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What a week. What a whirl. What words.

Canadian slam poet Shane Koyczan has once again caught international attention for his heartfelt anti-bullying video now gone viral. There is lots to admire here but pay attention to the "Just get over it" line thrown out by an ignorant, unnamed classmate. Was he visiting my neighbourhood where similar throwaway hurts have gone unpunished? Koyzcan is a strong advocate for better Facebook monitoring by all of us. 
I hope everyone's listening. You know who you are.

Talents like his don't burst onto the digital landscape by accident. If that rich voice sounds familiar, you are likely remembering the word bullets Shane Koyczan shot out at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. In case you were asleep and missed it, here is the extended version of We are More.

Those who work tirelessly to combat the toxin that is bullying might well take their cue from this passionate artist: Teach the children of the world to sing, paint and speak in verse. The anger and hurt might just change form.

Words matter.

Have a great weekend.
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Some recent posts you may have missed: I need brave thoughts 
                                                                  We were all children once

Oscar snapshots: Ang Lee
                            War Witch
                            Daniel Day-Lewis

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Daniel Day-Lewis: a little madness goes a long way

stand out: to be conspicuous, distinctive, or prominent.

The success of a film, or other collaborative art form, depends upon an assortment of elements that produce magic. It is impossible to say one element is more important than another.  Yet real balance remains elusive. What stood out when the lights went up?

Here is the third in a series of snapshots of Oscar nominated performances and films: Daniel Day-Lewis in Lincoln.

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A flame in two cupped hands

 

You don't need flowers or chocolate today. I never say no to either (lilies, sweet peas, roses, thanks very much. The darker the chocolate, the deeper my love.)

What is required are the right words. If you can't find them, seek help in literary gods.

Variations on the word Sleep

I would like to watch you sleeping,
which may not happen.
I would like to watch you,
sleeping. I would like to sleep
with you, to enter
your sleep as its smooth dark wave
slides over my head

and walk with you through that lucent
wavering forest of bluegreen leaves
with its watery sun & three moons
towards the cave where you must descend,
towards your worst fear

I would like to give you the silver
branch, the small white flower, the one
word that will protect you
from the grief at the center
of your dream, from the grief
at the center I would like to follow
you up the long stairway
again & become
the boat that would row you back
carefully, a flame
in two cupped hands
to where your body lies
beside me, and as you enter
it as easily as breathing in

I would like to be the air
that inhabits you for a moment
only. I would like to be that unnoticed

& that necessary. 

Margaret Atwood

If sharing a wordsmith is not within reach today, there remains film which gives us heroic and sloppy and goofy and sexy and breathless and slay me! love...

Happy Valentine's Day!

Related posts: 

on poetry: 

                  We were all children once 

 

                   Seeds    

                   I need brave thoughts

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Flashing the Neighbours

I hate it when my ideas get stolen by cool Brit filmmakers.
Guy Ritchie has made a short film for H& M to help plug his buddy David Beckham's Bodywear line.

courtesy: www.theedito.com

I swear. It's my story.
What a pity it remains in my memory bank. No one knows. Except Jim.

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Cole Porter wrote the story of us

     It was just another high school musical in a time before Glee was a hit TV show. I was part of a joint effort between two Toronto high schools to mount the Cole Porter classic Kiss Me, Kate. There were two big solo parts for girls. I wanted to be Kate. She gets to sing the love duets and slap Petruchio.  It was a spirited role and I assumed it would be fun to stare down the guy cast in the lead and call him a bastard in strident theatrical tones. 

The director of the show, in a prescient move, cast me instead as Kate's younger, flirtatious sister, Bianca.

I'm a maid who would marry
And will take with no qualm
Any Tom, Dick or Harry,
Any Harry, Dick or Tom,
I'm a maid mad to marry
And will take double-quick
Any Tom, Dick or Harry,
Any Tom, Harry or Dick.

The rehearsals lasted most of the winter. It was the best of times and... the best of times. By the spring thaw, those strident notes had dissolved into dulcet tones. We were a backstage secret kept by no one: Petruchio and Bianca had their own duet. It wasn't in the script but Cole Porter had his fingers all over it.

In the years since that show, my Petruchio and I have seen Kiss Me, Kate performed twice at Stratford, and once on Broadway, where we told the cast at the stage door that we had named our first child Kate.

This weekend, we will again watch a group of amateur performers ham it up in a Wavestage Theatre Company production of Kiss Me,  Kate. 

The cast includes a talented blonde, my niece, Rhiannon Kyle, who is a far more serious minded Bianca than my precocious turn circa 1981. You won't see it on stage but she has a plan.

Rhiannon has grown up juggling stage rehearsals and school work and says it is all about efficiency. Hers is a generation of sharp focus on the future which, for this teen, include studying international relations and politics. There is little to link her sophisticated turn in this classic show and mine but for some memorable tunes that are still playing in my head 3 decades later.

No video exists of that show long ago but you'll have to imagine me as a guileless teen with no shortage of chutzpah, tripping about the stage and having the time of my life. I didn't know then it would be the script that stuck.

Here's Broadway legend Ann Miller doing the same part. Pretend it's me and you'll get the idea.

 Kiss Me, Kate is playing all weekend at the Newmarket Theatre.  It will be easy to spot Peter and I in the audience. We'll be the ones mouthing all the words.

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Tegan and Sara blasting the generational divide

You know them as indie innovators.
Can you embrace them as pop sensations?

Tegan and Sara, Getty Images

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Red Letter Day: Superbowl ads leaked and other loony stuff

February means the year countdown has begun for the next winter Olympics which begin February 7th in Sochi, Russia.

At least one fan of the games would like to abandon any thought of keeping the games drug free:

The last winter Olympics made permanent dents on our couch.

Read why here

We are all 18 in our heads. Aging gracefully is no longer an option.

There is no such thing as an original thought. Or is there?
Another leaked Superbowl ad:

Yikes. Yellow Pants is NOT invited to my Fantasy Dinner party. But I would hire him to clean my toilets. Maybe he can find his Big Idea in there.

What exactly is the big idea with these ads anyway?
Harvard Business Review deconstructs a decade of Superbowl ads.

I don't watch football so will skip the Superbowl, thanks anyway.
I do love film though, which regular Red Chronicles readers have figured out by now, so I would rather head down to the TIFF Bell Lightbox and watch the Oscar nominated Short Films, now screening there through February 7th.

 I love theatre too. Here's your hot tip for the weekend: Toronto theatre lovers have one final weekend to see the latest brilliance from celebrated playwright Kristen Thomson. Someone Else, a beautifully performed production on stage at the Berkeley Street Theatre, is theatre at its most searing best. I loved it and strongly recommend you see what Crow's Theatre calls" a naked examination of marriage, middle age and the delicate nature of change." If that sounds like nails scratching a blackboard, think again. As actor Tom Rooney explains, "comedy is written around people in trouble."

Have a great weekend.

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