Caught Al Pacino and his Shylock act in the play- the merchant of venice in Broadway the other day. Cost me quite a packet - $180 to be precise, and I did'nt enjoy the play a bit.
Firstly, the seats at Broadhurst theatre on the 42nd at Broadway were pretty small, and added to the heavy set jackets and overcoats everyone was wearing in snowy New York, it made for very uncomfortable viewing.
Secondly, my seat at one corner didnt give the best of views, the elderly couple sitting next to me were jittery due to something in their seats and the young couple sitting in front of me ,though pretty engrossed in the play, had a packet or two of chips which made cracklimg noise just as Narissa was about to say something that would draw the applause of the crowd.
Thridly, Pacino was shorter than I imagined, his Shylock's delivery of dialogue wasnt impressive either. Antonio was better & smarter, I thought.
Fourthly, Shakespeare at 10pm is tough on any day, but when you have to manage a big event the next day, its even tougher. While seeing the Phantom of the Opera in London a few years back, i had dozed off a few times- due to the sheer darkness of its sets and due to teh late hours spent working on that day. A 50 pound ticket experience spent napping. With the MErchant, while teh sets were imagnative, its the verbosity of Shakespeare that got to me. After dozing off a few times, walked out of theatre half hour before the play ended into the chill New York night and to super Italian pizza.
Finally , $180 left a big hole in my pocket - it was what I was paying for Hilton for a night.
Pacino got me into the theatre, Shakespeare managed to get me out.
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
A new style of play
The reason I dont like Barcelona's style of play is its boringness.
Under manager Pep Guardiola, the team has become quite invincible- 18/20 wins in La Liga, GF 122, GA 21 ( a record both ways) for a 38 match season. So why is success in this case boring?
Its the way they play.
The team is full of steady(they have 80% match attendance) creative, short players- (most under 5'8 -tallest being Villa) who keep passing the ball between themselves (70-75% possession in most matches), tiring out the opposition and using the awesome quartret of Messi, Carles Puyol, Gerard Pique and David Villa to score.
My team Chelsea normally has 50-55% possession (balanced team, athletic and talented) and a good winning record, Inter had 45% possession and won Champions league last year.
This also is something Arsenal practices- while it does make for some beautiful football, so much science also drains the fun from the beautiful game.
Get creative, Barca.
Under manager Pep Guardiola, the team has become quite invincible- 18/20 wins in La Liga, GF 122, GA 21 ( a record both ways) for a 38 match season. So why is success in this case boring?
Its the way they play.
The team is full of steady(they have 80% match attendance) creative, short players- (most under 5'8 -tallest being Villa) who keep passing the ball between themselves (70-75% possession in most matches), tiring out the opposition and using the awesome quartret of Messi, Carles Puyol, Gerard Pique and David Villa to score.
My team Chelsea normally has 50-55% possession (balanced team, athletic and talented) and a good winning record, Inter had 45% possession and won Champions league last year.
This also is something Arsenal practices- while it does make for some beautiful football, so much science also drains the fun from the beautiful game.
Get creative, Barca.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Escape!
Nietzsche's Nihilistic philosophy is classically summarized by the statement- everything has eternal recurrance, since time is infinite and matter finite, everything will repeat itself. This implies that general human life is purposeless and mans actions have no inherent meaning. A meaninglessness endorsed by existential philosopher Camus in his essay, Myth of Sisyphus.
In contrast, there's a lighter, happier theme in 'Escape' centered works, one of which I have just finished reading- John Updike's Rabbit, Run. Escape to find meaning in ones live , existence and purpose. Escape to a better, more joyous state of being.
This theme has recurred in many books- Somerset Maugham's brilliant book, Moon and the sixpence( where bored stock broker Charles Strickand becomes an artist) ; Eat, Pray, Love - a recent blockbuster about the author, Elizabeth Gilbert, herself running away from a divorce thru Italy, India and Indonesia; Year of the Hare- Arto Passilinia's classic tale of Vatanan running into the forest with the hare and moving away from his drab city life.
A few movies have run the similar theme- Revolutionary road - with the Titanic lead pair of Leonardo di Caprio and Kate Winslet fighting to keep their boring marriage alive dreaming of escape all the time, but not being able to achieve it; A Good Year achieved escape - again a dreary and incredibly busy stock broker, breaks away to work on his uncles wineyard to discover the joys of country life. Russel Crowe is the unlikely hero, but does a commendable job, nevertheless.
Rabbit, Run ranks way above quiet a few of these as a good escape novel- simply because it dwells in escape and its consequences- by covering over four decades of the life of Rabbit- Harry Angstrom, who grows (or doesn't) from being a great basketball star to a dull householder and makes multiple attempts to escape his own life, even as he becomes rich (his Toyota dealership booms in the 1980s) and finally falls to ill health. Written every ten years, Updike managed to reflect on some of the key developments in American polity- from the launch on the moon to vietnam war to the end of communism- possible sheerly due to the span of the novel's progress.
This theme of leading multiple lives in search of purpose- a sort of escape from present circumstances makes very engaging reading.
In non-fiction, escape in the form of Jim Rogers beautiful travel books written with a decade between them 'Investment Biker' and 'Adventure capitalist' or even P. J.O.Rourke's Eat the Rich were highly engaging.
An escape experience, be it a movie or a book, leaves you satisfied that there is meaning in life and that all you have to do is to attempt it.
Getting back to Nietzsche, escape is also a recurring philosophy manifesting itself in different ways and forms.
After all, wasn't it the king Siddhartha- the Buddha, who found enlightenment after walking away from his wife, kids and family?
Is escape, then, the route out of meaninglessless?
In contrast, there's a lighter, happier theme in 'Escape' centered works, one of which I have just finished reading- John Updike's Rabbit, Run. Escape to find meaning in ones live , existence and purpose. Escape to a better, more joyous state of being.
This theme has recurred in many books- Somerset Maugham's brilliant book, Moon and the sixpence( where bored stock broker Charles Strickand becomes an artist) ; Eat, Pray, Love - a recent blockbuster about the author, Elizabeth Gilbert, herself running away from a divorce thru Italy, India and Indonesia; Year of the Hare- Arto Passilinia's classic tale of Vatanan running into the forest with the hare and moving away from his drab city life.
A few movies have run the similar theme- Revolutionary road - with the Titanic lead pair of Leonardo di Caprio and Kate Winslet fighting to keep their boring marriage alive dreaming of escape all the time, but not being able to achieve it; A Good Year achieved escape - again a dreary and incredibly busy stock broker, breaks away to work on his uncles wineyard to discover the joys of country life. Russel Crowe is the unlikely hero, but does a commendable job, nevertheless.
Rabbit, Run ranks way above quiet a few of these as a good escape novel- simply because it dwells in escape and its consequences- by covering over four decades of the life of Rabbit- Harry Angstrom, who grows (or doesn't) from being a great basketball star to a dull householder and makes multiple attempts to escape his own life, even as he becomes rich (his Toyota dealership booms in the 1980s) and finally falls to ill health. Written every ten years, Updike managed to reflect on some of the key developments in American polity- from the launch on the moon to vietnam war to the end of communism- possible sheerly due to the span of the novel's progress.
This theme of leading multiple lives in search of purpose- a sort of escape from present circumstances makes very engaging reading.
In non-fiction, escape in the form of Jim Rogers beautiful travel books written with a decade between them 'Investment Biker' and 'Adventure capitalist' or even P. J.O.Rourke's Eat the Rich were highly engaging.
An escape experience, be it a movie or a book, leaves you satisfied that there is meaning in life and that all you have to do is to attempt it.
Getting back to Nietzsche, escape is also a recurring philosophy manifesting itself in different ways and forms.
After all, wasn't it the king Siddhartha- the Buddha, who found enlightenment after walking away from his wife, kids and family?
Is escape, then, the route out of meaninglessless?
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