422 [ads-wpsitecount text="on"]
Missing and finding Xanadu

Missing and finding Xanadu

When I visited New York City in 2007, I didn’t see the stage musical version of Xanadu, but I caught it five years later when the students at WAAPA (the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts) put it on. Xanadu is an example of the public getting it right … repeatedly. The original movie did not do…

Read More

24

Jun

The gradual, graceful decline of the locutorio

The gradual, graceful decline of the locutorio

On my first trip to Argentina, before Skype, before international roaming (or at least before it was affordable), before prepaid calling cards, before you could phone on Messenger, before WhatsApp … if I wanted to call home, I went to one of these: In a pokey booth like this … … a meter would clock…

Read More

17

Jun

Three countries at once

Three countries at once

The bottom part of this photo is Argentina. The top left is Paraguay. The top right is Brazil. I spent the first 660 million seconds of my life (and then some) entirely in one country – Australia – so to see three countries in one second was a bit of a thrill, even if the…

Read More

3

Jun

What happens here?

What happens here?

You walk upstairs to this … … then into this: It’s La Catedral Club, a tango milonga in Buenos Aires. It would not be totally untrue to say that I have danced professionally. People did pay to see the first preview of my show The Sound of a Social Climbing Nun, where I bootscooted to…

Read More

27

May

The only thing we have to fear

The only thing we have to fear

I’ve previously told you that President Franklin D Roosevelt once said: ‘The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.’ And how he clearly hadn’t been in as many Buenos Aires taxis as I have. At traffic lights, for some taxi drivers, this means go fast: This means go faster: This means slow down, have…

Read More

20

May

The reason the Casa Rosada is still standing

The reason the Casa Rosada is still standing

The Casa Rosada, which literally means ‘Pink House’, is where Argentine presidents have their office, though they live elsewhere. It’s at Plaza de Mayo (May Square), which I walked through in 2011 during a riot when they burnt down a giant Christmas tree. And I was there at the start of the 2005 Pride march,…

Read More

6

May

Michael from Perth

(Michael Bowyer)

JOIN MY EMAIL LIST

Find out about my next show and other creative endeavours!