Categories
Acting

A Monologue You Will Never Hear

Happy New Year!

Among the many monologues you will never hear, we include this from the (Australian/American/British) – fill in the gap – (Prime Minister/President/Almost all senior officials) in public address.

“My fellow (Australians/Americans/Britons ) the time has come to admit that we have completely fucked it up. Our politics are uselessly toxic, and we are destroying the Earth.

Devastating and deadly floods and fires are on the increase the world over. We are now forced to confront what environmentalists have been attempting to bring to notice for more than fifty years. We of the ruling classes have hitherto chosen to distort, deny, delay, obfuscate, ridicule and in every way ignore the responsible warnings of scientists, conservationists and concerned citizens.

Beyond this, we have filled the airwaves with unending speeches of self-congratulatory lies and international xenophobic aggression while we knowingly continued to allow massive pollution and environmental degradation on all fronts, to the extent that the seas are dying and our food is toxic. We did this even when, especially when, feasible solutions were offered to us.

We in government have all had a complete change of heart. This is due to an outbreak of Common Sense, and we are now taking immediate action. Our measures will include:

Creation and distribution of 100% clean energy from wind, wave, solar, geo-thermal.

We realize this initiative will be met with resistance, in the aforementioned form of; distortion, denial, delay, obfuscation, and ignorance.

And lots of anger.

Why?

Because:

“Hell hath no fury like a vested interest masquerading as a moral principle.”

Middle-aged white men in positions of power who find themselves so enraged are referred to:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gl99R6FM5s8&w=640&h=497]

It merely remains for me to thank you for listening, I acknowledge that we never did that, and my resignation takes place with immediate effect.

Happy New Year.”

Categories
Acting

Political Theatre

Deeply sad news this week of the too-early death of Jan Maxwell. I only worked with her once, back in 2002, when I took over from Nick Woodeson in House and Garden at the Manhattan Theatre Club.

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On stage Jan was an elegant, intelligent presence, handling language with poise and precision and impeccable comic timing. Backstage her vocabulary was, what’s the word I want? Vigorous, energetic, vivid, feisty … all of these and more. I specially enjoyed her acerbic wit. She was the most generous of scene partners and a joy to play with.

I say political because as a dedicated artist, Jan worked whenever she could for The Wrestling School, a theatre company which produces the plays of Howard Barker. It was good to see the New York Times acknowledge her work both in an obituary and a feature article.

My own politics are green-of-centre.

I am among those subversives who wants clean energy solutions. In memory of a truly sparkling talent I recommend www.Kiva.org — it’s a way to fund eco-friendly people and projects.