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Jack Birkett
Jack Birkett (11 June 1934 – 10 May 2010) was a British dancer, mime artist, actor and singer, best known for his work on stage as a member of Lindsay Kemp's theatre company, and in the films of Derek Jarman. He was often billed as Orlando or The Incredible Orlando. Most of his best-known work was done when he was totally blind. Life and career Birkett was born in Leeds, England. His mother came from a Romani family, his father left home when he was six. He attended Coldcotes School in Gipton until the age of 14, developing a passion for ballet. He worked as an art model for David Hockney and others before finding work at the Grand Theatre in Leeds in 1950 as a stage hand and lighting technician. Soon afterwards, he moved to London, working as a dancer and singer in touring shows and musicals, including the UK tour of ''Oklahoma!'' in 1952. With Kemp In 1956, Birkett met Lindsay Kemp, when they were both doing ballet classes with Marie Rambert at the Mercury Theatre, Nott ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jubilee (1978 Film)
''Jubilee'' is a 1978 cult film directed by Derek Jarman. It stars Jenny Runacre, Ian Charleson and a host of punk rockers. The title refers to the Silver Jubilee of Elizabeth II in 1977. Numerous punk icons appear in the film including Adam Ant, Toyah, Jordan (a Malcolm McLaren protégé), Nell Campbell, Hermine Demoriane and Jayne County. It features performances by Jayne County and Adam and the Ants. There are also cameo appearances by the Slits and Siouxsie and the Banshees. The film was scored by Brian Eno. Plot Queen Elizabeth I is transported forward in time to the film's present day by the occultist John Dee, who commands the spirit guide Ariel (a character from William Shakespeare's '' The Tempest'') to bring them there. Elizabeth arrives in the shattered Britain of the 1970s and moves through the social and physical decay of the city, observing the sporadic activities of a group of aimless nihilists - mostly young women, including Amyl Nitrate, Bod, Chaos, Cra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mercury Theatre, Notting Hill Gate
The Mercury Theatre was a small theatre on Ladbroke Road, Notting Hill Gate, London, notable for the productions of poetic dramas between 1933 and 1956, and as the home of the Ballet Rambert until 1987. History (founding) The Mercury Theatre was opened in 1933 by Ashley Dukes for the production of new drama and to serve as a centre for the Ballet Rambert, run by his wife Marie Rambert. The building, at 2, Ladbroke Road, London W11, had been built in 1851 as a Sunday school for the adjacent Congregational Chapel, but was extensively altered to serve as a theatre. It was a well-equipped but small venue, seating about 150. Productions The style was set by the first production, ''Jupiter Translated'', an adaptation of Molière's ''Amphitryon'' by Walter James Turner with a ballet by Rupert Doone as entr'acte. Vladimir Rosing's ''British Opera Group'' was in residence for several weeks in June 1935. The theatre's reputation was further established in 1935 by the first London p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Drag Queen
A drag queen is a person, usually male, who uses drag clothing and makeup to imitate and often exaggerate female gender signifiers and gender roles for entertainment purposes. Historically, drag queens have usually been gay men, and part of gay culture. People partake in the activity of ''doing drag'' for reasons ranging from self-expression to mainstream performance. Drag shows frequently include lip-syncing, live singing, and dancing. They occur at events like LGBT pride parades, carnivals and drag pageants and in venues such as cabarets and nightclubs. Drag queens vary by type, culture, and dedication, from professionals who star in films and spend a lot of their time in their drag persona, to people who do drag only occasionally. Those who do occasional drag may be from other backgrounds than the LGBT community. There is a long history of folkloric and theatrical crossdressing that involves people of all orientations. Not everyone who does drag at some point in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
BBC Television Shakespeare
The ''BBC Television Shakespeare'' is a series of British television adaptations of Shakespeare's plays, the plays of William Shakespeare, created by Cedric Messina and broadcast by BBC Television. Transmitted in the UK from 3 December 1978 to 27 April 1985, it spanned seven series and thirty-seven episodes. Development began in 1975 when Messina saw that the grounds of Glamis Castle would make a perfect location for an adaptation of Shakespeare's ''As You Like It'' for the ''Play of the Month'' series. Upon returning to London, however, he had come to envision an entire series devoted exclusively to the dramatic works of Shakespeare. When he encountered a less than enthusiastic response from the BBC's departmental heads, Messina bypassed the usual channels and took his idea directly to the top of the BBC hierarchy, who greenlighted the show. Experiencing financial, logistical and creative problems in the early days of production, Messina persevered and served as executive produ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Troilus And Cressida
''Troilus and Cressida'' ( or ) is a play by William Shakespeare, probably written in 1602. At Troy during the Trojan War, Troilus and Cressida begin a love affair. Cressida is forced to leave Troy to join her father in the Greek camp. Meanwhile, the Greeks endeavour to lessen the pride of Achilles. The tone alternates between bawdy comedy and tragic gloom. Readers and theatre-goers have frequently found it difficult to understand how they are meant to respond to the characters. Frederick S. Boas has labelled it one of Shakespeare's problem plays. In recent years it has "stimulated exceptionally lively critical debate". Characters The Trojans * Priam, King of Troy * Priam's children: Cassandra (a prophetess), Hector, Troilus, Paris, Deiphobus, Helenus, and Margarelon (bastard) * Andromache, Hector's wife * Aeneas, a commander and leader * Antenor, another commander * Calchas, a Trojan priest who is taking part with the Greeks * Cressida, Calchas's daughter * Alexander, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jonathan Miller
Sir Jonathan Wolfe Miller CBE (21 July 1934 – 27 November 2019) was an English theatre and opera director, actor, author, television presenter, humourist and physician. After training in medicine and specialising in neurology in the late 1950s, he came to prominence in the early 1960s in the comedy revue '' Beyond the Fringe'' with Peter Cook, Dudley Moore and Alan Bennett. Miller began directing operas in the 1970s. His 1982 production of a "Mafia"-styled ''Rigoletto'' was set in 1950s Little Italy, Manhattan. In its early days, he was an associate director at the National Theatre. He later ran the Old Vic Theatre. As a writer and presenter of more than a dozen BBC documentaries, Miller became a television personality and public intellectual in Britain and the United States. Life and career Early life Miller grew up in St John's Wood, London, in a well-connected Jewish family. His father Emanuel (1892–1970), who was of Lithuanian descent and suffered from severe rh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thersites
In Greek mythology, Thersites (; Ancient Greek: Θερσίτης) was a soldier of the Greek army during the Trojan War. Family The ''Iliad'' does not mention his father's name, which may suggest that he should be viewed as a commoner rather than an aristocratic hero. However, a quotation from another lost epic in the Trojan cycle, the ''Aethiopis'', names his parents as Agrius of Calydon and Dia (mythology), Dia, a daughter of King Porthaon. Mythology In some accounts, Thersites, together with his five brothers including Melanippus, overthrew Oeneus from the throne of Calydon and gave the kingdom to Agrius, their father and Oeneus's brother. Later on, they were deposed by Diomedes who reinstated his grandfather Oeneus as king and slew all of Thersites's brothers. Homer described him in detail in the ''Iliad'', Book II, even though he plays only a minor role in the story. He is said to be bow-legged and lame, to have shoulders that cave inward, and a head which is covered ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Tempest (1979 Film)
''The Tempest'' is a 1979 film adaptation of William Shakespeare's play of the same name. Directed by Derek Jarman, produced by Don Boyd, with Heathcote Williams as Prospero, it also stars Toyah Willcox, Jack Birkett, Karl Johnson and Helen Wellington-Lloyd from Jarman's previous feature, ''Jubilee'' ( 1977). Plot The magician Prospero tosses and turns in his sleep while a violent storm tosses a ship on the ocean. Prospero awakens with a start as lightning strikes the ship, and summons his servant, the spirit Ariel. Ariel tells Prospero the details of the storm, which was an illusion he created at Prospero's command to lead the King of Naples (Alonso) and his crew to the island and trap them there. Prospero's daughter, Miranda, wakes up and joins her father in his study and they discuss their pasts. Caliban, Prospero's other servant, interrupts their conversation, and Prospero stomps on his fingers and threatens to punish him. Caliban explains that he is the rightful owner ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caliban
Caliban ( ), son of the witch Sycorax, is an important character in William Shakespeare's play '' The Tempest''. His character is one of the few Shakespearean figures to take on a life of its own "outside" Shakespeare's own work: as Russell Hoban put it, "Caliban is one of the hungry ideas, he's always looking for someone to word him into being ... Caliban is a necessary idea". Character Caliban is half human, half monster. After his island becomes occupied by Prospero and his daughter Miranda, Caliban is forced into slavery. While he is referred to as a calvaluna or mooncalf, a freckled monster, he is the only human inhabitant of the island that is otherwise "not honour'd with a human shape" (Prospero, I.2.283). In some traditions, he is depicted as a wild man, or a deformed man, or a beast man, or sometimes a mix of fish and man, a dwarf or even a tortoise. Banished from Algiers, Sycorax was left on the isle, pregnant with Caliban, and died before Prospero's arrival. C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jubilee (1977 Film)
''Jubilee'' is a 1978 cult film directed by Derek Jarman. It stars Jenny Runacre, Ian Charleson and a host of punk rockers. The title refers to the Silver Jubilee of Elizabeth II in 1977. Numerous punk icons appear in the film including Adam Ant, Toyah, Jordan (a Malcolm McLaren protégé), Nell Campbell, Hermine Demoriane and Jayne County. It features performances by Jayne County and Adam and the Ants. There are also cameo appearances by the Slits and Siouxsie and the Banshees. The film was scored by Brian Eno. Plot Queen Elizabeth I is transported forward in time to the film's present day by the occultist John Dee, who commands the spirit guide Ariel (a character from William Shakespeare's '' The Tempest'') to bring them there. Elizabeth arrives in the shattered Britain of the 1970s and moves through the social and physical decay of the city, observing the sporadic activities of a group of aimless nihilists - mostly young women, including Amyl Nitrate, Bod, Chaos, Cr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Broadway Theatre
Broadway theatre,Although ''theater'' is generally the spelling for this common noun in the United States (see American and British English spelling differences), 130 of the 144 extant and extinct Broadway venues use (used) the spelling ''Theatre'' as the proper noun in their names (12 others used neither), with many performers and trade groups for live dramatic presentations also using the spelling ''theatre''. or Broadway, are the theatrical performances presented in the 41 professional theatres, each with 500 or more seats, located in the Theater District and the Lincoln Center along Broadway, in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Broadway and London's West End together represent the highest commercial level of live theater in the English-speaking world. While the thoroughfare is eponymous with the district and its collection of 41 theaters, and it is also closely identified with Times Square, only three of the theaters are located on Broadway itself (namely the Broadwa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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