Cucumber Episode 6: Television as (Devastatingly Dark) Art

A spoiler-filled and hastily written reaction to THAT Cucumber episode (Episode 6).

The tragedy was not just the fact of a death, but that the character didn’t get the chance to change.

UK Channel 4’s Cucumber, by Russell T. Davies, is amazing TV anyway – complex and only partly likable characters, smart dialogue, the repercussions of life decisions, 21^st century culture. (Not to mention a lot of gay sex. Like, a lot.)

But episode 6, which I watched last night on catch-up and am still processing, took the show to a whole new level. 

Michael Lewis’s Flash Boys: Once Upon a Time on Wall Street

 The seductive appeal of Michael Lewis’s book about high-frequency trading on Wall Street – and the group of guys that got together to investigate and make the system fairer – is not merely the promise of learning more about the financial system and getting angry at how screwed up and misaligned the incentives are, although you will do that.

Obviously Lewis’s writing is a major part of it – the elegant effortless surface only partially concealing the structural and research muscle underneath, so that I am put in mind of a sleek but powerful mammal, an otter perhaps, or a mongoose.

Others have written very good reviews of the book as a whole (I’m a fan of John Lanchester’s, for instance). But what I want to talk about here is the structure, the narrative arc. I know that teaching people about the system, its problems and potential solutions is important for Lewis because that’s what he talks about in multiple interviews – and because anyone with any sense of justice or fairness should be outraged and want to know more about how the system has been rigged. 

But putting that complex explanation into a form that is not just simply expressed but has forward narrative momentum – that’s important too, or no matter how good the writing is people won’t keep reading. It came to me in a revelatory flash 12 hours after finishing the book (at 4am, I’m hoping this is one of those ideas that survives post-insomnia) that what Lewis has produced here – the sugary flesh helping us to swallow the hard seed of an idea that he wants to spread - is an aspirational fantasy as powerful (and as fictional in its way) as any 'Twilight' or '50 Shades'. The fantasy, though, is targeted not at romance-seekers but at disillusioned white-collar workers.

Book Review: Unspeakable Things by Laurie Penny

Laurie Penny’s Unspeakable Things: Sex, Lies and Revolution is a thoughtful, inspiring and revolutionary book and I would recommend it to anybody even the slightest bit open to the idea that society’s structure maybe needs changing a bit.

In a fiery, urgent style that makes it sound like she’s furiously getting her reasoning down so everyone can just read it and stop bothering her with the same old objections already, Penny lays out the need for activism (not necessarily feminism) because of the problems with the status quo – problems of sex, gender, and love that hurt women and “outsiders” like the queer community or those (including many men) excluded from mainstream society due to poverty or ethnicity.

Parody as Genre Entry Point

I.                     

Q: What do these books have in common: Murder on the Orient Express; Watchmen; The Colour of Magic; The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy? 

A: They’re all, to varying degrees, parodies or deconstructions of the genre that they represent  - crime fiction; superhero comics/graphic novels¹; fantasy; and sci-fi, respectively. They are also, pretty much, the first of each of these genres that I encountered, certainly the first as non-kids’ books, and I've never looked back. 

I’ve been thinking about parody and deconstructions as a genre entry point for a while now, I even started writing a thing last year, but didn’t get very far. And then I saw Amanda Palmer’s blog on “Weird Al” Yankovic and discovering some music genres via his parodies, and it has kicked my arse into gear (I mean if she can finish her book, I can do a single essay, right?) 

The First What the Function? episode of the Brain Scoop, and the Confidence Gap

Scooping up the wrong brain

I just watched the The Brain Scoop “What the Function?” video with Destin from Smarter Every Day, and my reaction was along the lines of the very similar but swearier phrase that that is playing off. I was disappointed, and a bit confused.  

I love these videos and I love that Emily Graslie is getting out there making her name as a young, female science communicator with genuine knowledge and enthusiasm. I sympathised about, and wanted somehow to help with, the “Where my ladies at?” edition, which talks about the ongoing abusive comments and discussion of her appearance that she has to put up with as a woman, and rues the fact that there aren’t more women (and girls) out there doing these videos about science and engineering and getting watched. I agree, that would be great – and when there are, it will be because of people like her. 

And so I was disappointed that the most recent Brain Scoop video was mostly given over to letting a male guest, outside his field of expertise, bluster through guesses with corrections and hints from the more knowledgeable ladies, and then explain basic stuff they already knew! It seemed to be deliberately reinforcing the idea that “guys can come in and solve problems without knowing that much”. 

Not Really a Review of Credible Likeable Superstar Role Model

In which I find a difference between performance art and theatre, and family matters are discussed

I recently went to the Credible Likeable Superstar Role Model show by Bryony Kimmings in one of its last few performances, at the Soho Theatre. This is the show where Bryony Kimmings and her 9-year-old niece Taylor encounter the current media situation for young girls: the sexualisation of women in pop culture, the continuous onslaught of marketing messages and incidental exposure to violence and misogyny. After a terrified and terrifying reaction involving eye-gouging, [1] together they create a new popstar/palaeontologist, Catherine Bennett (performed by Kimmings), to be a better role model for girls. The show touches on themes of family, how to help young girls, and the meta-commentary on the development of this show and Taylor’s work with her aunt.

Expectations are Dangerous

I went to see CLSRM because, well, I will at least consider seeing whatever is recommended by all-round cultural influences Neil Gaiman and Amanda Palmer, whose live-on-twitter ever-loving marriage meanders back and forth across the line between envy-inducing and inspirational. Even though I don’t like everything they recommend, I will at least have analytical fun-times[2] working out why, so it’s pretty much always a net win. In this case other reviews were positive too: lots of people mentioned tears, laughter, wonderfulness, etc. And even though I don’t have kids, it still seemed like an interesting take on culture.

A Tale of Two Lears

Review (sort of) of King Lear at the National Theatre, seen 14 June 2014

After seeing the female 'Lear' at the Union Theatre (see previous post), I saw the more usual (king-related) form of the play (the better known Sam Mendes/Simon Russell Beale production at the much larger National Theatre) nine days later. So, this is not so much a review, more a sort of comparison analysis.

Think of it as a "play-off" [heh, sorry] - and like in sport, there’s a bit of violence, a plucky little underdog, and the spectators just get to enjoy the contest, admire the talent, and avoid the (fake) blood. 

First, some brief[1] comparisons:

• Edmund is better done as a character at the Olivier, for me. It's a brilliantly cold, smart, sociopathic performance from the mesmerising Sam Troughton and the bit where he puts on a voice to pretend to do astrology, complete with rising inflection, was pure comedy. Gloucester in contrast was better at the Union because he comes across more as one of the good guys and a man of integrity making choices, where Gloucester at the Olivier had a bit of "i'm doing this cos it's what the text says" about him. 
• Cordelia was good - and fairly similar - in both productions but I think the National has the edge. It justifies her refusal to speak at the start by having Lear as a military dictator-type, and her rebellion comes across as both a child's sullenness and a political protest - that by compelling protestations of love by sheer military power, the King has overstepped (perhaps for the latest time) a mark.
• The trial-in-the-barn scene is amazing at the Olivier and I will not spoiler it, but it worked and I think was the key scene of the play. Sheer Mendesian genius.