The Actor’s Guide To Survival
Running time: 1 hour
Audio: StereoStarring: Jody Kamali, Vivian Taylor
Director: Mark Ashmore
ACTOR JODY KAMALI LOOKS at home on the stage, dishing out his best ironically-quasi-European accent as he recounts his character’s tale of waking up with a pretty Scandanavian lady.
He’s got almost as many shows in as many days as the Edinburgh festival – and thankfully, bagloads of cool-dudeness to get through it all.
Of course, there are still luvvies who insist after a performance that Jody’s show is still great as he fishes for reassurance but it’s all done with good humour and good vodka.
Jody: “I died.”
Supporters: “It was great… you had a crap audience”.
‘The Actor’s Guide…’ , a cross between raw performance footage and a behind-the-scenes documentary was released today: http://www.futureartists.co.uk/actorsguidetosurvival.php and is well worth a gander. It verges almost dangerously, yet innocently – but never self-consciously or awkwardly – between irony and a bunch of stories that actually are stranger than fiction.
Jody and Rob
There is a veritable checklist one must have before getting on with the Edinburgh Fringe festival it seems, such as having a wealth of honest buddies around you, like a lady called Dianne who will tell it’s all okay and knows when an audience is purposefully stiff-lipped and staunch – or if the show actually is crap.
The distance between the media coverage of the festival and the beauty of the weirdos who make up that coverage is referenced by cutaways to a lovely presenter exploring the fringes of the Royal Mile. Vivian Taylor goes walkabout and quite hilariously refers to a man as banana man.
“Banana boy? I’m dressed as a piece of toast!”
Essentially The Actors Guide To Survival is ironic. Summed up by Jody towards the end of the film by the “play hard, work hard ethic” all independnt actors need in order to make it, the film is a thoughtful look at what not being A-List is all about . So, maybe the title’s a tad misealding. Don’t expect a self-help guide for how to break into theatre. Rob, the techie/soundie/on board philosopher has got the whole scene down when he says: “You can’t take this too seriously, you don’t know what’s going to happen or when it’s going to end.”
The Actor’s Guide to Survival might best be retitled as the following: Watch A Comedy Actor Keep His Head Up And Get By Without A Fancy PR Agency When Confronted With A Stony Faced Audience At Prestigous Cultural Festival Even Though Everyone Else Is Nuts Anyway…
See. When you think about it, it really IS a guide to survival.
Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aRid_KhC4c&feature=player_embedded
TWO GRADUATES from the University of Manchester have set up a courier service online which allows people to send parcels- without actually disclosing addresses or visiting a post office.
The system works via social networking site Twitter, or through a standard email account.
The recipient is asked through the website for their address and if they want to accept a parcel. If they say yes, address details are taken by both the secure website and the courier. The sender then receives a barcode and the address is attached to the parcel only after it is collected from the sender’s home. The service only operates nationally at the moment, and senders and receivers also have to be registered with the website, called ‘SendSocial.com’.
Antony Stevenson, 24, from Derby and James Cranwell-Ward, 24, from London, studied at the University of Manchester, both graduating in 2007 with a BSc in Computing Science and helped develop the programming behind the idea.
The world’s first ‘address-less’ delivery system was the brainchild of Ben Ward, one of the entrepreneurs featured in Channel 4’s popular reality series about philanthropic businessmen, titled The Secret Millionaire. Cranwell-Ward said: “The concept was on Ben’s blog first, he then picked eight entrepreneurs to work on it, including me and Antony.”
This system of having to accept an online request prior to receiving post alleviates privacy worries and could prevent unwanted mail, allowing a person to screen what they receive.
Cranwell-Ward said: “It’s great because it means you don’t have to worry about the safety of your address and if you’ve lost track of people, but know them through Twitter then you can still give and receive mail.”
However, some students have questioned the usefulness of a website acting as a “middleman address book.”
Chris Milward, a postgraduate student from the University of Salford said the idea was: “Funny, [but] couldn’t I just email my friend with my address or message them on Twitter?”
Sarah Phillips, 21, a Film student from Manchester Metropolitan University, added: “I honestly don’t see the point. When you send gifts to people, you would know their address anyway. And it’s lazy! Or what if it was meant to be a surprise?”
However, the company’s Chief Executive, Glen Richardson, 27, commented: “Why take a parcel down to the local post office, sit in the queue and pay £5 when you can sit in front of your computer and have a courier turn up at your door the next day?”
The parcel service is cheaper than Royal Mail’s guideline prices: SendSocial.com charge £3.99 for parcels weighing up to 2kg whilst Royal Mail charge £4.41.
//published Student Direct December 2009
