Retired Colonels23 Nov 2010 05:57 pm
By Nelson

The RSC has a new stage

I saw many shows on the old proscenium stage at Stratford and have also seen many on thrust stages, even in the round, inc. a brilliant Lear and equally fine Winters Tale at the temporary theatre just down the road. I much prefer the new configuration because, without elaborate front-only illusory sets and 2D actors, the plays revert for their effect to the essence of Shakespeare – the spoken words, the words, the words, acted by people whose physical presence can be felt. I would avoid seats that were too far round the sides of the horseshoe – but then the old theatre had loads of even worse seats crammed into it.
Llandscape

Ah, the theatre, the theatre, theatre! The smell of the greasepaint, the greasepaint, the greasepaint! By the way, you sound a bit like you’re falling down a mineshaft. Or maybe loitering around the end of an echoey dream sequence and muttering about how something or other “will haunt you forever… forever.. forever”. But anyway, thanks for the tip about the seats halfway round the horseshoe, the horseshoe, the horseshoe. I’m off for a sandwich… a sandwich… a sandwich. Ham and pickle… ham and pickle… ham and pickle.

62 Responses to “Llearly Llever”

  1. on 23 Nov 2010 at 6:35 pm Hari

    Don’t laugh, some people’s heads are so big it automatically creates an echo effect in their speech and thoughts. And the utter garbage of an opinion they spew like lllllllandscape (is that the correct welsh spelling?).

  2. on 23 Nov 2010 at 6:43 pm Charlotte

    acted by people whose physical presence can be felt.

    I don’t think they’d want you feeling their “physical presence”, though…

  3. on 23 Nov 2010 at 7:05 pm Ed

    I’m more concerned about the 2D actors, surely they’ll slip through the cracks in the stage, or possibly blow away?

  4. on 23 Nov 2010 at 7:33 pm Yourockyourule

    Yay new post :)

  5. on 23 Nov 2010 at 7:46 pm Velvet Owl

    To be fair, is he not making a crippled reference to Hamlet? A character (Polonius?) asks H what he is reading and he answers with “words, words, words”. There’s no definite article there though. Or any reason to shoehorn it into a comment on the article.

    Who knows?

  6. on 23 Nov 2010 at 7:47 pm Velvet Owl

    If I’m right.

  7. on 23 Nov 2010 at 9:00 pm jeoffry

    Yes, it’s Polonius.

    Bit of an own goal, really. Not so much speak your branes as speak your ignorant philistine middlebrow branes.

    Still, call me a cunt and him a Welsh cunt, and all will be right with the world again.

  8. on 23 Nov 2010 at 9:11 pm Any Rand will do

    I saw many shows on the old proscenium stage at Stratford and have also seen many on thrust stages, even in the round

    Uhhhhhh, he said thrust.

    Doesn’t stop him being a lloris’s llabia, though.

  9. on 23 Nov 2010 at 9:54 pm Have Your Lurk

    And all is right once more with the world! I missed you guys so much. When are we going to have the first SYB love-in?

  10. on 24 Nov 2010 at 12:24 am Ed aka Otto

    Point of etiquette, “Ed”. You’re going to have to differentiate yourself in your monicker, or you, me and the 14 other various “Ed”s are going to have to step outside and sort this out. Alright?

    ps Welcome back, Nelson.

  11. on 24 Nov 2010 at 1:20 am random punter

    Hark now, what precious words slip from the lips
    Of knowing Llandscape, drifting through the air
    To settle softly at the eager ears
    Of acolytes convergéd from afar

    “Avoid the horseshoe – choose instead the stalls,
    As staged delights are best seen from the front”
    Fuck me, that Llandscape doesn’t half talk balls
    Mayhap because he is a festering cunt.

  12. on 24 Nov 2010 at 3:21 am Velvet Owl

    To be honest, he’s just a bit pleased with himself about going to plays and culture ‘n’ shit but not really being a cunt. What he’s saying isn’t balls, just superfluous. For cuntish behaviour, I can recommend today’s (yesterday’s?) Littlejohn column, which is more ignorant and offensive that usual.
    But err…
    RIP SYB
    :(

  13. on 24 Nov 2010 at 6:02 am nick

    i quite like those luvvy types

    uncle monty lol

  14. on 24 Nov 2010 at 6:25 am Sir Alf Ramsey's Porn Dungeon and Stage school

    the plays revert for their effect to the essence of Shakespeare

    … and how in hell does ll’andscape know that for a fact, has he been around for 500 years (cannot be arsed to check the specifics), did he know Shakespeare (although to be honest it would explain one or two things).

    Anyways, if this is the new “Big Society” SYB, I welcome more of the laughing at mentals approach and less of the bile.

  15. on 24 Nov 2010 at 7:51 am Have Your Lurk

    Indeed. Should we not be mocking some fucktard’s inflammatory, knee-jerk comment on a perfectly reasonable government policy? Llandscape is merely boring, not an actual cunt per se. (Gets coat, exits stage left humming “Einstein a go go”)

  16. on 24 Nov 2010 at 11:29 am Obamooslim

    I’ve missed you guys! SYB is not dead, it’s just resting with its eyes closed.

    Some honest to goodness typos over on Pesto’s blog today. My personal favourite comes from ElDeguello who manages to make the financial crisis sound like a nursery rhyme:

    “The peasants say peasants and the rice stay rich” [screw block quotes!]

  17. on 24 Nov 2010 at 11:52 am Have Your Lurk

    Apparently cigarettes will now be sold in plain brown wrappers. Like, that’ll really turn the kids off them, allegedly. I reckon the best way to make cigarette packaging unattractive is to put pink teddy bears on them. I have a Hello Kitty cover on my smartphone. Best anti-theft protection ever. What? Topic? Oh…

  18. on 24 Nov 2010 at 11:59 am c'est ça?

    SYB – you used to be cool.

  19. on 24 Nov 2010 at 12:10 pm The Global Warming Conspiracy

    Nothing stays cool forever.

  20. on 24 Nov 2010 at 12:31 pm Has anyone seen my watch?

    My ex-wife’s bed does (I hope to God)…

  21. on 24 Nov 2010 at 12:47 pm Jones

    by people whose physical presence can be felt

    A sure sign of culture – they won’t let him grope anything at the local Gentleman’s Club.

  22. on 24 Nov 2010 at 2:10 pm Gypsy on benefits

    It was impossible to read that without imagining it being spoken with the voice of Brian Blessed.

  23. on 24 Nov 2010 at 3:28 pm james mann

    That was worth waiting a month for.

  24. on 25 Nov 2010 at 3:49 am Pete Tong

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1332746/Asian-gang-raped-girls-young-12-picking-streets-sex.html

    Another success story for the champions of multiculturism. May all lefties rot in HELL>

  25. on 25 Nov 2010 at 6:13 am Hubbard

    Trolly-troll troll-troll.

  26. on 25 Nov 2010 at 6:53 am Have Your Lurk

    I wonder what internet-aware coarse anglers call trolling now?

  27. on 25 Nov 2010 at 11:19 am DonkeySquicker

    Ignore him. He’s just jealous.

  28. on 25 Nov 2010 at 11:50 am TinyClanger

    Hark now, what precious words slip from the lips
    Of knowing Llandscape, drifting through the air
    To settle softly at the eager ears
    Of acolytes convergéd from afar

    “Avoid the horseshoe – choose instead the stalls,
    As staged delights are best seen from the front”
    Fuck me, that Llandscape doesn’t half talk balls
    Mayhap because he is a festering cunt.

    That was bloody good. Iambic pentameter, alliteration and everything. Good use of rhyme for emphasis, and – most vitally – you called a cunt a cunt.

  29. on 25 Nov 2010 at 12:08 pm DonkeySquicker

    He may be a bit of a bellend, but he’s kind of right.

    I saw a couple of plays at The Courtyard a couple of years back, and the thrust stage layout worked pretty well.

    So yeah, maybe a bit of a nob but surely not at the same level of cuntery we have come to expect.

  30. on 25 Nov 2010 at 1:21 pm Have Your Lurk

    I thought a thrust stage was a kind of studio for live porn acts until I discovered Llandscape.

  31. on 25 Nov 2010 at 3:01 pm Kris

    I can see the problem with cigarette packets. Tacky gold and silver? Photographs of diseased bodyparts? Warning labels that say ‘You Will Fucking Die If You Even Look At These’?

    What impressionable child wouldn’t be enticed by that?

  32. on 25 Nov 2010 at 3:11 pm DonkeySquicker

    A mate of mine who is a doctor reckons condoms should be advertised using pictures of various types of horrific crotch rot and the slogan “The student doctor will see you now”.

  33. on 25 Nov 2010 at 3:16 pm Have Your Lurk

    Hello Kitty cigarettes. For the discerning youth who smokes a little pussy now and then.

  34. on 25 Nov 2010 at 9:08 pm Harriieee

    Another success story for the champions of multiculturism. May all lefties rot in HELL>

    I love the way that the guy who tentatively questioned the article’s emphasis on their Asian..ness, now has 147 down arrows.

    I also love all the allusion that the comments make. They all say stuff like “all the politicians are afraid of the truth….. hiding behind political correctness”

    None of them actually come out and say “Asians gang-rape women, it’s in their DNA.” Because… y’know, that would just be…. wrong? Dammit, guys, play by your own bigoted PC-breaking rules already…

  35. on 25 Nov 2010 at 9:32 pm Have Your Lurk

    After all, no white men ever gang-raped anyone. Fact. If I’m right.

  36. on 25 Nov 2010 at 9:54 pm Ed aka Otto

    @Harriieee

    They probably control themselves because even the Daily Fail has standards (sic) of what they’ll allow in comments.

  37. on 25 Nov 2010 at 11:05 pm Hubbard

    I wonder what internet-aware coarse anglers call trolling now?

    The coarse anglers are calling it ‘fucking trolling’. The very coarse anglers are calling it ‘fuckity Mcfuck cunty trolling’

    I’ll get me waders.

  38. on 26 Nov 2010 at 12:23 am tw@basket.com

    The penalty for gratuitous references to people’s ethnicity in a newspaper story which has nothing to do with ethnicity should be for the paper to be forced to print the ethnicity of everybody they mention for a whole day.

    Having to print headlines like:

    “‘Welfare cuts will only encourage the poor to breed’: Outrage at new white Tory peer’s outburst over child benefits”

    and:

    “White dentist ‘rang white patient’s white wife to confess ‘We’re having an affair… and he doesn’t have the b**** to tell you’”

    would get boring very quickly and might make them think twice about doing it again. They clearly don’t care about looking racist so lets see if they care about looking stupid (or rather, even more stupid).

    Oh, and every time they asterisk out a word that isn’t even rude they should be made to print a mugshot of the editor at the top of the leader column with the caption “Prissy little cunt”.

    If only I was in charge of the PCC, what fun we would have…

  39. on 26 Nov 2010 at 1:34 am Ed aka Otto

    The PCC is the last defence of civilisation in controlling the media. Who’s in charge of the PCC again?

  40. on 26 Nov 2010 at 6:14 am Every time you blah

    The PCC is the last defence of civilisation in controlling the media. Who’s in charge of the PCC again?

    The media.

  41. on 26 Nov 2010 at 7:15 am Have Your Lurk

    Well, then, what do coarse angling blogs call the like of Pete Tong, eh? Eh?

    Come to that, what do you call a not-very-good job in the plum industry?

  42. on 26 Nov 2010 at 10:47 am Have Your Lurk

    And now that I come to think about it, a thrust stage is a part of a rocket.

  43. on 26 Nov 2010 at 12:15 pm Neil Craig

    Trust nobody is being inconvenienced from the global warming we are allegedly suffering from.

  44. on 26 Nov 2010 at 1:02 pm EGB's Smelly Sox

    Well noticed, Prof!! Brrr, have you noticed how cold it is, anyone? Surely this must disprove the existence of summer!

  45. on 26 Nov 2010 at 1:14 pm ligne

    it’s called “winter”. apparently it happens every year, but i think it’s just a conspiracy by the russians to make us buy more of their gas.

    incidentally, neil craig is a cunt.

  46. on 26 Nov 2010 at 1:21 pm Ed aka Otto

    Just when you thought sYb was on its last legs: it’s the intellectual Fisher King!

    When will the fascist communist genocidal lie about “seasons” finally be exposed? When will “Professor” Craig be Prime Minister? When will Peggy Mitchell (gawd bless ‘er) return to Eastenders?

  47. on 26 Nov 2010 at 1:25 pm eleanora_

    Ther’s ice outside, therefore there is no such thing as climate change!!1

    Cockend.

  48. on 26 Nov 2010 at 1:47 pm DonkeySquicker

    There are no utter bellends in my office, therefore Neil Craig doesn’t exist.

    Yay!

  49. on 26 Nov 2010 at 1:48 pm ligne

    When will “Professor” Craig be Prime Minister?

    whenever his “9% growth party” manages to garner more than a single-digit number of votes.

  50. on 26 Nov 2010 at 2:24 pm Have Your Lurk

    What I really love about the global warming conspiracy is that as soon as it’s been discredited, scientists will tell us we’re heading for a new Ice Age, and then that will have to be shown to be a conspiracy as well. If I’m right.

  51. on 26 Nov 2010 at 2:44 pm john Adair's Gerbil

    After a slow start, SYB is returning to form.

    @Pete Tong – google “Police Rape” – another success for the champions of lorranorder. May all Daily Mail readers rot in HELL>

    @Neil Craig – well spotted, the axial tilt of the planet is all part of the conspiracy.

  52. on 26 Nov 2010 at 3:47 pm new scientist

    Was anyone daft enough to click the link? I love it: peer review isn’t good enough, so instead we’ll replace it with … peer review, except randoms on the internet are also allowed an opinion. All it would take is some cunt to post “hang on, you claim this protein is increased in schizophrenic brains, but this one patient here had hardly ANY protein!!! Therefore, cabbages. LOLZ” and that paper is stuck at ‘level 1′ for life. Unless you get someone suitably qualified to peer review the comments of course; but then, why not restrict the consultation process to those people in the fucking first place? i.e. peer review.

    Fuckwittery of the highest degree.

    (loving also the reference to the ‘hockey stick theory’ – it’s a fucking *graph*, not a bastard theory)

  53. on 26 Nov 2010 at 3:57 pm new scientist

    I think there was an extraneous ‘peer’ in that comment, sorry. Come to think of it, there are a few extraneous peers in the Tory party too.
    I’ll get my lab coat.

  54. on 26 Nov 2010 at 5:00 pm ligne

    no, you’re looking at it wrong, new scientist.

    the peer review process keeps producing answers they don’t want to hear (and are therefore wrong). ergo it’s broken, and needs to be fixed.

    makes perfect sense when you think about it.

  55. on 28 Nov 2010 at 5:24 pm Clovis Sangrail

    Thank fuck – Neil Craig is back. Not a professor any more then Neil?

  56. on 29 Nov 2010 at 2:23 pm Professor Craig

    Snow is starting to disappear from our lives. According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, within a few years winter snowfall will become “a very rare and exciting event”. “Children just aren’t going to know what snow is,” he said. –The Independent, 20 March 2000

  57. on 29 Nov 2010 at 5:20 pm Clovis Sangrail

    THAT’S better!

  58. on 29 Nov 2010 at 9:00 pm Mike Ochertz, PhD

    So the Arctic and Antarctic ice caps, the Greenland ice sheet are all doing great?

    And what of that record drought the Amazon just experienced? Or the unprecedented level of flooding that’s hitting the American Mid-West?

    Or that the fact that the last few years have been amongst the hottest ever recorded globally, going back to the end of the last ice age?

    Just how much research have you actually DONE into this subject, Professor? Gazing moodily outside your bedroom window mid-wank one cold, lonely November morning is only one of the essential qualifications to be a climatologist, after all.

  59. on 30 Nov 2010 at 8:48 pm ligne

    i was going to ignore neil craig’s arse-gravy as so much ill-informed toss. but if he’s a *professor*? well, that changes everything.

  60. on 30 Nov 2010 at 8:49 pm ligne

    Mike> obviously they’re in on the conspiracy too.

  61. on 30 Nov 2010 at 9:06 pm Ed aka Otto

    He’s a professor because I sarcastically labelled him as that last year. He seems to have embraced it, which is touching but a little sad.

  62. on 01 Dec 2010 at 1:31 pm Professor Craig

    “So the Arctic and Antarctic ice caps, the Greenland ice sheet are all doing great?”

    Yup, still covered with white Mr Phd.

    Your 2nd para is simply lies your 3rd & following ones are the ravings of wholly corrupt beeboid mother fucking parasites who know perfectly well they are lying & cannot make any reasoned factual case for their fascism. No offence.