So SJ Theatre Productions has just finished it's first show 'West Side Story' and to put it bluntly it was a massive success. The show did amazing numbers, sold lots of tickets and has had an extremely positive reaction. (You can find the Daily Echo's Curtain call review here). So what else is there to say? Caution: if you don't actually know the plot to West Side Story, this blog contains some spoilers here and there.
Da da da da da da da da da da MAMBO.... Errr I think that's it.
Well, to those who know me personally. I don't give the impression that I'm the musical theatre type and to be honest before this show I really wasn't. I've got no problem with Musicals and people who enjoy being part of them, but it's never really been my 'thing'. I don't have experience dancing and I don't have experience singing, those are the two keys to musicals for me and as far as I'm concerned I had neither of them... However, I'm always game for a challenge, and when I saw that SJ Theatre were looking for some more male cast members after it's original auditions it seemed silly to give this opportunity a miss. Next thing I know, I'm trying to slot myself into dance routines that have already been devised and it really isn't what I'd expected. I was completely outside of my usual acting comfort zone and I was already self conscious from the very first rehearsal I had for West side that I was going to look like an absolute tit. Singing on the other hand, wasn't too bad! This is a much more likely scenario though, seeing as in the one song I was a part of my voice was accompanied by about 15 others. Needless to say it didn't sound terrible, so I was happy!
Coohole Cottage. Representing.
My happiness with myself in general seemed to grow with each passing rehearsal from there on. Dance numbers still maintained a feeling of utter horror and fear but also became pretty damn fun as well. I was able to get the grips with the mambo thanks to help from the rest of the Sharks and I was finally able to tackle Dance at the Gym with help from the amazing choreographers. I absolutely loved the prologue and I am extremely thankful that I was added to it. I was very lucky to be following Marcus and Christian throughout, thankfully following these guys made learning the dance section ridiculously easy to pick up. Speaking of Christian.. He's lovely isn't he! (My sister seems to think so at least) I've done so much acting with my other house mates Sam and Aidan but never with Christian, so it was nice to finally get a chance to rectify this. Being his back-up through Act 1 was a fun experience from the beginning to end. I would have prevented you from getting stabbed if it wasn't in the script buddy... From what I saw, the show was fantastic from top to bottom (even Becky Radcliffe's disgusting dress didn't bring the show down in quality). 'Officer Krupke' had... 'Good Energy', Maria and Tony made you go "awwww" a lot, Anita had you believing everything she said and the rumble... Hurt.
My nipples were desperate to overshadow the death of Tony. Chino questions whether that's a shadow or a stain on his shirt.
I wasn't actually able to see Performing Arts Winchesters production of Hair, but I won't hesitate in admitting I was on the verge of insanity after hearing the songs so many times outside of the theatre. But now that West Side Story is over I find myself guilty of the same crime. Humming the same songs over and over again, mentioning West Side Story far too much and all in all having blues that we won't be performing it any more.
West side story was one of my smallest roles in a piece since moving to Winchester, but it was easily the best cast and crew I've worked with. Everyone who was a part of it helped make it one hell of an amazing experience. I hope I've kissed enough ass now. Thanks for reading. Mark (According to the programme my character was called Nibbles. That's funny.)
This was such an awesome snow day, the videos include me and my house mates attempt at recreating the training montage from Rocky IV and the video below features a frame for frame comparison of the bits that really did come out better then expected. Hope everyone else in the UK is enjoying the snow.
Television is full of characters that are douchebags, liars, murderers, idiots and quite frankly bad people that suffer from an array of bad personality traits. Despite this, some of these characters have brought so much entertainment to me over the years. Without them, I would not enjoy certain shows nearly as much (or at least the seasons they specifically appeared in). I have taken 10 of them and ranked them in this blog, it was a challenge but I managed to pick just 1 character from each series (I'm rather impressed with myself for that one). Anywho, onto the choices:
At the number 10 slot we have Barney Stinson (Neil Patrick Harris, you must know this). He's a pretty obvious choice seeing as he fit's the criteria of being a bit of a sleazy, lying douche. But deary me the show would be in a bit of a state without him. The thing I find funny is that since the shows beginnings, despite all the things Barney has done and will continue to do, he still strikes me as a more likeable character then Ted. Who we are apparently supposed to be identifying with and rooting for? Screw that. I'm rooting for the man whore in the suit. Keep going Barney, I know you'll settle down eventually, but until then please continue to be the loveable jerk that you always have been. He's the first of many characters in this list that rocks a suit.
Douglas Renham (Matt Berry) enters the number 9 slot as potentially the funniest moron I've ever seen on my TV. He is also the second character on this list to rock a suit. I had no idea why they replaced Denholm (Chris Morris) at the end of Season 1, as he was absolutely hilarious, in fact he was a near candidate for this list. But Douglas manages to edge him out purely because he takes the ridiculousness to completely new levels. His incompetence knows no bounds, he's an idiot beyond belief, his suits are disgusting (much like his stubble), he's due several sexual harassment cases and he has the greatest booming voice known to man, outside of Brian Blessed of course. Whether it was the time he nearly died and met Hitler or the day he spent staring at a dead fly on the windowsill, he's cracked me up to no end. I would very much like to see what Renholm is up to these days. Shame there's no more IT Crowd.
"It's Monty Burns!" Sure Homer is probably one of the worst people in Springfield in terms of what he does, but he's not a bad person at his core. However Mr Burns (voiced by Harry Shearer) is very much that. His evil ways have been up and down over the years and he's had a lot of different motivations. This is not a shock to me seeing as the Simpsons have pretty much exhausted everything their characters can do by this point. He's had his utterly diabolical moments such as using Lisa to get back to the top when he went broke, there was even a mystery involving his shooting (I bet so many people raged at the reveal of the culprit) that ended the sixth season (I love the rare occasion where a show that doesn't usually have cliffhangers does). But Mr Burns is to me, at his best when he is lazy, complacent and needy. The scene where Hospital Staff choose him over Smithers (following his bee sting allergy induced fit and forced cycle to hospital) is a thing of beauty. Oh yes, he's the third to Rock a suit.
Merle (Michael Rooker) slips into the number 7 slot purely based on how horrible his character has been so far in the Walking Dead. From the start of the show he did not make a good impression on the rest of the characters and him and his brother Daryl have essentially become opposites (Daryl has had some pretty amazing character development since the two characters got some distance, it must be pointed out). I'm always made to feel uneasy when there's a scene featuring Merle, especially if it's just him and one of the other survivors. At his center he is out for himself, inexplicably racist, sexist and just plain scummy. The thing that I'm interested to see with Merle, is will any good come out of him? We've seen it in Daryl, but I can't imagine it will be so easy to take in if Merle does the same. Merle is the first person on this list to not rock a suit, but he doesn't really need to for his line of work in all honesty.
It was hard to rank Dexter (Michael C Hall) on this list. He's an amazing character, one of my favourite of all time. But I couldn't rank him higher purely because despite his 'problem' (understatement) he is ultimately the protagonist of his own show. His inner thoughts are often hilarious and have always been a constant source of entertainment for me, but we can't ignore the fact that, you know, he's a serial killer. Dexter has killed so many people by now that his fate will surely be soon decided, especially now that it's been confirmed that the next season will be the shows last, you can only cover up the lies for so long Dexter! There's not much else to say about Dex, but his ability to get amazing looking women in his bed needs to be mentioned. Guess they really do like the bad ones.
Yep, I managed to get Wrestling into this blog. CM Punk (Phil Brooks) has probably been the freshest Character to enter the WWE Universe in the past 5 years and has constantly reinvented himself and developed some amazing persona's, even if you don't like wrestling I think you'd like him, or in this case love to hate him. In 2009 he pioneered a straight edge cult, and with each week they were together he began to more and more resemble some kinda fucked up evil new age Jesus (Good sentence). He managed to turn some pretty cringe worthy television into something special (evident here: The Straight Edge Society invades a child's birthday party) and had an amazing sense of coldness about him. In 2011, Punk turned the wrestling world upside down when he decided he had had enough of being a WWE superstar, he was fed up of not being given a chance to shine. The WWE loves to create stories using truth as fuel for fire, and when they told CM Punk he could air his grievances on television... He did not hold back: Punk breaks boundaries, and shatters the forth wall. It's rumoured that the reason behind CM Punks sudden loss of the title in 2009 was due to his refusal to comply with the companies dress code whilst travelling, this would have required him to wear a suit. (No lie.)
Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito) manages to to take the phrase 'don't judge a book by it's cover' and hammer it in to the point where I don't think I could ever trust the manager of a fried chicken fast food restaurant. There's so much you wonder about Gus when you are first introduced to him, and simply put, he ends up being one of the scariest characters mentally I've ever seen in a TV Programme. Gus is probably notable for being one of the breaking bad characters who doesn't actually appear in a lot of the seasons, but his mental intensity is so jarring it's hard not to see him as the highlight to the whole series. My good buddy Marco told me he used Gus as a basis for his character for a Theatre Production we did at uni last year, it was a great choice for him, he got a first. Physically Gus is nothing, but the control he has of everything at all times is amazing. Gus has been known to rock a suit whilst visiting Los Pollos Hermanos and when dealing with his 'extra' activities.
Sylar (Zachary Quinto) is ranked number 3, why so high? Well my general opinion is that Heroes season 1 was absolutely awesome. It's a great story arc and it end's pretty neatly, I've said this to most people but generally speaking I pretend the show ended there. From half way through season two onwards I realised that Sylar was easily the best thing the Show still had going for it, no matter how convoluted the plot got, I could always count on Sylar to slice open someone's head. I have no idea why he hasn't had his own spin-off TV series or Film. I can't be the only one who wants to see that surely!? Although I guess it could end up being like some odd Dexter/Superhero hybrid, which sounds icky. I will also mention that his facial expressions terrify me deeply. Look at those cold eyes, peering into my soul...
I wanted to give Michael the top slot, but I couldn't justify it. So he will instead be atop the 'character that wears suits' list that has spontaneously been compiled. I've watched all the episodes of the Office from the start so many times and there are seriously too many funny Michael moments, and the show really has declined in quality since his absence (BRING HIM BACK FOR THE SEASON FINALE DAMNIT). He starts off similar to his horrid UK office counterpart David Brent but his character evolves into something much greater then Ricky Gervais ever did with Brent in my opinion. After the first few seasons you find yourself looking forward to Michael creating these horrible situations for everyone, as opposed to wanting to give David Brent a hard slap round the face. And I guess that's why Michael is here opposed to Brent, he has a Childlike charm in the end, and it's very satisfying to see his story have a happy ending. The episode of the Office where he leaves makes me feel sad whenever I think about it, and that does not happen a lot.
There is much complexity to Eric Cartman but it most definitely is not hidden. He is greedy, overweight, explicit, racist, sexist, stupid, spoilt, ungrateful ... The list could go on and on. There is literally no good in him and despite this I rank him very confidently atop this list. He is easily the best original South Park character and over the years we have seen him do so many ridiculous unjustifiable selfish things, and I have enjoyed wholeheartedly seeing him partake in each of them, disgraceful as they have been. There is nothing else to say. Cartman wins. No question. He doesn't even need to rock a suit. (But has done in the odd couple of episodes.)
So there we have it, there's the list. Any agreements? Disagreements? Drop a comment below.
Thanks for reading please give it a + if you enjoyed.
