Season 03, Ep. 06

#LeaveTaylorAlone

I have to say, human race never stops to amaze me. And I don't mean this necessarily in a good way.

First, I would like to begin by outlining some facts. We have, well what pretty much feels like World War III at the moment, I guess this is what WWIII looks like in the 21st Century. I don't need to elaborate on that whatsoever, do I? We are all aware of what is happening in Europe at the moment and the situation in the US. Any gaps, just log on to any social media platform or if you're more traditional, turn on BBC. War is a huge business. 

And in the world of entertainment, which is a world we all bury our thoughts into in order to escape from reality, we have the Taylor-Calvin war that has just broken out ever since Taylor Swift admitted to have written the new hit Calvin Harris has released with Rihanna 'This Is What You Came For'. Calvin claims she has not much to do with it and it is rude to come out now saying something like this. And suddenly she is not the sweet, funny and talented Tay Tay we all know and love, she is Taylor, the man-eater, the heart crusher, the 'let's all post snake emojis on her photos on Instagram for comments to express how much of a snake we think she is'. 

I'm sorry, how is this of an inconvenience to you? No, not war, this SHOULD be of a very big inconvenience to you, the Taylor thing. People are going crazy over it. Just check the poor girl's Instagram page. "Poor". Sorry, wrongfully used term. 

Seems to me, people have no clue how to export their anger, despair, frustration so they log on to their social media, hit the pages of famous people and begin with the hate. Brutal, bullying, disgusting hate. Towards celebrities who seem to have it all like Kim K, Kylie Jenner, Tay Tay etc etc, and produce envy. Fair enough on some level, but why SO much hate. They haven't killed anyone, they don't do drugs, they don't bash anyone in return. I read the comments that get typed and I honestly want to cry. Do you kiss your mother with that mouth? Or rather, would you actually be saying any of these things out loud to somebody's face? Is the convenience of the keyboard and the fact that no one can see you behind your sad little screen, bringing out the incredible Hulk in you? 

And most importantly, if you gon' hate, hate for the right reasons bro. Is Taylor Swift the vicious truck driver that mowed 80 lives in France last night? Is Kim K the cop that shot the innocent black lives? Are Kylie Jenner's lips causing bombings in Ankara at this very moment killing somebody's mother, wife, sister? 

Get your tiny heads out of your big bums and educate your logic please. There is real tragedy out there, and it ain't Taylor Swift swapping men within the same month. We need to get our priorities in check, our principles and role models right. The snake emoji you keep posting all day ain't making you any happier and you know it. So dear hater, I am asking you from the bottom of heart. Think before you hate. Or, hang on a minute, don't hate at all. Self reflect, and work towards your own happiness. A wise friend once said "you won't make your fire burn any brighter by blowing out someone's else's". Mic drop. 

PS: I'm not even a big fan of TayTay, I'm all about Pink. 

Season 03, Ep. 05

The Audition

This shall be a brief(ish) post...

I was in the car yesterday on my way to the city and "Apologise" by One Republic came on the radio. It's a song that comes with many memories. The first one is the fact that when I still owned an iPod, this song was the top song on my Top 25 most played songs playlist. With a whopping number of plays of 372 times. Yes, I was obsessed. It is a crazy good song after all, the words, the music, the angelic voice of Ryan Tedder. There is even a video of me singing it a Capella with two friends, back when I was still a University student in 2008, on YouTube. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TJSgDyuG7s -see?).

In spite of all this, yesterday, a more chronologically progressed memory popped into my mind. It's 2009 and I am about to graduate from University and I was itching to move on to my Musical Theatre training. I have just applied to a dozen of Drama Schools in London and I have just heard back from a few of those asking to see me for an audition. One of them was Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts in the heart of London. Knowing that a few names were part of their alumni including THE Judy Garland and the quite controversial Russell Brand, you can imagine my excitement. I had to nail this. 

Every Drama school's audition process is different but most schools due to their vast amount of applicants they receive every year, they decide to offer very limited audition time to each candidate, having the confidence that within 5 mins of a monologue, 2 mins of a choreography and 16 bars of any Musical Theatre song will help them make their final decision. And it's true, sometimes, this tiny window of a shot each applicant receives, shall be enough to sift the goodies from the baddies judged by industry 'experts'. Show-business usually works this way anyway, everyone's time is money and if you have what it truly takes, you may as well be able to show it within 180 seconds. 

Italia Conti has a bit of a different approach. Their belief is that every candidate deserves a thorough examination in order to see if this is their ideal place of training. So they dedicate weeks to auditioning every applicant in the following areas: A monologue, a solo dancing piece, an entire solo song followed by three classes of dance and acting classes. This way the judges get to see how each performer works with another, how they cope within a classroom, how well they take direction etc. 

I see both different audition approaches' point, but let's be honest, Italia Conti's thoroughness is definitely helping a little more, both judges and performers. If you screw up your dance, you get a chance to redeem yourself within the class that follows. Everybody messes up, especially when under pressure. And come to think of it, all applicants are ages 16-23 max. Tinies. 

So as I am at home thinking and preparing for my dance solo on the day, I decide to go with 'Apologise' for my song and create a dance with it, since my background training was ballet and contemporary dance. It was perfect. I had it all prepared and on my iPod. I just needed to make sure they have a lead that I could connect to my iPod so I wouldn't have to burn a CD for the day. Kids, a CD is a round disk we use to burn songs onto and pop them into a thing called a stereo and listen to our favourite songs. Just FYI. 

I gave the school a ring and they said that they surely have an iPod lead I could use on the day. Phew, all ready. 

So I show up and I am ready to go, having practiced my dance again and again, since out of the "Triple Threat"* package, dance was my weakest. I walk in the room and I ask for the iPod lead. They look at me, I look over at the stereo, no lead. "Oh sorry there is no lead in this room, do you have a CD with your song?". "Um, no I called to ask if it's okay to use my iPod and they said it's okay". There was only one lead on the floor and it was being used by another class. After what seemed the longest and most awkward pause, in order to figure out what to do, the director of the course says "look, we only care about your dancing abilities and your moves here, not so much about the music, would you be comfortable doing it without music then?". I stood there and put on my uber confident suit and said "Sure thing". And then straight after that, without even thinking about it again, I blurted out "Actually, it's a slow song and dance, I can try to sing along while dancing". WHAT. So here I am singing "I'm holding on your rope got me 10 feet off the ground..." and doing my little twirl and slow walk along the room...Needless to say the courage and multitasking skill I portrayed despite my 'technical difficulty' on the day, secured me a place in the school. Well, that and my big talent and dancing technique of course LOL LOL LOL. And the rest is history...

Lesson to be learnt. Don't let minor hinders stand in your way of your dream. You want something, go get it. Technology will always be letting us down. It's up to us to carry on and do well. 

Huh. Maybe this wasn't a brief-ish post after all.

*Triple Threat: an all rounder performer who is able to act, sing and dance exceptionally.

BYE

Season 03, Ep. 04

Me Before This Book

...and the movie.

So the first time I came across this was when I saw the trailer for the upcoming movie. I instantly thought that would be an interesting love story but I was not ready for what came after. I started talking about how I was keen to see it, besides, even though I am not a Game of Thrones fan (please don't hate me), I am an Emilia Clarke fan. There's something about her that's very captivating on screen. 

And then someone said 'you HAVE to read the book, I could not put it down and I finished a box of tissues'. I needed something to get me back into reading since the last time I touched a fiction book must have been the Harry Potter series in my teens. Shame, I know. I just didn't feel reading was for me, I get worried that unless it is totally gripping, I lose my interest and focus. And I've always been a more audio-visual person, I can digest documentaries, shows and movies like that. But still, reading. What do you do when technology fails...

I was just coming back from Hanmer Springs and I'm at the airport thinking, it's now or never, so I ended up purchasing my copy of 'Me Before You'. I finished it within 12 days and that's only because I had so much work in the day. I am not the biggest fan of Hollywood-happy ending-chick flicks, but this is so not it, so not your typical happy ending. It's all relative here, and some of you may disagree it's a happy ending at all, but that's the beauty of a book, it opens so many doors of different feelings and interpretations. I reckon it was a happy ending within a sad ending. If you don't know what the story is about I shall not spoil it for you and how this chapter ends. I am ready for my sequel now.

As far as the box of tissues goes, I don't cry easily anymore, in films, shows or in books for this matter, but I felt that lump in my throat the entire time since she realises her feelings for him. But I held it in perfectly right. ...Until those last two chapters. Until that first tear dropped and here it went. A proper cleansing. Oh my lawd, Jojo, you got me there. 

Jojo Moyes' writing is perfect for the average reader and for a huge age range. Easy, personal, detailed and exciting. Thank you Jojo. 

Sunday I had the chance to watch the film version. It is always a given that movies never do the books they are based on any justice and fair enough, how can you fit 500 pages of details in a two hour movie. So for what it was it was perfect. Emilia Clarke lived up to my ridiculous expectations and beyond. She is Louisa Clark. Sam Claflin was indeed Will Traynor minus the spinal cord injury. You know me, I always judge a movie based on the acting and this was a top of the tops. They portrayed the story and their characters with such care, delicacy and wit. If I were Jojo Moyes I would be so chuffed with the casting. And again, final two scenes in the movie, hashtag cleanse. Only because I went back to that moment I was first reading it in the book. 

Let's just say that this book has successfully put me back in the reading game. My next purchases will be "After You", the sequel to this one and I came across an interesting one, 'The French Wedding' by a New Zealand author. Ha, look at me, a bookie.