Don't let the cave-in get you down

So I love love love the version of The Threepenny Opera I have. It's a 'relentlessly modern' translation set in a future 2001, in the run up to Prince William's coronation (this was 1994, bear in mind).

I can only think of Mac the Knife the way my friend Graham played him: runty and sleazy and creepy and weasley and absolutely terrifying. (The guy is a terrific actor, being absolutely none of the above himself.) And although they have completely different accents, the voice of the actor on my CD fits perfectly to my idea of How Mac Should Be. (Oddly enough, the Polly has my exact same accent.) And I've known for a while, vaguely, that the actor's name was Tom Hollander - but just now I realised, HOLY CRAP THE GUY PLAYING MAC IS TOM HOLLANDER

Like, Mr Collins from the new Pride and Prejudice. The evil Navy dude from Pirates of the Carribean. The drunk, bitter one from The Cambridge Spies. And just - yes.

BRB listening to the Knocking Shop Tango over and over and over and over

I'm generally quite content with my capitalist false consciousness and pretend freedom, so I think my general approval of Marx is because it puts me in mind of my favourite ever book ever. Ursula Le Guin I love you so much. The library does not have The Dispossessed but a neighbour does; for now I will settle for reading your essays and literary criticism because I LOVE YOU THAT MUCH.

In other news, I finally got my MP3 player working! \o/ But it won't play things that I've ripped from Youtube, ie, almost my entire playlist. So lots of Threepenny Opera. 3PO is something else I love a lot, so today has been a good day :D

So I'm in a show! Not one that's all that popular right now, but it was pretty huge during the 20s and 30s: The Threepenny Opera, by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill. (If you know anything about it at all it'll be the songs Pirate Jenny and Mac the Knife). I adore the music, but (surprise-surprise) its treatment of women is pretty awful and it can be cringingly ~edgy~ in places. Especially with the not-so-great translation we're working with.

Since there's a week before it goes up I feel it's important that I blather on about it rather than, I don't know, learn lines or something.( In which I take a piece of political satire entirely at face value for my own entertainment! )

I've never done a show where you're expected to be able to read music before. I really can't, and it's slightly intimidating and makes me feel more than a little slow. Oops.