M J Johnson
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Catching the 3:10, Gregory Porter and Other Stuff

27/3/2014

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I completed the first draft of the new book I’ve been working on a week ago. It’s massive and will need to be savagely reduced, but then that’s the way I like to work. I plan to spend a few weeks attending to some other stuff that needs my attention, then will return to it with a refreshed eye. I was ordered not to do very much this week by my wife Judith. I guess she knows the signs of when I’m tired far better than I do! I generally only realise I’ve reached the point of exhaustion when I sense an overwhelming desire to collapse to the floor and weep - I’m so lucky to have a partner who knows what I’m like and generally warns me off long before I actually reach this point. It was a good week, and I felt seriously proud when a friend whose opinions on any kind of literary offering I highly value, contacted me to let me know just how much they had enjoyed Niedermayer & Hart. He took the time to write and send an in-depth analysis of what he’d liked about the book. My tail hasn’t stopped wagging since!

On Saturday evening we watched 3:10 to Yuma - the original Glenn Ford, Van Heflin film of that title made in 1957, as opposed to the Russell Crowe, Christian Bale 2009 remake. They are both good movies, with faultless performances from both sets of leading actors, however for me it’s only the ’57 film that deserves to be hailed a classic Western. The earlier version lacks the extremely dark post-modernist ending of the later film. The short story upon which both scripts were based was penned by Elmore Leonard, which I haven’t read but most certainly plan on doing. Judith remains keen on watching any kind of cowboy film and has recently been observed by myself (still nursing some very grave suspicions - see earlier post Could the Aliens who Abducted my Wife Please Return Her!) at bedtime excitedly turning the pages of a compendium of short stories entitled The Giant Book of Western Stories. Weird, huh?

On Sunday we went to see the extraordinary jazz singer Gregory Porter at the Assembly Rooms, Tunbridge Wells. He possesses one of those rare voices that isn’t really definable, no matter how many adjectives can be strung together to assist with this purpose.  But I think if you’ve ever heard him sing you’ll know immediately what I mean. The wife and I don’t really typify your regular jazz lovers, but then Gregory Porter doesn’t typify the regular jazz singer. I’ve heard him described as a ‘Jazz’ singer who possesses a ‘Soul’ voice. I suppose both of us have a deep and abiding fondness for classic soul and perhaps this is why he appeals so much. His aura as a performer radiates great warmth, which is not an inconsiderable feat at the Assembly Rooms, as this is not a venue that could ever be classified as intimate. Apparently, Porter, who grew up in California, planned to be an American Football player but his plans were scuppered by a shoulder injury. It’s hard to believe that someone with such incredible vocal talent might have considered a career in any other field. It’s also difficult to understand why Porter, born in 1971, has taken all this time to receive anything like the recognition he deserves. We first saw him on the Jools Holland show and certainly hope to see him again whenever he tours the UK. The four musicians supporting him were equally superb and deserve mentioning too: pianist and music director, Chip Crawford, drummer Emanuel Harrold, bassist Aaron James, and alto saxophonist Yosuke Sato. It was a tremendous evening. I highly recommend listening to this man, take a look at the Gregory Porter website where you get the opportunity to hear a few tracks. Enjoy!


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The Stinker!

20/3/2014

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What is ‘a stinker’? Well, in my own personal definition it’s a play or film that is so bad you wish your name could be erased from any association with it. Every actor has a stinker or two (or three) lurking somewhere, much like the proverbial skeleton in the closet. I recall my father, who never minced his words, coming to see some scenes from Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure early on in my training at RADA. The production was really awful “Don’t act ... feel the moment ... let the words play the scene”  the director had implored us every time our survival instincts kicked in during rehearsals and we tried to raise the thing out of the doldrums. Dad, after watching my performance, exclaimed later in private in his honest Welsh valleys unvarnished way, “RADA training! That was the worst thing I’ve ever seen on a flippin’ stage in my life!”

He was right of course. However, the thing about being in ‘a stinker’ is that the performer has to go on and do it again the next night. And I wasn’t yet ready to acknowledge and accept it as ‘a stinker’. I think I may even have waffled on about the underlying esoteric significance of the scenes and what we were trying to achieve. “Rubbish!” Dad reaffirmed.

He was right.

The College Principal, a marvellous man by the name of Hugh Crutwell, blamed the director and vowed that the man would never set foot in the Academy again, which I don’t believe he ever did.

That was my first brush with ‘the stinker’. I met a few plays later on in my rep days that were pretty undistinguished. The thing is, whilst rehearsing ‘the stinker’ you and the rest of the cast endlessly reassure yourselves that you’re doing something really important, yes different perhaps, but most definitely very worthwhile. However, when the curtain finally comes down on the last performance and you see the same relief you feel inside clearly etched on the faces of your fellow performers - you know then, without a shadow of a doubt you’ve been involved in ‘a stinker’! You head for the bar and commiserate with your colleagues. As you weave your way (often unsteadily in days past) towards your theatrical ‘digs’ you feel like a great weight has been lifted from your being!

What made me raise the subject of ‘stinkers’? For my wife’s birthday this year, one of the presents I gave her was a box set of Sidney Poitier films. In the Heat of the Night probably ranks as one of our all time favourite movies: great title song, title singer, script, acting and direction - a tick in every box! So imagine how delighted we were to finally have the chance to watch its sequel They Call Me Mister Tibbs for the first time. Oh dear! You can probably take every single item in the list above and replace the tick with a thick red line. Every performance and every throw-away line was delivered like it was a Hamlet soliloquy. Everyone, including Sidney Poitier, looked really bad; the car chase just looked silly; the reasons behind a character’s speech or actions seemed to make no sense whatever at times; a foot-chase with Poitier hunting down a bad guy looked like out-takes from a Naked Gun movie; the cast, tried and trusted paid-up members of the acting fraternity looked like veterans of a bad daytime soap. Ed Asner, an actor I generally admire, was lousy in two categories, for his performance and his terrible wig. Poor ol’ Sidney Poitier - the ignominy of landing himself in ‘a stinker’ after playing the same character in such a great classic. I did wonder for a moment if someone by the name of Max Bialystok was the movie’s Executive Producer.

But like I said at the top, nobody in the performing arts can elude ‘the stinker’ forever. My father-in-law, himself an actor of some distinction in his heyday, once told me a story of his own regrettable brush with an ill-fated production. It was his first major appearance in London’s West End. He proudly took a box for his family and friends, booked a table at the Savoy for afterwards and invited his cousin the British Ambassador to Moscow to the first night. It is easy to imagine his chagrin when the audience began boo-ing the performers whenever they appeared. The only good thing that came out of the night, he informed me, was that the show closed immediately.

Yep, ‘a stinker’!


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And the Winner is ...

13/3/2014

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PictureTwo new garden varieties
It’s rare that I don’t feel genuinely excited about writing and posting my weekly blog. I don’t see it as a chore at all. It has become something that I just do - a bit like brushing my teeth! Last week I was happy to announce my hundredth (blog post) birthday, and although I felt that I ought to definitely mark it in some way, it was with a certain hesitancy that I held a competition/giveaway. I’ve laboured to create interesting competitions before for local magazines etc, and the response has sometimes been about as dynamic as a middle-aged bald guy with a comb-over who acts like he’s a babe-magnet. Not hugely successful in other words! (unless of course you’re Christian Bale in American Hustle!)

I am pleased to tell you all however, that my ‘Hundredth Birthday Compo’ really was not only a lot of fun to do, but also received a terrific response, locally, nationally and internationally. It also received, by quite a wide margin, the most hits of any piece I’ve ever posted on this blog. Thanks very much to every single one of you for taking part! I’ll even forgive the handful of people who ignored my specific instructions and entered the compo by adding a comment to the blog itself without following the right and proper procedure! Tut! Tut! Tut!

N & H proved slightly more popular in terms of requests for a signed copy - but only just, and some folk who have read both books on their Kindles chose Roadrage or either. And the response was overall so excellent that I’ve decided to improve the conditions for winning and I’m therefore going to have two draws, one solely for the UK, the other for everyone who entered from overseas. Each draw will now give away a signed copy of each book - i.e. four books rather than the two I promised. So extra chances!

I’m really sorry that not all of you can be winners - but I guess that’s what makes it fun to enter competitions.

And for all you N & H lovers out there - incidentally, I’m always delighted to hear from you -I thought perhaps it was time I ‘fessed-up, as I reach the final few thousand words of a first draft - that I’ve actually been working on its sequel. So cast your mind back and remember where it left off, all those little loose ends after they’d left Hungary and ...

But don’t hold your breath, it’ll be many months yet before it’s complete!

The competition is now officially closed. I’ll let the winners know who they are very shortly.

Once again, my sincere thanks to all of you!


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A Hundred Today!

6/3/2014

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PictureSmile birthday boy!
This blog becomes a hundred today! I can’t honestly say that it feels like I’ve written quite that many! However, when I do a quick calculation from the time I started I realise it must be so, and what’s more, it said on Goodreads last week I’d done 99 posts. Therefore, it has to be true!

So what was the original plan, and how, if at all, has this blog in practice veered from its straight and narrow path?

The aim was simply to place the blog like a big smiley face on the landing-page of my website, so that visitors weren’t met by the same static monolith each and every time they chose to take a peek there. I’d done my research and had looked at a lot of sites. The basic Home-Page that never alters always struck me as uninviting. It certainly isn’t telling me 'if you enjoyed this post, come back some time and I’ll do my best to inform or entertain you again'. 

And so there you have it - chicken and egg, or something along those lines: I created the website to market my books (then just one book) and created the blog to encourage people to keep coming back to my website. The book came first of course, but without the website and social media it would still remain my best kept secret.

I attempted to create the kind of blog I’d like to read myself. I’ve always found my limbs stiffening with a phenomenon mirroring the exact symptoms of rigor mortis when subjected to writers’ blogs that bleat on solely about different aspects of the ‘writing experience’. So, I try to make it constantly different: sometimes I’ll review a book, a film, or piece of theatre; occasionally I blog about a place I’ve visited; I might write about an artist I like; sometimes I tell a story. Of course now and again I do allow myself to plug my books Niedermayer & Hart and Roadrage - see, like that!

The stats suggest that I get around three to four thousand visitors a month, which is pretty amazing when you think my earliest goal back when I started at the end of 2011 was to get ten hits a day - for the first few months I did a post every ten days before committing to one a week. I also take a short blog holiday each summer.

Here are seven of my favourite posts (not in any specific order):

Vlaho Bukovac
Porthcawl
Aunty Dorothy and Squire Yorke

The Door
Do Not Go Gentle ...
Ghostly Encounter
The Lift

To celebrate my hundredth birthday I thought I’d give away a signed copy of the trade paperbacks of Roadrage and Niedermayer & Hart. Simply get in touch through the contact form indicating which book you'd prefer, and I’ll put all the names in a hat, pick out the two winners and post them off to you. The offer is open to anyone wherever they may live.

So hope you have a go! Good luck! And here’s to the next hundred!

Cheers!


(winners names drawn in a week's time when new post appears!)




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