INDEPENDENT NEWS

Of Telly Tubbies, Panto Dames, and Youth Tubies

Published: Wed 5 Mar 2008 12:12 AM
Of Telly Tubbies, Panto Dames, and Youth Tubies
by Rosalea Barker
::In the night::
On learning this weekend of Missy Teka’s death in a car accident, I searched for and found a video filmed (perhaps) at the Westward Ho Tavern in Kelston back in 1982. It’s Prince Tui Teka singing E Ipo to Missy, and the pair of them joshing with each other. Choice!
::Cosplay and sing and dance::
“Costume play”—role-playing taken to fabricated heights—has become as popular in the States as it is in Japan, where it originated. But I’ve become addicted to the more traditional costume- and role-play of Russian television adaptations of famous books, fairy tales, and operas that have been playing on the MHz Channel.
Not that the way the productions were staged was in any way “traditional”—The three musketeers, for example, were all women and their musical performances were like a cross between a punk band and country and western balladeers. Although it’s another vein, here’s an ad from an online showreel for the Three Musketeers director, Tinatin Barkalaya. No language skills needed.
Director of several other musicals in the series, Semen Gorov, has a website where you can view some of the trailers and “making of” videos, to get some sense of the whacky (and adult) nature of the productions. They were subtitled on MHz, but who cared about the story when the costumes, acting, and scenery were just so faaaabulous, darlings! Gorov is also mentor of the Kiev Video Lab, which is one of Nokia’s Trends Labs.
::Words and pictures::
Praise be to Fox’s affiliate here in the Bay Area, which now broadcasts LATV on its second digital channel. At last I can watch music videos again, with my new buddies Ceasar & Chuy, Puerto Rican and Mexican cartoon characters whose commentary on the music videos they’re watching in their basement is both funny and incisive. They’ve recently added the ability for amateur critics to text their comments to the show while it’s playing on air.
Click here to link to a promo for the second series. (Language warning.)
LATV is pretty big on viewer interaction. It also has a program called Texty Videos, which streams text messages live on-screen, enabling viewers to communicate with each other while watching music videos. For monolingual moi, completely unfamiliar with the abbreviations and other style usages in text messages, it’s like watching a stream of internet passwords go by. You know, “must contain at least one uppercase letter, number, and special character”.
::In the works::
If this listing in the Gigs section of Craigslist last week is anything to go by, some nasty ads are going to be turning up later in the year:
We are looking for the following actors:
1 white male 25-35 to play John McCain in his navy days. He must be well built, square jawed and possess a military-type bearing. An actual resemblance to the young Senator McCain is not strictly necessary.
3 Asian-American females 18-30 to play Vietnamese prison guards. These are comedic roles, so the actors should have comedy experience and excellent timing.
The ads are apparently going to be “comedic parodies of contemporary campaign ads. These ‘ads’ will be posted on the most popular liberal political blogs and video sites, and will also be submitted to short film festivals.”
*************
rosalea.barker@gmail.com
--PEACE—

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