thank you, Mr Sean Kempton, during his great solo show, Stuff, at Jacksons Lane.

BEST CHRISTMAS SHOW: Clementine, the Living Fashion Doll’s Christmas Special at the Crazy Coqs/Live at the Zedel. Pic: Martin Barber.

BEST COSTUME: Anything worn by Clementine, the Living Fashion Doll/Alfie Ordinary in Dracula mode.

BEST VARIETY SHOW: Slightly Fat Features’ Slightly Fat Show at Leicester Square Theatre. Hoping to see more of Wayne Marvell and his doves next time…

BEST CONCERT: Alex Mendham and His Orchestra at St Martin-in-the-Fields with the gorgeous singers Serena and Hannah Dunlop.

BEST PANTO: Charles Court Opera’s King Tut: A Pyramid Panto at the King’s Head.

BEST ONGOING PRODUCTION: Cirque Le Roux’s The Elephant in the Room, which has been touring France all year and is back at Bobino in Paris. Read about Lolita Costet and Philip Rosenberg.

BEST GIG: The goddess known on earth as Sevdaliza at Omeara.

BEST DANCERS: Tango duo Rocío de los Santos and Luciano Capparelli from Tanguera at Sadler’s Wells. Thanks for the tango class! MOST STYLISH LOOK: Bishi (below left)

MOST GLAMOROUS LOOK: Lili La Scala (above right)

BEST MC: Calixte de Nigremont.

BEST CIRCUS PICTURE: Circus Harmony alumna Elliana Grace, who started early! Yes, that’s her on the left!

MOST WELCOME RETURN FROM INJURY: Louis Gift, who returned to Barely Methodical Troupe for BMT & Friends, and will appear in Bromance in New York City and in BMT’s new show Shift, which premieres during the Norfolk & Norwich Festival in May next year. We’re there!

SIMPLY THE BEST: Tina T’urner Tea Lady.

MOST MISSED: The heaven-sent voices of Glen Campbell and Sharon Jones.

MOST MOVING TRIBUTE: Patti Smith writing about her friend Sam Shepard in the New Yorker.

BEST NEWS FOR 2018: The return to Soho Theatre of the madly bonkers and inimitable DIna Martina with her new show, Crème de la Dregs.

And that’s it! See you in 2018… which we’ll be kicking off by interviewing an amazing artist who is celebrating 40 years in the circus next year…

[oscopelabs]

Lights, Camera, Mania: Showbiz Satire’s Descents Into Madness by Charles Bramesco

In his seminal tell-all Hollywood Babylon, Kenneth Anger claimed to reveal the festering truth beneath the dream factory of the American film industry. His was a bemused but cynical perspective on the business of show, reveling in the sordid juiciness of early Tinseltown controversies that usually concluded with tragedy, if not death. Representatives of the film idols referred to in the book lined up to denounce the tales of drug-fueled orgies and suicide cover-ups as conjecture and falsehood, and indeed, the modern reader would do well to take Anger’s gossip with a metric ton of salt.

But rather than a factual history, Anger’s book has more value as a portrait of a certain mentality specific to this professional milieu. Even if Clara Bow didn’t bang the entire USC football team, this progenitor of the celeb exposé spoke to true conditions of the culture surrounding the movie colony, suggesting that decadence and luxury made—and continue to make—it too easy to go mad with power. Readers flocked to Anger’s toxic oil spill of a book for the same reason airport bookstores regularly sell out of the latest A-lister’s confessional: it’s devilishly pleasurable to watch fame and fortune make someone act crazy.

The best Hollywood send-ups have adopted this jaded outlook, turning an eye inward to find a carnivorous business that masticates talent and spits it out once the flavor’s gone. The recent, toothless likes of Argo, La La Land, and The Artist have courted the label of satire with a line about expanded universes here or a jab at blowhard producers there, but these little rib-nudges have been affectionate counterpoints in otherwise adulatory valentines to the magic of the movies. The good stuff cuts to the dark heart of an industry that gives creative types—and who could possibly be more mentally infirm than a writer—too much money and influence for their own good.

The history of showbiz spoofery is the history of insanity: the finest entries have used the assorted pressures of filmmaking to push their characters to their wit’s end as an absurd representation of the corrosive forces of Hollywood. Starting from Anger’s sensationalist tracking of Frances Farmer’s long, sad descent into madness, all roads have led to the sanatorium.

The main thoroughfare is the derelict drag of Sunset Blvd. Billy Wilder was the first to conjure a human manifestation of filmmaking’s maggoty underbelly with Norma Desmond, a crumbling grand dame cannily played by crumbling grand dame Gloria Swanson. Swanson applied the exaggerated techniques of silent film acting to the talkie form in order to create an affected style marked by its own period, a symbol of decay in an industry obsessed with the new and young. She constructed an insular fantasy life in her isolated castle lair as a coping mechanism for her fall from prominence, and for his blackest joke, Wilder allowed her delusions to become reality in the film’s concluding punch line. Norma’s deteriorating psyche imbues the film around her with a bit of her mania, too; a funeral for a chimp Charlestons along the line between the silly and the somber. Even as he verged on the outlandish, he struck a chord; Louis B. Mayer famously bellowed to Wilder at an L.A. screening, “You have disgraced the industry that made and fed you! You should be tarred and feathered and run out of Hollywood!”

But this strain of satire truly hit the fever-pitch sweet spot with S.O.B. in 1981, trading the showbiz-specific indignity of aging past relevance for that of creative compromise. Director Blake Edwards plays a cruel and pernicious god to his Job-like plaything of Felix Farmer (Richard Mulligan), a producer driven to desperation by his first flop and willing to do anything in order to salvage it. He’s put through the wringer several times over, bungling four suicide attempts in increasingly pathetic fashion before arriving at the epiphany that sex was the missing ingredient from his character study of a closed-off woman retreating into the recesses of her own mind. (All we see of the fictitious Night Wind is a disturbing, surreal dream sequence set to “Polly Wolly Doodle” twice over, first as an unsettling juvenile fantasy and then as a doubly unsettling eroticized juvenile fantasy.)

The film industry, at least as it’s shown here, doesn’t function like other professional sectors. Nobody really knows what’s going to connect with an audience and what won’t, and to those working on the inside, it often feels like no rhyme or reason governs the separation of hits and misses. Edwards makes Felix into the casualty of a sense-defying work culture, where no bad idea or underhanded maneuver is off limits so long as it yields success at the end of the day. Felix grows deranged as a result of his constant humiliation, and resolves to play as dirty as the weaselly studio executives who cheat him out of the rights to his picture once it starts to look like a success. By the moment he’s killed due to his own harebrained plan, he’s been reduced to a nattering nutjob, martyred by a system seemingly resistant to logic.

Robert Altman would torment another power-producer to the point of breaking a decade later with The Player, but the next film to actively integrate the mentality of lunacy into its overall atmosphere would be the gleefully unhinged Death to Smoochy. (It’s no coincidence that all the films mentioned so far drew powerfully polarized reactions at the time of their release; a draught this bitter has never gone down easy.) Shifting to the other side of the camera, director Danny DeVito mined laughs by transposing the cutthroat nature of big-leagues entertainment to the bush leagues of kids’ shows. He juxtaposed the core nastiness of back-room wheeling and dealing with the outward-facing nicety of Barney and his ilk, and in doing so, delivered an uncommonly misanthropic take on how the sausage of entertainment gets made.

Moreover, the film presented a physical manifestation of hyperactive id in Robin Williams’ corrupt, ruthless kiddie showman Rainbow Randolph. Starting at a coked-out 10 and only turning the dial higher from there, Williams rendered his role as a manifestation of pure, white-hot hate, screaming every line at the top of his lungs. As he goes about his dogged mission to dethrone his replacement Smoochy (Ed Norton as the chipper Sheldon Mopes), DeVito suggests that Randolph’s frenzied dysfunction simply reflects the fucked-upped-ness of his climate. The ostensibly incorruptible Sheldon is offered the seductions of money, pleasure, and influence, and while he’s able to remain true to his principles in the face of it all, Randolph’s the foil illustrating what happens to those without the required moral fortitude. He has a near-complete psychotic break at feature length, his mind irreparably warped by the deleterious forces of televised playtime.

Tropic Thunder took a more specific set of reference points for its deflation of Hollywood ego and pretension, ultimately driving its subjects to the brink of sanity as well. Namely, the myth of Francis Ford Coppola and the notoriously calamitous production of Apocalypse Now (dutifully chronicled in the making-of documentary Hearts of Darkness) provided the guideline for this send-up of war films and the people who play make-believe in them. Coppola reportedly went a touch native while mounting his titanically ambitious epic in the jungles of Vietnam, and likewise, the prima donna actors dropped into the wild start to lose it when they realize the danger they’re in is bona fide.

Writer/director/star Ben Stiller gets in some good potshots at scuzzy corporate types (Tom Cruise’s craven studio head Les Grossman comes off looking the worst of all), but mainly lampoons the actors taking their craft seriously enough to lose sight of themselves. Both Stiller’s macho action hero and Robert Downey Jr.’s award-festooned boob slip into their assigned roles, extending Method acting to the point of fractured identity. Rather than taking aim on the machinery that generates movies, Stiller trains his crosshairs on the process of acting itself, mocking those artistes so wrapped up in “becoming” their role that they can’t tell where it begins and they end. Stiller accelerates their mental strain by dumping the cast in enemy territory, but they don’t end up anywhere that Jared Leto hasn’t gone of his own volition.

Just about all entertainment that goes behind the scenes of entertainment agrees that the job’s not a part-time gig, that creating art on this kind of scale demands a lot from the people involved. The gentler critiques have stopped the symptoms at workaholism, but these more incisive films expand that list to include a wide array of psychological hazards. Los Angeles runs on hysteria, on the single-minded willingness to do anything and everything to make the show go on. The innumerable “troubled-but-brilliant” biopics have made the suggestion that inner anguish is the noble sacrifice that true talents make for shouldering the burden of genius; in an art form as prone to disaster, complication, and overall FUBARification as cinema, it’s just the cost of doing business.

[ckcker]

Spit-Take’s Last Squirt

I look down at the parking lot of the apartment complex, I briefly think the back of a woman’s head walking away from me is the front of a hot guy walking towards me.  I hear a deadbolt unlock and turn and am invited inside.  Crossing the threshold of Rob’s apartment door sinks a throttled prick through my body akin to stumbling into a rusty and bubble-wrapped metal spike apparently for sale in an antique store.  Even as the top door hinge passes by my temple as a snubbed showbiz air kiss there is a flash in my mind of something, unrelated to the physical apartment and also a thing I will never be able to remove, that asks to keep my focus in two places at once.  Between these two places, the feet and the head spitroast me with their perverse negotiations.  My initial trauma is at this point overused as a topic and let’s agree boring to think about; my mind starts to suggest trauma spinoffs instead.  I am given a glass of water by Rob but then ask for a beer as, without asking, my memory gifts me excruciating yet kinkily edited content of my attempts to recover.  One of the best ways to come back from a nervous breakdown, I decided in the aftermath of that notable moment, is to do it very very quickly, ‘few solutions are as correct as speed-processing a massive landmark shift in the perception of reality,’ I had soothed myself in the aftermath.  I was hoping for something shittier than an IPA, I drink the IPA and turn, I notice the back of what I believe is an old woman’s head and body resting on the couch.  

After my  ˹survivable event˼  it was typical for all of the dying to retire inward. I believed I could bring back my life in the same way that people made jokes about being dead inside to prepare for the end of the world.  Alright, the remodeling of total defeat into pragmatic quarantine.  Enough disaster movies had passed, everyone notices catastrophes have entertainment value, I would walk past and look in the glass reflection of a recently opened Thai street food spot run by white ex-skaters, I evaluated my drilled in face and greyed out options, my de-emphasized terror: maybe even I could be entertaining. My original twist on the concept of recovering was to imagine my strength and ability as limitless. To decide I could pre-understand the well-flung implications of my situation, of a mind unable to cope with learning all of the things that are possible.  I wanted to turbo-ravel a lights out unraveling; the poet who wanted to be a cop.  I turn to Rob and say nothing about the apparently older woman, he also says nothing about her, asks, “what kind of music do you like?” before playing an Ace of Base song and I don’t have to answer.  The woman seems to be activated.  Her limbs slide against her torso and she turns to look around the room, then briefly at us but again at the room, then one certain spot on the wall to the right of where we are standing where she settles and says “hi” in a warble expelled as a foehn.    

I return the hi and am introduced to Gail.  I thought of all my failed solutions.  For instance, attending several satellite Occupy Wall Street protests, where discussions of income inequality and widespread mobilization were annotated with shouts, why is there fluoride in our water and end the fed.  One important takeaway involved a large man yelling along to the song being played on the sound system, “fuck you I won’t do what you tell me,” for two repetitions of the lyric before realizing no one else would join him and vanishing into embarrassed aerosol.  A successful protest fixates on a way for everyone to feel more or less the same emotion at a coordinated moment.  A successful protest is very sharply art directed and does not relish the display of rehearsed outrage.  The foot I thought I’d taken out of my ass and put through the door had somehow ended up in some other ass.  Feel it for the first time again.  Though people will regularly re-watch movies only waiting for their favorite lines to be said, it seems they rarely stop to consider protest tactics they have seen before.  I thought I had the patience, the dedication for such things, I tapped out naturally and in gas form. “She needed a place to stay for a bit,” Rob tells me, Gail says nothing but smiles lightly, looking at us in some awesome combo of salivating for a response and indifferent to the fact of being trapped behind twenty successive panes of stained glass.  Tchah, the experience of watching an ancient demon fail an eight week long beginner’s course on improv. “I see,” I conclude, Gail’s expression remains the same.  “Wow…’Beautiful Life’ is such a good song,” Rob says. The song moves to the front. I say, “Yes, I do love ‘Beautiful Life.’”

I had tried walks and not just sometimes but many walks.  Down the city cul-de-sac at a certain time.  Listening to wordless music, this one some sort of ambient dramatization of Eurydice’s botched escape from the underworld, a repetitive melancholy chunnel.  Then a rotation: it becomes Britney from an era when pop turned us around an axis both blingy and higgedly-piggedly-nigh-fucky-wucky, gently increasing the healing concept with each exacting flail, that there may be a consolation for all problems leading up to and including the end of the world.  The consolation was dancing all night.  Of course the time of my walks was twilight.  Fried mindsets gave the music much power as a narrative soundtrack; as I looked at a single branch of a very tall tree overhead and caught in sunset and streetlight, jiggled evocatively by wind, and heard a sort of coincidental despair-organized belch from the buckled gut of the mp3, I attempted to speed things up by trying to lose my mind all of the way.  This did not work, I had to stay somewhere in between.  

I went on more walks alone but never too far from my amazing bed.  It was crucial to be within 30 walking minutes of somewhere unsurveilled where I could lay down and catalogue mysterious headaches, as mysterious headaches had rightfully been selected as the center of my world.  The speed of losing a mind is incredibly hard to measure.  Gail also listens to ‘Beautiful Life’ and clearly does not know what it is, I don’t feel familiar enough with Rob to confront the question of how they know each other, I try:

“Are you two related?”

“No no no, haha,” Rob’s voice enters an excited tone. Gail emerges a glacial grin that, even as it forms one of the most approachable configurations able to be realized on a face, still seems misdirected from the hook of a comforting social cue, “no, I met Gail at a bar last night.  At Tina’s.  She just needs a place to stay for a little.  She just moved back here.”  “I spent many years in Lawrence, with my family,” Gail says.  

“I see.”  

Context clues point to homeless, I ache to know much more, Rob twirls around with unbridled pizazz.  He puts his two arms straight out towards me, “what would — ohhh!!”  He retracts his arms. “I was going to ask if you wanted something to drink.” Gail rests, “but you already have a beer,” and here he must have felt the panic to entertain away a social gaffe by immediately giving a clear-cut logical explanation, “my mind has been wiped away this week.  So much molly…           Well…   good.”  

“Yes.”  

“Yes INDEED hunny. This past weekend just about mummified me, I’ve been in a sarcophagus all WEEK, did you do anything fun?”

“Umm.”

I remembered then I was trying to stop using umm. I was coaching myself to be quite fearless and brave when entering sentences.  The CEO of a major newspaper-then-media company once said, before filming a segment for an in-house spot on the company’s approach to advertising its newly launched free weekly targeting 23-35 y/o young professionals, ‘I’m not an umm guy.’  This dialogue, delivered to the video director who was reminding the CEO to look straight in the camera and avoid using expressions like “umm” and “uhh” since they communicated unpreparedness, nerves or insecurity, revealed in its choppy severity a set of verbal and body language constraints that likely this man thought of all the time in order to conjure his short and long term goals.  Likely he thought of them almost as much as I thought about mysterious headaches.  I had been hired to help craft services for the shoot and spent much of the time sitting against a wall print of a famous basketball player, staring at the glass-walled office and elevators meant to enhance, via the perspective of ‘more space’ given by such architecture, a tech-oriented workplace for the media-damaged graduates.  See-thru offices offer more natural light, the young people of the era seem to enjoy a certain kind of light.  Another two-day job to float me, and an opportunity to rebuild a stomach for being outside of my incredible room.  “I stayed in on Saturday,” then I pause before continuing, “I watched a movie.  A documentary,” which I had watched for 17 minutes before moving to my window to observe the parking lot for 45 minutes, followed by bed.  

Rob seems uncomfortable with this idea, “you should come out with us this weekend. There’s some stuff going on.  Maybe you can come to this super fun party, it’s a queer party.  In fact it’s a conspiracy theory-themed queer party.”  Gail moves her left forefinger a splanch.  “It’s really funny! And good music, people dress up, it’s called……….Femmetrails” there is a pause of expectation which I do not know how to meet and which is ignored “it’s really funny and lots of dancing. My friend Blake hosts it. But in drag.  And, guess what his drag name is” I try to remember: was it a parking lot I observed, or a man in his early 40s masturbating within a fingerprint-shrouded computer screen “Georgia SORROWS.  Gail’s going to come!”  Gail has stopped grinning and seems to be unreachable for the length of a square breath before a small shift in her sitting style punctures the proto-gargoyle droop. “Yes I am going to come” she confirms.  “Yes and you should too,” it appears Rob is attached to the idea.  I clean out my lower mouth with my tongue, with mouth closed.  “That would be, maybe” this seems to be enough of an answer for everyone.  

Rob sits on the ground, I begin to prepare my body to also sit on the ground.  It had been a meat lover’s pizza approach to self-healing.  Kava tea from the pharmacy chain, sugar abstinence, performative meditation, I slipped into nonsensical jogging regimens, coffee abstinence, I walked gently in frozen empty parking lots, I didn’t touch anyone for a full year, “my balls are lost halls,” short term CBT and do-it-yourself biofeedback, waiting for hyperventilation so I could write about it, and all this supported by typical means: substantial daily hard alcohol acceptances and fearless ibuprofen stuffings.  And to heal oneself completely, one must never enlighten others to the full extent of the problem and the drenched map of half-solutions being applied, regularly, in secret.  Yes, I had as much spiritual discipline as a teen in an Intro to Photo class taking b&w photos of homeless people on the street.  I sit down at least four feet away from Rob and twelve from Gail, who in the meantime it has been discovered does not know the story of Amanda Bynes’ breakdown.  She also does not know who Amanda Bynes is.  Neither Rob nor I have any interest in making that clear.  The super gonorrheic minutiae that line and then bedazzle the mental process of a terrified person do not enter conversations as smoothly as quotes from 23 year old cult TV shows canceled after two seasons.  Not a shock, only a condition that makes the thoughts turn ever more crunched, ever more specific and internally bound, glowing with unpopular culture.

[vdbstore-blog]

New Post has been published on Vintage Designer Handbags Online | Vintage Preowned Chanel Luxury Designer Brands Bags & Accessories

New Post has been published on http://vintagedesignerhandbagsonline.com/shoppertainment-how-department-stores-are-becoming-theatres-of-dreams-business/

'Shoppertainment': How department stores are becoming 'theatres of dreams' | Business

“We are the controllers of the funfair, of the rabbit hole … of the dreams,” cries an eccentrically costumed showman as a three-dimensional kaleidoscope whirls into life.

The ride is one of the Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland-themed theatrical “experiences” designed to inject some pizzazz into the opening of Westgate Oxford, the £440m shopping centre that has replaced the city’s rundown 1970s scheme.

The spinning wall of coloured mirrors has a dizzying effect; when the ride ends, you stumble out blinking like a modern-day Alice. It’s not Wonderland – the huge John Lewis in front of you confirms that. Rather, you have entered the realm of “shoppertainment”, a brave new world where retailers aren’t just in the business of trying to sell stuff – they are also in showbusiness.

The more than 300 staff at Westgate’s John Lewis have been put through their paces by the Oxford Playhouse theatre. The acting lessons, which included voice coaching and body language skills, are part of new John Lewis boss Paula Nickolds’ bold plan to “reinvent the department store for the 21st century”.

Simon Tavener, secretary of the Oxford Theatre Guild, says it’s useful for retail staff to find their “character”, adding: “You need to put on a face and adjust your performance to suit [the customers’] needs and wants.

‘‘Selling requires you to have a sort of script in your head,” Tavener says. “Not one you recite, but one you tailor to your own voice … a form of improv, if you like.”

Paula Nickolds, managing director of John Lewis, inside the company’s new Oxford store. Photograph: Eddie Keogh/Reuters

John Lewis’s new Oxford shop is “more than a route to selling things”, according to Nickolds, who has turned over a fifth of the 120,000 sq ft selling space to 21 “services and experiences”, ranging from style advice to personalised Christmas baubles. The retail theatre is stage-managed via an “experience desk” where shoppers can plan their itinerary. One option packs personal shopping, a manicure, a light lunch at Benugo and a Charlotte Tilbury makeover into a five-hour spree. Given the store’s £18m cost, the last entry on the agenda is, of course, “Head to customer collections to collect your purchases”.

Shoppers hungry for experiences have plenty of other options. In the nearby Nespresso store, fans of its pod coffee machines are invited to sit down and literally smell the coffee. Staff are coffee specialists who deliver the “ultimate coffee experience”, and the store’s props include an atelier table where shoppers can take masterclasses.

Westgate Oxford took nearly 20 years and three sets of developers to complete, despite the fact that major retailers were desperate for modern units rather than the more traditional style of shop the historic centre of Oxford is famous for. The 800,000 sq ft mall, a joint venture between Landsec and the Crown Estate, is now 93% let.

Despite the uncertainty created by Brexit, Landsec’s Scott Parsons says there was still plenty of interest from retailers. But he admits that “getting some deals across the line took a bit more time. Retailers were being a bit more cautious and going back to their boards for approval.”

On Thursday, the CBI’s monthly retail survey provided a grim snapshot of high street trading, with sales falling at their fastest rate since the height of the financial crisis. On the same day, Debenhams reported a 44% slide in pre-tax profits to £59m, dragged down by £36.2m of exceptionals as it marked down the value of its worst performing stores.

In the digital era, the retail industry is pioneering retail theatre to get consumers into stores. Photograph: John Phillips/Getty Images for W

All the major department store chains are trying to give their stores a raison d’être in the internet age. Retail theatre was pioneered by famous London department stores such as Selfridges, although its efforts reached parody levels earlier this year when it ran potato peeling workshops to help stressed-out consumers “reconnect” with themselves.

The chief executive of Debenhams, Sergio Bucher, has coined the term “social shopping” and is trying to make visits to stores a “fun leisure activity”. Bucher, who joined from Amazon last year, wants to turn functional trips to pick up internet orders into experiences by combining the collection with a consultation with a personal shopper and a glass of prosecco.

Bucher is also trying to inject some showbiz into stores via X Factor-style auditions for staff at Debenhams’ recently opened retail park store in Stevenage, Hertfordshire. The shop’s stock room is known as “backstage” and a sign by the door leading to the shop floor says “Smile, you are on”. “We want to have people on the sales floor who love working there,” says Bucher. “We don’t want to harass customers, but want to be part of this fun activity called shopping.”

The GlobalData analyst Maureen Hinton says these store investment programmes are a bet on the experience economy as Britons spend more on leisure, travel and entertainment pursuits.

“The beauty industry is also benefiting from consumers’ greater interest in how they look – you’ve got to look good in selfies – as well as health and wellbeing,” she says. “This is a way of tapping into that and getting them to come to your store and hopefully spend on other products. However, I do wonder how profitable this is for retailers.

“In a way, department stores are returning to the old version of themselves, where you could go to a hair salon, beauty room and the restaurant and have stuff delivered to your home,” adds Hinton. “This is what the original Selfridges, Harrods, and probably Dickins & Jones were like.”

Back in John Lewis’s Christmas shop, Joyce is deciding whether to splash out on an £8 plastic unicorn for her tree. She is steering clear of the experience desk, but has already bought an oven and a laptop, persuaded by the chain’s “never knowingly undersold” pledge. With a tight budget, she has no plans to splash out on a beauty treatment. “Oh, no,” she says. “I only buy cheap Rimmels in Superdrug.”

But downstairs, a row of women with beatific expressions on their faces are having their nails buffed and polished in full view of passing shoppers. One is sipping prosecco. They are living the 21st-century department store dream.

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[rollstroll-blog]

Nicki Minaj: 19 Shocking Facts You Didn’t Know About Nicki Minaj - http://rollstroll.com/2017/03/21/nicki-minaj-shocking-facts-about-nicki-minaj/ #Billboard, #Celebrities, #Music, #NickiMinaj, #Pop, #Rap, #SHOCKINGFacts

New Post has been published on http://rollstroll.com/2017/03/21/nicki-minaj-shocking-facts-about-nicki-minaj/

Nicki Minaj: 19 Shocking Facts You Didn’t Know About Nicki Minaj

Onika Tanya Maraj, Nicki Minaj’s real name was born on December 8th, 1982. She is probably among the most popular rap artists currently. So to say, her life has been a rollercoaster. One of its own. Faced with various problems while at a tender age, she overcame the issues and made it in the competitive and rather male-dominated entertainment industry. She is an American based singer, rapper, vocalist, rapper and television superstar. She was born and raised in South Jamaica, Queens, New York. Her breakthrough came after releasing three mixtapes featured between 2007 and 2009. Currently, she is signed to Young Money Entertainment Records. With that said, highlighted below are some of the shocking facts about Nicki Minaj depicting her real superstar feature.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She Hates Her Stage Name

Apparently, she hates her stage name ‘Nicki Minaj.’ Before adopting this name, she began with ‘Cookie’ to ‘Harajuku Barbie’ before finally settling on Nicki Minaj. The first part, Nicki, was derived from her first name Onika. It is a short form of Onika as her friends would refer to her. Minaj was a twist from Maraj as suggested by a friend.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She Wanted Her Dad Dead

It is a fact that most rappers, musicians, and celebrities have a questionable childhood. Be it parenting issues, raised by single parents or divorced and ignorant parents, a lot of them really suffered during their young age. For Nicki’s case, her father was a problem. He was a drug addict who would give off anything including house furniture for some money. Nicki got fed up when he started a fire on her mother. She wanted him dead. Quite a troubled life! Isn’t it?

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She is the First Female to Get Seven Songs on Billboard Hot 100

As mentioned before, the rapping and hip hop music sector is male-dominated. However, Nicki beat all odds to become the first female rapper to have seven songs on the Billboard top 100 simultaneously in October 2010. Some of the songs that made it include ‘Your Love,’ ‘Check it Out’ and Right Through Me.’

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She Began as a Waitress

It is said that every bright future has a humble beginning. To prove it, Nicki began as a waitress at the Red Lobsters restaurant. During the time, she also tried out some acting. She was fired from the restaurant due to being discourteous to customers. Nicki admits that she was fired from at least 15 jobs for similar reasons.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She has Only One Tattoo

Unlike other showbiz personalities, Nicki Minaj has only one tattoo. The tattoo is imprinted in Chinese meaning ‘God is always with you.’ Apparently, she regrets having the tattoo and wants it removed.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She is a Great Cook

Having worked as a waitress and other odd jobs, expect a better cook from this queen of rap. However, this is not where her cooking skills began. She said in an interview that it is her father who taught her how to cook, especially Chicken Curry.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: The First and only Female Rapper on Forbes Hip-Hop Cash King list

Her music and rapping career began in 2004. However, in a short span, she managed to not only appear on the Forbes list of Hip-Hop Cash King list but also became the first female. So to say, she clocked no. 4 with an average earning of $29 million in 2013.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She was Discovered by Lil Wayne

If you know Nicki Minaj, then you are more conversant with Lil Wayne too. Just to mention, Lil Wayne is a famous rapper who made it rapping too. After kickstarting her career in 2004, she was signed to a Brooklyn-based group, Full Force where she rapped in a quartet called The Hoodstars. She later left the label and signed a deal with Young Money Entertainment in 2009 under the influence of Wayne.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She is the First Female Rapper to Perform at Yankee Stadium

To this extent, Nicki Minaj has broken and set up numerous records. She made history by performing alongside hip hop and rap kingpins Jay-Z and Eminem at the Yankee Stadium on 13th September 2010. Other famous artists who were present included 50 Cent, Chris Martin, Dr. Dre, Drake, and B.O.B.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She is a Dog Person

Nicki Minaj has been on record stating that she dislikes cats. However, she prefers keeping dogs over cats. Simply, she is a dog person.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She is a Social Media Queen

With all these records and achievements, expect more from this superstar. So to say, she is the most followed rapper in various social media platforms including Twitter. Besides, she was listed at position four of the most active musicians on social media in the year 2011 by the Billboard.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: Her Favorite Stuff?

Nicki Minaj is medium choosy. This implies that she isn’t much choosy but has better options. To begin with, her favorite color would obviously be pink. Her favorite fruit is Mango; chocolates are Twix’s and Kit-Kat; program is Judge Judy. Lastly, her favorite actress is Zoe Saldana.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She Had Ambitions of Being an Actress.

As mentioned before, Nicki tried her shot in acting while still a casual worker. However, she reports that acting was her main ambition. She hasn’t fallen short of this as she has been featured in various movies including ‘The Other Woman.’

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She Raised Money for AIDS

She is not only a musically oriented persona. Back in 2012, she partnered with MAC cosmetic and helped raise $270 million for people living with AIDS. The campaign was dubbed MAC AIDS Drive and featured Ricky Martin.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She wasn’t Happy with Pink Friday

Nicki Minaj released her debut album Pink Friday in November 2010. The album sold over 375,000 copies in its first week and debuted at position four on the Billboard 200. Though a success and a hit with her fans, she admits that she was not happy with it. To her, it does not bring happy memories as she was dealing with ‘rapper problems.’

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She was a Bookworm

Unlike other celebs such as Adele who hated reading, Nicki Minaj loved reading books as a kid. She notes that books are a source of inspiration to her.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She is a Real Feminist

Nicki considers herself a real feminist and believes that all women should be empowered. Probably, the reasons behind this being her early life, considering how her abusive father treated her mother. She has also battled a lot in the male-dominated rap industry.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She is Acrophobic

This will probably surprise you. Yes! She has a fear of heights.

Nicki Minaj Shocking Facts: She Hated Being an American Idol

The 12th season of the American Idol is probably among the most memorable reasons. Not because of special occurrences but due to the inclusion of Nicki Minaj as a guest-judge. However, her appearances were short lived. This was due to a viral video which was released depicting utter feud between her and Mariah Carey, the other judge on the show. Both left the show following this. However, she later admitted that she never enjoyed being in the show.

Conclusion

Much can be said about this fascinating queen of rap. She has intriguing character depictions, both positive and negative. However, Nicki Minaj has done a lot and broken more records, getting into the history books. If you get to know her outside the screens, you will certainly get to love her.

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