mockturle06 | that's entertainment

I wish we had marriage equality here because frankly I'm tired of all the nudges and winks, especially at this time of year. I've stayed silent for so long because if you're gonna hate on me, I've no time for you, but it's tiring. I'm not single because I'm a man-hating lesbian. I'm still pathetically single because I'm a very weird, very ugly man-hating spinster.

Not that it stops me pining over The Pine, but he's still a guy, and probably as much a dick as the rest of them, despite his carefully considered and thoughtful quotes.

Man-hating is probably a bit strong. I don't hate men the way men hate women. I'm just afraid of them, like any predator. I've taken too much abuse, physical, sexual, emotional, financial, verbal, and these are such truly scary times.

So I'm fine with the Pine, but observed at a safe distance, behind barriers and glass. Like any predator. Even the very pretty ones.

Such terrible times. I remember when my social feeds were full of silly cat videos. Now they're full of real nasties. It's anxious making, I have to say.

I'm also having a rough time with the whole being hit by a car thing. Not that anyone is taking is seriously or being kind. No, I take it back, one friend gave me a hug and chocolates. Others, not so much. Which is almost as upsetting as getting run down and being left alone to crawl out of the road, in front of bystanders, too (one fucker beeped his horn and drove around me). In case you're wondering why the milk of human kindness is running a little sour this post. I'm not having a good time.

The knee's still playing up, but mainly it's the severe headaches for four weeks now. Apparently the noggin is in a very bad way. Great, just what I needed - my only asset. Can't write, can barely type, can't read or even glance at my phone without wanting to hurl, having to self-medicate with booze to get through all the plays I've been seeing.

Well, I had tickets and I had to miss so much already, so I made a great and terrible effort to see Faith Healer at the Belvoir, which was electric, screenings of The Entertainer and Threepenny Opera, and Speed the Plow (sic) at the STC.

Faith Healer was sparse and bleak and one of those recollection pieces where everyone tells the same story differently. It was really moving, with the characters talking right to you, confiding in you. Really hollow, too, as no one knew what the others were thinking or feeling. That was the tragedy.

Same sort of period and bleak in The Entertainer, which had the same hollowness and bitter scrabble, all these people circling around a charismatic male who was completely empty inside, and so cruel, selfish and ruthless. Men, eh? Lots of sharp Brexit-era flag waving that was more than a bit sinister and cynical.

The flag waving really took a turn for the terrifying in Threepenny Opera, with the St George flag standing in for certain other flags that were just around the corner from this Weimar production. Right now, it was chilling because it was absolutely true.

I love Threepenny Opera and this was a cracking production, everyone absolutely perfectly cast - and I didn't know Rory Kinnear could sing that well. Damn, we'll never get that Penny Dreadful musical episode that clearly needed to happen. (Btw, Rory's credits were listed as Hamlet, Othello and James Bond - the most British credits ever).

So, yes, another play about, well, Mack is a total sociopathic/psychopathic serial killer, and his abuse his physical as well as verbal and emotional - but great songs, eh? More hard scrabble 99% and I won't sneer because I'm the 99% (hell, Hell or Highwater could have filmed where I live so much it's not at all funny). In fact I'll join the rabble in Threepenny sneering at the upper orders and their middle-class morality. So tired of prissy, precious little princesses not understanding that a hard life gives you hard edges. It has to, or you die, it's that simple.

So yeah, plays suddenly getting a lot more bite than they would have even six months ago.

Did I mention seeing Hell or Highwater? Best western ever. And I'm not just saying that because Chris Pine was in it, though he was so perfect in it, and I mean it. Not just swooning over the bloke, but appreciating his choices and timing and the rest of the mechanics of his performance, the way I liked Rory slithering about the stage in Threepenny like a mad cut snake.

Lastly, I saw STC's Speed the Plow (sic - and yes, I'm going to keep doing that, if the US can elect a nasty clown, no way am I letting their American software tell me how to spell, dammit). After all the 99% fare, here were the 1%, scrabbling and arguing over…finding religion and meaning in a crap screenplay? Really?

Well, it was funny, still, and so alarmingly true (at least, with all the films churning out of Hollywood of late I can assume that art has become acutely observed life). Lachy, in the Q&A afterwards, swore the really bad prison buddy film had been made with Arnie. I reckon the really twee radiation film has been made with the world's sexiest nuclear holocaust survivor, Mr Chris Pine. Well, pretty close, ya gotta admit.

I originally just wanted to see Damon Herriman, Dewey Crowe from Justified as was, doing 80s set Mamet because. Just because. And he was flying. And then Rose Byrne walked on and dropped the teaspoons and it was all about her from then on - which was the way Upton was directing it, but she was so damn good. Wasted in just about every film I've seen her in, then, though I'd really like my favourite actor boys, those that haven't already, to test their mettle against her. And yes, I said mettle, let's not mention those films (though I have now seen a frightening number of X-Men on stage, I truly have).

Some really great, snappy performances, and yes, I could see the Pinter and even the screwball comedy influences. It was something to see, and it was nice to have some real Hollywood glamour with some topflight talent doing such a slick play (well, sometimes it can be a touch, well, provincial in the far provinces). Would have loved to have stayed to get my programme signed, but Himself was having none of it (if you're wondering why I never lurk at stage doors locally, there's the reason).

Had a nice evening before, too, well, not really, shitty day and very not well, but a couple of glasses of rose in my favourite bar in the world at sunset, with a nice plate of pate, made me happy.

I am a girl of simple means. Just give me a $10 bottle of moscato and Space Twink, I mean Star Trek on telly with baby Chris Pine, and a nice plate of pate, and I'm very happy (mind you I got in so much shit for that because despite working 14 hours I thought I could sign off but no, so much no, thou shalt not watch Chris Pine, never ever).

Pine is probably the reason I started this post so snappily. Every time someone asks if I'm looking forward to the new Wonder Woman film I say 'of course', then I realise they're laughing at me. Oh, do fuck off you misogynistic homophobic douche nozzle. Yes, Wonder Woman way cool, this little girl's hero and probably one of the reasons I was so into myths as a kid, but, hell, give me some points for drooling over ol' blue eyes as well.

I mean, I love my so lez they never even noticed Karl Urban played a couple of characters in Xena pals. But I did, so it's not really accurate. You know. I'm such a fucktard no one has noticed or cared I'm staggering about with a very serious head injury. There's enough to insult me about, don't use the quality that makes my friends good and kind and wonderful and so damn quirky I love them to bits. Insult me, but not with that. Don't lump me in with those wonderful, creative folk. Don't insult them by mixing a lump like me in with them.

Sorry, just been quiet for so long, just on principle. Like uninvited from family annual dinner for decades because they thought I was gay and I was too principled to say no because what did I want with their prejudiced arses anyway if they were going to be like that, but, seriously, enough now. If I'm going to be thrown up against the wall and shot, let's make it for who I am, not who you think I am. I have faults enough, I'll be up against that wall before my friends are.

That said, I'd like to thank certain people for being so damn awful you've made my choices simple. Not easy, but reasonably binary. Given a choice between having my noggin scooped out and living a half-life no longer me, surrounded by people who hate me, or living out my life to the bitter end as me, defiantly weird, awful, unacceptable me, I've finally chosen me over your middle-class comfort. I want to be me. I choose to be me. This is me. I will be me. I'm going out as me. Only me. And if you don't like it, so much the better. Rough, uncouth, rude, freaky, ugly as fuck and wildly inappropriate me.

Ah, the universe might be sending some more eggs my way, backyard eggs at that, just when I wanted some. That's it, just eggs, but I appreciate the gift, insanely appreciate. Last week was a terrible week and I was in a very bad way and having to stay back late and then, at the absolute apogee of awfulness, I was offered a hard-boiled egg to eat. Exactly what I needed, when I needed it. I thanked the person and the universe with far too much fluster, but such random acts of kindness completely side-swipe me, as they are rare and unexpected. So, yes, eggs. Eggs are good (and, as I live in a non-egg household, very much a sometimes treat).

that's entertainment

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