Thor On War

Understanding Roy

2011-05-28T20:38:00.000-07:00

Roy Anderson is just an amazing filmmaker.

There is a certain melancholia to his films, a atmosphere of wonder and brutality intertwined with humor and understanding.

He works with space in a way no other filmmaker does - it is like watching a mixture of paintings and polish comedy from the '60.

His characters are at the same time deeply human and totally superficial.

His use of music is next to none.

Yes - he is by far the best filmmaker in Scandinavia.

Here is my favorite movie song involving a dog-loving nazi and an alcoholic woman!

And he got his training in commercials

Thor - God or Cartoon

2011-05-26T12:10:00.000-07:00

Montreal is suffering a thunderstorm - in more meaning than one.

Since I god back to Montreal there has been a subtle change in the use of language from the people around me.

Before, when I would tell people my name, Thor, they would comment "like the God". (Which I rather liked).

But now they ask me "Oh, like the movie".

Of course it hurts to be downgraded from a God to a figure out of a Marvel comic - but even worse is the confirmation of the power of entertainment in modern culture.

Of course the Marvel comic Figure - THOR - is based on the God of thunder from the old nordic religion. But that fact seems to be transplanted, taken out of context and given it own (and very simplified) meaning.

Gone is the connection to thursday (derived from Thor), gone is the heathen influences on Anglo - Saxen culture. All that is left is - THOR the comic character.

Sometimes it is hard not to think that we are evolving into idiots...

All the best

Thor

Thor and the art of Butchering

2011-05-24T12:55:00.001-07:00

I went to my butcher today - Vito's.

The butchers name is Tony (I guess Vito sounds more like a butcher from the old country).

There is a very special feeling shopping at his butchery. For starters, Einsteins view on the relativity of time gets confirmed. With Tony time becomes relative - relative to the needs of his clients.

Tony take his time. Even though there is a line at the counter, he talks to his clients, knows their stories, what meats they like, what the cooked yesterday and shares his view on everything from your evening dinner to last nights hockey results.

And there is more.

he has a genuine passion about his product. he visits the farms where he buys his meat. He knows (and tells you) how the animals are treated. And not out of a concern for animal wellfare (even though he might care about that) - more important is the effect the treatment has on the quality and the taste of the meat.

He cares. his butchery is not only a job - it is a way of being. he loves his meat like I love my theater.

Today he told me that in Italy butchers are sometimes called doctors:

"Hey doctor, give me 800 grams of aged beef"

and added that over here (in canada) they were closer to the buttom of the food chain (so to speak) then the top.

And why is that?

Could this be the price of economic "progress" and increased productivity?

Well...

At least I looked very cool at the butcher today

Thor

Farwell to Hemmingway

2011-05-23T19:30:00.000-07:00

Sat down in the park today with a bottle of water and this most famous of book.

I have been waitng quite long for this moment - having left King Lear and Mother Courage behind me - back in Montreal and finally there was this first (and long overdue) meeting with master Hemmingway.

And I started reading. The famous opening lines. Something about a tree and mountains and soldiers marching by.

I thought that maybe I had missed something. Maybe there was something wrong with the printing. That they had forgotten to print the opening; this amazing opening which has brought shivers to strong hearts and tears to stony faces. This beginning was totally lost on me.

So I read on - in hope of proving myself wrong. That I would wake up to the fact that I had misunderstood something and that this really was a great great book.

One fourth through and I could not stop thinking about how much better "Catch 22" or "Live and Fate" were. At least there was real take on the absurdity of war in one and the terror of the war in the other.

Farewell is just about this rather boring man and his rather uninteresting relationship to ms. Barkeley. All rather dull - really.

Would take Stefans Zweig "the World of Yesterday" over "Farewell" any day.

So - for now - the only farwell I am saying is "Farwell to Hemmingway".

Thor

The talented mr. Van Trier

2011-05-19T07:20:00.000-07:00

What a press conference!

The poor man.

I have never seen a man dig himself into such a mess before. It was like watching suicide live on tv.

Of course everybody can see where he meant to take it but the wording got in the way and instead of putting a point to it and start the thought from scratch he really totally fucked himself.

Ending up talking about wanting a "final solution" for journalists, talking about admiring Albert speers work and saying "Im a Nazi".

Of course there is a context but at a certain point what you say exceeds the context and creates his own.

I dont think this man will make many more movies on international scale - this will drive everybody in their right mind away.

And leave him to deal with his (self admitted) alcohol problem and his Melancholie!

Thor

ps. Here is the video of the press conference - it starts to heat up on minute 28.

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-31T16:41:00.000-07:00

Day 17

Read the text yesterday to prepare for this new direction that the production has taken. The problem with this text is that it is too long.

In some parts I just dont get where Shakespeare is going with it.

For example, why write the whole 5th act with all it's twists and turns and plots and brimborium when Juliet is already in a coma and we (the audience) know that she is going to die. Why the wait? Suspence? Building hope? delaying the action in order to delay the inevitable. What is the point??!

After the death of Mercutio this play turns from a light, interesting, tragicomic love story into a tragedy. And that is well done, all things considered. The current of this play runs in one direction, exept the 5th act, which runs against the current.

So I just edited it out!

Since I have to do this text as written I will at least tell the story in such a way that it has some action.

After finishing with the downsizing and decided to go look from the girl from last night, the one with the beautiful eyes, eyes that spoke volumes in their misterious silence. And I found her - and her boyfriend.

I watched sleepless in Seattle in the hotel room.

Love is deception, idioticy, spinning of tales, fools gold and misunderstanding all in one.

It is hard to stage a play about a feeling that is past it's sale by - date.

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-30T16:11:00.000-07:00

Days 15 and 16

I did not reherse today or yesterday.

Better to let things settle a little before we go on.

It seems that I wrote a little email when I got back to my hotel room the other night.

I was maybe a little to candid about the problems I saw within the group and how certain people were holding the production back.

And there are some that think I went overboard with my graphic descriptions of the sex scenes I want to have in the play.

But problem solved.

We will work according to the original text.

But there is a lesson here. You cannot stuff originality down peoples throat, they have to find it within themselves.

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-30T15:50:00.000-07:00

Day 14

They did not like my ideas in the theater.

They are so small...

So narrow-minded...

I gathered all the actors to tell them about the changes and to show them some of the references that I had gathered in order to get them to see where we were heading (apocolypse now, Platoon, one flew over the coocoos nest, Titanic) but they just closed off and want to keep going down the path of shorts and balconies.

I have never felt so humiliated.

They do not show me the respect that I deserve.

Went to the pub.

on my own

the girl from the party the other day was sitting in the corner.

I know that I went over to her...And spoke to her... and I think that I was funny...to begin with...I told her about my ideas...I fell asleep...soemwhere...I woke up in my hotel room...

She had beatiful eyes.

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-30T15:28:00.001-07:00

Day 13

I'm depressed

Romeo and Juliet is such a superficial play. A farce mixed up with banal love scenes. There is just no way to make this plausible.

And theater has to be realistic, otherwise it looks like it is fake. This is why I'm hoping to make it into the filmbusiness, films look real!

And for this reason I am thinking about returning the costume I ordered from Italy (from Verona of couse) and turning the concept into something modern and interesting.

Skip the nurse and the boring love scenes and concentrate on the fighting. Work with themes involving rasism and broken society.

Something in the way of two families from the same country but different clans. And for some reason hatred has blossomed for centuries. But newly it has escalated into a civil war.

Of course you can't play scenes on balconies in a middle of a war but you can adjust that within this concept.

Romeo and juliet live on different sides of a bridge in town. But nobody can cross the bridge because it is guarded by a terrible sniper that goes by the name of Tybalt.

They communicate through light signals, and hidden messeges and decide to sacrifice their life in order to bring peace and freedom to their nation. They call up CNN and in front of the cameras they run onto the bridge. Of course they are shot to peaces but they manage to get to oe another before they bleed to death.

And then the princw comes, wearing a blue helmet. The united nations decided to intervene because of the news footage.

This is great. This way I can make the piece current, political and get away from telling a banal love story.

My name is Thor and I am a genius!

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-30T14:50:00.000-07:00

Day 12

So as already mentioned...

I have a confrontational east European Juliet and a Jewish Romeo for my production.

Some might of course say that this is in some way interesting, offers a new approach to the play and opens up possible interpretations.

But as an answer to that I simply state that this is only Romeo and Juliet that we are talking about, it is not really like I have a literary masterpiece on my hands.

Don't get me wrong, Shakespeare is great and all, but love stories just were no his thing. I mean nobody is perfect.

I this were a Ibsen... The doll house, for instance, would have plenty of space for these kind of nationalities. Nora, a east european immigrant, lives with her Jewish husband which does not understand a word she says. So he just ignores her. But she starts handeling the money of the family, which of course sets unforseen things into motion.

Or if we want to be anal and stay with Shakespeare how about a Jewish Othello and a east european Destimona. Othello escaped Nazi Germany and hid away in a Ungarn village where he was taken in by a welthy family.

He takes up duties for the family to repay the trust that he was given and to earn the daughter of the house. But the nazis are after him and have infiltrated the family in order to search for the jew and their spy follows him to where he has been posted. And there a epic history of revenge, greed and the follies of love take place.

(These ideas are copyrighted to Mr. Arnarsson enterprieses)

But I am stuck with plain old boring Romeo and Juliet.

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-30T14:47:00.000-07:00

Day 11

The romeo that this theater came up with is not the following:

Tall
Charming
Interesting
Blond
Blue eyed

But as a matter of face he is...

Short
depressed
intellectual
mouse coloured hair

and last but not least...

He's Jewish!

There is nothing more that I can say tonight

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-24T14:39:00.000-07:00

Day 10

I decided it was time to take some physicological action in orderto protect the production from undo fear- or stressfactors and informed the actors that they did not have to worry about how to tackle the roles in the play. Since Romeo and Juliet is the most performed play in history there is absolutly no way that they can be original. No possibility what so ever! And thus the did not have to worry at all, it's all been done before, and most likely better than they will ever be able to.

( I mean everything that is to be done with this play has already been done, and besides, all the greats in the history of acting have done it - from Olivier to Dicaprio)

This really helped the athomsphere. The normal chatter between the actors died down and there was a good working silence for the rest of the rehersal.

This will get though as we go along so no need to set up undo pressure at this point.

" Get them to belief that they don't have to belief - and belief will duly arrive" TS Elliot

In other news I'm really in a good mood. The sun is shining outside me 5 star hotel window.

One thing surprised me though, you can't open the windows more then a tweak. I guess it is to keep the businessmen from jumping - given the crisis and all.

Well good night

Thor

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-19T15:00:00.001-07:00

Day 9

This Julia knows not the meaning of the word gratitude. She throws scorn on every single good idea that I bring to her!

And just for the record, it is not only my idea that the woman in the German Theater have to be either one of the Marias, the mother or the whore. That is just the best way to criticise the position of the modern woman. And who am I to change the stream. I can't be original everywhere.

As an example for how Julia treats me: I suggested that she continually stroke herself, sexually. I mean, she is after all an virgin, so she must be dying for it. Julia did not like this very simple, strong and politically motivated idea one bit. And not only that but she recruited her co-actresses with her against me.

Great, all the woman in the show against me!

What is wrong with Julia waking up to her true self, to her sexual beeing? What is the taboo...

And don't throw me the line that the actresses tried today, that it is podophilesque because of Julia only being 14 years old. Like I was some sort of pervert.

For christ's sake, it is a PLAY, Theater is not reality!

And besides, everybody knows that the actres is much older than that.

Just you wait julia until we get to the Nightingale scene, just you wait...

I was walking around town today and my eyes cought a girl from last night. I, which had just declared that there were better looking dogs in St Gallen than woman, was forced to re-evaluate my findings.

She did not see me...

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-18T04:15:00.000-07:00

Day 8

I tried as long as I could, but you can only reherse Romeo and Juliet for so and so long without actually rehersing the role of Juliet.

The problem is just that I cant make any sense of the role like it is now.

I remember asking specifically, clear as a jellyfish, for a blonde haired, blue eyed, master race sort of Juliet. And I was very clear on this. This request was ignored and in stead Im stuck with a brown haired, dark eyed, emotional bomb from East Europe.

And what Im a supposed to do with her. It is much harder to work from ones own imagination than borrowing what has come before, at least get inspired. But until now there is only one sort of Juliet. Juliet is the perfect representative of the sexual fantasy for middle age men, which is fine, but hardly reachable with onorthdox Juliet!

What am I to do?

One has the feeling that se will just eat Romeo alive if he comes near her.

So I used the first day to suggest changes to the role, but her uptake was somewhat missing. They clearly don't teach manners in East Europe (what were they doing during the cold war?) My Juliet has a problem with authority.

Even my Berlin trick does not work. Maybe I should tell her that I read this interpretation by Marx?

Note to self – Ask for Actors pictures before you confirm the cast.

In other news I got invited to a prominent party this night where the good and the rich of this city came together for a quiet evening of soliciting. Even though it was never stated it was obvious that I was the guest of honor. I find it very interesting that the Business life here has such deepseated interest for Theater. Also, that so many of the well-to-do of this city have so beautiful daughters.

or concubines...

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-16T18:26:00.000-07:00

Day 7

Day of rest. Day of God himself. In worldy Switzerland, the day of worldly glory maskarading as Protestantism.

There is a feeling of panic in the air.

The Swiss are terrified of losing their intangible material goods which were created in the unreal markets and are now collapsing faster than you can say banking secrecy.

Took a break from Shakespeare today. The fucking bastard refuses to let me go. It is like suffering from Asberger syndrom. You get totally obsessive.

Stubit questions like “What is man” pop into your head while you are doing something real – like watching football. It is very disturbing.

Could it be that Shakespeare, in his texts, is working on reflecting the human condition in all it’s complexity and beauty?

Or maybe it’s just bullocks!

I don’t belief in love. Especially not on stage. Love is a charade. A mask people try putting on to hide from the terror of being alone.

People that don’t like themselves.

I live in a hotel – in a single room.

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-15T15:16:00.000-07:00

Day 6

In Switzerland they reherse Saturdays.

Which is of course ridiculous.

I who was going to the museum of natural sience.

Wanted to catch a show about insects. (which I identify with)

I missed it.

Rehersed the Prolog. What a load of crap.

Shakespeare tells us what is going to happen in the play, before we play it. Which makes no sense.

So I had them do it fast. Told them it was very "Berlin".

They bought it.

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-15T15:05:00.000-07:00

Day 5

Romeo enters the stage. The most famous lover in history. (apart from Rocco...) We meet him for the first time in this most eternal of love stories. And he has been struck by the deadly poison of Love, and the object of his affection is of course - Rosalind.

He cant sleep, cant eat, cant feel, cant live - for love.

Like this one

(I really dont know which is worse, to watch the woman in the room singing, with forlorn loooks on their faces, along with this non-existant subway romance or watching the singer picking out which girl he is going to nail in the dressing room after the show)

And here Shakespeare presents his lover as in love - with different woman than she - which the piece is named after. Brilliant or nuts?

I explained to the actor that this did not make any sense and would thus be cut. No reason to make this story more complex than she is.

Boy meets girl. girls like boy. Boy wants fun. Girl is willing. Problem with physico families. They get it off anyway. A lot of young men die. Romeo and Julia are seperated for a day. They die.

Actor liked my angle.

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-15T15:01:00.000-07:00

Day 4

Today we went through the first scenes.

Benvolio and Montague. Rather difficould characters. Especially Montague since he hardly firgures in the play. Which makes it extremly difficould to direct.

But as I have always said, the largest part of the directing profession is knowing enough stories on can tell on any given moment.

And make them sound like they are actually about something profound.

At least pretend they are.

Bonvoilio's actor is gay. He seems to think that the play is called Romeo and Benvolio (which funnely enough rimes).

I ignore him!

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-15T14:58:00.000-07:00

Day 3

Moment of truth - the day it all began to unravel.

I told them we would start with the end and work our way to the front of the piece.

They did not like the idea.

I told them that this came from the Berlin school. And that it was hip.

They were impressed.

So was I

We started at the beginning.

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-15T14:55:00.000-07:00

Day 2

I had no new idea so we just read that play again. Again I did not get inspired.

To fill the time, I lied that the revolution in Iceland had been bloody. They bought it like a sack of potatoes.

I did not.

I told them that a banker friend of mine had jumped out the window after the crash - and nobody had seen him since.

They did not belief me.

But this time I did...

Rómeo and Juliet - Production diary

2009-05-15T14:40:00.000-07:00

Day 1

Showed up lacking in sleep and motivation. Nobody noticed. Had a read through of the Piece. Got no better understanding of it. Even though it did strike me as odd that romeo and Juliet only meet 4 times in the piece. Decided to write new scenes in.

I told the actors that I was a fugative political artist - that had given art up. I told them that I had just enjoured a revolution in my native Iceland and given my encounter with politics I had decided that I wanted to stay an artist.

They did not take this seriously.

I did...