Archive for the 'things i do' Category

Newer posts »

going solo

October 1, 2011

I’ve just finished a few performances of I never even killed a bird at The Yard. It’s a storytelling piece with projected illustration that started life a few months ago at Samantha’s Sunday Night Supper Club. I had loads of fun and had some really great audiences in.

It was such a funny experience, sharing a bit about my life with an audience in the context of a show, but I was reminded how much I really love connecting with people in that context and how much people appreciate it when a performer really shares something of themselves. Loveliness all around.

Also: I got to draw some things…


 

 

…and I made up a song.

 

So thank you super-mega-bigtime to:

-everyone at The Yard for making what they’ve made (which is pretty special) and giving me the opportunity and an excuse to try out my little idea. If you haven’t been there yet, go. It’ll only be there through October. Great art, nice people, gorgeous food.

-Camille Bozzini for providing me with perfect publicity illustrations.

-Othello Woolf for letting me use his music in my trailer and in the show.

-Tom Elstob (The Idol Rich) for helping me make up a song.

-Hetty and Bryony for providing me with an essential outside eye when I started going crazy in a rehearsal room on my own.

All photos by the amazing Katherine Leedale.

And lastly, I’m THRILLED to say I’ll be performing I never even killed a bird on two more occasions this month:

October 13th, 7pm at LVX Books in Bethnal Green. It will be a lovely little intimate performance in the bookshop. Looking forward to doing some storytelling surrounded by books.

October 28th and 29th as part of the nabokov Arts Club at BAC. This will be an awesome night by nabokov, filling every space at BAC with theatre, comedy, performance, happenings, music, DJs, etc. It will basically be All The Art. You’ll find me both nights tucked in an upstairs room with a fire in the fireplace projecting on the walls and telling a story. I’m beyond excited about this.

PLEASE DO come to either (or both!) of these. I promise they’ll be awesome. And totally fun.

I mean, Inmate Renshaw will be there…

All for now.

G

Posted in JFDI, The 27 List, things i do | Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , ,

Shedspotting

July 20, 2011

A couple of months ago I had the pleasure of co-directing a film with Doug Lyon for Straight 8.

The competition involves making a film on a Super 8 camera with a single roll. No editing, no retakes. You just shoot the film, record the audio and send it in. The first time you ever see your own film is at a screening with everyone else.

Our film is called ‘Sarah’, and it’s about a lovely lady called Sarah. Sarah’s favourite book is The British Locomotive Shed Directory, and she loves nothing more than to jump on a train with a flask and a packed lunch and head out for a full day of spotting. Shedspotting.

The idea for the film came from an improvisation weekend I did with Likely Story a few months back. Sarah came from a character Anne Langford created while we were improvising in a bookshop, and Doug and I thought the character of a wistful shedspotter would fit the nostalic feel of the Super 8 perfectly.

The beauty of Straight 8 is that it’s all about getting out there and doing it. Aside from playing around in Dorset awhile back, I had never made a film before. Neither Doug nor I had ever used a Super 8 camera before, but under the pressure of creating a film on one roll, we just had to jump in and go for it.

I learned loads, and I know there were loads of things both of us would do differently if we did it again, but that’s kind of the point of doing it, I guess. You gotta make stuff to get better at making stuff.

‘Sarah’ was chosen to be screened at the ICA next week as part of Rushes Soho Shorts Festival which we’re mega-pleased about. We’ll be there, and in front of an audience we’ll see our film for the first time. You can get a ticket here if you fancy coming along to a night of Straight 8 films. Ours will be on Tues, the 26th July.

So thanks to Doug, Hetty and Anne (who played Sarah) for making the film, thanks to Dentsu London and Straight 8 for giving us an excuse to do it, and congratulations to the other Dentsu teams who were chosen for screenings.

Posted in JFDI, things i do | Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , ,

the1four1 of the3six5

May 22, 2011

I’ve been keeping up with the3six5 all year. It’s a fantastic project by Len Kendall and Daniel Honigman in which someone from somewhere in the world writes a post each day about their experience of that day. It’s super-lovely and really varied. It’s thoughtful, funny and brave.

Yesterday, 21st May, day 141, I contributed a post to the project. Check it out here along with all the other posts. I’ve also reposted it below.

Today it was hot—or at least hot in London terms. Six years in the UK and my concept of hot weather has changed dramatically; I’ve suppressed my inner Texan. The second the sun made an appearance this morning I headed to the park to shiver on a blanket. London Fields was packed with cut-off shorts, barbecues, rosé, twiddly mustaches and tramps.

A day experienced in bits and pieces. Satisfaction in unrelated things mashed together. Like a unicorn sandwich.

Today I saw a baby receive a personal performance of “The Wheels on the Bus” from a lager-swigging busker in the park. The baby’s parents both took videos on their iPhones of the baby gurgling and dribbling on its shirt, but I thought the busker was more interesting. At least he could play the banjo.

I guess I’m not much of a baby person.

Today my girlfriend and I talked about names. It’s a recurring game that started a few years ago with ridiculous cat names, but now we’ve progressed to hypothetical baby names. If we ever have a baby girl she wants to name it Anna-Nicole, Miracle or Shirley.

Today I didn’t go for a run. I’m resting a self-diagnosed sprained big toe in the lead up to the Stockholm Marathon next week.

Today I listened to pigeons outside my bedroom window. A friend once told me that when pigeons coo it always sounds like they’re saying, “My foot hurts, Betty”. Now whenever pigeons are around it’s all I can think about.

Today I had an impromptu photo shoot with my cat, Mona. What started out as a couple of quick snaps to catch her looking out the window at a pigeon turned into an hour-long feline modeling session in which I tried to capture the essence of her soul in a single definitive portrait. I think I may have succeeded.

And today I’ve had the urge to listen to Fleetwood Mac. I’m not saying it’s because of Glee’s recent Rumours episode, but I’m also not saying it isn’t.

Posted in The 27 List, things i do | Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , ,

The Elephant and the Goldfish

April 22, 2011

I started a photo-a-day project, inspired by the fantastic ‘Today’ by Jonathan Harris.

It’s called The Elephant and the Goldfish. I’m hoping it will be like a stake in the ground for each day.

The week in photos:

black cat

Jacket on Regents Canal

Margot

Mona by the window

Oxford Circus

on the 8

Ostrich + Wolf

Posted in JFDI, photo-a-day, things i do | Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , ,

Harry Potter and the Holding Cell Scabies

April 18, 2011

Last weekend I performed at Samantha’s Stately Sunday Night Supper Club in the basement of Bethnal Green Working Mens Club. I decided to tell a story—a true story—accompanied by projected illustrations. It was the story of a night in Sherman, Texas—May 2003—when a few friends and I went to The Orphanage.

It also happens to be the true story of the night we spent in Grayson County Jail.

The police had apparently been called away from the Taco Bell drive-thru to bust us for trespassing. One of which was this lovely policewoman with the front bottom:

We learned a number of things while behind bars, including (but not limited to) the following:

•a shoe makes a decent pillow in a pinch
•prison food is surprisingly tasty (esp. the chocolate cake)
•jail doesn’t take Mastercard
•do not make eye contact with cellmates who are still drunk
•warm ups from acting class are good for relaxation
•holding time=bonding time

My badass prison name was Harry Potter. At least that’s what my cellmates called me.

No joke.

Here are a few of my fellow inmates:

Red Polo Shirt Man was a friendly sort of guy. He was wise; a sort of father of the cell. He was arrested for embezzlement. He wasn’t really wearing spurs–those would have been confiscated–this is just an artist’s representation.


Thin Man was a sickly looking guy who spent a lot of time huddled on a bench. Seeing him reminded me of something I heard once about Sherman being the meth capitol of Texas.

Singing Guy was one of my favourites, and not just because he reminded me of Coolio. He spent time making up songs and telling the guards that we didn’t deserve to be there because we had never even killed a bird. He also helpfully pointed out a female inmate who had “deep nipples”.

Supper Club was super-duper fun, with a fantastically lovely audience who was really supportive of this story’s first outing.

Mega-thanks are in order to Vera and Adrian of Saltpeter (and of course the lovely Samantha) for having me along. Also to Camille Bozzini for her powers of illustration (all the above are by her). And Daniel Johnson for lending me a projector.

And thanks to my fellow arrestees/inmates: Tiny, Nails, Laces and Piss Ant.

Strong are the bonds that are forged behind bars.

Posted in JFDI, The 27 List, things i do | Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , ,

ledge dancing

April 14, 2011

Last year I shot this little film with Hetty Abbott while we were camping in Dorset. Just for fun with a basic handheld camera. It’s called Dancing Ledge.

I shot it awhile ago and then sat on it, slightly worried that it wasn’t good enough to show or that it didn’t represent exactly what I wanted to say. But I was inspired by Austin Kleon‘s fantastic How To Steal Like An Artist, especially this bit:

If I waited to know “who I was” or “what I was about” before I started “being creative”, well, I’d still be sitting around trying to figure myself out instead of making things. In my experience, it’s in the act of making things that we figure out who we are.

So I thought: fuck it.

We made it in a couple of hours with the stuff we had in the moment, I played around with Final Cut Pro until it was edited, we asked a friend to write some original music to go with it (thanks to The Idol Rich), and now I’m posting it.

I kind of like it. I hope you kind of like it too.

I want to make more things.

Posted in JFDI, things i do | 2 Comments »
Tags: , , ,

i did (helped with) a podcast

March 28, 2011


I helped with a podcast recently at Dentsu London on Tree of Codes, by Jonathan Safran Foer.

We talked with Visual Editions who are lovely and had lots of interesting stuff to say about books and visual storytelling. Read about it/listen to it here.

Posted in things i do | Leave a Comment »
Tags: , ,

Newer posts »
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.