Strange & Obscure Gigs

[richard]

I did a days filming just recently, which involved one man standing on top of a bit of wood covering another man, while tap-dancing, and all of this while a live dove perched on his head.

 

Modern art they called it!

[Peter Russell]

Another gig that comes to mind is the video projection for the launch of private blue, the cable porn channel. The job consisted of providing a video wall which showed some approriate footage whilst two lovely young ladies danced around a couple of poles infront of it. :P

 

Modern art they called it!

[Rob]

We had a slightly interesting few days last week, when we had various visiting companies.

 

First up, the soufle saga - One performance was basically a man, dressed as a woman, cooking a soufle and putting make-up on. This went on for over an hour and was accompanied by very loud classical music. We therefore had to provide a fitted kitchen in one of the studio spaces, except nobody mentioned the sink having to work. The star of the show decided without warning to pour something down the sink... And all over the floor. Oh, and did I mention the two goldfish on stage as well...

 

Second place in the weird category, was the woman who for half an hour, jumped up and down on broken glass. Some poor person had to break up loads of the stuff, which then had to be struck between performances, as other groups were using the venue. We plucked up the courage to watch the show, and whinced every time this woman fell over on the glass. For her other party trick, she also sliced an onion in half with an axe and rubbbed the halves in her eyes. Oh, and did I mention the angle grinder... :P

 

We asked her as we cleared up the glass about whether she had every injured herself, to which she replied: "no, only the crew get hurt!"

[Kate]

Ah yes, the joys of performance art! I have seen one piece that consisted simply of a woman who sat motionless with a needle in her arm taking out about a glass-worth of blood (this took about ten minutes, riveting stuff, eh?) Then once she'd got enough, she drank it back in one. People are so, so, odd sometimes...

[Guest lightnix]

...to which she replied: "no, only the crew get hurt!"

Blimey, I wonder what her insurance premiums are like :(

[TeeJay]

Anyone remember the Soho theatre running a play-writing competition based upon a picture of a pair of bare feet on double yellow lines?

 

The winners which were shown were reasonably normal pieces but I had the great fortune to work on three pieces that didn't make the grade.

 

One based on the premise that it was a siamese twin during the photo shoot :D , one on the premise of removable feet :( and the last on the premise of what the yellow lines thought of the idea of being stood on :D

 

Very interesting to be sure.

 

And how about a certain ex-west end musical that had to cast pretending to be of the feline persuasion (sp?) ;)

Not the most normal idea in the book :D

[Stig]

I will let the show and the venue remain nameless to protect the muppet who wrote it and the pratt that booked it. But I once did a show that had 43 people in the first half. the crew held a sweep as to how many people came back for the second half. The correct answer was....................NONE!!

I don't blame them it was the worst thing I have ever seen and I have seen some rubbish in my time.

[Kate]

Just remembered an edinburgh fringe show I had the misfortune to encounter. It really was abysmal in more ways than I can express. It got a hilarious review in the observer though, which finished with ".... we cannot tell you what happens in this show because to remember it makes our ears bleed." :D

[PeterT]

Not a gig of mine but...

I read in the 'Return of Heroic Failures' by Stephen Pile that a Romanina Folk singer by the name of Joan Melu did a concert at the Capitol Theatre Melbourne to 2,200 EMPTY SEATS :D

Apparrently the show should have lasted 2 hours but overran for thirty minutes due to encores! The crew must have needed counselling after that one!

 

If anyone wants the whole story Email me and I'll send it to you

[NickLee]

Believe it or not, I have "The Book of Heroric Faliures" by Stephen Pile on the shelf by the PC, and have had for the last six months, I don't know why!

 

This is off topic, but the entry for "Worst Phrasebook" has to be the best.

 

"Pedro Carolino is one of the all-time greats. In 1883 he wrote an English-Portuguese phrasebook despite having little or no command of the English language.

His greately recommended book 'The New Guide of the Conversation in Portuguese and English' has now been reprinted under the title 'English As She is Spoke'.

After a brief dedicaton:

'We expect then, who the little book (for the care what we wrote him and for her typographical correction) that may be worth the acceptation of the studious persons and especially of the youth at which we dedicate him particularly.'

Carolino kicks off with some 'Familiar phrases' which the Portuguese holidaymaker might find useful.

Among these are:

Dress your hairs

This hat go well

Undress you to

Exclupate me by your brother's

She make the pride

Do you cut the hairs?

He has tost his all good

He then moved on to 'Familiar Dialogues' which include 'For to wish the good morning' and 'For to visit a sick'.

 

Dialogue 18 - 'For to ride a horse' - begins: 'Here horse who have bad looks. Give me another. I will not that. He not sall know to march, he is pursy, he is foundered. Don't you are ashamed to give me a jade as like? he is undshoed, he is with nails up'. In the section,on 'Anecdotes' Carolino offers the following guaranteed to enthrall any listener:

'One eyed was laid against a man which had good eyes that he saw better than him. The party was accepted. I had gain, over said the one eyed; why I se you two eyes and you not look me who one'.

 

It is difficult to top that, but Carolino manages in useful section of 'Idiotisms and proverbs'. These include:

 

Nothing some money, nothing of Swiss

He eat to coaches

A take is better than two you shall have

The stone as roll not heap up not foam and the well-known expression

The dog than bark not bite

 

Carolino's particular genius was aided by the fact that he did not possess an English-Portuguese Dictionary. However, he did possess Portuguese-French and French-English dictionaries through both of which he dragged his original expressions. The results yield language of originality and great beauty. Is there anything in conventional English which could equal the vividness of 'To craunch a marmoset'?"

 

The worst Singer entry is now overshadowed by Britain's recent Eurovision entry, but all you need to know about the worst orchestra is "Two thirds of it's members had never touched an instrument before."

 

Actually, the Worst Song Entry is spookily familiar:

"Singing an entrancingly drab number called 'Mile after Mile', a Norweigan pop singer, Mr Jan Teigan, scored nil in the 1978 Eurovision song Contest. The voting from the panels all over Europe was unanimous:

'Norway - no points

- nil points

- keine Punkte'

Next morning the papers were naturally full of Mr Teigan, pushing mention of the actual winner, Izhar Cohen, into a subsidiary paragraph. After the contest, press photographers had crowded round our hero giving him star treatment. 'This was my greatest success', he said, 'I have done what no-one ever did before me. I'm the first Norwegian to get zero points. After the concert I had to make 60 splits for the photographers and I'v got lots of offers for TV appearances tours and interviews. I've never known as much interest taken in me."

 

I was gonna add some from the "Worst Show", "Worst Ever Actor", and "Least Successful Production", but I'm gonna send that extract off to the paper...

 

--N