As I write this I can hear the Queen Mary 2 sounding her horn as she leaves Sydney. When I arrived at work this morning, The Queen had already arrived in Sydney ahead of the QE2 and moored below our offices at the naval dockyard (too large to fit at the International Passenger terminal). Making her maiden voyage, the QM2 is the largest ship ever to visit Australia at 150,000 tonnes.
Her sister ship, the Queen Elizabeth 2 docked later this evening. This was quite emotional for me as my nana, used the QE2 to travel around the world and once made the same journey into Sydney.
The last time two Cunard Queens called at Sydney together was during World War II, when they were troop carriers.
David and I went to see the firework show after the arrival of the QE2, which being on Sydney harbour was of course fantastic.
A perfect night.
Farewell QM2
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An old photo of Leonardo DiCaprio “caught naked” in 1998, apparently.
Playgirl tried to publish these nude photos at the time, but Leo’s lawyers prevented it. However, thanks to the Internet, they have eked out into the public domain (oh, so that’s what the internet is for), revealing Leo’s semi-hard state for all to see. Are they fakes? Who cares?
David Beckham Naked without a Motorola in sight. There are so many David Beckham Naked photos on the internet, but this is the best.
Those photoshop boys with nothing better to do than fake David Beckham nude. Still you can see why he maybe nicknamed Golden Balls by Victoria.
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Hedwig evolved as a one-man, off-Broadway musical in 1994 and became a hit for its creator and star John Cameron Mitchell. It was - and still is - one of the most unusual musicals around. Equal parts rock gig, cabaret confessional and drag act, it broke the mould. It also set a new direction musically. There’s no pit band, no grand piano. Instead, composer Stephen Trask (of New York cult band Girls Against Boys) penned a set of 10 songs designed to be played at gig volume by a real rock’n'roll band on stage. It’s in between these songs that Hedwig (played here by Sydney singer iOTA) tells of her struggle, her longing for completeness.
Years ago, before the fall of the Berlin Wall, young Hansel Schmidt, a “slip of a girly boy”, catches the roving eye of a lusty American serviceman. Love blossoms, but in order to migrate to America with his lover, Hansel must submit to a backyard sex change. The operation is botched, and Hansel, rechristened Hedwig, is left with an angry, inch-long stump, a reminder of the boy she used to be.
And that’s not the end of her troubles. Abandoned in a Kansas trailer park, Hedwig turns tricks to get by until she scores a babysitting gig. It’s there that she meets her “other half”, god-bothering teenager Tommy Speck. Together they make beautiful music. But when the relationship takes a physical turn and Tommy discovers the “angry inch”, he runs out on her. Worse still, he claims her songs as his own and becomes a stadium rock sensation.
Mitchell’s Jerry Springer-worthy script unfolds in a wonderfully droll, bitchy way. But this is more than just a snappy drag act. Given the inch, iOTA takes the mile.
The show is brazenly alive from the get go, so much so that, for the 90-odd minutes Hedwig is on stage, this bizarre construct in a Farrah Fawcett fright wig seems completely believable. As a singer, iOTA’s versatility and vocal strength are never in doubt. Well supported by an unrecognisable Blazey Best (playing Hedwig’s gender-blurred offsider, Yitzak) and a pounding band led by Tina Harris, he tears through Stooges-influenced punk ( Angry Inch), channels Young Americans-era David Bowie ( Tear Me Down), and delivers a sweet cabaret lullaby in The Origin Of Love. It’s a remarkable performance. Even more so when you consider that this is his first major stage role.
If you hate musicals, Hedwig is the musical for you.
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Robbie Williams has checked into rehab on his 33rd birthday. The former Take That star’s spokeswoman, Bryony Watts, confirmed that he has been admitted to a clinic to deal with an addiction to prescription medications.
Robbie is close friends with Elton John, and is still planning on doing a “full monty” strip for Sir Elton on his 50th birthday.
Elton John will be celebrating the landmark birthday on 25th March with a performance for friends and celebrities at New York’s Madison Square Garden.
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CANBERRA, Australia (CNN) — Australian Prime Minister John Howard on Monday stood by his comments from a day earlier when he said that terrorists should pray that Sen. Barack Obama and the Democrats take over the White House in 2008.
Both Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. were telling Howard to butt out of American politics.
Speaking to Australia’s ABC News Radio, Howard said his comments were aimed at the Illinois Democrat’s plan to withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq in March 2008.
“What I have done is to criticize Sen. Obama’s views on a particular issue, and I don’t retreat in any way from that criticism,” Howard said. “I think if America is defeated in Iraq that will be catastrophic for the West and it will have tremendously adverse consequences for Australia.”
Howard, who trails the opposition Labor Party in his re-election bid this year, criticized his opponents as being hypocritical.
“Apparently it’s all right for people in the Labor Party to regularly criticize the Bush administration’s policy on Iraq — and they do that almost on a daily basis,” Howard said. “Yet my criticism of the policy position of somebody who is not president — and is not even the Democratic candidate for the presidency — that is interfering in American politics and is absolutely to be forbidden.”
On Sunday, Howard told an Australian TV program that, “If I were running al Qaeda in Iraq, I would put a circle around March 2008, and pray, as many times as possible, for a victory not only for Obama, but also for the Democrats.”
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David and I went to see Holding The Man, at the Stables Theatre on Thursday. The first half was hilariously funny, the second unbelievably sad…. It was an excellent production and adaptation of Tims book and both Tommy Murphy and David Berthold did a stunningly good job of playing Tim and John.
Holding the Man is one of Australia’s Favourite 100 Books. Tim and John met in high school in the mid-1970s. Tim was in the school production of Romeo & Juliet, and had a crush on John. John was the captain of the football team, and wanted to play for Essendon. By the end of high school even their yearbook acknowledged them as the year’s cutest couple.
This story is breathtakingly honest, achingly funny and a completely heart-wrenching account of a 15-year relationship that weathered disapproval, separation, temptation and, ultimately, death. It’s a story, and a celebration, that speaks across generations, sexual preference and cultures.
This stage version is by Tommy Murphy, a Griffin Resident Writer. His Strangers in Between for Griffin in 2005 won the 2006 NSW Premier’s Literary Award for Best Play. Well done Tommy, you did an excellent job.
The play ends with the death of John. The kind of death that if ugly, cruel and harrowing. The kind many of us remember happening to our friends and lovers.
The timing of the play, Holding the Man for me is perfect. A reminder of how bad things were and how good the prospects are now, for the survivors and for those contracting the disease in Australia. What saddens me more than anything is the injustice between the developed West and third third world nations - where the story is as grim if not grimmer than Johns’.
John Caleo died on Australia Day 26 January 1992. My own partner William died on 28 January 2002, two days afer celebrating Australia Day at Nelson Bay. William died quickly, with dignity and without pain, in my arms at St Vincents hospital - 10 yards from the Stables Theatre.
The production’s success and a return season for the 2007 Mardi Gras confirms three things: the story is not simply a museum piece charting gay life in the 1970s and ’80s; it is much more than what might be crudely termed an AIDS biopic; and it can be reinterpreted by a new generation. The story, therefore, is art.
Dieux Du Stade Calendar 2008
The 2008 Calendar of your favourite rugby team: Dieux Du Stade (Gods Of The Stadium), the French Rugby Champion team from Paris, France has arrived!
John will be celebrating the landmark birthday on 25th March with a performance for friends and celebrities at New York’s Madison Square Garden.
